In kind of a surprising move last week, although not really, the Florida Marlins jumped into the sweepstakes for Cuban left-handed pitcher Aroldis Chapman. The Marlins reportedly offered the young phenom a five-year deal for $13 million dollars. That averages out to about $2.5 million annually.
The Red Sox have reportedly offered a similar five year deal for a little more at $15 million dollars.
As the Mets continue signing these risk/reward type players like Kelvim Escobar, Ryota Igarashi, and Clint Evert, all of whom have considerable risk, but came cheap, why haven’t the Mets made a play for what could be the best risk/reward player on the market as well as the best and healthiest starting pitcher still left?
We’ve all heard and read about the 22-year old defector who has many scouts drooling over his 102 mph fastball, but with a Mets bullpen still short a left-hander, why not take a shot on this kid and break him in as a reliever at first sort of like the Yankees did with Joba Chamberlain?
It’s been said by many, that Aroldis Chapman would easily be the overall number one pick if he were to be eligible for the Amateur Draft in June. If that is truly the case, shouldn’t the Mets (who didn’t even have a first round pick in 2009) be “all-in” on a player of this caliber and this much potential?
The types of offers being discussed are very similar to what a number one overall pick would get anyway, and considering that the Mets spent “LESS” than any other team in the Major Leagues in last year’s draft, why are they choosing to sit this one out?
Chapman has been compared to phenom Stephen Strasburg, last year’s #1 overall pick by the Nationals. That’s a heck of a comparison if you were to ask me, and it could mean the Mets would get themselves a potential ace left-handed starter to replace Johan Santana at the end of his contract. Until then, Chapman could become a viable number two starter that would certainly fill the Mets needs and for a lot less than they would have had to pay Roy Halladay or John Lackey for just one year.
“Aroldis is special,” said one scout who has monitored and watched Chapman. “He doesn’t have the command and control of Strasburg, but he could end up being another Randy Johnson. When Randy was drafted, some people said he’d never get it together and be any good. Aroldis is one of those great talents that comes around and you hope he eventually grows up enough to master it.”
You want to talk low risk and high reward players?
Well here is potentially the best of the lot.
Do IT!!!!!!
They’re not going to do it. He has too much earnings potential for the Mets to be interested. They will forego the performance potential to maintain the current small market approach they have adopted. Moreover, if they should sign him, they have no clue how to develop his potential anyway. The Mets current mgmt would turn him into a bust. Best to stay away and just play the bottom of the barrel game.
They have the highest payroll in the NL so why is it that people think the they’re acting like a small market team. Also, developing a prospect is a team effort which we have done before. A large part of our ML team comes from our minor leagues not to mention that a lot of the personnel that help in the development were changed this off season.
They may have the highest NL payroll, but what good is that if the spending is unwise (just look at $36 mil blown on Ollie)? What have they done recently regarding meaningful player acquisiton (Cora, Coste, Blanco, Dickey)? How many players that came up from the Mets farm system were unable to perform up to expectations in the Majors (examples, Murphy, Evans, Parnell, FMart, even Pelfrey) because of inadequate development under Mets tutelage?
I like that you said unwise spendind. Those signings that you listed are small signings. They were not ment to put them over the top. All teams make the small insignificant signings please check it out. Last year we were not going for those high priced pitcher since we signed Johan the year before and we were going to compete with the ridiculous Yankees. Ollie was a known quality to the Mets and most pitchers were getting bloated contracts. If Omar was shut out of the off season the fan base would go ballistic on him and he was not going to give in to Lowe for the extra year that he wanted. Shouldn’t we be appreciative of Omar for learning from his previous mistakes of signing an aging veteran Pedro)for one year too many although, then he had to and you know why.
As for the players that came up to help last season, Non of these players were the cream of the crop of our farm system with the exeption of Pelfrey and FMart. Fmart was 21 and a part time rookie. Remember even HOF Willie Mays was 0 for 21 when he came up, give him a break. Pelfrey has shown that he can be successful but like other players on the team he did not have a good year. Parnell is a talent that needs a spot and time, there is no problem with that, do you.
Now I must remind you of some of our successes that we still have; Wright and Reyes. Some more bright spots for the near future; Niese, Thole, Santos and Davis.
