While Buck Showalter may not have been the right fit for the New York Mets job, this job was the perfect fit for him. This is a job where Showalter can cement his legacy, and depending on how everything goes, it’s possible he has a shot at the Hall of Fame.
As we have seen with the media coverage, Showalter has been well respected in the game. That goes to every media person, and we have seen former players Zack Britton, Adam Jones, Manny Machado, and Mark Teixeira speak highly of him. There are reasons why that is the case.
Showalter has his strengths. He is a good communicator. He develops players. He knows this game inside and out. No, he doesn’t know analytics well, and he has been adverse to them, but he’s a lifer who knows the game.
The biggest knock on Showalter is teams have won after he has left. The 1996 Yankees. The 2001 Diamondbacks. Both World Series championships came after Showalter has been fired. As we saw with the Britton issue in the ALDS, there are a number of reasons why Showalter hasn’t won a ring..
However, the Mets now present that opportunity. He has Jacob deGrom and Max Scherzer atop the rotation, that’s even better than Randy Johnson and Curt Schilling (who Showalter didn’t win with). As we have seen before the lockout, Steve Cohen is going to do everything he can to win the 2022 World Series. He is spending like we haven’t seen a team spend in ages, perhaps ever.
This will be a Mets team built to win in the postseason. There is the vaunted top of the rotation. Francisco Lindor in year two. Brandon Nimmo moving to right field where he will thrive along Starling Marte. Pete Alonso hitting tape measure shots. The pieces are there, and there will be more to come. The challenge for Showalter will be to let his best players win instead of going to Jack McDowell or Ubaldo Jimenez.
If he is now truly receptive to analytics for the first time in his career, wonderful things can and will happen. His reward will be completely changing the narrative on his career. Now, Showalter will be the manager who builds winners and can take them over the top.
He will then have at least three Manager of the Year awards. By winning a World Series, he would join Bobby Cox, Jim Leyland, and Tony La Russa as the only managers to win three awards and a World Series. Leyland is the only one not in the Hall of Fame. If Showalter were to win two World Series, he would join Sparky Anderson, Tommy Lasorda, Joe Torre, and La Russa as the only managers to win multiple Manager of the Year awards and multiple World Series.
The Mets will put Showalter in a position to win those World Series titles. That will come in the form of both players and with information. Everything will be there for Showalter. If he is willing to grow as a manager and accept the more collaborative role, he will get that elusive ring, and quite possibly, he will be enshrined in Cooperstown.
One of the more interesting rumors which emerged during Buck Showalter‘s interview process was he’d be willing to have Carlos Beltran as his bench coach. It was an odd rumor.
When looking at a bench coach, you have someone responsible for running QC during a game. They’re making sure batters bat in order, keeping tabs on who is available, and chatting strategy with the manager.
The entirety of Beltran’s coaching experience is 76 days as the Mets manager. In that time, he had zero team meetings and managed zero games. Put another way, he has zero experience.
Putting him in a position to be Showalter’s right-hand man makes little sense. He’s ill equipped. Moreover, there’s no pre-existing relationship where they’re able to have a synergistic relationship.
It would also be bizarre to have Beltrán in place as a manager in training. Showalter wasn’t just hired to win in 2022. He was hired to be in place and win for as many seasons as he’s capable of doing the job.
The Mets hired the then 62 year old Terry Collins in 2011. He would manage seven more years with the Mets.
Tony La Russa managed the St. Louis Cardinals until he was 66 years old. After being inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, he returned to the Chicago White Sox in 2021 as a 76 year old.
Showalter is 65. Looking at Collins and La Russa, he has as many years as he can do the job. With Showalter taking the job, we can presume he’s in for the long haul.
That’s just the thing. Showalter wants to win. He’s been in this game as a manager for 20 years. He knows people, and more importantly, he knows who he wants for different roles.
Maybe he likes Beltrán. It would make sense with Beltran being a noted leader and hard worker who is very intelligent. However, no one knows if Beltrán can coach.
