The Mets added a reliever at the deadline, acquiring veteran Mychal Givens from the Cubs. Givens broke in with the Orioles when Buck Showalter was the manager and has been a reliable setup man for seven years now. Lifetime, he has a 3.34 ERA and a 1.181 WHIP in 437 IP. This year with the Cubs, he has a 2.66 ERA and a 1.254 WHIP. Givens has more of a track record than the “B” relievers that floundered Tuesday night and Showalter should have an immediate comfort level with him.
Some Mets fans are angry that the club didn’t do more at the deadline. But this was a club already in first place and playing well. And they still managed to do the following:
Upgrade from:
Dominic Smith and his 61 OPS+
J.D. Davis and his 95 OPS+
Travis Jankowski and his 34 OPS+
In their place now are the following, with numbers from their team before joining the Mets:
Daniel Vogelbach – 116 OPS+
Darin Ruf – 98 OPS+
Tyler Naquin – 99 OPS+
And the additions probably are underrated by their numbers with their previous teams, as they will almost exclusively hit with the platoon advantage with the Mets, while they played more of a balanced role with their initial club. Vogelbach has a 152 OPS+ in 27 PA with the Mets and he has yet to hit his first homer in blue and orange.
The imports will also mean that current Mets will see fewer PA. Eduardo Escobar won’t be playing against every RHB, against whom he has a .588 OPS this season. And while Mark Canha has reverse platoon splits this season, Naquin allows Showalter to rest any of his starting outfielders whenever he sees fit.
Additionally, they get Jacob deGrom, Trevor May and Givens for the pitching side.
The Mets’ roster looks significantly different – and better – today than it did on July 1. And it already looked pretty darn good at the start of July. And for those who still believe the key to a bullpen is if they have a guy to neutralize lefty batters, someone who can come in and get outs from guys like Freddie Freeman, Bryce Harper and Juan Soto – just know that those three are 0-7 against Joely Rodriguez this year.
Joely is not going to see the light of day come postseason.
Ok, now I can rant properly about the Ruf trade…
See above: Davis 95 RC+, Ruf 98 RC+, and it took 3 minor league pitchers to get a 36 year old that’s barely better than the 29 year old. That was stupid!
On the Givens trade, whatever… Chicago would have taken gift card to Dave & Buster’s, but I like that trade as well as the trades made last week. The Ruf trade was an overreaction, knee jerk, stupid move for a marginal player when you do have Vientos in the minors, and I think they needed the diversification of a lefty reliever more than Ruf. The Padres have four lefties in the pen. The Dodgers have lefties coming out of their ears. The Yankees, Rays, and all modern day strong teams have every aspect covered. Only the Cardinals and the Mets don’t need them, and when was the last title the Cardinals got? Again, now I realize why Eppler never got another job… and as for his mentor, Alderson, oh boy…. ‘Sorry Steve, we wasted another year’…
You didn’t lik the Vogelbach trade either. I think you fall in love the Mets players and overrate them.
Actually, I recall saying that I wasn’t in love with it but felt Holderman was not a major cost since relievers have a lesser value.
I’m OK with what the Mets did at the deadline. Your point about the platoon advantages that Vogelbach and Ruf provide is important to look at rather than their overall numbers, as it should be possible to give each of them most of their at bats with that platoon advantage. Vogelbach has a .905 OPS against righties and Ruf is at .886 against lefties. If they can sustain that type of production, that would be a huge upgrade over Smith and Davis and is roughly the same as Soto this year (.894).
I mentioned this in the trade article but here is the triple slash line for Vogelbach/Ruf with each guy playing with the platoon advantage:
.264/.371/.528 in 356 PA.
And that’s with 21 HR. That’s a massive upgrade from the pseudo Dom/JD DH platoon they had previously
Sorry – missed that!
I thought this was a very good article that pointed out all the good acquisitions and the reasons why they were good. I previously commented on the offense in the other article and now I’ll tackle the pitching. Givens is a good acquisition for the back of the bullpen. Givens, May, Lugo, Ottavino will be the setup men for the 7th and 8th innings. They are all experienced in that role. The starting pitchers are going six innings when they’re going good, and they have been going good. Williams is also valuable and could pitch in a tight game, like extra Innings. Rodriguez and Hunter don’t have options and they should stay because of that. The others will be on the Syracuse shuttle. Sure, I would have liked to have an upgrade for Rodriguez but it didn’t happen. Epler said though that later on in the season there would be more opportunity to enhance the bullpen. I take it that Peterson and Megill will be promoted when the rosters expand in September if not sooner. Eppler did a good job pertaining to the bullpen but Rodriguez upgrade would have been better.
