Don’t like focusing on the negative? Click here for the positive in Part I
How do you ultimately judge a season where not much was expected only to have the team play inspired ball for three-plus months of the year? Especially when that strong play was followed up by inertia from the front office and then dreadful play over the final three months? I don’t know. So, instead of trying to put some type of grade on the year, here are the top 10 negative things I’ll remember about the 2012 Mets.
10. The pointless loss of a RH bat – One of the biggest problems the Mets had this year offensively was their production versus LHP. A guy who was helping was Vinny Rottino. Now, Rottino is a career AAAA guy and his overall line with the Mets was not very good. But he had hit a couple of homers, the team’s record when he started a game was 4-5 (outside of this stretch, the Mets are 17-33 against LHP) and he offered great flexibility off the bench. But the Mets cut him so they could promote LHP Justin Hampson, who tossed all of 1.1 IP before he was sent back to the minors. This move made no sense at the time and in hindsight it looks even worse. It’s not so much the players involved – losing Rottino in a vacuum is no big deal – but the insanity of the logic behind it (getting Terry Collins another lefty reliever) that was so frustrating.
9. The handling of the $25 million man – No one knew what to expect from Johan Santana this year coming back from his shoulder woes. No one knew how best to handle a veteran pitcher in this situation. Let’s just say the Mets did not treat their asset with kid gloves. Because of the no-hitter, Santana threw the most pitches of any player for the Mets this year. OK, I think we all would have done that. But he was left in way past the point where it was obvious he didn’t have it in several starts and was allowed to pitch too much after his ankle injury. Perhaps the end result was unavoidable but the way they got there sure didn’t help.
8. The 2012 Draft – It’s too soon to pass judgment on this year’s draft but at this time in 2011, I was pretty excited about at least five guys that were just drafted and I simply don’t have that feeling this time. My take is the Mets needed to grab upside with their first pick and instead they played it safe. I would bet money that Gavin Cecchini ends up making the majors. I’d also bet money that he’ll never be elected to an All-Star team. I understand that every team was dealing with the unknowns of the new draft requirements. But it appears that the Mets played it too safe. At this point in time they need the upside of a Brandon Nimmo and Michael Fulmer. Instead they got Cecchini and Kevin Plawecki. I think these guys have value; I just think the Mets should have swung for the fences instead of choking up and going the other way.
7. The adventures of Buffalo Head – I think it’s a pretty well-known idea that Lucas Duda does not have a problem with overconfidence. So the Mets put him in RF instead of LF, sent him down to the minors despite outhitting two other players on the team who should have went down before him and then Collins made a public display of pulling him from a game for not hustling on a pop fly that fell in for a hit. Collins could have done that to just about any hitter on the club yet chose the guy who struggles with confidence. Jordany Valdespin could have handled any of these and no one would worry about him. But there are some guys who need more TLC than others. It’s been a disappointing year for Duda. Perhaps if he had been managed differently it could have been better.
6. Results of Pagan deal – I want to state up front that I was in favor of this trade at the time it was made. It still does not change how poorly it has turned out for the Mets. After years of being a solid reliever, Ramon Ramirez turned into a stiff. Andres Torres did not hit and his fielding was nothing special. And to top it all off, Angel Pagan turned in a very nice year for the Giants. This deal was a disappointment in just about every way imaginable.
5. Announcement that all coaches will return next year – Should someone pay for the second-half collapse? My gut tells me yes. Yet the team has already announced that everyone is coming back. Two years in a row, the team has followed up a strong first half with much worse results after the All-Star break. In 2011, it was easy to blame trades and injuries. This year there’s no such excuse available. I think you could make a case for firing any or all of the big three coaches – the manager, the hitting coach or the pitching coach. There’s something to be said for stability. There’s also something to be said for on-field results. Just because the players like you is no reason for a coach to keep his job.