Don’t forget a few trades or pick ups in no specific order that Omar made that were a little beneficial to us; Francoeur, Delgado, Ollie, Maine, Sheffield, Santana, Pagan, KROD, Putz, Nieve, Figueroa and Misch to name a few.
As you can see, I don’t think he has done a bad job. Last year they were too hurt to trade for anyone. That would have been a waste. Fans would argue that we didn’t have sufficient talent to back up our regulars but what team could survive that comlete debacle. Just my opinion.
Reyes, very well put. Few consider the total lack of valued prospects on hand when Omar was hired. It’s very easy to name each and every one of them. please bear with me. the entire list of top prospects within the Mets entire farm system when Omar was hired was: LASTINGS MILLEDGE! As Porky once said, “THAT’S ALL, FOLKS!”
Considering he also inherited a Major League roster coming off a(71-91) 4TH place finish, being NYC, the MLB concerns were obviously a higher priority than the MILB ones.
Fixing the one meant sacrificing draft picks needed to fix the other. hamstrung by Wilpoon insistance upon adherance to Slotting guidelines re. signing bonus payments, the top draftable talents passed us by. While the lack of prospect depth is often mistaken for a lack of total depth, for the Mets that’s obviously a mirage as they were able to use 12 SP, 4 SS, 4 1b, 7-8 ofers in ’09 without being held up in trade demands looking for backfills. With all their resources, The Yanks were strapped for a decent backfill for one player(A-Rod) last yr, somehow Omar managed to replace nearly 10 simultaneouslyincl 75% of thew CORE, 80% of the rotation (Santana,Maine,Perez,Redding).
With all of that, people are complaining we didn’t win? Hell, it was remarkable we didn’t forfeit!(lol)
ReyesforPrez,
I read your comment as one giant whitewash. I’m sorry, but I have to disagress with your viewpoint. Omar has not made a single move of any value since prior to the ’09 season. The little moves are nothing but window dressing without any urgency. The important moves have all been missed. We are going into next season with a rotation that is a near disaster. We will “wait and see” while the 2010 season gets away from us just as 2009 did. Wright and Reyes are old news by far as regards homegrown talent. There are too many examples of unprepared players being brought up before they are ready. Their development was lacking and it reflects on the competence of the farm system. You cite Niese, Thole, Santos and Davis as future players that will be prepared properly. Neise and Thole, however, have already shown deficiencies that need correction and the final verdict is far from clear. Santos does not even count as he was acquired. I certainly hope they don’t screw up Davis, but his development also needs to be demonstrated. Omar has overseen an organization that has little resemblance to a large market organization. The reality is that the team operates in a large market but suffers from a small market mentality. The responsibility lies jointly between the ownership and the GM. You can blame the owners all you want, but a good GM needs to know how to manage the owners and push back against their controls and limitations. Omar is not up to that. Again, sorry but I disagree with your viewpoint.
Yanks go out & sign C.C., Tex, & A.J. That is a big market team, not afraid to sign 3 high priced free agents in the same offseason. Mets signed K-Rod (give them full credit for that) but followed it up with an assortment of clowns who were low risk/high reward types. So just because their payroll is 2nd highest, it doesnt make them a “big market” team. Granted, only the Yanks (and maybe the Bosox) splurge like that but when you have 2 seasons like 2007 & 2008, you know you’re quite close to being a team that goes deep in the playoffs, you go all out & make a play for the best available talent. Having said that, I do not blame them for not signing Lackey & I would urge them to even lower the offer to Bay. Both not worth the money they’ve gotten/asking for. Save your money for the big fish that might pop up next off season, but make sure you blow them away with your offers.
Your big market Yanks extremely over paid for all three but specially AJ. AJ is last seasons Lackey. He has the tools but there is always a question with his health and again they got lucky that he stayed healthy and didn’t cause any more trouble for the team with the catcher issue. Thank god for the Yankees that they were winning because that fiasco would cause problems if they weren’t. They have him for a lot more years for a lot of money so we’ll see how it’ll play out. As for Tex, he sucked before AROD got there and had a lot of dry spells throughout although his defense was great. And Fatso(CC)just wait. Now those three signings put them over the top of course but what other team would overkill like that. It’s fair to say that not even the Red Sox would be so irresponsible and if you think that the Mets tickets were expensive then what do you think that the normal Yankee fan was thinking last year.
