Musings
The news Mickey Callaway was harassing women while a member of multiple organizations came to light in an article written by reported by Brittany Ghiroli and Katie Strang of The Athletic. That was the beginning of February.
In reality, the Los Angeles Angels and really all of baseball were aware prior to that report being published. After all, Callaway’s actions were termed as “the worst kept secret in baseball.”
Callaway denied the allegations, even with their being pictures and texts, and as such, an investigation was launched. That investigation is nearing its third month, and its carried through the first month of the season.
At this point, we cannot be sure what the hold-up is. This does seem like a lengthy amount of time for contract buyout talks. Maybe Callaway is looking to negotiate a deal where he gives up others while keeping his job and/or salary. No one can be quite certain.
The only thing we’re certain is Callaway is still employed for the time being, and no one can be quite sure how much longer he will be an Angels employee. All we do know is he’s currently employed by the Angels.
Wherever the Angels and MLB are doing now better be good. After all, with baseball obsessed with pace under Rob Manfred, everyone is certainly slow playing this.
Back in 2015, Chase Utley tackled Ruben Tejada way outside of the baseline, broke Tejada’s leg, and he never bothered to touch second base. As Tejada writhed in pain and had to be carted off the field, MLB replay officials awarded Utley second base.
Think of the outright absurdity of that. The Mets couldn’t challenge Utley was out of the baseline. They couldn’t challenge interference. However, the Dodgers could challenge a player not touching the base was safe, and they’d actually win the challenge.
That should’ve been a seminal moment in replay. That’s where MLB needed to decide they wanted to get the plays correct and not make this a system about technicalities and perpetuating errors.
Unfortunately, that’s exactly what its become.
We each have calls over the years which have benefited and hurt our team where we thought replay was going to overturn it only for replay to just confirm the ridiculously wrong call. Perhaps it is just this season, but things seem to be at an all-time worst with the entire replay system.
The first call which comes to mind this year was Michael Conforto. In a tie game with the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth, Conforto clearly stuck his elbow out across home plate. Instead of his being rung up on what should’ve been strike three, he was awarded first base, and the Mets won the game.
What a crazy ending to the Mets win in the Home Opener.
Michael Conforto clearly stuck his elbow over the plate.
But you know what? How many times have the Mets not had a game go their way because of some crazy happening. Never apologize for winning. pic.twitter.com/MypiyhUBLw
— Ryan Field (@RyanFieldABC) April 8, 2021
Don Mattingly sought to challenge the call, and all the replay booth could do was confirm Conforto was actually hit by the pitch. For some bizarre reason, they were not permitted to see if Conforto put his elbow into the strike zone, or if he even bothered to try to avoid getting hit by the pitch.
Again, if the concept of replay is to get the calls right, they should have a system in getting the calls right. When you defer to just outright bad and blown calls, your system is failing. That’s not just the case with “judgment calls.” That’s with every call.
As an aside, calling some calls judgment calls and others not is just absurd. Literally every call an umpire makes is a judgment call. They have to judge if the ball is a strike or an out. It’s a judgment as to whether the runner reached the bag ahead of the fielder catching it and applying the tag. It is a judgment as to whether a ball was caught. The same goes for interference calls, hit by pitches, running in the baseline, or whatever calls fall under the purview of “judgment calls.”
However, you could see the reticence of allowing replay officials to handle that when they got the obvious calls right. Case-in-point was Elvis Andrus being called out on home in the game between the Oakland Athletics and Tampa Bay Rays.
It was a bizarre play where Tony Kemp hit a pop up which landed out of Joey Wendle‘s reach. The ball took one of those AstroTurf hops, and Andrus, who was running with two outs, tried to take advantage of all the confusion by trying to score from first. Home Plate Umpire Sean Barber ruled Mike Zunino tagged out Andrus. The only problem was he didn’t. That is what led to the Athletics challenging the call, which was somehow . . . upheld?