To continue because I’m not done with Eppler:
The Astros gave up an extra starting pit her in Jake Ordozzi, who is having a nice year, to get a solid lefty like Will Smith. Are they idiots? No…
Michael Cahill put up his version of the Mets players given to Nationals for Bell and some kid named Soto. It was Alvarez, Baty, Mauricio, Megill and Robert Dominguez (whom he claims grades out very close to the second pitcher in the deal). He says that he would do that in a heartbeat. Probably many of us would agree, but that i f and a big I F Mike Rizzo would trade in his division and I don’t see it. I’m ok with missing on that, but man, the Padres will be interesting for a while. Can you imagine the Mets in that division?? Ouch!
I’ve always believed. In platoons. So did Hodges,Johnson and Valentine. Let’s see what Vogelbach/Ruf,Escobar/Guillorme,and Canha/Naquin do. I think it’ll work.
Brian,
Nice recap of the deals. They Met deals were far from sexy, but for the most part they were efficient as you described well. Yeah, the Padres made huge splashes (with the GM in job preservation mode), the Braves got better (certainly concerning), and Phillie went all in at what is stated as a pretty steep price. Still, even with Joely, the Mets have an excellent chance for deep advancement this year, and have left themselves well positioned going forward prospect-wise. They’ll have a real shot at Ohtani this winter as well. Overall, hard to complain. The current players just need to get it done.
I thought this was a very good article that pointed out all the good acquisitions and the reasons why they were good. I previously commented on the offense in the other article and now I’ll tackle the pitching. Givens is a good acquisition for the back of the bullpen. Givens, May, Lugo, Ottavino will be the setup men for the 7th and 8th innings. They are all experienced in that role. The starting pitchers are going six innings when they’re going good, and they have been going good. Williams is also valuable and could pitch in a tight game, like extra Innings. Rodriguez and Hunter don’t have options and they should stay because of that. The others will be on the Syracuse shuttle. Sure, I would have liked to have an upgrade for Rodriguez but it didn’t happen. Epler said though that later on in the season there would be more opportunity to enhance the bullpen. I take it that Peterson and Megill will be promoted when the rosters expand in September if not sooner. Eppler did a good job pertaining to the bullpen but Rodriguez upgrade would have been better.
Great article once again, Brian, especially because I agree with all of your key points.
Giving up Seymour, Zwack, and Szapucki seems really concerning to the Mets social media universe. People are calling for Eppler’s head and blaming the whole lot on Alderson and the return to Wilponism. My god. In the last 18 months or so, we’ve landed Max, Lindor, Marte, plus the lesser lights of Canha and Escobar. In the Wilpon times, getting Canha would have been the single headline. With these deadline trades, we took the least productive slot in the order, DH, and have made it a real asset. Vog and Ruf are not big names but are the professional hitter that makes this lineup so tough. The lineup just got a lot longer and the bench a lot deeper. Well done. We gave up nothing. Seymour and Zwack don’t pass the sniff test of being significant prospects (their underlying stats are so-so and they are both old for where they are in the system) and Szapucki is a known – backend of the bullpen at best.
Of course not landing a better RP is an issue, but why the complete disregard for what Eppler said? At face value, he just said he didn’t want to get fleeced. IMHO, the Mets got taken for PCA last year and the Mets FO needed to ensure that this year wasn’t a repeat. They likely put up some offers and then didn’t budge during the game of chicken. Presumably, they blinked last year and had to regain some credibility this year. Would you rather have lost Vientos for 2 months of Contreras? How about being the Cubs GM, Carter Hawkins, who failed to move Contreras and now will have nothing except a draft pick to show for it.
I like that Eppler and Cohen are playing the long game.
The trades felt quite Wilponian. Who knows, maybe we get this years version of Kelly Johnson and Juan Uribe and its enough to stave off the wolves. Im glad Atlanta didnt turn the gas up. We really need to win the division and hope for post season miracles against the Dodgers, Padres, Astros, or Yankees.
Sexy? No
Serviceable? Lets hope
Spinnable? Yes! I mean Ruf and Voglebach aint much to brag about even with control years.
Improvement? Lets go with probably
The Mets have been undone by having a huge drop off after the top 6 prospects all blue-chippers and only worth Soto or Ohtani. Most of the after 10 level is pretty much roster filler, making fair deals hard to come by. In many respects, Eppler/Cohen’s hands were tied.
Last night was humiliating though. Easy to see deGrom saying see ya.
Lol @ Wilponian. Wilponian would have been bringing Cano back or finding other aging vets on the waiver/dfa trash heap.
We will know soon enough!
The passing of Vin Scully is probably worth a mention since he did have a tie to the Mets, specifically as being the television play-by-play broadcaster of the 1986 World Series. He seemed to be a humble man, so he probably did not think about it, but he was clearly the G.O.A.T at his profession of baseball broadcaster.
…and after all this, where does it leave Dominic Smith? I thought he was Boston-bound for sure.
Who?
LOL