4. Offensive struggles – It’s maddening to watch hitters who let cripple pitches go by only to flail helplessly at pitches in the dirt or a foot outside. It’s frustrating to watch batters content to hit the ball the other way when it’s an inside pitch they should drive. It’s disheartening to see a lineup with Bay and Torres batting back-to-back, knowing it’s two automatic outs. It’s incredibly sad to watch David Wright be an MVP candidate in the first half only to revert back to the 2011 version the past three months. Hey but at least bench players Scott Hairston and Ronny Cedeno hit better than we expected, right?
3. Refusal to acknowledge the sunk cost – It’s bad enough that the Mets are paying Jason Bay a ton of money. They do not have to compound the problem by keeping him on the roster, much less ever starting him. I hold no grudge against Bay, who has busted his tail every time he steps between the lines. I blame those above him, who write his name in the lineup and who do not have the stones to just DFA him.
2. Mindless chasing of the platoon advantage – Collins may have 100 good traits as a manager. But his zealous devotion to playing matchups late in the game is actively hurting the team. Forget the team – it may have ended the career of Tim Byrdak. As long as the manager insists on running his bullpen to favor the relievers who pitch the fewest innings, bad things will continue to happen. Not only are the results from chasing the platoon advantage no good – it ends up making the game from a purely aesthetic point of view worse. Other than the health of his relievers, the on-field results and the enjoyment of fans watching the game – chasing the platoon advantage has been a smashing success!
1. No moves at the All-Star break – The Mets were six games over .500 at the All-Star break and right in the thick of things. However, they had glaring needs in the bullpen and for a productive RH bat. The team stumbled out of the break and ended up losing 11 out of 12 games, which effectively ended their season.
Making a move at the break may not have had any influence whatsoever on what happened. But then again it may have. People like to say that the team overachieved in the first half. But the Mets’ Pythagorean record was just one game off from its actual Won-Loss record at the break. Their record was an accurate reflection of their runs scored and allowed. Just as it is now.
No one projected the SP collapse that occurred in July. But the bullpen cost them Wins in this time frame. And the offense making any deficit a lost cause had an untold impact on the starters. No one was suggesting that the Mets mortgage the farm to make a move. All they had to do was show both the players and the fans that they cared, too. But when they needed a boost, the only move made by the front office was to cut ties with a productive Omar Quintanilla to activate a useless Bay.
The players in the dugout and the fans at home deserved better.
Brian, I think your list is a good one. But (there’s always a “but”), I’d find a place for the lack of progress in Josh Thole’s game. His hitting has become virtually non-productive, and aside from his being Dickey’s catcher he has not impressed behind the plate.
I would like to suggest that a closer look might be taken at the weird season that Ike Davis has had. Did someone drop the ball on his first half rehabilitation? Also, why is it that when Davis was going bad Wright and the team were winning, but when Davis began to produce, the Mets and Wright came crashing back to earth? Simply a coincidence? Or, were the Mets and Wright playing so far above their heads that even a productive Davis could not save them in the second half?
I know that you have negative points about the coaching staff, but (there it is again), I wish the criticism could be more specific in nature. Did Teufel do a good job on the 3B line or help the infield with his defensive tutoring? Did Hudgens help or hurt specific hitters? What did Geren bring to the table to help/hurt the team? Warthen, Bones?
I think it’s mostly coincidence. You asked if the Mets were playing so far over their head in the first half but I think it’s the exact opposite. I think the Mets were so underperforming in the second half that Davis’ output couldn’t save them.
I absolutely think Teufel helped with the defense. David Wright went from a guy who looked like he needed to be moved off third base to one deserving the Gold Glove Award. And Murphy has done a good job not only staying healthy while turning DPs but a reliable DP man.
I think Hudgens deserves credit for Ike’s turnaround. The two of them completely overhauled his stance and the results speak for themselves.
