Re: New York Mets 2010: The Magic is... um...
Yes...
Bay > Delgado
Francouer > Sheffield (at this point in their careers)
Molina > Castro (this was operating at the time I thought we had Molina locked up)
Howard Johnson spoke a local hall of fame dinner a few weeks ago that i covered for newspaper and I talked with him afterwards and he is VERY high on Daniel Murphy establishing himself as a 20 HR, 90 RBI, .300 hitter this season.
I asked him about the pitching and of course he dodged the question but he did think the team at the time was going to address the problem. Obviously this was right before Sheets and Pinerno went to other teams...
Maybe we'll take a flyer on Wang. At this point we have nothing to lose. At worst he'll still compete for the 5th starter spot even if he struggles. At best we have ourselves a solid #2 pitcher if he can pitch the way he did winning 19 games three straight years.
Delgado's last healthy season for the Mets he hit .271/.353/.518
Bay's last season .267/.384/.537. I'll grant you that I expected Bay to outperform 2008 Delgado however I expected Delgado to play like he did in the second half of 2008 for all of 2009. Instead he hurts the hip stretching for an unneeded triple landing on the hip he should have surgery for long before the 2008 season ever began. I'm not comparing 2010 Bay to 2009 Delgado. I think we all know we expect more from 2010 Bay than 2009 Delgado. However, the expectations for 2009 Delgado were close to what we'll expect from Bay. That's what I'm arguing here, expectations.
.276//372/.451 That's Sheffield's line. At age 312 or however old he is. He was less than 20 points away of OPS from Frenchy's amazing stint with the Mets.
Basically Frenchy had the year of his life in his short stint with the Mets and barely outhit a decrepit Gary Sheffield. Woohoo! I'm pretty sure I'm willing to put 2009 Sheffield up against 2010 Frenchy. Anyone want to make some bets here?
Who will have the higher OPS, Frenchy 2010 or Sheffield 2009. Don't all rush up at once.
All I'm saying is looking at our expectations of the 2009 Mets lineup, I expected more from that team on paper than I will of the 2010 lineup. And the fact that the Mets have quietly slashed 20 million from the payroll and avoided getting flack for it is really annoying.
And of course HoJo is high on Murphy. What is he supposed to say, that Murphy stinks? HoJo has been a much maligned hitting coach in his time with the Mets and I think if he wasn't a former Met star he would have been canned.
And don't even get me started on Warthen who has the brilliant idea of shaming pitchers into throwing strikes. Hey Warthless how about you pay attention to their mechanics, teach them new pitches, etc...find out if they're telegraphing certain pitches...you know the job that pitching coaches are supposed to do.
Warthen has no track record of success. But that's OK! We let Rick Peterson go to be the scapegoat and Warthen is terrible.
The worst part is at midseason HoJo and Warthen will likely be fired....just to delay the firing of Omar and Manuel at season's end.
Just fire all 4 guys right now and hire competent people at each position. Oh, and while you're at it fire Jeff Wilpon for thinking he's an executive with baseball management skills instead of being an owner. You sign the checks lil Jeffy, you don't make personnel decisions.
Anyone who thinks Omar is really in charge right now is deluding themselves. He's just the scapegoat for Jeff making stupid decision after stupid decision. Until the Wilpons leave this team won't win.
After that I don't expect them to do much. 