Comments on: Rubin: Tim Byrdak On Mets Radar

By: alwaysnextyear

alwaysnextyear — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 20:40:37 +0000

Merritt could be a long shot to snag the role too. He is lefty, right?

By: Pete

Pete — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 19:46:36 +0000

The way I see it, the Mets will keep either two or three lefties in the pen, depending on who the long man is. There are four left handed contenders to fill those spots, and I am not counting Ollie Pee. They are, of course Tank and hopefully Byrdak, along with Mike O’Connor, and Pat Misch. Realistically I think the only way Misch makes the team is as the long man, so he really won’t be in this competition since he does not have good success against left handed hitters. So you have two bullpen roles going to the favorites, Tank and Byrdak, unless one gets unseated by O’Connor. I wouldn’t mind seeing another loogy brought in since my confidence in Tank and or O’Connor isn’t all that high.

By: Chris

Chris — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 05:47:26 +0000

Tankersley doesn’t really have control problems. His control issues are with right-handers, and hopefully he won’t be seeing many of those. His K/BB against lefties is 2.36 for his career with 1.19 WHIP, which is pretty darn good. If anyone has control problems it’s Byrdak, with 4.12 BB/9 against lefties, but with a slightly lower WHIP at 1.13.

Either way I don’t think anyone will be missing Feliciano and his 8 million dollars this year. Just my opinion. LOOGY and closer are the two most overrated and overpayed-for roles on a baseball team, and you should never have to pay top dollar for either. If you’re a LOOGY it’s because you can get lefties out. you don’t have to pay 8 million dollars for someone to do it when you can get someone to do it for league min.

By: alwaysnextyear

alwaysnextyear — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 04:11:14 +0000

not much else available it seems.

By: Mr North Jersey

Mr North Jersey — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 03:25:31 +0000

Here are Byrdek’s 2010 splits vs lefties.

baseball-reference.com/play-index/share.cgi?id=Luiaz

Here are Feliciano’s 2010 splits vs lefties.
baseball-reference.com/play-index/share.cgi?id=87Koq

By: kevin

kevin — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 03:21:12 +0000

Oh brother. Must everyone we sign be crippled, injured, suspended or ancient?

By: Nester

Nester — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 03:19:29 +0000

Byrdak would immediately elevate the Mets bullpen and adequately replace what was lost in Pedro Feliciano. This would make the real spring battle finding the setup man. I dont think it should simply be handed to Parnell. Maybe Buchholz?

By: 86mets

86mets — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 03:16:07 +0000

It would be nice to have another lefty option to compete w/ Tankersley. Now, Tankersley could end up being a steal this winter, but given his history of command / control issues w/ Florida he cannot be considered a sure thing just yet. Adding a veteran such as Brydak could prod Tank to work just a little harder on improving his poor control. Plus, who ever loses goes to Buffalo and provides the Mets with some AAA depth. I hope they can land Byrdak.

By: Mr North Jersey

Mr North Jersey — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 03:01:26 +0000

This is {OFF TOPIC}

I came across this article by Tie Dyed dated Feb 22 2010 titled,
“Low Expectations For 2010. And That’s Good.”

Here are some excerpts.

We head into 2010 with very low expectations. And I’m glad. We’ve got stars coming back from injuries. We have an uncertain situation at 1B and behind the plate. We’ve got Johan followed by 4 question marks. Our front office in utter chaos. Our owner is not well liked and we still have mixed feelings about our new stadium. We have a manager who is in the crosshairs and a General Manager who has been the subject of more discussion then Health Care. And to all of this I say, Good. I hate to use clichés but it is always darkest before dawn.”

metsmerizedonline.com/2010/02/low-expectations-for-2010-and-thats-good.html
Interesting to see where we were last year round this time.