Top 7th – Athletics challenge call that Elvis Andrus is out at HP; call stands, runner is out. Powered by @Mitel. pic.twitter.com/6QPuyKwxbK
— MLB Replays (@MLBReplays) April 27, 2021
There is literally no replay which exists which shows Andrus out. It doesn’t exist, and yet, somehow, the play was upheld. It’s an embarrassment for Major League Baseball that this happened, and really, that this continues to happen. The only good thing we can say is it did not cost the Athletics the game as they would hold onto that 2-1 lead.
At the moment, replay has become Russian roulette. You really never know what is going to happen. There is no rhyme or reason. The clearly blown call stands because of reasons that confound reason. When you have a system that blows calls again upon review, and you cannot review other clearly blown calls, there is simply no point to having the system.
At the moment, Major League Baseball has two options. They should be overhauling the system top to bottom to ensure ALL CALLS are correct, or they should be scrapping the entire system. That’s the position they put themselves in when we see how this dysfunctional system is working.
If we hearken back to the 2018 season, the New York Mets were languishing, and Todd Frazier landed on the IL for the first time in his career. Jose Reyes was just flat out terrible, Wilmer Flores was at first, and David Wright, well, he wasn’t an option. Down in Double-A Binghamton, Jeff McNeil was flat out raking. He just kept hitting and hitting and hitting.
The answer seemed obvious to everyone. Everyone, that is, except Sandy Alderson and the New York Mets. When pressed on calling up McNeil to play third base, the answer was McNeil was a second baseman only. Of course, the irony there was McNeil was the Binghamton Rumble Ponies Opening Day third baseman.
Back then, it was difficult to ascertain how much of personnel decisions were driven by Jeff Wilpon, whomever Wilpon decided to listen on any given day, or Alderson. Whatever the case, McNeil would eventually get the call-up, prove himself, and he would go on to have an All-Star season in 2019.
Since 2019, things have gone quite uneven for McNeil as it has for the rest of us. In the end, what we do know with McNeil is he is an exceptionally gifted contact hitter, and he is a fiery player who you could trust defensively at four different positions.
According to Baseball Savant, McNeil has a career 3 OAA at second, 3 OAA at third, and -1 OAA in left field. DRS has a much better picture with McNeil having a 5 DRS at second, 6 DRS at third, and a 3 DRS in left field. All told, McNeil is not a Gold Glove, but he is a very solid defender at multiple positions.
As noted, McNeil could hit. Entering this season, McNeil had a 139 wRC+. Since his debut, he has been the 13th best hitter in the majors, and he trailed only Brandon Nimmo among Mets players. All told, McNeil has established himself as a very good, versatile, and valuable Major League player. Despite that, we are seemingly back at square one with McNeil.
With the acquisition of Francisco Lindor, and his preference to hit near the top of the lineup, McNeil was dropped from the top two spots, where he thrived, to sixth and seventh in the lineup. Perhaps it was the drop in the lineup, the new baseball, the delay to the season, the typical influence Chili Davis has on his teams, the pandemic, or just the normal ebbs and flows of the season, but McNeil has struggled.
The thing is, he didn’t quite struggle right away. In fact, to start the season, McNeil was tattooing the ball. Unfortunately, he was not getting any luck. Balls he normally hit for singles and doubles weren’t falling in anymore. The Mets reaction to that was to sit him after the Mets first two games of the season.
That has become an emerging pattern for McNeil. So far, the Mets have played 17 games, and McNeil has only started in 14 of them. The only projected starter who has started in fewer games is J.D. Davis, but that was only because Davis landed on the IL after getting hit by a pitch early in the season.
Davis is somewhat illustrative of the problem here. Davis has again been a nightmare defensively. He’s already a -2 DRS and a -1 OAA at third. He made errors directly impacting his team and leading Taijuan Walker and David Peterson to have shorter starts. The end result was just one game off, where he still appeared as a pinch hitter, and he was put right back in the lineup.
For some reason, Davis is able to work through his problems despite them not being fixable. For McNeil, this is very clearly a blip, but he keeps getting relegated to the bench. Instead of getting to see more pitches and get into a rhythms, the Mets are doing to the opposite. In fact, they’re just setting him up to continue to struggle.