Winning when no one is in your league is not fun.
Now the clowns that Omar signed were suppose to make them world champions. Putz, Green and stokes along with KROD were added to what we had and Wagner at the end of the season. Three closers!!! of course it didn’t work out but those are the breaks.
Now what you said in your statement was that if you had a team that was close, why not go all out. Well when you’re that close you don’t need but a few pieces, not restructure your pitching staff specially since at the time you had a good feeling about the people that you already have and signed. Remember that the Yankees missed the playoffs the year before and they could careless what the payroll would look like at the end of the day. They proof this point every year. Last year they bid against themself for AJ. How could you beat that. I could see overpaying sometimes to get players to come to you vice the place where they would like to play but that was ridiculous. I bet you were one of these fans that wanted Lowe for the contract he got. Come on you got to have some type of control.
Keith, where were u in ’05? Didn’t we come within an eyelash of a similar trifecta? Pedro, Beltran, Delgado? if not for Bernazard’s blundering compounded by Delgado’s agent favoring Fl is that not big time enough? What no mention of Santana? Wagner? U obviously are a NYY fan disguised as the greatest defensive 1b ever. Go put your Mattingly shirt back on!
****They’re not going to do it. He has too much earnings potential for the Mets to be interested. They will forego the performance potential to maintain the current small market approach they have adopted. Moreover, if they should sign him, they have no clue how to develop his potential anyway. The Mets current mgmt would turn him into a bust. Best to stay away and just play the bottom of the barrel game.****
I know, right? If they tried to sign him, they’d probably accidentally sign some guy at Costco with a similar name. If they did sign the right guy, they’d accidentally set him on fire. If he actually made it onto the field for them, that would PROVE that he actually SUCKS because only sucky players get signed by the Mets, survive their player-burning ways, and take the field.
Now, we can believe that, or we can get some perspective.
Please omar, for once we got a chance to get a good young pitcher wit dwight gooden credentials!! Please sign him, itd be inexplicable for u or mets mgment for that matter to have sign oliver perez for 36 million!!!! And not this kid for 16-18 and control him for about 5-6 years.. This would come most of us mets fans a lil over ur ineptivity to have sign someone.
The Mets are too stupid of an organization to actually sign a player who can greatly upgrade their rotation. That is why we signed Blanco who quickly failed the physical but was signed anyway. And should I mention the Dickey signing?
Until we get rid of all these clowns like Omar, Jerry and bring in proven baseball people this organization will continue to bottom feed.
The Mets should be ashame to call themselves a New York team. They really belong in Pittsburg.
if you had to make dicisions to make this off season as the Mets GM, What would you do?
Ouch, way to insult Pittsburgh.
As a long standing Met fan (since day one) I would like management to get
real. Give a deadline to Bay and Molina, sign a pitcher and be honest with your fan base. If Omar and company stay mute, there will be consequences (empty seats are hard to stomach)Omar step up, we will back you up if Bay doesn’t want to play here, I hear Beirut is lovely this time of year. Go Mets GO !!!!!!!
That’s what I like to here. You are a real Mets fan. I have the same feelings towards making altimatums to these players. I think the problem with the off season with the Mets is that they don’t let people know what the plan is and the media(Yankee Fan media) speculate and bad mouth the Mets and the boderline Mets fan runs with it.
By all accounts, this Cuban could be the best thing since El Duque in his prime or even better. If the Marlins can offer 13MM there is no reason for us not to top that with a 16MM offer. Annually, that’s still less than what they paid Tim Redding last season and less than half what they paid JJ Putz.
Signing Aroldis Chapman makes too much sense for this organization that suffers from a permanent brain cramp to do.
I’m waiting to see what’s the excuse going to be, or if they even address this issue.
Everyone is comparing him to Strasburg from Nats but what are his stats. I have seen some video of him and he looks, dare I say it, a younger version of Ollie. He may throw hard but he also has to throw it for strikes and before we start handing a spot as #2 in rotation, lets see what he does in minors against good hitting. How would Met handle his lack of control? Warthen couldn’t straighten out Ollie, Pelfrey, or Maine and you want to hand over a coveted prospect to be taught by a pitching coach who has not cojones and throws his catchers under the bus.
