We all know the Mets are in bullpen trouble and they’re mismanaging the situation. You know the only way it could be worse? Putting Noah Syndergaard in the bullpen.
In 18 starts, he’s 7-6 with a 3.17 ERA. He’s got an ERA+ of 119, which loosely translated makes him 19% better than the league. He has a 9.5 K/9, which is better than Matt Harvey and Jacob deGrom. His FIP is 3.16, which equates to him being a great starting pitcher. On a team with a weak bullpen, he averages 6.1 innings per start. On top of all of this, he’s going to finish within his innings limits.
Now, please tell me why we should pull him from the rotation? Is it because we don’t want to be successful? Is it because we think Steven Matz MIGHT be better? Is it because we’d rather him make a few appearances pitching one inning a piece over six starts at six plus innings a piece? Fact is, there is no good reason.
We know the Mets have a weak bullpen. One way to mitigate that is to keep the weak arms in the bullpen. You do that with pitchers, like Syndergaard, who go deep into games. I like out-of-the-box thinking, but I also like ideas that make sense.
Syndergaard belongs in the starting rotation.
With David Wright set to come off the DL on Monday, it seems as if Michael Conforto‘s days are numbered. This series against the Rockies will be his last until September.
First things first, with Terry Collins’ inane handling of Conforto, it seems Conforto will only play two games. Since Eric Campbell was sent down on August 10th, Conforto will only have started in seven of eleven games. Regardless of his inactivity, Conforto has made contributions. There was the homerun against the Rays and the one against the Pirates.
He will be missed. I believe he was missed during his time on the team. Let’s enjoy this weekend because he’ll be gone for two weeks.
Considering the issues with the Mets bullpen, I thought today’s quiz should focus on the top Mets’ relievers by appearances. Good luck!
We may soon find out how bad the Yoenis Cespedes trade was. With an injury to Daniel Norris, the Tigers are pondering calling-up Michael Fulmer.
This is salt in the wound after watching Terry Collins throw away the last game in Baltimore. In part, that is because of the ineptitude of the Mets front office in handling the innings restrictions. If Fulmer is truly ready, he could have been used for a spot start over Logan Verrett. This way the Mets bullpen, in the middle of a pennant race, wouldn’t be understaffed for a full week.
There’s also the possibility if Fulmer stayed with the Mets organization, he wouldn’t be called up to make a spot start. Correction, there is no way they would call him up. Considering they won’t consider Steven Matz in the bullpen, they wouldn’t consider Fulmer there either; especially with the intriguing possibility of Vic Black.
Also, don’t misconstrue this as me saying I don’t want Cespedes. It was a sign to the Mets fans and players the team was all-in. The Mets took off since that time. However, this is a question of whether the Mets had to give up Fulmer. I still say they didn’t. Sandy Alderson balked and the departing GM didn’t. This trade could very well haunt them.
So in the history of John Smoltz and Jeff Bagwell, the Mets may get a glimpse of what could have been part of their future.
My favorite part of this year is seeing my son becoming a baseball fan. At night before bed, he asks to watch baseball. He says, “Go Mets!” He’s starting to understand what is happening.
Last night, right after his bath, he identified his second baseball player, Daniel Murphy. In the fifth inning, Murphy hit an RBI single briefly putting the Mets ahead. When it happened, my son said, “Murphy hit ball.” Later in the game, my son was again able to identify who Murphy was.
This is special to me because of how great Murphy was when I was lucky to meet him and what he personally had to deal with when his child was born. Upon meeting Murphy, I told him my wife was expecting. He signed an autograph for him and gave me a baseball that I could use to teach him how to play.
So no matter what happens, I’ll always root for Murphy. He was incredibly kind and generous to my and my then unborn son. I’m glad my son now recognizes him so he can root for him too.
I’m not the first, and I’m not going to be the last to compare David Wright and Don Mattingly. My goal today is to hopefully be a little more nuanced than a side by side comparison. Rather, I want to see exactly how back problems deteriorated Mattingly’s abilities.
Normally, I would use Lenny Dykstra as a comparable because he also has spinal stenosis. However, I don’t know if I can trust any of his stats with his steroids usage. We do know like Wright, Mattingly suffered from a low back injury. The nature of the two injuries are different, but they are both chronic problems.
It appears the problems first surfaced in 1987. In that year, Mattingly went from a 7.2 WAR to a 5.1 WAR player. In essence, he went from a superstar to an All Star player. He would then quickly deteriorate into just a “good” player. Mattingly’s back worsened in 1990, and with that he became a -0.3 player, which translates to a bad player. For the rest of his career, Mattingly would be nothing more than a solid starter. He retired at the early age of 34.
Wright has had a terrific career, arguably better than Mattingly. In 2007 and 2008, Wright was a superstar player, as per WAR. In 2009, the Mets moved to Citi Field and Wright was nothing more than a solid starter. In 2010, Wright suffered a broken back. Unlike Mattingly, Wright would rebound from his back injury to put up superstar numbers again in 2012 and 2013.
