The bullpen was not their only problem last year. They have plenty of holes offensively as well. They were ranked #18 in run scored and that is only 29 runs more than the Astros scored last year. If they have another 20 million to spend then more power to them. If they don't, they're in for major disappointment.
Cameron is gone to SD. And yes, a 2.59 era for Jae Seo is pitching over his head. Considering his next best season is a 3.82 era, I'd definitely say so. He got hot last year, in half a season worth of starts. I look at the mets staff like the Cardinals of 2004 with Carpenter healthy. One ace, and depth. Personally I think this says more about the rest of the NL pitching staffs outside of Houston and STL than it does anything else that the mets finished 3rd in era last year. My point was they would have been better served to pursue an arm for 200 innings than spend SP caliber money on a closer.
I agree - but Delgado is a big improvement. They had the worst production from first base of all MLB teams, something around Ausmus' level in terms of OPS. It's like us replacing Adam Everett with a superstar offensive SS. Offense certainly is their biggest problem, but they have worked to address that as well. Plus, I assume they expect Beltran to rebound a bit. A lineup with: Reyes Beltran Delgado Wright Floyd and maybe Cameron is pretty damn good if they players play to their norm.
It was his 3rd year in the league! Players tend to improve as they adjust to the majors. The Cardinals staff in 2004 was good enough to get them to the World Series. Consistent pitching and great hitting. And I disagree about going and getting another starter. They lost 10+ games because of their problems at closer last year. Flip those and they are comfortably in the playoffs. None of the available starters is going to flip them 10 games in the standings compared to the guys they have on the team.
Reyes - He had a good year last year and he had 60 steals. With a .300 OBP, he is hardly a leadoff threat. It is possible he will break out in a big way this year, but I won't bank on it. Beltran - His drop of production is a mystery to me. Maybe he is having a tough time playing in a more demanding environment. Delgado - A Solid but not elite power hitter at 1st base. He is entering the tail end of his career. He should have a year or two of solid production in front of him. Wright - Stud Floyd - His nickname should be the "Human Glass." You can pretty much write him off for half the season due to injuries. He is also entering the tail end of his career as well. That does not sound like a good offensive team to me.
Reyes is certainly a bit of a questionmark - he's a sort of Willy T I think. Beltran had the worst year of his career last year. I suspect he will be substantially better. Delgado's not anywhere near the end of his career. He's 33, which means he has several years left, and he had the 3rd best season of his career last year. He's as consistent as they come. Wright - stud, assuming he's for real. Floyd - He did play 150 games last year, but yeah, there are questionmarks. If they are healthy, though, that's 3 guys with an OPS over 0.900 and a 4th that's pretty close. 4 guys with 30 HR potential (Beltran is unlikely though). How many teams have a better core of a lineup?
4 guys with 30 HR power would be impressive, but you're counting on 2 guys getting close to mid-30s (one of them gets injured pretty frequently, 1 guy who had a major drop-off in performance the year before and 1 guy who could be a rising star but the jury is still out. They certainly have potential to be a strong offense, but I find it doubtful that it will turn out that way. Even if they do have a powerful lineup, an above average pitching staff and a closer finally, they still have one of the most atrocious infield defense. David Wright had 24 errors along with a zone rating that is barely above Aramis Ramirez's. Jose Reyes had 18 errors with a very subpar .821 zone rating. While the defense will improve when they find Piazza's replacement by addition through subtraction. Their key cogs in the right infield is a major weakness.
Jae Seo is not going to constantly have seasons anywhere near that 2.59 era. This is what I'm talking about with you and statistics. If Seo was so good, then why was he in triple A half the year. Why did he post an era of 4.9 the year before. Why is he in the "battle" for the mets 5th starter spot this spring. You did the same thing between Jorge Sosa and Roy Oswalt. At some point the eyetest has to come into play with looking at stats. Furthermore, the Mets as of right now do not have great hitting. In fact, it's not that different from the houston lineup which most people agree need another stick. Taveras-Biggio-Berkman-Ensberg-Lane-Lamb is pretty similar to Reyes-Beltran-Delgado-Wright-Floyd-Nady/Diaz quite frankly. It should be slightly better based on Beltran not underperforming next year, but still those 2 lineups are pretty comparable.
The Mets starting pitching could really have used that improvement. It's far more likely that they're pitcher's will get worse than they'll improve. Pedro is good, but who knows how long his shoulder will last. Glavine is the no. 2, and he's old and aging. His walk numbers have stayed the same while his strikeouts are declining. Their No. 3 pitcher is Kris Benson, who's a 4.0 ERA and an injury concern. Zambrano's wild. Seo had five good starts in August, is he as good as Roy Oswalt now too?