Warthen helped Pelfrey redo his delivery and Pelfrey ended up on the DL for the first time in his career. But he did teach Dickey the knuckleball and taught Harvey to throw 97 mph…
Murphy has really shown me something down the stretch defensively.I didn’t think he could remain the second basemen earlier but he has come on in all area’s.He is notably better turning the DP now than he was earlier in the season.Hopefully he will continue to improve,one area still lacking is range but now that he has moved in some,even that has improved.
Hey Brian – No buts from me.
#1, #3 and #7 were just three indications of the poor handling of the roster. I could pile on with Batista starting and Harvey being held back.
#5 leads me to believe that ownership thinks that the staff should all be in this together setting an organizational tone and by the end of 2014 if it hasn’t turned around then clean house. Once again I don’t agree with ownership. I’d have made some changes. (Viola for Warthen?)
#7 again: The team has mishandled every aspect of Lucas Duda. One year later and still minimal trade value.
#1 I get it. They have no money. But it is like going to a fight with your hands tied behind your back.
“Warthen helped Pelfrey redo his delivery and Pelfrey ended up on the DL for the first time in his career. But he did teach Dickey the knuckleball and taught Harvey to throw 97 mph…”
Brian,I’m still laughing… wait till he teaches Harvey his change up , lord help us.
We can only hope that our organization remembers what happened when the pitching coach tried to get Gooden to strike out fewer batters…
Brian, your list just eats me alive. I see gross failure in the coaching staff, and so #5 tells me this team is headed nowhere. Warthen has presided over miserable injuries to the staff and the worst pen imaginable (ok, just about). Hudgens gets credit for heloping Ike. Why did it take so long? How come we still cant hit breaking balls (lefty or righty)…its like our batters have never seen a curve or slider before. UGH…2013 will be lucky to get to 70 Ws.
There was just so much going on with Ike this year – coming back from injury, some form of desert fever, general slump – that I don’t know if it was realistic to expect it to get fixed earlier. I’m not mad at Davis or the coaching staff that it took so long. I just think he should have been doing it in Buffalo.
To me the biggest negative was our recent position playing graduates of the farm system combining for a 1.4 b/r WAR. This doesn’t inspire much confidence in those who are currently making their way up the ladder.
10. I usually wouldn’t care that we lost a guy like Rottino, but the way that we lost him speaks a lot about our manager and GM.
9.I don’t know how many tmies i have to repeat this. The no-hitter was not the problem, it was freaking Reed Johnson stepping on Santana! It irritates me so much when they point to his pre and post no-hitter stats, but 4 starts after his no-hitter they are excellent. Look at his pre and post stepping on nijury stats and it is clear that was the main issue!
8. I’m not a minors/developmental guy so i can’t really comment here. I think the Draft is mostly a crapshoot anyways.
7. Duda has been the victim of a couple of things this year. In addition to what you mentioned, TC had to pick on Duda, the guy with the lowest confidence on the team, for not running out a fly ball.
6. The pagan deal was a steal on paper. However, Ramirez severly disappointed here. Can’t blame the GM here.
5. TC shouldn’t keep his job in my opinion. I think we could have won 5-10 more games if he didn’t manage the bullpen.
4. I’m befuddled on how an offense can drop from 3rd best to 2nd worst in the league. I expected a drop off because we had some overachieving players in the 1st half, but droppping that significantly is just unexplainable.
3. I don’t even want to comment about Jason bay anymore. The good thing is that i forgot he was on this team for about a month until i saw his name here.
2. I have probably been the most critical of TC for his matchup-madness. He needs to go because you can’t win games this way.
1. Bullpen problems were evident from late-April and Sandy did nothing for 2.5 months. The onus has to placed all on him here.
Name,
What are your reasons for feeling the draft is a crapshoot?
I know that whoever is selected doesn’t come with any guarantees, warranties or anything else but certain teams do very well in the draft. They consider the draft and IFA to be their primary source of procuring players and to be fair they’ve been successful with this core belief.