Perhaps, this is just Alderson resting back on previous biases towards players from his first stint with the Mets. Taking a broader look, Dominic Smith has had some similar struggles getting into the lineup. In fact, the Mets have begun using him as a platoon bat. That’s despite him being one of the Mets best hitters against left-handed pitching.
To some extent, McNeil is also being used as a platoon player. For example, he was also not in the lineup against Patrick Corbin. More likely, McNeil is just being punished for struggling. For some reason, he is not going to be permitted to struggle and figure things out at the plate while others can go out there being butchers in the field costing the Mets games.
Make no mistake, how the Mets are handling McNeil is a very big problem. They are taking one of their best players, and they are crossing him up further. They are not putting him in a position to succeed in terms of where he hits in the lineup and in terms of getting to play enough to get into a rhythm and figure things out. Whatever the reason for the McNeil benchings, they have to stop, and they have to stop now.
For two nights in a row, J.D. Davis made errors which cost the New York Mets dearly. In back-to-back nights, his defense was a direct cause of Taijuan Walker and David Peterson being unable to navigate through five innings.
The problems with Davis at third are multi-faceted. He sometimes has difficulty hitting balls hit right at him. He doesn’t have range. While he has a strong arm, he seemingly has the yips where he is taking multiple steps before releasing the ball.
Honestly, this is a player who is crossed up right now, and it is an adventure when he is out there. Right now, his play is on par with Todd Hundley in left field or Mike Piazza at first base. Put another way, the Mets are putting a player in a position to fail, and despite Davis’ best efforts, he’s failing miserably.
This is not a direct reflection on the effort. We all saw the reports of Davis working with Gary Disarcina and Francisco Lindor. There is really nothing to doubt the effort. That said, there is every reason to doubt he can play third base or any position.
Since joining the Mets in 2019, Davis has a -19 DRS at third base. That is the worst at the position by a significant margin. In fact, on just his play at third base alone, he’s the fifth worst defender in the majors. When you include his -9 DRS in left field, he surpasses Jurickson Profar as the worst fielder in all the majors.
The Mets were attempting to hide him at third, and they thought putting him next to Lindor would help. Seeing him in action this year and over the past three years, it’s not working. It can’t work.
Also, keep in mind, the Mets are not just trying to hide Davis’ glove. Because they refused to make the hard decisions, they put Pete Alonso at first pushing Dominic Smith to left field. That put Brandon Nimmo to center. Of all those moves, Nimmo in center seems to be the only one working well. That’s the Mets getting lucky.
The Smith in left field is another factor. The Mets left side defense is atrocious. He and Davis combined are working to neutralize Lindor. Honestly, what is the point of getting Lindor if you’re going to surround him by terrible defenders? That’s like putting a great sound system in a Ford Pinto.
The bigger problem is the Mets pitching staff. We saw it with Walker and Peterson, and we will see it with Marcus Stroman. In fact, we will also see it with Jacob deGrom. The Mets have a ground ball pitching staff. That issue will further compound it self when Carlos Carrasco and Noah Syndergaard return from the IL.
Overall, the Mets have built a team based on ground ball pitching. That is why you could believe you can get away with Smith in left and Nimmo in left. That’s all well and good. However, you can’t assemble a ground ball staff and put literally take the worst defensive third baseman in the majors and make him the starter.
The Mets decision is compounded by the fact they have Luis Guillorme, who is a great defender. We also see Guillorme is hitting to start the season. He’s a grinder who is just never going to give up. Case-in-point is Guillorme’s at-bat last night. The Mets were down 12 with two outs in the ninth, and he got a base hit after battling in a seven pitch at-bat.
Overall, when you look at how the Mets built this team, Davis cannot start. When you look at how mightily, he’s struggling, Davis cannot start. When you see his numbers over the past three years, Davis cannot start. When you see the other options available, Davis cannot start.
