As you’re all well aware, Jeff Francoeur will be the Mets new everyday rightfielder. The reaction on this site and all over the blogosphere has been quite vocal, to say the least. I have noticed a share of fans panning the deal, despite the fact that Francoeur has yet to play his first game in a Mets uniform. I will not attempt to compare Ryan Church to Francoeur in this post. I will leave that to other writers on this site. Instead, I will attempt to give you a different perspective on Jeff Francoeur and hope that you will accept him as your new rightfielder. After all, the name on the front of his jersey now says “Mets”, so we should support him as a member of our team.
In New York, in addition to getting the job done, fans demand a hard worker on the field day in and day out. This is why fans loved players such as Ty Wigginton. He never put up All-Star caliber numbers, but he was a hard-nosed player who did the little things to help the team win. From bowling over a catcher while attempting to score a run to challenging the outfielders by taking the extra base, Wigginton was loved by Mets fans during his short stay in New York. His best season for New York came in 2003 when he led the team in games played with 156. Wiggy batted .255 with 11 HR, 71 RBI and 73 runs scored. He also struck out 124 times while drawing only 46 bases on balls.
Wigginton’s 2003 season was eerily similar to Francoeur’s season in 2008, a year in which he was briefly sent down to the minors by the Braves. Francoeur hit .239 last season, with the same 11 HR and 71 RBI Wigginton had in 2003, while playing in 155 games. Frenchy scored 70 runs while striking out 111 times and drawing 39 walks. By the way, Francoeur is now 25. How old was Wigginton during his 2003 season? You guessed it – 25.
The fans who loved Wigginton surely weren’t applauding his stats, as they were less than spectacular. They were able to see his grit and determination to help the team win by any means necessary, even if his contributions did not show up in the boxscore. Francoeur can be that same type of player. He’s certainly showed his durability by playing in all 162 games twice in his career. No one is better at throwing out runners trying to take an extra base, as he has more outfield assists than anyone else in baseball since he made his debut in 2005. If he fails to drive in a run while batting, he will go all out to prevent the opposing team from adding a run with his strong and accurate arm.
Francoeur has also made great strides to cut down on his strikeouts. Although he is still a free swinger, he is now making much better contact, as evidenced by his decreasing strikeout totals. Since his first full season in 2006, he has reduced his strikeout totals from 132 to 129 to 111 last season. This year, he has only whiffed a total of 46 times in 304 at-bats. Although he is only hitting .250, the lack of strikeouts suggest that he is more likely to raise his average than lower it. After all, you can’t get a base hit by striking out. You can only raise your average by making contact, which is something Francoeur is certainly making more of this year.
Mets fans, I know some of you loved Ryan Church. I also know some of you are claiming that this is just a trade for the sake of making a trade. You say the Mets could have gotten more than Jeff Francoeur and you might be correct. However, this is what I say. Did any of you really think Ryan Church was going to be a permanent fixture in right field? Francoeur certainly has more of a chance than Church to be more than just a stopgap player in right. Also, the Mets did not have to lose any of their minor league trading chips to acquire Francoeur. If Omar is going to continue his attempt to make this team better before the trade deadline, he’s going to need those minor leaguers in order to get major league talent in return. A potential trade suitor is not going to take Ryan Church for one of their high-salaried players that they’re willing to deal. They will take cheaper minor leaguers that they can control for a longer period of time, players with the potential to help the team for more years than a Ryan Church could. If he so chooses, Omar can now use some of those minor leaguers that weren’t used to acquire Francoeur and turn them into an Alex Rios or a quality starting pitcher.
Before panning this trade, take a look at all the variables in the equation. As with all trades, this could be a bust or a godsend for the Mets. At the very least, give Francoeur a chance. If you’re going to Citi Field tonight, cheer him on when he comes to bat. You never know. He might give you plenty of reasons to cheer for him in the future.
“After all, the name on the front of his jersey now says “Mets”, so we should support him as a member of our team.”
Thank you. This is a very good post, I feel. And i’m tired of all the negativity. Look. Frenchy is a Met. No amount of complaining is going to change that now. SO SUPPORT HIM! He now plays for the Mets. And i live by these mets, Win or lose. So i’m cheering this guy on.
And News Flash to some people : He’s not bad! All trades carry the risk of becoming a bust because you can’t script baseball. If you’ve got the entirety of Francoeur’s career as a Met on DVD, please let me see it. Because if there’s one thing I’ve learned in my years of watching baseball, is that you expect the unexpected. Did anyone expect Santos to tear it up? Did anyone expect Nieve to even have a role? Give the guy a chance. That’s what i’m asking.
You’ve created a straw man.