Can he be a hitting coach? Can he be an outfield coach? Does he know how to interpret, apply, and communicate analytics?
No one knows, not even Beltrán. That’s why putting him on a staff makes little to no sense. Grooming an inexperienced coach for a role he may never be suited doesn’t make much sense.
Unfortunately, bringing Beltran back doesn’t make much sense. If Beltran does indeed want to come back and eventually manage, he will have to do the work and go to the minors much like Edgardo Alfonzo did.
When and if Beltran does that, then maybe Showalter can and should add him to a Major League coaching staff. Until that point, it just doesn’t make any sense.
Todd Zeile covered the New York Mets as an analyst throughout the 2021 season. That left him eight months to say something about Marcus Stroman.
However, now that Stroman is gone Zeile calls him one of the most divisive players in the Mets clubhouse last year. He intimated things in the clubhouse are better just because Stroman is a Chicago Cub.
Mind you, he didn’t say this when Luis Rojas was taking the fall for the purported clubhouse issues. Notably, he didn’t rebut Rojas when the former manager lauded Stroman for being a great teammate.
He didn’t say anything when there were reports of the Mets having a special chemistry. He was silent on Stroman when the narrative emerged the Mets didn’t do more at the trade deadline because they didn’t want to infringe on the clubhouse chemistry.
Zeile also was silent on Stroman when the clubhouse chemistry issue emerged with Javier Báez‘s thumbs down to the fans. There was a perfect opportunity to address team chemistry and issues. Zeile said nothing.
Time and again, Zeile was silent on Stroman’s impact in the Mets clubhouse. However, now with Buck Showalter being hired and Stroman a Cub, he is telling everyone Stroman is divisive.
Zeile sat on this information until the offseason. He sat on it during the many times the Mets clubhouse chemistry was at issue (good or bad). Now, that he never has to face Stroman, he’s more than ready to denigrate him.
This is completely unprofessional, and it highlights Zeile has little to no credibility. He had pertinent information to share in his role as analyst, and he didn’t disclose it.
Zeile didn’t have the courage to say anything while Stroman was a Met. He didn’t have the courage to say anything while the possibility of Stroman returning existed. This is as callow as it gets.
With these comments, Zeile lost credibility. It leaves you wondering what other information is he failing to disclose just to make his life easier. What is he not telling us so he can avoid an awkward conversation with a player?
Mets fans deserve better than this. The Mets players do as well.
Since Steve Cohen purchased the New York Mets, the organization has made it a priority to build a great analytical organization. It was an important part of their defense becoming leaps and bounds better in 2021, and its positive impact could be seen elsewhere.
How the organization goes from that to hiring Buck Showalter makes little to no sense.
Sure, he’ll talk a good game, and undoubtedly, he will say he will use the analytics and collaborate, but that runs counter to who he is. Really, he was the same guy in 2016 pitching Ubaldo Jimenez (and not Zack Britton) as he was in 1995 pitching Jack McDowell.
He overly says he tracked against shifting. He said he uses it to confirm what he’s thinking. He says it overlooks the magical unseen tools. He even tries to sound smart saying how analytics disagree with themselves.
Really, it’s just another way to say I’m going to manage my way. Honestly, when you hire Showalter, that’s apparently all you want.
The Mets didn’t want a Joe Espada or Matt Quatraro. These are managers who could’ve taken the Mets to another level and taught them all the things they don’t know.
They didn’t push for Bruce Bochy. Bochy is a manager who actually won something, and he’s gotten that little extra from his teams. Remember, Showalter has a .506 winning percentage and win exactly zero LCS games.
However, Showalter is seen as a great hire because the media loves his press conferences. They also love his eschewing analytics. His having won nothing is of little consequence.
Overall, Showalter was the popular choice. That doesn’t make him the right one. That’s because he wasn’t. Really, the Mets hired someone who runs contrary to what they were purportedly trying to do when they revamped their analytics department.