Last year, Wright regressed again. However, last year it was a shoulder injury and not a back injury. This year it was discovered that Wright has spinal stenosis. We don’t know if it’s related to the 2010 injury.
What I do know is that Wright and Mattingly are two different players. We have seen that Wright once overcame a back injury, a different back injury, to return to superstar form. Mattingly never did. So yes, both are popular New York corner infielders. Both have back injuries.
However, they are two different players with two different back injuries. We shouldn’t be comparing them to determine how the rest of Wright’s career is going to proceed. Wright is a different player and person.
I’m nervous about Wright, but after 2012 and 2013, I won’t bet against him.
Again, just because this is an off day, it doesn’t mean you it’s an off day for working on your Wilmer Flores cheers:
When the Mets assembled this front office, they were all touted as geniuses. Apparently, everyone just disregarded J.P. Riccardi’d tenure in Toronto and Paul DePodesta’s brief tenure in Los Angeles. The only known contributions from the two of them is the Colin McHugh-Eric Young, Jr. trade.
The reason I bring this up is everyone in the whole organization is acting like idiots right now. We all agree that the Mets needed to do something with Bobby Parnell. Some wanted him released. I wanted them to give him time to get himself right. Seemingly, the Mets found a terrific option: put Parnell on the DL and call-up Logan Verrett to take his place. Only that’s not what happened.
What happened is they brought him up to make a spot start for Matt Harvey on Sunday. Yup, they called up Verrett to pitch one very quick inning on this throw day, Wednesday, and then make a spot start on Sunday.
Where was the genius that said, “maybe this is a bad idea?” Who said, “let’s delay putting Parnell on the DL until Sunday so as to not short change our bullpen one arm Friday and Saturday?” How come no one thought, “is there an another option, like Vic Black, that we can call up and have available until Sunday?”
This mismanagement is unconscionable. Keep in mind you’re not just shortening your bullpen for two games, you’re also doing it in Colorado with your three worst starting pitchers. This is like going to Iceland in December and saying, “I have a heavy sweatshirt, why would I need a winter coat?” It’s not like the entire country is one massive glacier in the Artic Circle. Oh, it is. Well then I’ll bring a winter hat.
Keep mind, the Mets are also shortchanging their bullpen going to Philadelphia. It’s not like Verrett will pitch Sunday and be available on Monday. The earliest he will be available would be Wednesday. So essentially, the Mets called up Verrett to shorten the bullpen for at least five games. How does this make sense?
All of this also ignores the insanity of how this team has handled Matt Harvey this season. We all knew there was going to be an innings limit issue. Did the Mets hold him back a month to restrict his innings? No. Did they decide to sit him after two rough May outings? No. Instead, they’re choosing to sit him in the middle of a pennant race when he’s been pitching really well.
Maybe they send down Verrett after Sunday’s start and recall Black or someone else. Maybe there is a move I’m completely missing. I doubt it.
Overall, I don’t know what the Mets are doing right now. When they act like this, I’m not sure they even know what they’re doing either.
Tonight was yet another example that Terry Collins is not ready to manage in October. This is unacceptable.
I’m angry and you should be angry. Logan Verrett was called up to help in the bullpen. He comes in and faces three batters in the sixth. He’s been starting in AAA, so after a quick inning, in an AL park, I presumed it was a no-brainer that he came on for a second inning.
Nope, he was lifted. Why? So he can start on Sunday to permit the Mets to skip Matt Harvey‘s start. Yup, the Mets are messing around with a team in a pennant race. As I’ve said before, if you want to skip starts, you do it in May when Harvey was struggling; not now, not in the thick of the pennant race.
Sure enough Hansel Robles gives up the game tying HR in the seventh (which was supposed to be Verrett’s innings) to Adam Jones tying the game at four. There’s no shame in allowing a HR to Jones. There is shame in allowing your fourth or fifth best reliever to get beat in the last three innings of a game.
Terry Collins continued his rough night by allowing Juan Uribe to face former Met Darren O’Day after Lucas Duda‘s one out double. O’Day holds righties to a triple slash of .192/.259/.277 for his career. This year Uribe hits righties .246/.300/.375. Predictably, Uribe grounded out with Kelly Johnson on the bench. Travis d’Arnaud would then make the final out of the inning.
If you’re going to sit Michael Conforto against lefties, you pinch hit Johnson there. Sure enough to make sure I get an aneurysm, Collins PH Michael Cuddyer against the lefty Zach Britton. On what planet is it more important to look at lefty-righty match-ups in the beginning of an inning as opposed to during a rally in a tie game.
Finally, to show Collins shouldn’t be managing a team in a pennant race, he puts in Carlos Torres over a warmed-up Jeurys Familia. Sure enough, Torres let up the walk-off homerun to the first batter he saw in the ninth giving the Orioles a 5-4 win. You always want to lose a game with one of your worst relievers when you’re best one is available and ready to go.
I’m angry. Collins botched this game top to bottom. He cost the Mets the win. Some will blame the bullpen. I think it’s how it was deployed and how Collins handled his bench.
Thank God Washington hasn’t fired Matt Williams. Otherwise, I would be positive the Mets would blow this lead.