Archive for the ‘2009 Season’ Category
Tuesday, October 20th, 2009
Two weeks ago, during the “It Was All Luis Alicea’s Fault” Media Tour, Jeff Wilpon committed to a 2010 payroll in line with the $147M the team spent this season. To that, the average baseball fan says, “Mets fans are lucky! Their owners are willing to spend top dollar on talent.” At the surface, there’s nothing wrong with that statement. Mets fans are lucky — and if given the choice between a high payroll and a low payroll, I’m taking the high one. In this case, unfortunately, $147M doesn’t buy what it used to (supposed to) and therein rests the primary failing of the Mets in 2009.
The table below represents Fangraphs Wins Above Replacement (WAR) calculations for each Mets player. To the right of the overall WAR column is the value of each player’s contributions on the open market (Fangraphs determined that a win is worth ~$4.5), their total salary according to Cot’s Baseball Contracts and the ‘Net’ value of that player’s contract to the team in 2009 (derived simply by subtracting the player salary from their value).
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Posted in 2009 Season, Uncategorized | No Comments »
Friday, October 16th, 2009
A few days late, but oh well. This is the last you’ll hear from me for about 10 days, as I’m going on vacation next week, but I suspect somebody else will post something while I’m gone. Or…they won’t. Either way, with the Yankees and Phillies playing in their respective League Championship Serieses, I can think of no better time to get away, other than maybe the following week if they wind up playing in the World Series. Here are the Mets’ pitchers grades, and if you thought the hitters grades were ugly, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.
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Posted in 2009 Season, Bobby Parnell, Brian Stokes, Fernando Nieve, Frankie Rodriguez, J.J. Putz, Johan Santana, John Maine, Livan Hernandez, Mike Pelfrey, Oliver Perez, Sean Green, Tim Redding | 2 Comments »
Wednesday, October 14th, 2009
Since grading the Mets’ hitters first half was such a rousing success, I thought I would grade their whole season now that it has mercilessly ended. This is still a very, very hacky thing to do, but with the World Series possibly shaping up as an Alien vs. Predator-esque Phillies/Yankees finale, I need to distract myself from that impending doom somehow. I will grade the pitchers tomorrow.
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Posted in "Nasty" Nick Evans, 2009 Season, Alex Cora, Anderson Hernandez, Angel Pagan, Argenis Reyes, Brian Schneider, Carlos Beltran, Carlos Delgado, Cory Sullivan, Daniel Murphy, David Wright, Emil Brown, Fernando Martinez, Jeff Francouer, Jeremy Reed, Luis Castillo, Omir Santos, Ramon Martinez, Ryan Church | 4 Comments »
Monday, September 28th, 2009
I have probably complained about Jerry Manuel enough this season. Anybody who reads this blog should already know I don’t like him, and think he’s a terrible manager. I probably should move on. But here’s an example of why I don’t, involving one of my other causes since the All Star break:
You’re Jerry Manuel. You are manager of the New York Mets, and you probably aren’t feeling too much pressure to win at this point. After all, the team has clinched 4th place, it is one loss away from 90 for the season, and next year’s first round draft pick will be protected from free agency. These last few games, there is literally nothing to play for, other than development of players for next year and perhaps a few moral victories from players who have struggled in some way, be it with a lack of power (David Wright) or injuries (Carlos Beltran). Plus, you can assume that management will not fire you because they will not want to pay two managers in 2010.
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Posted in 2009 Season, Jerry Manuel | No Comments »
Friday, September 25th, 2009
Coming into the 2009 season, I felt pretty good about Jerry Manuel as manager of the Mets. He had an impossible job to handle at the end of 2008, handling the disastrous Mets bullpen, and seemed to do as good a job as one man can do handling that pit. He tried to minimize platoon situations as much as possible. He went with the hot hand at closer. He tried to piece together the best with what he was given, and he seemed to do as good a job as anybody could do in that situation.
I would also be lying if I didn’t say that the man was an engaging post-game interview. Following the days of Willie Randolph monotonously saying one tired cliche after another, Jerry seemed like a welcome change, with his infectious chuckle and animated, lively presence in trying to piece together what went wrong that night. He also proved himself to be a leader who wouldn’t be bullied, when he benched Jose Reyes during his first day in the job after Reyes came up lame running out a grounder. He seemed to be the answer the Mets were looking for, and I was actually happy to have him around.
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Posted in 2009 Season, Jerry Manuel | 3 Comments »
Thursday, September 3rd, 2009
Nothing better sums up the 2009 Mets season than this picture. Brilliant.
Posted in 2009 Season | 1 Comment »
Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009
Thirteen months ago, the Mets found themselves noticably thin in the outfield corner spots. Moises Alou had appeared in a mere 15 games, and would not play again this season (and perhaps ever; he has not played in the majors since). Ryan Church was still battling the effects of post-concussion syndrome. Endy Chavez had been an absolutely dreadful hitter, and his all-world defense was not appreciated by the front office (full disclosure: after every single Endy Chavez at-bat, I wished to never see him bat as a Met again, so I didn’t appreciate him at the time either). Even Marlon Anderson was hurt, robbing the Mets of their worst possible choice to play left field regularly.
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Posted in 2009 Season, Daniel Murphy | 1 Comment »
Friday, August 28th, 2009
Well, more accurately, I have been on Twitter for months, but I’m actually going to start using it for things other than writing to ESPN.com columnists. I don’t know exactly what I’ll be doing, probably bitching about the Mets in many fewer words than I do on here, and plugging the website. But if you want to follow me on Twitter, you can do so at http://www.twitter.com/cox813.
Posted in 2009 Season, Housecleaning | No Comments »
Tuesday, August 25th, 2009
And sadly, I don’t mean GOB Bluth, although somehow that would be appropriate too. But with all of the pratfalls that have befallen the Mets this year, from the Tony Bernazard situation and the Adam Rubin situation that grew from it, to the injuries on the field, to the ridiculous poor play, to the downright agonizing ways that this team has lost games, only an absolute masochist could truly enjoy this year’s Mets.
Here is a look at exactly what has gone wrong for this team:
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Posted in 2009 Season, Carlos Beltran, David Wright, Johan Santana, Jose Reyes | 2 Comments »
Saturday, August 8th, 2009
I don’t want to hear about a lack of work or anything…right now, he is getting rocked out there, he just isn’t very good. Too many walks, too many extra base hits, not enough strikeouts. Frankie (he’s not K-Rod anymore) isn’t getting the job done, and he’s not worth a quarter of what he is making this season. Prediction: the Mets will find some way to shut him down to keep from paying that ludicrous option.
Posted in 2009 Season, Frankie Rodriguez | No Comments »