No one is arguing that they “hate” Jeff Francoeur as a human being and will be rooting against him. The rational among us are complaining that this is a terrible trade that, along with the silly Omir Santos situation, does not bode well for the future of this franchise. They are totally separate things, which you are blending together for the sake of a straw man argument.
“Frenchy is a Met. No amount of complaining is going to change that now.”
By this rationale, we shouldn’t ever question what the front office does. We should just say “oh well, no use complaining, LETS GO METS!!##!##!”. This is the wrong attitude.
I never said that anyone hated Jeff. I contest that tt really wasn’t a bad trade, though. By saying that it doesn’t bode well for the future of the franchise, you’re basically saying that Jeff is incapable of helping the future of the franchise. Jeff is under team control longer than Church would’ve been, and he statistically provides more power. I’m not going to sit here and say Omar’s a good GM, or that this trade will save us. But i strongly believe it will help. I think he deserves a chance to show us what he’s got on the field in a new environment before everyone clamors that it’s “incredibly foolish”, as you wrote on your site. And no, by saying that, I meant to stop complaining about the trade and try to find the good in Jeff, because I believe it’s there.
James, I was actually going to leave a comment for you on a previous thread, but decided against it. I do however want to respond to that comment as well as this one.
First of all, I believe you took offense to a post and accused it of cherry picking some comments, but he cherry picked two negative comments and two positive comments.
What compelled me to comment to you now was the fact that your site created an entire post of about a dozen or more negative cherry picked comments from Braves Chop. You even included one comment that this very site posted in their original blog. And while the original post here was balanced in portraying Francoeur, your post was created for the sole purpose of bashing him and encouraging other Mets fans to join in which I see that they did by the hundreds.
I just saw your most recent post this morning which lists all of your Francoeur posts of the day:
Failcouer Posts
Mets Trade Ryan Church For Jeff Francoeur
Instant Opinions Of The Jeff Francoeur Trade From The Best In The Business
Quick Math Lesson
More Thoughts On The Francoeur Trade
Braves Fans React To Church-For-Francoeur
You mock Francoeur in your summary title and you bashed him in every single one of your posts.
I never saw a more egregious case of Mets bashing in all my years, and I have 62 of them. I find your site offensive, arrogant, and the worst example of team spirit of any Mets site I have ever visited. Most of the Mets sites I visited were split on the trade, but whatever their opinion they laid out well versed arguments, certainly not that moaning and groaning that emanated from your site.
You went ahead and referred to yourself as objective and intelligent in the other thread, and then you actually have the gall to post that kind of 24 hour Mets bashing on your own site?
It’s okay to hate the trade, but to launch an all day assault and not even have anyone else on your staff post a counterpoint for the most minimum of balance?
That my friend is not objective or intelligent.
Ed, I want to thank you for posting several blogs on the trade yesterday, including one that was skeptical, one that was objective, and one that embraced him. This site gave Mets fans a real sense of how our fan base felt and it was done without the need to bash the opposing viewpoint and most importantly, with respect for the reader. You and your staff do a fine job here.
Thank you. We try our best to provide an accurate representation of our entire fan base. Not everyone is going to like a move the team makes, but I have never seen the fan base be 100% for or against a trade the team makes. Therefore, our opinions should take on all fronts. Naturally, everyone’s entitled to an opinion, but basically when a person says his/her opinion’s right and he/she is going to pound that opinion into you until you’re with him/her on it…not too cool if you ask me. We Mets fans are better than that.
Jeez, this has nothing to do with hating the Mets. It has to do with hating the thought process behind the trade. And if trades like this continue to be made, then the franchise is headed for a downward spiral.
It’s a terrible trade, and all the writers at AA agreed. What are we supposed to write? That we love it when really don’t? That we are excited we traded a good player for a bad player? We don’t sugarcoat things, we say what we think based on objective evidence. And all the rah-rah talk and LETS GO METS!!! isn’t going to change that this is a bad trade. Thank you for the well thought out comment though.
Thanks for the comment, but I felt I needed to intervene. I can assure you that James and the rest of the gang at AA have their heart in the right places where the Mets are concerned. In fact last week, I was interviewed for another site and when asked what my three favorite blogs are, one of them was Amazin Avenue. We don’t always agree on the road to a Mets championship, but our loyalty to the team is unquestioned. Me and James often get into a healthy debate about a number of topics from time to time, but it is a HEALTHY debate, and nothing more.
I also want to point out that the fact we had three different view points posted on our site, was purely coincidental and not planned. We never discuss what we post amongst ourselves. It may very well be that sometimes we will post the same opinions on something 3-4 times a day, like they did at Amazin Avenue.
Anyway, thanks again for the comment, and I hope you understand what I was trying to convey. Also thanks for supporting the site.
Lets get another win today guys!