The Braves for instance since 2002 drafted in just the 2nd round Brian McCann, Yuniel Escobar, Freddie Freeman and Andrelton Simmons. They also have another 2nd rounder Todd Cunningham a RH hitting CFer from their 2010 draft hitting .309/.364/.409 in AA, Nick Ahmed a slick fielding SS in A+ their 2011 2nd rounder and Alex Wood their 2012 2nd rounder a LHP killing the Sally League.
Kimbrel and Matt Harrison came from the 3rd round in the last 10 years.
First round wise they’ve nabbed Jason Heyward, Mike Minor, Jeff Francouer, Saltamachia and Adam Wainwright in the last dozen years.
Many of their selections were HS kids who typically have a higher bust ratio, but a higher ceiling as well and a longer peak and they’ve been able to identify and develop tons of picks other teams overlooked that they got in the 2nd and 3rd rounds, not to mention their equally outstanding job internationally.
They’ve had their share of FA blunders as well (Glavine, Wagner, Lowe) but their farm keeps delivering either in MLB ready players or in prospects to trade.
Why i think it is a crapshoot. Well, you just listed names that DID make the majors. But have you checked how many DIDN’T make the majors at all? My preliminary guess is that there are many more busts than not.
And while a 2nd round draft pick sounds high in retrospect, in reality, they aren’t that high. A second round pick can be up to pick #60, that means there were 59 picked ahead of him. Besides, i, and probably most fans, can barely even remember our recent 1st round picks let alone our 2nd round picks(I can’t even remember’s this year’s 2nd rounder). MLB drafts get no coverage from the public because the kids that are taken aren’t even close to being MLB-ready(AKA MLB Drafts are a crapshoot)
Getting coverage isn’t the point, getting production is what it’s all about.
I think a lot of people feel the way you do about the hit ratio but I look at it completely differently. To me it’s not about the busts, it’s about the hits and how big they hit when they do.
Right now, despite all the buffoonery of the last 15 years we are still only 3 impact players away from having an 85 win team. One arm (Kimbrel, 3rd round) One CFer (Trout, late 1st round) one catcher (Molina 4th round) over a six year period (2004-2010)
Or you could say Street supp rnd #40 2004, McCutchen 1st rnd #11 2005, McCann 2nd round 2002.
Or you could say Trevor Cahill 2nd round 2006, Austin Jackson 8th round 2005, Travis d’Anaurd supp rnd #37 2007.
Or you could say Johnny Venters 30th rnd 2003, Michael Bourne 4th rnd 2003 and Jonathon Lucroy 3rd rnd 2007.
Or you could say Papplebon 4th rnd 2003, Stanton 2nd rnd 2007, Norris 4th round 2007.
What I’m not talking about is missing on every single 2nd pick as we have done since 1987. Hitting on just one 3rd (Joe Smith) and one 4th round pick (Angel Pagan) since 1983.
That’s what leads to a year like 2012 where your entire OF (all eight of them) and your entire catching staff (4 More) team up to provide a negative WAR (-0.3)
My point is those players are out there. Other teams are getting them and we’re not and to say it’s just up to chance when some teams routinely pull All Stars, gold glovers, silver sluggers and guys who get consideration for the MVP and Cy Young out of rounds that from 1988-2008 we have pulled exactly one cross over reliever and one OK-decent CFer out of is inexcusably bad and is in fact the reason we have to address so many spots on the roster every year from a limited pool of expensive players who frequently under perform, get injured or both and then sift through the scrap heap to fill in around them.
That’s not chance, not when teams that routinely go to the post season consider it (as well as IFA) to be the life blood of their Organization and prove it year in and year out.