Yes, this is getting redundant, but then again, so is the Mets insistence on trying to make Davis an everyday player. They tried. Davis tried. It’s not working, and they are putting an entire season at risk by doing so. It’s time to make Davis the strong bench player he was always meant to be and allow Guillorme and/or Jonathan Villar play in his stead.
In the Mets 3-1 loss against the Chicago Cubs, J.D. Davis was a disaster in the field again. That should be no surprise as he’s literally been the worst defender in the Majors since he joined the New York Mets in 2019.
What was interesting about the two errors was he didn’t seem bothered by it, and he didn’t take ownership of it. In fact, on the second throw, he thought he did nothing wrong.
J.D. Davis discusses his 2 errors in the field tonight pic.twitter.com/iwW572U3t9
— SNY (@SNYtv) April 21, 2021
According to Davis, he doesn’t know what happened there because he “delivered a strike.” That’s another way of saying Pete Alonso was the reason for the error.
Seeing how Davis doesn’t believe he was at fault, let’s take another look at the play:
Kris Bryant was called safe on this ? pic.twitter.com/o60iPk5sxI
— Baseball Authority (@BsblAuthority) April 21, 2021
There can be no other conclusion here than Davis is delusional. Actually, that’s a charitable explanation. There are others which don’t reflect well on Davis’ character, but even with his involvement with the Houston Astros and the aftermath, we won’t go there.
First, Davis makes no effort to charge or get in front of the ball. Arguably, backhanding it like he did allowed him to be in a better throwing position.
After that, Davis took about three to four steps before he threw the ball. This has become a pattern, and it’s becoming a problem. With each passing day, it becomes apparent Davis has the yips at third.
This is no laughing matter. It’s a serious one which we saw rob Mackey Sasser of what was a promising career. It was also something which helped bring an end to that Mets run. It’s a sad moment for both the team and the player.
After the steps, the problem is Davis didn’t throw a strike. Rather, he threw it high. Between the steps and the high throw, Alonso was forced to make a stretch for the ball he otherwise shouldn’t have needed to make.
Now, Alonso’s foot did seemingly come off the bag, and yes, Kris Bryant did not touch first base himself. Bryant is a red herring here. The issue is Davis’ throw and steps effectively forced Alonso off the bag.
Davis not being able to field his position is a real problem for the Mets. His compounding it with the yips is all the more alarming. However, for some reason, they don’t have a problem with that.
They should have a problem with Davis blaming a teammate and not taking accountability. That’s a real problem, and it should be unacceptable. We’ll see just how much the Mets deem it as such in the coming days and weeks.
The New York Mets are 11 games into the season, and they are not quite getting the offensive performances they expected from key players. One of those players is Francisco Lindor. So far this year, he is hitting just .189/.340/.216 (62 OPS+).
Now, when it comes to Lindor, he is a new face to the Mets. Since we have not been following his career, we do not know what a typically Lindor season is. Every player is different, and they typically thrive over different parts of the season.
When looking at Lindor’s career, he is more of a second half than a first half player. His batting average, OBP, and SLG are all better in the second half. In fact, he has a career 113 wRC+ in the first half as opposed to a 122 wRC+ in the second half.
Part of the reason for that is Lindor has typically struggled in the months of March/April and June. In March/April, he has a .792 OPS (108 wRC+), and in June, he has a .762 OPS (97 wRC+). In no other month of the season does Lindor have an OPS under .828 or a wRC+ below 113.
Looking deeper into Lindor’s career, his performance in April is really no indicator on how he will perform that season. For example, his best offensive season was 2018. In that season, Lindor had a .740 OPS and a 100 wRC+. Contrast that with the previous season, 2017, Lindor had a 1.018 OPS and 156 wRC+ at the plate in the first month of the season. Putting aside the COVID shortened 2020 season, that 2017 season was his second worst at the plate.
Now, if you are prone to panic, yes, Lindor’s start to the 2021 season has so far resembled his start to the 2020 season. So far this year, he has a .557 OPS and a 69 wRC+. That is actually a step back from his first month of the season last year (July) where he had a .690 OPS and 77 wRC+.