In reality, this is a step backwards. Hopefully, this Mets roster will be so good that it won’t matter . . . much like the 2001 Diamondbacks team who won the year after Showalter was fired.
Famously starting with Billy Beane, the war on analytics on baseball has long been fought. Really, it started before him, and it’s a war which continues to this day.
Back in the 1970s, it was Earl Weaver looking for a bloop and a blast. In the 1980s, it was Davey Johnson pouring over computer reports to find a statistical advantage. There’s more, and yes, this is an oversimplification.
Ultimately, analytics won. We see the Tampa Bay Rays have a competitive advantage with their use of analytics despite a low payroll. The Los Angeles Dodgers meld spending power with analytics to gain a stranglehold on the NL West and to some extent the National League.
When Steve Cohen took over the New York Mets, his first and main focus has been analytics. After using it to significantly improve the Mets defense, it’s being expanded to the minor leagues. In many ways, this is the tip of the iceberg.
Again, despite the whining of John Smoltz and Harold Reynolds, analytics won. That’s going to be the case in other sports.
We saw it with the NFL. The Los Angeles Chargers lost a game in OT to the Kansas City Chiefs. One of the purported reasons why is the Chargers opted not to kick a field goal on three separate occasions while subsequently failing to convert on fourth down. The ex-players had a field day.
The #chargers Analytics guy leaving SOFI as Coach Staley heads to the podium to explain 4th & goal x 2 = 0pts #TNFonFOX pic.twitter.com/VlRhnn9WZm
— Carl Banks (@CarlBanksGIII) December 17, 2021
Turns out analytics suck!
— mark schlereth (@markschlereth) December 17, 2021
If you break it down, the Chargers made the correct choice. With analytics, we see going for fourth down is the better choice.
Like with baseball, the criticism is grossly misplaced. The issue isn’t the decision itself, but rather, the execution. Much like it’s the reliever and match-up chosen, it’s the play call and execution.
However, the naysayers only choose to focus on one part of the process. It’s why they’re losing the battle. People increasingly understand the full process, and overall, the numbers and data prove out the process on the field.
This is why teams go for it more. This is why analytics eventually win in all sports. It did in baseball. With teams going for it more, and with all Bill Belichick did, we see it is in football.
For that matter, it is in hockey and basketball too. Just this past year, we saw it as a big reason why Adam Fox won the Norris Trophy.
Overall, analytics always win. They win because it’s the start way to do things. They win because it works.
Former players whining days gone by continue to miss the point. Instead of the woe is me, their focus can still be on the things where everyone agrees. It’s not the option to go for it, but rather, the play call.
The sooner these former players buy in, the better. We’ll see a more informed fan base. We’ll also see fans hearing from people who actually like to see the sport. Ultimately, more than anything, that will help grow sports.
This year, there are three seminal Hall of Fame cases on their tenth year on the ballot. By all accounts, Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Sammy Sosa won’t be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Now, Bonds and Clemens have complicated their Hall of Fame cases more than anyone. Each have had their respective criminal cases related to the steroids, and each have had significant off the field issues with Bonds’ abusive behavior and Clemens’ inappropriate relationships.
Really, the cases against Bonds and Clemens run much deeper than steroids. To that point, you can understand their failure to receive the needed vote.
That’s not really the case with Sosa. He denied using PEDs at the congressional hearing even though it was revealed he tested positive during the survey testing. To a certain extent, there was the corked bat incident.
Beyond that, Sosa was the first man to hit 60 homers in consecutive seasons. He helped transform the Chicago Cubs into contenders. His running to right field with an American flag post 9/11 still gives many goosebumps.
All told, Sosa had a 58.6 WAR, and he hit 609 homers. Before delving into whether those are Hall of Fame worthy numbers, just keep it in consideration.
Right now, according to Ryan Thibodaux’s Hall of Fame tracker, David Ortiz is faring significantly better than Sosa in the voting. Really, there is no justification for this.