The fact that your examples are filled with non-first rounder clearly illustrates my crapshoot theory. The fact that we have failed in every 2nd round, but hit in rounds like 7(Niese,Duda), 9(Parnell), 13(Thole,Murphy), 21(Gee) also strengthens my crapshoot theory. A 2nd rounder is as high as pick #60, 3rd rounder is pick #90, 4th rounder is pick #120. You even mentioned an 8th rounder, which is pick #210-240. That means there were supposedly over 200 other guys which teams thought had a better chance to help contribute at the MLB level(i’m guessing of them 90% of them failed)
The road from draft to MLB is so long and filled with so many hardships that to say that teams can consistently pick out the ones that can complete the journey is absurd to ask and not feasible. An even harder task to figure out what kind of MLB career a player will have once they make it to the big leagues. There are too many variables for our tiny human mind to calculate this stuff(Heck a computer can’t even do it)
For every winning combination that you named there, i probably could name 10 combinations that would have seemed like winners at the time of the draft pick but turned out to fail.
In the end, it’s all about quantity for the minor leageus, because “quality” is impossible to predict.
I was mentioning All Stars and Gold Glovers, Silver Sluggers and MVP candidates and your bring up Thole and Duda?
Every teams gets a Jon Niese out of the 5th round every 10 years or so and every team gets a Dillon Gee here and there out of the 21st round.
I purposely avoided discussing the first round because not every team has a chance to draft a Steven Strausberg or a Bryce Harper. The 2nd, 3rd and 4th rounds contain players every team has a chance to draft.
Every year there are 1500 players drafted and only 750 big league jobs. Probably only 75 open up every year. Of course your going to have a ton more misses than hits.
What I was interested in is who is identifying the Joey Votto’s, Freddie Freemans, Yuniel Escobar’s, Tim Salmon’s, Andre Either’s, Yadier Molina’s, Curtis Granderson’s, Trevor Cahill’s, Jason Giambi’s,John Lackey’s, Chris Washburn’s, Garrett Anderson’s, Darren Oliver’s, Luis Gonzalez’, David De Jesus’, Scott Erickson’s, Carlos Beltran’s, Jon leiber’s, Dustin Pedoria’s, John Paplebon’s, Jeff Bagwell’s, Jon Lester’s, Brandon Phillips’, Jimmy Rollins’, Randy Wolf’s, Scott Rolen’s, Carl Crawford’s, Mike Stanton’s, Brian McCann’s, Andrelton Simmons’, Craig Kimbrell’s, Randy Winn’s, Josh Johnson’s, Grady Sizemore’s, Cliff Lee’s, Brian Harrison’s, Jordan Zimmerman’s, Mauquis Grissom’s, Michael Bourne’s, John Olerud’s, Dan Haren’s, Ray lankford’s, Bronson Arroyo’s, Chase Headley’s, Chone Figgins’ Troy Glaus’, Yovanni Gallardo’s, JJ Hardy’s, AJ Pierzynski’s, Denny Neagle’s, JJ Putz’ and Hunter Pence’s?
I’ll give you one hint. it ‘aint us. Since 1984 we have drafted one player in the 2nd, 3rd AND 4th rounds combined that accumulated 10 WAR or more. That’s 2nd to last in the Major Leagues. No one else has done worse except Arizona and we had a 12 year head start on them. Most teams have 3-6 guys that accumulated at least 10 WAR and more often than not it 20+, 30, 40 even 100 WAR. The average team has 60 WAR from these rounds over the preceding 29 years. We have 15.
These poor results not only hurt us in the 5-15 years after the draft, they hurt us in that we often have to overpay or sift through scrap heaps to find suitable players and it hurts us again in that we have no one to trade.
Call it whatever you want but you don’t get to be 2nd worst in your industry in anything by doing a good job over a fairly lengthy period of time.
OK. After a couple posts chatting with you about the draft, i think I can now more clearly articulate my reasoning for why the draft is a crapshoot.
I don’t think the draft is a COMPLETE crapshoot, as obviously a higher percentage of 1st rounders make it to the majors as opposed to 2nd rounders, and 2nd rounders have a higher percentage than 3rd rounders and so on and so forth.
What i do think is a crapshoot is that after you have classified players using a ranking scale, let’s use the A-F scale, that trying to pick a player within the same rank is a crapshoot. That is, trying to identify that gem out of all the players who are ranked “B” prospects is mostly based on luck. If a player becomes a star later on in his career, it is not rational to give that team or scout credit for that “find”. Similarly, it is not rational to discredit teams who don’t find those stars (within the same rank).