Of course, not every season is equal. Last year, Lindor and all of baseball had to deal with a shutdown and abbreviated Summer Camp. This year, Lindor seemed primed to have a great start of the season, and then the Mets didn’t play in over a week because the Washington Nationals were infected with COVID. After that, the Mets have had a series of rain and even snow postponed games. That makes it difficult for any player to get going.
There is also the fact Lindor is adapting to a new team and a new city. He’s no longer the big fish in a small pond. He’s now a shark in the ocean. Everyone has an eye on him and his every move. We’ve seen superstars like Mike Piazza and Carlos Beltran struggle with that in the past only to eventually take their game to an even higher level than it had ever been.
Right now, the next step for Lindor is to take a look at his May, and more importantly, his second half. Lindor usually thrives in May, but he also regresses in June. If he follows his typical career norms, we may see some “What is wrong with Lindor” analyses coming heading into the All-Star Break. There is bound to be some hand wringing that the trade and contract were a mistake.
When and if that comes, they should largely be ignored as panic. The true test for Lindor is going to be how he comes out of the All-Star Break. That is the point of the year where Lindor typically recharges and takes off. No matter what happens between now and then, we can expect Lindor to finish the season strong.
In that end, that is what we want. Let Lindor continue playing great defense and acclimate himself to New York. Sooner or later he is going to be completely comfortable, and he’s going to play a stretch of games which allow him to get in a rhythm. Before all is said and done, Lindor is going to be great, and hopefully, he is going to lead the Mets towards having a special season.
In the New York Mets second game of the season, J.D. Davis was hit on the hand by Chase Anderson. Initially, the Mets believed Davis would miss the IL, but his hand didn’t heal as well as initially intended.
That left Luis Rojas and the Mets juggling between Luis Guillorme and Jonathan Villar. The tandem worked beautifully and helped the Mets to first place in this very young season.
Since Davis went down, Guillorme has hit .364/.533/.364, and Villar has hit .278/.278/.500. They have combined to start key rallies and drive home game winning runs.
Given their respective careers, it’s likely their combined output will stay around this level. We should also see improved defense as the season progresses.
With Davis, he’s a player whose offensive output depended on the juiced ball and an unsustainably high BABIP. That ball is deadened now, and over the past year, we’ve seen his ground ball rate return to poor levels.
Worse than that is his defense. It’s been unplayable at third in his career. No matter they hyped up his working with Francisco Lindor, the learning curve was just too steep to trust playing him there everyday with a ground ball pitching staff.
Davis still has a spot on this roster. That’s only solidified by Jose Peraza being his replacement. Davis is going to give an honest at-bat, and he’s a good complement to a heavy left-handed hitting lineup.
He’s just not an everyday player. In fact, as far as third goes, when you put Jeff McNeil in the mix there, he’s the team’s fourth best option there.
Despite that, when Davis gets activated off the IL, he will just be plugged back into the lineup. It’ll happen despite Guillorme and Villar showing themselves as a better option both individually and as a tandem.
That makes forcing Davis into the lineup a big mistake. That begs the question as to why they are doing it. In the end, it really makes no sense.
When the initial reports regarding Mickey Callaway came to light, there was room to excuse Sandy Alderson. After all, there wasn’t much about Callaway that was under his purview.
Callaway wasn’t Alderson’s choice. He was hired by the Wilpons. It’s also notable Alderson was battling with cancer, and he was no longer with the organization when Callaway’s harassment was reported.
While Alderson was able to escape culpability and blame for Callaway, the recent report from Katie Strang and Brittany Ghiroli of The Athletic make it very clear Alderson was a very real part of the problem. In fact, Alderson helped build that culture.
Alderson hired harassers over complaints and warnings of female employees. He was aware of at least some of the harassment, perhaps all of it. He knew and was well connected with the head of Human Resources, Holly Lindvall, who tried to silence and terminate those who objected to harassment.