The steroids case against Sosa is the same against Ortiz as both tested positive in the survey testing. Again, this is the same test results which have kept Sosa out of the Hall of Fame.
Ortiz is a known hot head. He couldn’t handle teams returning the favor for celebrations, and he’s thrown bats at umpires. Considering Mike Piazza and the 2000 World Series, throwing bats at people is something else Ortiz has in common with Clemens.
Through it all, he had a 55.3 WAR and 541 homers. That puts him a significant step behind Sosa. Again, he’s doing better in voting than Sosa.
He’s also well ahead of Alex Rodriguez. A-Rod was clearly the far superior player, but he was suspended for PEDs. Notably, A-Rod and Ortiz used the same MLB banned trainer.
Interestingly enough, while that link isn’t enough to tinge Ortiz, it was enough to keep Gary Sheffield out of the Hall of Fame. According to Sheffield, he was duped by Bonds and BALCO.
This has kept Sheffield out of the Hall of Fame. He has a 60.5 WAR with 509 homers.
Overall, in terms of performance on the field, Bonds, Clemens, Rodriguez, Sheffield, and Sosa had far superior careers than Ortiz. Despite that, Ortiz testing positive and working with MLB banned trainers has had zero impact on his Hall of Fame case like it did with the others.
For reasons that confound reason, nothing sticks to Ortiz. He’s allowed to cheat and throw bats at people. He’s allowed to use banned trainers. While all of these things in the singular have proven fatal to others Hall of Fame chances, it appears it won’t fit Ortiz.
Because of this and many more reasons, if he’s elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame, it would be a complete and utter farce.
The one gem from that ill-fated trade deadline was Drew Smith. When he’s been on the field, he’s proven why the Mets took him in exchange for Lucas Duda.
In 2021, he made the leap. In 31 appearances, he was 3-1 with a 2.40 ERA, 1.065 WHIP, 3.5 BB/9, and an 8.9 K/9. From an advanced stat perspective, he had a 0.8 WAR and 168 ERA+.
Looking to Baseball Savant, Smith had elite fastball spin and near elite curveball spin. Harnessing that spin with Jeremy Hefner helped Smith make significant progress in 2021.
However, Smith didn’t make “the leap.” The reason was he once again landed on the IL. This time it was with right shoulder inflammation. It was his second time on the IL that season with this IL stint being season ending.
That is one of the marks of Smith’s career – injuries. He had undergone Tommy John in 2019. That cost him a year of pitching and development. He was healthy for parts of 2021, and we again saw the potential.
The thing is the Mets are getting past the point of his potential. They need real progress. Mostly, they need him on the mound.
He’s an arbitration eligible player. He does have two options remaining, but the Mets don’t want yo have to use them anymore. They want Drew Smith.
In many ways, they need him to take that leap. After the 2022 season, Edwin Diaz will be a free agent, and Smith is about the entire list of internal closer candidates. Smith has the ability to take over, but the biggest ability is availability.
Smith isn’t there on the latter, but it seems like everything else is there or can be there. Hopefully, in 2022, Smith will be healthy for a full season and put it all together. The Mets desperately need him to do so.
The New York Mets have narrowed their managerial search to Joe Espada, Matt Quatraro, and Buck Showalter. By the end of this week, one of these men will be the new Mets manager.
Reading the tea leaves, Showalter is the odds-on favorite. He’s worked with current general manager Billy Eppler, and he’s seen as the favorite of Mets owner Steve Cohen.
As noted, Showalter carries risk. He’s had issues managing veteran teams like the Mets have, and he’s not analytically inclined. In fact, he’s shown skepticism. It’s also led to him making mistakes like not pitching Zack Britton.
Mistakes like this are one of the reasons Showalter has never won so much as a League Championship game in five postseason trips.
Conversely, in their roles as bench coaches, Espada and Quatraro have been a part of pennant winning teams. They were also part of some of the most analytically advanced teams in the game.