Thanks for the kind words Joe. My loyalty to the Mets is unquestionable, and any suggestion (“egregious case of Met bashing”, from Metcentric’s comment) that I’d root for a Met to fail is ridiculous. I was at the game today and to see Jeff get 2 hits was great. If he can continue to do that the rest of the season, awesome.
Also, the idea that it is a requirement to post a “counterpoint” simply for the sake of doing it is ridiculous (this is also directed Metcentric’s comment). Write what you think – this isn’t 10th Grade Debate Club, where you are assigned to take a position even if you don’t believe it.
Thank you for being a voice of reason. Hopefully when the hysteria dies down, everyone will embrace our newest Met just like all the other players. I cant help feeling that if Murphy had the exact same career and numbers as Francouer, nobody would even be making a stink, because he was homegrown.
I agree with Ed and Joe D. Get behind your team. Find the good in this trade and open up your mind. GO METS! Welcome to New York Jeff!
wow great stuff. i love the deal did we really screw the team up more than what it was? not possible. gut feeling is that he will improve now that he is with us and next year we might see the old french men. and as good as church was in right jeff is that much better. i love the move and as omar says these are baby steps. we dont have the prospects but is rios and halladay next? we take rios contract and we may not have to give up that much!!!
if he fails, he’s going to be run out of town
Excellent post. To all of the naysayers, just think about a few things. We all knew Church was on his way out, nobody on this board or anywhere else but under a rock would question that. While I felt Church was a very good player and enjoyed having him in Flushing, I knew he was going elsewhere. In getting Francoeur, we got a player with more upside than Church has, a guy who’s 4 years younger, and if he fails, big deal. We didn’t give up anything that we didn’t already know we would be losing in the next 20 days or at the most 3 months, and we got a guy in return who could fill the spot in RF for us for the next decade, or he could fall flat, and then so what? We didn’t give up any chips to get him, just a guy who was being chased out of town anyway.
I’m not suggesting that Minaya and Manuel were right to chase Church from New York, but they did, and there was nothing that we could do about that. We should at least be grateful that when they did finally give him the boot, we got something that could be good in return, as opposed to a sack of bats and balls or cash (because we know that wouldn’t go towards helping the team…). At best, Francoeur will be a solid player for us and a gold glover in RF for years to come. At worst, we part ways with him, and move on, having only lost a guy who, while a solid player, was on his way out anyway.
I don’t want to blindly accept anything said or done by Minaya or Manuel as the gospel, I just honestly think this is a good deal for us, all things considered. I live in North Florida, a 5-hour drive from Turner Field (still Braves country), and the attitude that I’m hearing here is either disappointment that Francoeur is gone, or indifference to both players. I think we should be looking at it for what it is: 2 similar players swapped for one another, we gave up the guy who’s perhaps SLIGHTLY better at the moment for the guy with 10 times the potential, and both players desperately needed a change of scenery. If there’s a trade where both teams can win from it, this is it.
I never said I disliked Francouer or that I was upset that he is now a Met. I’m glad to have him, and he seems thrilled to be here, I just don’t see what was so “wow” about this trade. We need a BIG move, and I don’t think this was it. I’m taking nothing away form Jeff as a player or a person. I’m sure he will do well and will contribute, but I don’t think it’s going to be anything spectacular in comparison to Ryan Church. This trade alone is not enough to turn this team around. We need more.
I dont think the trade improved the Mets, it was more like a lateral move. However, sometimes a trade, even an unsignificant one, can help energize a team and transform the chemistry of a team. We won’t know if that will happen for another week or two, but maybe it will, and last night there semed to be some positive vibes that I got from the game. That said, unless Reyes or Beltran are back within the next 10-14 days, we do still need to make another move for a bat.
My real problem with the trade is if it is the only trade Omar makes, then we have a real problem for the balance of the season. I believe we need another trade badly. If this is it, then wow this is hugely disappointing. Omar needs to get on the stick and make a real trade. This one was just a little teaser and could be a marginal improvement or could just as easily be a loser. The bottom line is we really need Omar to bring in a bonafide hitter.
This is from mlb.com, taken from the night of the trade:
Minaya also said the team “needed something different” and is far from done in the trade market.
“We’ve got to keep on trying to do these kinds of things,” Minaya said. “We’re not going to say, ‘This is it.’ As a front office, we’re going to do some things to shake it up.”
I hope Omar means what he says and that by “shaking things up”, he does mean a good hitter has to be brought in. I’m glad they’re finally not standing pat and are trying to do whatever it takes the make the team better now. I’m thinking this is a stepping stone from which other deals will be made.
Thanks Ed. Hopefully he’s got some irons in the fire and there are some real changes near term. More help is needed and I don’t think wait and see works any longer. At least this sounds a little promising.