Of course I would be for this signing but Mets would need to hire an experienced coach or retired player to shadow him, teach him and show him out to get the best out of his stuff.
I doubt that he is ready for 2010 and maybe not for 2011 but he is a project worth taking on, only if Mets commit to the proper coaching and mentoring and not allow Warthen near him.
If the reports are correct then Mets need to swoop in and blow him away with an offer.
Bye to Bay and Molina cause they need Mets more than Mets need them, there are other options out there that are cheaper and can give Mets depth.
Agreed. Signing Chapman only makes sense if we really develop him properly. I would be all for signing him, but not as a ML starter or (preferably just keep him in the minors) for at least a year or two. He definitely needs more time to develop.
We will see, I’m thinking we don’t sign him, he will be a best pitcher of the comming decade, if we do sign him , he will trip over a cat or have a lawn mower accident and dislocate his shoulder or tear a tendon and end his career
[...] Will the Mets make a surprise move for Cuban phenom, Aroldis [...]
I strongly believe the ’10 season may be deliberatly scuttled by Jeff as his reason to finally force his father to fire Omar, Jeff’s nemesis & target since ’07. Jeff is insulated & I’ve long felt his blind ambition & super-ego was targeted to so disenchant Daddy, that the team is turned over to him to run, much as the crosstowners were handed to the heirs early. Jeff, controls SNY and has there ever been a sports-flagship so anti the home team? by denigrating the brand he sees himself capable of turning it around & becoming the biggest hero in NYC. Read your bibles, in Jewish history, second sons are often forced into devious schemes. Most likely being #2 Jeff is more favored by Mom than Dad, big brother is already running the Nippon holdings of Sterling. While “big bro” was given an important position as an earner in the family core business, Lil’ Jeffie runs the hobby and deals with his father imposed babysitter, Omar. As old as the storyline is as often as it’s rehashed by Hollywood, the kid has targeted his sitter for extinction. We’ve been setup as jurists with prosecution supplied details of the crime and Jeff controlled SNY as the press coverage.
Mask, whose expectations? Evans & Murphy were, I think, third rounders without full milb development. F-Mart signed as 16 yr old, now what? 21? with just a smidgeon of mlb exposure & being called a flop? Me thinks, expectations are far from realistic on all; but Pelfrey, the sole firstrounder, rushed through development rarely is any credit forthcoming on developing to allstar caliber infielders in Wright & Reyes. For a team that’s lost their firstround pick more often than they’ve had one over past 5 yrs and been thwarted by adhereing to slot rules they actually haven’t been as horrid as we’re being told they are. By comparison, neither Phl or Atl has signed a type A or B requiring loss of pick over the same time period. Phillips left us with only 2 potential top prospects, Milledge & Kazmir. of those Milledge “fell”to us since everyone questioned his character after high school sex scandal was released & Kazmir was dealt away by Duquette under orders from Jeff & advice of Peterson.
I’m truly amazed that with all the intelligence constantly in evidence on this site, that I’m the only one who sees the Jeff ordered roster decimation by Duquette without inclusion of cash to ensure decent prospect returns as the Low Water Mark for our farm system. Smart teams generally restock their farm systems when dealing away veteran players and generally get higher grade prospects if they offer cash to buffer the contracts dealt away. Jeff ordered Duquette NOT TO consider any deal requiring cash inclusion.
The net result was the trading away of Alomar,Benitez,Burnitz,Ventura, Zeille with only one creidible prospect(Royce Ring) in return.
Expectations? Normal expectations for supposedly ML players.
Mask, ther’s certainly undo pressure from the fanbase to excellerate these prospects so your crack re. supposed MLB quality playwers is well taken; but I believe it’s imperativer to show a lot of patrience with younger callups. If u don’t u wind upo never seeing the likes of a Willie Mays or u trade away a NOLAN RYAN, Amos Otis, Ken Singleton, Scott Kazmir. Patience is certainly a virtue and NYC for all she is, she isn’t virtuous.lol Try to recall how many were labeling Reyes a bust after his early injury issues? Where would we have been from ’05 to ’08 without him at the top?