Here’s a little case study to think about. I just looked at this year’s draft. The Dodgers took someone named Steven Rodriguez at pick #82, The Braves took someone named Alex Wood at pick #85. Both are left pitchers and juniors in college. I’m assuming they would be both ranked in the same grade if you did a grading scale because of the closeness of their picks. Do you think you can pick who will have the better MLB career in 6 years? if you did this comparision with multiple players, do you think you would be able to pick out the better player 6 years from now?
My answer would be a resounding No. There are too many variables on the road to MLB that trying to predict this stuff is just too hard. In the end, it all comes down to luck.
I would certainly agree that luck plays a fairly large role in how individual draft picks turn out. no question about it. Ike for instance was the 6th first basemen taken in the 2008 draft. Was he our highest rated player in the draft? Who knows, maybe, maybe not. For all we know maybe we liked Smoak better, it is impossible to say. What we can say is that five roughly equally talented first basemen evaluated by people in the business were deemed better than Ike by at least five different organizations. To date they all appear to have been wrong about that.
KC took Hosmer at #3, Cinn took Alonso at #7 Texas took Smoak at #11, the Cardinals took Brett Wallace (Ike’s teammate in college) at # 13, Toronto took David Cooper at #17, we took Davis at # 18.
Statistically college first basemen drafted in the first round have the highest hit ratio of any type of selection (HS LHP the worst) All were college selections, all were picked in the first round, all were getting slot selection signing bonuses. This can only be accounted for by pure randomness as you state but there are other competing factors at play.
Development must play a role in certain organizations because they churn out players constantly but that is hard for us to judge.
I’ve tried to take the randomness out of it by looking at 3 particular rounds which traditionally contain players who are just a notch or two below the industry consensus of the top 50 picks (including the supplemental round)and compare results over 20+ years. The law of large numbers should even out the randomness.
Here is where philosophy, signability concerns, one Major League ready tool vs. 5 tool boom or bust types and need and speed conflict with pure top talent. In short there are reasons why players taken 50-150 are taken where they are. Too risky, too far a away, too expensive, an industry glut in a particular area ect and so forth.
Take 2007, we had two 2nd round picks and two 3rd round picks from losing Chad Bradford and Roberto Hernandez and selected three college relief pitchers and a HS pitcher with those picks (we also took a college reliever in the supplemental round) I cannot say for sure but to me this screams need and with the 4 extra picks cost as well in needing to stretch the draft budget and that was even after dumping our best pick by signing Moises Alou a week before SF had to offer arbitration.
If you look through different drafts you see that somehow the industry values some players quite a bit more highly than players selected before them. How do we know this? The signing bonus for some players is significantly higher than others. I’ve included a couple of notes next to our pick and bonus.
2007
No first rounder (Alou)
1S Eddie Kunz 720K, Rangers 1 M, Nats 1 M
1S Nate Vineyard 657K, Rangers 1M (again)