And Sosa went 6 innings 3 runs, while Roy went 7 innings 3 runs in their playoff game. Seems pretty similar to me. You have a habit of valuing name players and dismissing players from teams you don't care for. Young players come up and have great seasons all the time. I have no idea if he'll continue to perform at this level. But if I have to pick whether he's more likely to do what he's doing or just randomly regress because he doesn't have a great name, I'll pick the former. Neither Seo or Sosa have a long history of being bad, and there's no reason to take previous performance over current performance for a player in their second or third year in the league. Those lineups are in no way comparable. First, the bottom two in our order are so terrible that we need the top 6 to be that much better. Second, Reyes-Taveras is a good comparison. Berkman/Ensberg is probably comparable to Delgado/Wright. Floyd and Beltran are far and away better than Biggio and Lane. That's your extra bat right there. I would take that Mets lineup, offensively and defensively, without hesitation.
And despite all the spending that the Mets do this offseason, Atlanta will still finish first in the division.
You guys are under the assumption that the Mets won't look for starting pitching, or that all of these bad contracts will hurt them. They are in a market where you can overpay and still be in the black. Without a salary cap, the issue of bad contracts is only a detriment in baseball if you are on a budget...they clearly aren't.
Exactly - it's not an either-or situation for them. They can make these moves and still look at other areas. That's the beauty of having financial flexibility. You can pick off the free agents you want, and still have flexibility to go after other possibilities.
Young players do come up and have great seasons. Jae Soo didn't have a great season - he had a great August, then he regressed back to the player he's always been. If Jae Soo is worse next year, there won't be anything random about it - it'll be a simple regression to the mean. He's a low-strikeout pitcher with control issues and mediocre stuff. That he put together a good string of games isn't a surprise, players do it all the time. That he then went back to his regular mediocre performances is no surprise either. As far as Jorge Sosa, it was 6IP, 3ER against 7.1IP, 3ER. That one and a third inning was the difference between a 3-3 game, and a 7-3 game - as the Atlanta bullpen took a 3-2 game and lost complete control over it. Which is why Oswalt got the win, and Sosa got the loss.
Obviously one playoff game makes two pitchers comparable. No, I can recognize talent. Jorge Sosa is a 3rd starter at best(in fact he is most comparable to our very own brandon backe, albeit he had the better year) while Roy Oswalt could be an ace for any team in baseball. Do you still need this point hammered through your brain. Just like I can recognize someone who pitched well over their head in Jae Seo. Defensively, no way. The Astros are better defensively than NY if they retain Ausmus(or replace him with another solid defensive catcher), and that isn't close. Offensively, the Mets are slightly better if Beltran doesn't underperform again. You are the one overrating players here. Cliff Floyd is not a .900 OPS hitter consistently. In fact, he has had one year with a full season's worth of at bats and a .900 or above OPS. Last year his OPS was .863. Lane had an .815 OPS. They are comparable hitters although it slightly favors Cliff if he can stay healthy(which is always a concern). Biggio outperformed beltran last year, but if Carlos bounces back of course I give him the edge. However, I doubt it is as substantial as you think. I'd venture on him posting an .850 ish ops this year and craig at worst about a .750 OPS. Furthermore, that illustrates my point. We all want the Astros to upgrade the offense. If the only real substantial difference in our lineup and NY's is beltran vs biggio right now, what does that tell you. They do not have a great offense currently.
Seems as though the Mets trumped the other offers by including a no trade clause....where have I heard that before?
This is exactly my point. Somehow Sosa, who's ERA was better than Oswalt's this year and went 13-3, is the equivalent of Brandon Backe, who's ERA was close to 5, and has never been below 4.3. Beltran, who consistently improved for 6 straight years before last year, and had consecutive years with an OPS over 0.900, you expect to have about 0.850. Sorry, but you consistently undervalue opposing players and overvalue your own team's. There's so much more to baseball than physical tools - this is the Chris Simms disease. Because he has a great arm, he must be the better QB. It works better in baseball, but still does not always fly. Go back and read the thread on Sosa/Oswalt. My argument for Sosa was that his <B>season</B> was as good or better than Oswalt's, and that you could expect him to perform that way in the playoffs, as opposed to everyone saying Oswalt was tons better. People don't accidentially have ERAs of 2.5 for a season. It means you know how to pitch. Now, your stuff may not be good enough once people figure it out, but projecting in the short-term, they are more than likely to stay at current production than to suddenly fade away. There is nothing in either Sosa or Seo's performance to suggest they will suddenly suck next year. It may happen, as happens with all sorts of players (Beltran, for example), but their performances weren't flukes.