The Houston Astros and Tampa Bay Rays know how to apply analytics better than anyone. They use coaches like Espada and Quatraro to meld the analytics with performance.
More than that, they know all the things the Mets and other organizations don’t know. They know the data they’re getting, and they know what’s the really important data needed to help their teams win.
The institutional knowledge Espada and Quatraro have is of immense value. Teams who hire them aren’t just getting managers; they’re getting a wealth of information on how to transform and improve their organization.
That’s something Showalter just can’t bring or offer a team. He’s been out of baseball for three years, and he came from a Baltimore Orioles team who didn’t have an analytics department.
In the end, if the Mets hire Showalter, he better be THAT good that he can overtake what the Mets are passing up. To date, he hasn’t, and that’s why the Mets should be really looking towards hiring Espada or Quatraro.
In all sports, we keep looking for ways to get teams to stop tanking. Why aren’t more teams going for it? There are a number of reasons with the competitive balance Tax one of those policies standing in the way.
Under the current iteration of the CBT, if you spend over $210 million, there’s a tax or penalty. The more years you go over it, the worse the penalties.
For the first year, it’s a 20% penalty for the amount a team exceeds the threshold (or cap). It goes to 30% in year two to 50% in year three. If you go over by $20 – 40 million, there’s a 12% surcharge. Over $40 million, and you start losing draft picks?
At some point, you need to ask why? Why is this good for the sport?
We know, or at least are told, it’s in place to help the “poorer” teams compete. They get some of the money, and the bigger market teams can’t blow them out of the water by having their spending unchecked.
Of course, as we see with the Oakland Athletics and Tampa Bay Rays, being smarter has always trumped reckless spending. Really, spending by one team doesn’t prevent the other teams from competing or winning.
That said, spending does help you win. Getting good players makes you better. That costs money in free agency.
We should want teams trying to get better. That’s a good thing. The bad thing is the system is set up to fight against that.
Case-in-point, if you dip beneath the threshold, your penalty clock is reset. Basically, a team is told you get two years to really go out and do all you can to win before you need to reign it back in.
That’s not a measure aimed at winning. It’s a measure aimed at not winning. If it was working as intended, fine, but there’s a reason the Pittsburgh Pirates are always terrible.
So, if we really want the competitive balance tax to stop building dynasties, and we want other teams in the mix, why not recalibrate the tax? Why not make a system easier for teams to build winners while preventing great teams from becoming unbeatable?
Instead of making the tax applicable to teams who just spend, why not make the tax applicable to only teams who win? In essence, make the tax applicable only to teams who make the postseason.
By doing this, you’re really narrowing in on the behaviors MLB purportedly wants to stop. It also doesn’t impact teams trying to build a winner.
Really, not doing it this way makes the name of the tax a misnomer. It has nothing to do with competitive balance because it isn’t designed to impacting competitive balance. Rather, it’s nothing more than a thinly veiled player salary suppressor.
In the end, this lockout should have MLB dedicated to finding ways to make the product better. They need to better tie the methods to buttress smaller market clubs to actual competitive balance. This is one such measure.
Right before the lockout, there was a free agent frenzy. Big name players signed with teams who want to win in 2022. Then, nothing.
Really, it’s been seemingly nothing. The owners unanimously voted to lock out the players on December 2. Over a week later, we’ve heard nothing about any progress towards a new collective bargaining agreement.
According to a report from the San Francisco Chronicle, we may not see any progress towards March. Naturally, this means any excitement we saw from the free agent frenzy will be a distant memory.
That’s the short term view. There’s also the question as to the impact this will have on the season. Will there be a Spring Training? With a huge group of free agents still unsigned, do we get those blockbuster deals?
Mostly, when do we get baseball again? That’s the biggest concern.
Right now, there’s nothing happening. That’s bad news. Everyday that becomes worse news. Just how bad it gets will depend on just how long things remain radio silent.