Over the past few years it has been a popular style of Mets baseball to have at least one lefty in the bullpen who comes in late in the game to face Ryan Howard and leaves right after for another picture. The LOOGY, which was popularized in the early 90s, is common place for the Mets with notable players being Pedro Feliciano, Tim Byrdak, and Scott Rice. Since 2007, the Mets have been in the top ten for total relief appearnces.
The definites in the Mets bullpen going season are Jennry Mejia, Jeurys Familia, Vic Black, and Carlos Torres. The other three spots are going to be made up from Dillon Gee, Sean Gilmartin, Josh Edgin, Scott Rice, Rafael Montero, and possibly a few others. Then once Bobby Parnell comes back he will be slotted somewhere into the bullpen, maybe even as the closer. Mejia and Familia had breakout seasons in the bullpen last season, and both deserve a shot at the closer’s role this season. Vic Black was great last season, especially coming in with runners on base. Torres provides the Mets with a nice arm out of the bullpen, who if the starter comes out early can give two or three innings of work.
Against lefties last season Mejia held them to a .239/.340/.307, which was better than his slash line versus right handed batters. Mejia fared better against righties in the fact that he struck out more betters and walked less batters. Familia was lights out against righties last season. He only allowed 20 hits to them last season over 169 plate appearances and just three of them were for extra bases. Lefties were a different story, and they had an OPS of .821, but still managed to have an overall ERA of 2.21. Black’s WHIP was a little high last season, so if he could drop that a little bit, he would be very dangerous. He was very solid last season after having a poor spring training, but then came up at the end of May. His ERA never went above 2.00 until halfway through August. Torres is good when he is not used on back to back days. In 2013 and 2014, Torres was horrendous after going back to back games, but on at least one days rest he was great. A big thing for relievers is to be able to be used a lot and in back to back games, but if Torres is not successful in those situations, then it is a waste to use him. Just in 2014 when he pitched on no rest, his ERA was 5.12 and batters hit .304/.375/.544 off of him. He is there workhorse in the bullpen, but using him back to back days does no good especially as he gets older.
Aside from Familia, those guys actually pitched better against lefties than they did against lefties. They have the ability to get out players from both sides of them plate. The Angels last season did not have any lefties in their bullpen last year and they won 98 games. They just had really good pitchers. It should not matter, if he can get lefties out unless the guy is absolutely lights out against lefties and can get righties out decently for a player to be in the bullpen. Their bullpen was not spectacular, but it was still a good bullpen. Their ERA was 3.52 compared to the Mets 3.14. The Mets lefties last season were primiarily Scott Rice, Josh Edgin, and Dana Eveland. Rice was horrible last year and had an ERA above 5. Edgin and Eveland were both good against lefties and righties and if needed could go full innings and face both righties and lefties and get them out. Now Edgin is having Tommy John surgery and Eveland is in Boston. Having pitchers that are good and can go multiple innings can prevent things like what is going on with Torres. Being able and confident in all your bullpen pitchers leads to less stress on each bullpen member because they will not be used as often and can get the rest that they need.
The Mets will likely have at least one lefty in the pen, but they should just choose the best players and put them in the bullpen. Pending on whether a starter ends up on the disabled list then Gee can go to the bullpen or be traded for a reliever. Gee is a good player, but Rafael Montero is ready if someone does go down plus their other dynamic duo of Noah Syndergaard and Steven Matz are going to be ready soon. Gee is expendable in that they have players who can start if something happens, plus Gee is making the most money out of all of them. All of the Mets lefty candidates have not been impressive this spring training so far. Spring training numbers are not the be all end all, but they do show a few things. When a player only has a few outings and they have walked five batters and only struck out one, it is a little concerning. Jack Leathersich has been working with John Franco on a two-seam fastball. With Edgin out, there is now definite lefty in the bullpen right now and Leathersich wants to be the guy. Alderson has been looking outside the organization for a lefty to slot into the bullpen, but if Leathersich can drop his walks down a lot then he is the answer. In Vegas last year, he had a very impressive 15.1 K/9, but a horrendous 7.6 BB/9. There is interest in Orioles lefty, Brian Matusz, but he does not have good numbers against righties. Montero should get a bullpen spot now and take some of the work that Torres would get, but that still leaves two spots open until Parnell gets back. Buddy Carlyle and Gee could get the other two spots or their will be one of the lefties or who knows Alderson may make a trade for another reliever.
I actually disagree.
While Mets360 and Brian Joura have been leading the charge against the LOOGY (which i 100% do support), i feel like this article statement is too strong. There’s a slight misconpetion in my opinion that all lefties suck and there’s no need to carry one. It’s not that we dont need a lefty, but rather we don’t need to carry/acquire one no matter the cost. If we had guys like Billy Wagner or Aroldis Chapman in the pen, i’m all for them. But when we’re deciding between fringe guys like Scott Rice or Sean Gilmartin, when there are better options from the righties, that’s a problem.
In a perfect world, i’d love for my bullpen to be completely balanced. 4 effective righties and 3 effective lefties (or 3 righties and 4 lefties).
However, we don’t live in a perfect world. For one, the population of righties is much greater than lefties, and the overall skill distribution says that there are far more effective righties than effective lefties.
I’d amend the title to : “The current Mets with their current situation, should not carry a lefty”
Agreed.
I agree with you in that it would be nice to have the balance. My point is that the Mets do not need a lefty for the sake of having a lefty.
At this point, I’d like to see them bring Leathersich up as a pure development move. He’d get predictable opportunities in a situation where his high-variance ERA would be forgiven, and potentially prove himself as a more reliable general bullpen option.
I think he is better off working more with Frank Viola and focus on control. He definitely gets the swing and misses he needs, but he still walks too many guys for a reliever. He has walked five guys so far in spring training in 3.2 innings. I hope that number drops and he can prove himself, but right now there are better options.
Not carrying a lefty is really misguided. I agree Name.
In any event, the world is spinning out of control and weve now had at least 3 articles on lefty relievers and the disdain for them here at M360.
Its fair enough to say, the readership appreciates your discrimination.
Meanwhile….I wonder if there is more to be concerned about in Mets-burg?
TC doesn’t pay attention to “reverse” splits all that much — he’s much more of a “by-the-book” kind of guy.
“they should just choose the best players and put them in the bullpen”
I would not put Syndergaard or Matz in the rotation for at least 21 days in order to maintain another year of player control.
Gee is an experienced starting pitcher and should be given the rotation spot. Colon seems to be struggling this Spring but he is a veteran so there should he some faith that he will be ready when the season starts. Montero is the problem. He has pitched well at the end of 2014 and I prefer him to Colon in the rotation but to upgrade would hurt any trade value Colon has left (and Colon needs to be moved by this summer). This summer either Syndergaard or Matz should be ready to take Colon’s place so Montero really doesn’t have a place in the rotation. For that reason, I would start to develope Montero as a relief pitcher and with his control and velocity he may become a good late inning reliever.
Montero is the forgotten man. It is strange.
And further complicating things is that Montero has made just one appearance this Spring and has the fewest IP of the 30 pitchers in camp. There’s been no update that I’m aware of as to why that’s been.
Suggests to me some kind of injury he’s nursing.
As the Wheeler info comes out, it underscores the limits of being an armchair GM. We are always operating without full information regarding trades, injuries, personnel.
We had a Montero sighting in today’s game against the Marlins. He was warming up in the bullpen in the 9th inning but did not get into the game.