Mask, your 3:05pm comment stating, “Omar has not made a single move of any value since prior to the ‘09 season. The little moves are nothing but window dressing without any urgency. The important moves have all been missed.” was again, unreplyable this was your next “invalid”(lol)posting. to which I reply, whoever this is posing as “the only maskman” please let the somewhat succinct, usually provacative, always reasonable, REAL MASK, loose, Where do I start? “not made a single move of any value prior to ’09? BELTRAN,DELGADO,SANTANA,WAGNER,SANCHEZ,FELICIANO all qualify as significant valuable upgrades prior to ’09! Is there a better CFer in NL than Beltran? Who was the 1b prior to Omar? Thew ‘ACE’? Lieter?, Glavine? Benson? Zambrano? Mask in a few short years Omar has totally turned over 99% of the Roster making Jose Reyes thew single longest tenured active Met for at least 2 yrs now. Changing ownership’s minds/policies? Do u believe anything short of a miracle would get this franchise that historically observed the free agency market to go from total non-entities to significant players? Why do I have to always be your memory? U’ve been around this team as long as I. Recall this, the very first foray into FA mkt was an unsuccessful bid to ink Dave Winfield against perennial F/A signing powerhouse “THE BOSS”. The first “big” successful signing was George Foster in early 80s. then absolutly nothing significant until 2004/05 offseason w/ Omar landing Pedro,Beltran w/near miss on Delgado. This franchise was taken from one that repaired with spit & bailing wire to one that looked at the top shelf F/A with avarice instead of forlorn longing. Try this:OMAR EFFECT:
NEED SOLUTION
MGR WILLLIE
RESPECT PEDRO
OFFENSE BELTRAN & DELGADO
CLOSER WAGNER
ACE SANTANA
CLOSER K-ROD
Just because the solutions u cried out for weren’t chosen does not minimize the actual solutions chosen. you are being less than honest if you believe anyone could alter a higher powered person’s CORE BELIEFS through cajoling. Dragging this franchise KICKING & SCREAMING into the new age of baseball is a remarkable feat unto itself. It certainly would be refreshing if you were willing to rethink your position as esily as u believe Omar should’ve “forced” upon Fred & Sol. FYI, I keep imploring u to shift your paradigm away from picturing the Wilpons as uber-rich instead of ‘just’ rich. It took considerable creativity for Fred, Sol, rest of Wilpon family to muster up the 500M needed to buy out Doubleday in 2002. Remember, that was my position when I denounced the BS stories re. them investing & losing 700M with Bernie. Mathematically undfeasable then & proven to be true, now! Unlike many of his peers, Fred has reinvested in this ballclub btw Citifield & total payroll.
Back to your commentary, I consider Beltran, Delgado, Wagner, Santana, K-Rod to be Major significant moves and Nady, Duque, Alou, Castillo, Perez, Livan all minor relastively insignificant moves. BTW, in my opinion Bay is a necessary medium effect move/upgrade.
NB. not one name were u or youer ‘replacement’ called! Your a GOOD GUY; but your opinions suck!lmao!
I don’t get the sense will be doing anything with SP, except maybe signing a Wang or something to a minor league deal and won’t pitch until June and they will be going with Johan, Pelfrey, Maine, Perez and Neise. I don’t love it, but that is what i think they do. In terms of LF, I think either, Guerrero, Holiday or Bay will be the LF, which one..i am starting to believe it won’t be Bay. I still think it is at least a 50-50 shot delgado is the 1b, do think mets will give Molina a 2 year deal.
I hope that you are wrong 62fan cause it would further deplete my sense of the future of the Mets. Whether he is or not Jeff cannot take away what our core will do next year and with the addition of some depth in OF and pitching all things are possible even with a strange person in charge, yes you Jeff.
Cheer up Anthony, the season has not started and spring is right around the corner, living here in the Orlando area we have seen some serious cold weather for us and am looking forward to the surprises, good ones I hope, to come out of Port St. Lucie. Mets need to give Bay a deadline and stick to it. I would sign Wang to a contract with incentives more than I would Sheets and invite him to Spring Training. If Mets can get Chen to stop worrying about the pressure on his landing foot then Mets have another SP in minors or ML that is perfect for Citi Field.