Remember, it was Lindvall who told Leigh Castergine to resign when she complained about Jeff Wilpon. We now know there were more complaints, and those complaints were similarly ignored.
There may have been a time we could give Alderson a charitable treatment regarding the harassment. After all, this was a veteran and Harvard educated man. He was self made.
Alderson seemed like a good guy. He certainly grew in stature while serving as a juxtaposition to Jeff Wilpon. In fact, Alderson was a direct contrast to Wilpon.
The problem is he wasn’t. Alderson may not have been the perpetrator of harassment, but he sure was an enabler. He also sees no wrong in what he did, and if his statements aren’t taken out of context, he may not have an issue with what was done.
It’s sad. Alderson spent the whole of his life building a reputation. His return to the Mets was supposed to be in glory and about unfinished business.
Instead, the same stink that attaches to everything the Wilpons touch attached to him, and he has no one to blame by himself. He could have and should have done something, and instead, he chose to allow it to happen time and again.
Due to his actions, he needs to be fired. No, he should not be allowed to resign on his own accord. Steve Cohen has to send a clear message he doesn’t condone what predated him. That requires firing his most prominent hire.
There has been an overreaction to Michael Conforto struggling at the plate to start the season. He has slumped like most of the lineup, and he’s been dropped three spots in the lineup.
Based on his career, he’s going to eventually be fine. We know Conforto will hit and put up good numbers. What we don’t know is how he will be defensively.
Yes, it is absolutely too soon to judge this year’s defensive numbers. That said they merit a look. According to Baseball Savant, Conforto has a -1 OAA and a -1.6 JUMP
This follows Conforto’s 2020 season where he saw similarly poor defensive numbers. Last year, Conforto was a -5 OAA with a 0.1 JUMP.
Now, neither of these sample sizes are really sufficient to absolutely derive the conclusion Conforto is now a bad defender after being a very good one through the 2019 season. In fact, the two seasons combined are still way too small of a sample size to be even remotely statistically significant.
That said, we still need to pay attention because Conforto’s slipping defense has coincided with his having lost a step. That’s a very real problem.
In 2019, Conforto had a 7 OAA in RF, and he had a 27.5 ft/sec sprint speed. Notable with that sprint speed was it was the slowest up to that point of his career.
What was interesting was before 2019, Conforto had seen gradual improvements in his sprint speed. Since 2019, Conforto has completely lost a step.
In the shortened season last year, Nimmo’s sprint speed was just 26.8. So far this year, it’s 26.4. That’s a very real issue.
Now, it should be noted there are some explanations for the loss in sprint speed. There was the COVID interrupted season last year making it extraordinarily difficult to work out and train. On the eve of Spring Training this year, Conforto actually contracted COVID.
Maybe he can regain that extra step at some point. However, it’s not there now, and that’s a huge problem.
Remember, the Mets outfield alignment partially hinges on Conforto being a good defensive right fielder. Brandon Nimmo is out of position in CF (even if he’s been quite good there so far this year), and Dominic Smith is not an outfielder at all.
Conforto continuing on what may be a defensive decline can be a very real problem. Suddenly, what could’ve been a passable outfield, especially with a mostly ground ball staff, becomes a very real question mark which could cost them games.
That is going to put more onus on Luis Rojas and the Mets front office. Right now, they’re only using a defensive replacement for Smith late in games. At some point, they may need to have the very uncomfortable conversation with Conforto about his needing to come out of games as well.
On the bright side, the Mets are well suited for that with Kevin Pillar and Albert Almora. However, if the Mets do need to walk down that path, their chances of extending Conforto may then be kaput.
Before the Mets even contemplate this, they need to see if Conforto can begin getting his speed back, and they need to see if they can better position him to offset his loss in speed. They also need to assess if it will ever come back.
The future of the Mets actually hinges on this decision. They’re making an important decision on someone who can be their next captain. They’re making a decision on someone who may be starting his decline.
It’s too early to know for sure, but we have warning signs. That makes Conforto a very big problem for the Mets.