You may remember that back on April 19th, the Mets purchased the contract of pitcher Nelson Figueroa from Buffalo to make a start against the Milwaukee Brewers. Figgy pitched a decent game allowing just three runs, but the Mets lost 4-2.
Immediately after the game, the Mets designated Figueroa for assignment and came close to losing him as Figueroa refused the assignment and opted to test the free agent waters. Nothing happened for Figgy so he sucked it up and went back to Buffalo. Figueroa is 3-4 with a 2.61 ERA and a 1.11 WHIP. In 76 IP he has allowed just 63 hits and has a solid 58/21 strikeout-to-walk ratio. He was just selected to be the Bisons’ lone representative in the AAA All Star game. Wow…
One little tidbit that is missing from this drama, is that fact reliever Darren O’Day was released to make room for that one and only start by Nelson Figueroa. Remember him?
The 26-year old righthander was originally signed by the Mets after they selected him in the Rule 5 Draft in November. O’Day had a terrific spring and made the trip up north on opening day. He only appeared in four games for the Mets and pitched three scoreless innings before the Mets designated him for assignment.
Two days later he was picked up by the Texas Rangers and he is now one of the biggest weapons in their bullpen.
The young side-armer and former Angels top prospect, has established himself as the Rangers’ premier setup man and currently sports a 1.27 ERA. In 29 innings pitched he has allowed just 21 hits and 8 walks while striking out a whopping 27 batters. His 1.02 WHIP leads the bullpen and he has two wins, one save and nine holds for the Rangers.
Teams and GM’s make mistakes like this all the time. Every team can name one or two costly cuts they never should have been made. But what makes the O’Day cut so bad was how the Mets thought so little of him that they cut him just for one Nelson Figueroa start. In fact the Mets came close to losing both pitchers in a matter of 24 hours with nothing in return to show for them.
So every time you look at the mound and see a Jon Switzer or a Ken Takahashi, remember what we could have had instead.
Remember what we did have and let slip through our fingers.
O’Day had some rough appearances for the Mets early on this season, but some of that could be attributed to the death of Nick Adenhart. He was very shaken by the death of his friend and teammate from his Triple-A days in Salt Lake. Once he recovered from his emotional stress, he took it out on the mound against opposing hitters. Of course, by then the Mets had given up on him. It’s not the first time the Mets pull the plug on a player too early and it certainly won’t be the last.
Yeah, he was doing good also for the Mets and somehow management pulled the plug too damn early.
Man, that was a big mistake. Now we need a side armer now.
I wonder where the Mets would be if they had both Figueroa and O’Day all season long, but especially O’Day who I was glad we picked up during that Rule 5 draft.
Ed brings up a great point about the death of his friend, but he has obviously taken that sorrow and used it to motivate him and the results are pretty dramatic. Evem more so because he’s doing it in the AL.
It’s too bad we didn’t have him in our bullpen right now. Maybe if we did, guys like Green and Feliciano wouldn’t have been so overworked so early in the season.
I like Figgy, and I wish to heck the Mets gave him more chances to prove that he could be decent out of the BP, as a spot starter, or even frequently as the back end of the rotation.
With hindsight, it’s easy to see O’Day as a mistake, but he pitched pretty terribly in his Met appearances. Sorry, but consistent good relief pitching is a pretty rare commodity.
“So every time you look at the mound and see a Jon Switzer or a Ken Takahashi, remember what we could have had instead.”
Who’s to say that O’Day wouldn’t be on the DL right now if the Mets never lost him? I haven’t thought about him since April and won’t think about him again after today. It’s easy to play GM months after the fact, but you never truly know how something or someone is going to play out on your team. Also, how was this costly? The Bullpen has not been the major issue this year, it’s been the hitting. How many wins could he possibly account for even if he pitched well, 2 or 3?
As any Mets blogger would do and always do, we like to check in with former Mets like I did with O’Day and countless others over the years.
In my opinion, and in retrospect this turned out to be a bad move.
Look at Parnell’s ERA 5.07, and I think Switzer was over 9.00.
I understand your point that if you put an O’Day or even a Pujols on the current Mets who’s to say they wouldn’t be on the DL right now. But the point I was making is that it stinks that O’Day is having a great season as the Rangers’ setup man, while we still wonder who our setup man is. Even before Putz got injured his ERA was over 8.00.
Everyone have a nice 4th of July!
Hindsight is 20/20
I was against cutting O’Day, back when it happened. One thing was that we had him pitch the two games immediately after Adenhart’s death. He may be on the DL now, I admit because of our poor training staff. Texas’s bullpen depth is a big part of why they’re contending. I wish him well.