2 Moviel 414K, Miami 475K (Stanton)
2 Rustich 373K, NYY 500 K (Romine)
3 Niesen 351K – slot guideline progressed evenly
3 Clyne 110K – lowest pick in the 3rd round by 130 K
4 Luvas 150 K 4th lowest bonus NYY 1.3M
5 Lutz 120 K, Orioles 1.1M, Boston 925K
6 Leduc 120 K, Nat’s 1.8 M, Detroit 1.1M, NYY 450K
7 Duda 85K, Boston 550K.
2008
1 Davis 1.57M Boston (picking 30th)3M (Casey Kelly)
1 Havens 1.4M
1S Holt 1.04M
2 Javier Rodriguez 585K 3rd lowest, Clev 1.2, TB 1.5, Nat’s 1.1
3 Kirk Niewenhauss 360K, Hou 700, SF 525, TB 515, Phil 500
4 Sean Ratliff 225K, KC 1.2M, TB 500, Cubs 500, Nats 475
5 Dock Doyle 167K, Boston 2 M, Clev 600K
6 Josh Satin 25K, Pitt 1M, Minn 650K, SD 400K, Phill 400K
7 Michael Herbert 135K, A’s 1.1M, Clev 725, TX 600, Chisox 525
2009
1 No pick K-Rod
2 Steven Matz 895K, Det 1.5, NYY 1.2
3 Robbie Shields 315K, KC 2 M (wil Myers)Tor 1 M,Boston 1.4M, TB 930
4 Darrell Ceciliani 204K, A’s 1.5M, TB 750, Mil 700, Pit 600, SD 600
5 Pick we did not sign, TB 680
6 Pick we did not sign, Pitt 1.2M, Det 1.6M, Cubs 750, Tor and SF 500
7 Gorski 118K, A’s 925, Boston 975, Phil 900, AZ 500.
2010
1 Harvey 2.6 M, Seattle 1.6M, LAA 2.3, Cards 2M, LAD 5.25M
2 No pick (Bay) Nat’s 2.2M, A’s & KC 1.2M Det 1.1, Nat’s 1M,Pit 2.2M
3 Forsythe 392K, Celv and Boston 1.3 M
4 Vaughn 240K, Nat’s 2 M, NYY 1.4M, Bos 1.3, Sea 940, Torr 600.
5 den Dekker 110K, Tor 1.5M
6 Peavey 200K, SD 1.4M, Cinn 975K, Bos 628, AZ 500, SF 410K
7 Walters 50K, Cubs 530K, Boston 375K, Miami 300K, Tor 367K
Signing bonus information is available from perfectgame.org and many of the overslot selection picks names will be familiar as they either are currently braking into MLB in a big way or have recently been traded in some of baseball’s biggest trades.
I’m not saying you can just throw money at anyone and have it work out but I am saying that you would have to be a magician to adhere to slot and extract the same sort of talent that teams are paying 10 times more than you are. If the talent levels of the players were equal so would the signing bonuses.
I don’t see how a prospect getting 10 times the signing bonus of a player taken in the same round hitting big while the cheaper player never gets out of A ball can be ascribed entirely to luck.
Just to clarify my argument, i am NOT trying to say that the Mets lack of success in the draft is due to luck. My theory is more about the draft as whole. From the statistics you listed above, it seems like the lack of success is due to the Mets purposely picking players with less talent so they can give them smaller bonuses(correct me if I’m wrong here). Or the Mets are just really good negotiators and are able to convince players to sign for a lot less than they are actually worth. Therefore, the talent that the Mets are picking in a round are considerably less than the talent that other teams are picking(for example, the Mets are picking B- talent in the 3rd round when other teams are picking B talent). Then, my crapshoot theory doesn’t really factor into that situation because the players are at different talent levels, and someone who has more talent at the high school/college level will obviously have a better chance of sucess at the MLB level.
I think my theory is best summed up by your first paragraph and your example with the 1st basemen. Since you agree on that, i think we are on the same page.
Well clearly negotiating good deals with players has certainly been a tremendous strength for us over the last couple of decades so that must be it.
The reason I thought the draft was a crapshoot was because the Mets low picks always seemed to be a bust. It is through your posts, 7Train, that I realize that this doesn’t have to be the case. Although I don’t value a prospect as much as you do,thanks for showing me a different perspective.
Thank you Metsense for at listening to it.
Appreciate it.
It makes sense to hold over T.C. and staff because you know next year with no $$ to spend and 3 teams in our own division light years ahead of us you might as well save Backman for 2014. We’ll have no excuses then to not spend some of the money saved from Bay/Santana and another year of development for the youngsters. As for Sandy and Co. this winter we’ll know how good/bad he really is….now is the time!!!!
Except that with a full season at Triple-A under his belt, some other team may be ready to hire Backman now.
I agree with pretty much everything you wrote Brian.