Agree with most of what you posted 62, the lack of 1st round picks and/or other draft picks to stock system has hurt for the past few years. How can Yanks with their winning ways and signing Type A and B free agents still come up with prospects that other teams are willing to take in trade and Mets don’t.
I might want to blame Tony B. and his chief Omar for their insistence in having young players play against competition way above their level to bring them up sooner yet I have not seen or heard of other teams doing this and the success rate for this tactic.
Whether Jeff was part of this I don’t know but Mets need to pay a prospect, especially a can’t miss type, to whatever it takes to make the whole system, major and minor better and increase depth and pieces for trades Mets might need.
Sarge, your question regarding NYY’s ability to ink top F/A & still stock a quality pipeline is a valid one. The answer is directly attributed to the optional “Draft Slotting System” created & recommended by Selg & followed under orders from “NYM Ownership”. the concept is simply this; top amateurs are often bypassed in the first rounds due to perceived “signing demands”(large signing bonuses or mlb roster spot demand. these, ‘typically Boras clients’ slide to later rounds to be cherry picked by the likes of NYY & Boston to supplement their loss of first round picks by offering to meet these player’s first round equivilent demands even though they missed first round selection. (a practice forbidden by the guidelines) It was obvious, after Omar signed both Pedro & Beltran in ’05 that he was unaware of ownership’s decree to adhere when a NY reporter(Harper?) asked Omar what his plan was for the upcoming draft. his initial comment basicly was he’d go cherry picken with NYY & Bosox. Scribe informed a suprised Omar of the Wilpon edict to which, Omar replied, “I’ll need to look into that, it may need to change” Nothing has changed, this is ultimatly when the Int’l signings plan was initiated with 16 yr old Giomez & Martinez. Unfortunately there haven’t been enough of them. BTW, NYY have also garnered significant prospects by dealing no longer needed surplus vets(Sheffield to DET for example). We have very few of those since ’04 purge under Duquette. Prior to the official unveiling of the Slotting Formula, Omar was able to actually exceed typical limits by siggning his first round pick, Mike Pelfrey, a Boras client getting that MLB roster spot.
Agree 100% with you 62fan, and can just hope that someone in org talks to Jeff and Omar and explain how their current practice when it comes to draft picks winds up hurting Mets in the future, no one to bring up or develop, and financially if you develop your own starter then you have to spend less in FA mkt or making trades out of desperation.
Sarge, unfortunately, it’s neither Omar or Jeff’s call; but Fred’s. I totally believe “Omar has tried every argument possible; but obviously Fred’s adament.
Fred’s financial practices are quite reminiscient of many Depression survivors.
Thank You Joe,
I have been postponing my predictions and Mets suggestions on my site because it has been unclear (thus far) who is the team’s GM. Omar or Jeff using Omar as a hand puppet. I am starting to see things take shape and am almost ready to start to give my 2 cents worth. But you have said what I have been trying to explain to people for the last 6 months. A)There is probably not a team in history who could have sustained the injuries that the Mets did last year and even remained competative. (That is more or less what Peter Gammons said and few could argue that he is the greatest baseball man ever) B)The “Barron” Farm system won 70 games in the big leagues this year. C)Window dressing or not, Omar has gone into every off-season with a need and come out of it having (for better or worse) adressed that need. Last year, we needed a closer and bulpen help etc.) The year before that a starter. Fill in the blanks from 2005 – 2007 but I assure you, they are there. As far as Chapman is concerned I think that he could prove to be a very good long term find. If I was a hard throwing left handed starter, I know who I would most like to be sitting on the bench next to. (I still wake up at night and say out loud “Johan Santana is both the best pitcher in baseball and a Met.” For the present, however I suggest you guys have a look at another Cuban defector Yuniesky Maya. Does not throw as hard as Chapman, but he seems to be big league ready both mentally and with his legit 4 pitch arsenal. I realy enjoyed your post. It is nice to see an opinion that is not so doom and gloom. Okay, we share a city with the Yankees. That does not make us a bad organization. Again, if Peter Gammons says it, there is a fair chance that it is at least close to true. 85% of what happened last year was injuries. The other 15%… did it matter? I am hearing that Molina may have come to his senses and that there may be a Carlos Zambrano discussion pending. Just rumors though.