Is it still hind sight if I said the move stunk when we first made it?
http://metsmerizedonline.com/2009/04/what-the-heck-was-that-all-about.html
Joe, Absolutely correct! It is not hindsight but confirmation of the original viewpoint. At the time I commented that “it’s time to start thinking of letting Omar go.” Just one more poor decision in a season of poor decisions.
MASK, THERE U GO AGAIN TOSSING OUT THE BABY.
IF NOT FOR OMAR PICKING UP O’DAY IN THE FIRST PLACE, YOU WOULDN’T HAVE CAUSE TO FIRE HIM FOR LETTING O’DAY GO. I KEEP POINTING OUT, HOW CAN U POSSIBLY FAULT OMAR? WE’VE BEEN WITHOUT REYES,DELGADO,BELTRAN+ FOR NEARLY HALF THE GAMES PLAYED SO FAR & WE’RE STILL ONLY 3 GB. EXACTLY WHAT WOULD U HAVE DONE DIFFERENTLY BEING GIVEN THE REINS TO AN 83-79 TEAM(WHOSE ROTATION WAS HEADED BY LEITER & A CLOSER NAMED LOOPER) TIED FOR THIRD WITH NO MAJOR PROSPECTS IN THE MINORS AND A HARD PAYROLL CAP OF THE LUXURY TAX LINE? CAN YOU NOT REMEMBER IF NOT FOR BOSTON’S FEAR OF NYY, OMAR WOULD’VE SNAGGED DICE-K & DID ACQUIRE SAINT ANA FOR BARELY BETTER THAN A BAG OF BALLS? BTW, EXACTLY, DEFINITIVLY WHAT IS YOUR COMPLAINT(S) AGAINST OMAR? BE REALISTICLY PRECISE. NOT SIGN CASTILLO? HOW DO U ENSURE SANTANA WAIVES HIS NO-TRADE IF HIS GOOD FREIND COMPLAINS OF HOW HE WAS DISSED BY NY? WELL, REMEMBER ALSO, EATING CONTRACTS DOUBLING UP ON CONTRACTS ISN’T ALLOWED EITHER. WITH THOSE CONSTRAINTS & RESTRAINTS YOU WOULD DO EXACTLY WHAT DIFFERENTLY?
Mets62, The problem with Omar is he is just fiddling around doing nothing while the team is decimated with injuries. Instead of trying to obtain at least one pro hitter to fill in a gap, he is just playing wait and see. We cannot go on losing 2/3 games series after series and expect to be anywhere .500 ball let alone 1st place as time goes on. This team will be fighting with the Nats over ownership of the cellar before very long. Other teamms are makig deals to position themselves for the pennant race. The Mets are standing pat in an untenable position. I would rather make a deal to try to stay close so that when some of the injured return we can make a run at 1st place. As it is, if and when the injured return, it will be a day late and a $ short to make any kind of run. He has thrown the season in the crapper with his inaction. I view himm as Nero fiddling while Rome burns to the ground.
Good call Joe
It was more of a generic comment Joe…..
Oh I know that Kay, that’s why I didn’t reply directly to you. I just saw an opportunity to post an old blog that showed my original position.
I thought at the time that the Mets should have made every attempt to keep him rather just than let him go for nothing. We’ve had so many bums move through the team this year, it shouldn’t have been difficult to keep 1 slot for O’Day. Plus I’m getting pretty tired of some the bums who are here now.
We wouldn’t be having this conversation if Putz had not got hurt and Parnell had to step into a role that he was not ready for. After seeing Redding’s start yesterday, the mets should have kept Figgy and allow him to be long man out of BP. Taka and Switz have got to go please. Better figgy than a lefty that cannot get lefties out. Where does Omar come up with these guys? O’Day, I was following him when watching Ranger games and he could have been a complement to Green and give a diff look to batters coming out of BP.
Figgy is more consistent than Redding OR Perez(a Pit bull on crack is more consistent than Perez but that’s another issue)-should have kept him up. He is very similar to Livan so you would have had to stagger the rotation some so they don’t pitch back to back.
I just don’t understand how the mets gm’s go about this mets team, They need to understand direction and focus, playing with heart and not about the money, Omar is just not understanding why he is letting down the mets going this route, he let the wrong players go for bad players in return. It hurts me to see this team play like it was from the 1990-1997 years. No heart and soul and no leadership to add. The money is killing great ballplayers of this game and scott boras is part of this why look at the money the mets were put in to resign ollie perez, give me a break and an agent taking advantage to give him more money in the end. We need salary cap back to stop agents like boras to get ahead and kill baseball and what baseball means to the young generations ahead and bring back the true meaning of baseball. I’m so mad with my mets and this plays apart of there season too. Thanks Larman and please write back to me