19
2011
Morning Grind: Scott Hairston Should Be In On The Second Base Sweepstakes
An article by 
As everyone knows, the second base job is wide open for the Mets in 2011, especially now that Luis Castillo has been released. The competition has seemingly been narrowed down to Daniel Murphy, Brad Emaus and Luis Hernandez. But arguably the hottest hitter on the Mets this spring has been left out of the discussion.
Scott Hairston has been one of the hottest hitters in the game this spring, providing him basically a guaranteed spot on the roster come Opening Day. The question is in what capacity.
Hairston has been mostly an outfielder in his career, but he does have experience at second base. In fact, he was solely a second baseman in his rookie season. He spent most of his time in the minor leagues as a second baseman playing a total of 262 there. Yes, he does not have great defensive ability, but neither do any of the other candidates. Comparing them, Murphy and Hernandez have little experience at second, and Emaus earns his money from what he does with a bat, not with the glove.
This spring, in 12 games, Hairston is batting .397/.487/.697. Hernandez and Murphy have held their own with .294/.368/.298 and .308/.341/.426 respectively, while Rule 5 draft pick Brad Emaus has batted an underwhelming .231/.310/.269. Hairston has clearly been the best candidate as far as hitting this spring. He needs to be taken into consideration, especially given the fact that Luis Hernandez might be injured.
The only reasons I can personally think of why Hairston would not be in on the second base contest is that it has been nearly 7 seasons since he was a full time second baseman. The other reason is that since Beltran’s health is in question, they might want Hairston to start in the outfield. But given his incredible performance this spring, and the lack of talent at second base, Hairston should at least be given a shot to show he can play second base for the Mets this season.
Happy commenting!
About the Author: Clayton Collier
Clayton, a Long Island native and die-hard Mets fan, started writing online about three years ago. He is currently a Journalism major with a minor in Broadcasting at Seton Hall University. Although very disappointed with the current state of the team, Clayton remains hopeful that the young prospects in the farm system will bring the Mets back to a respected franchise in baseball once again. Besides writing for MMO, Clayton is also a staff member at 89.5 WSOU, Seton Hall's modern active rock radio station. You can contact Clayton by following him on Twitter: @Clayton_Collier or E-mailing him at MaybeNextYearMets@yahoo.com
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NL East Standings
| Team | W | L | Pct. | GB |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Braves | 26 | 18 | .591 | - |
| Nationals | 23 | 22 | .511 | 3.5 |
| Phillies | 21 | 24 | .467 | 5.5 |
| Mets | 17 | 25 | .405 | 8.0 |
| Marlins | 13 | 32 | .289 | 13.5 |
Last updated: 05/21/2013
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the 7 seasons might have something to do with it. He also is likely to be starting in RF until (if) beltran comes back. And the hot spring aside, he really did not hit much last year.
But, I like the out of the box thinking. I am on record as saying 2B is going to be a mix/match situation most of the year (at least until havens comes up to take it for good!). Very fluid, might be the best way to describe it.
so who knows, you might see Hairston at some point. or willie harris, supposedly the best glove in camp now.
Who really knows at this point. Since Fonzy left, they have had 1 productive year out of a 2B, and that was the fluke from Valentin in 2006.
The further removed we are from 2006, the more I’m noticing most of that season was a fluke. Good timing that everyone’s fluke coincided, though.
2006 was no fluke. That was a very strong baseball club that finished 12 games up in 1st place.
The Mets that year used to score first and early frequently that year and finished high in ratings in many offensive categories and even 3rd in team pitching ERA.
2006 was a good team and it was certainly no fluke. Fluke? You’re just saying that because Sandy Alderson is now your GM.
That doesn’t even make any sense. I like Alderson, so 2006 is a fluke? Go back to your room and come up with something more concrete.
I don’t care how you take my statement but 2006 was certainly no fluke.
It’s funny, for a guy who thinks defense and pitching wins games and offense isn’t a factor, it’s somewhat hypocritical to go around extolling the virtues of the 2006 team, wouldn’t you think?
So we didn’t have good pitching that year? I think having the 6th best ERA in the MLB, and the 3rd best in the NL, is good pitching.
Don’t be stupid,
I like offense just as much as the next guy. What kind of idiot are you turning out to be? First, just because i randomly throw a couple numbers around the other day when talking about Tejada you interpret it as I don’t know how to calculate batting average..and you’re serious about it! And now just because I say the 2006 Mets are no fluke, that they were a very good hitting team you interpret that as me going back on my beliefs on defense and pitching? What is wrong with you.
The 2006 team was very much a fluke. Do you even know what a fluke is? This is a fluke:
- Only two starters reaching 30 starts, and one of them was Traschel who pitched terribly that year.
- The only starting pitcher with an ERA under four was Maine, who only had 15 starts, anyway.
- Valentin, who had played second base in a total of 19 games before that year, filled in admirably.
- All eight positions had over 400 PAs (seven individually, and the two-man RF platoon), an incredibly lucky plateau to reach, health-wise.
- The top six relievers all had over 45 games pitched and four of them had an ERA under three, another tremendous health attribute. The bullpen was tremendous. Incredible. And the first thing Omar did after Beltran looked at that third strike was blow it all up.
The Mets put everything together that year. Career years were had all at the same time. That’s a fluke.
Ohhh…so you’re only going by numbers, i see. It figures.
Of course. What else is there? It was five years ago. All we have to measure the past are numbers. That’s why baseball cards have backs. It’s been that way since the 50′s. You should get with the times.
What else is there besides numbers? Unbelievable. I’m sure you can come up with any number of World Series winners or any types of success teams have had and the number don’t add up correctly.
If you need me to explain the other factors it takes to win in athletic competition besides numbers then there’s no way you and me should be having any type of a conversation because clearly you have a LOT to learn about baseball and sports in general.
Except……..the Mets didn’t win. Numbers measure what happened on the field. If grit and heart and all your other fake measurements add to what happened on the field, then it shows up in the stats. A guy hustles to extend a single into a double? Well, his SLG% increases. And there’s millions more examples. Whatever your grit and heart can do to a player, that stats measure it.
The numbers ALWAYS add up correctly. Every team that wins out-performs their opponents. All the time. Every time.
The Mets that year blew out a lot teams early in games that year and would stop scoring the rest of the game. I think it was almost record breaking for them how many times they were scoring in the first inning or just scoring first. Numbers can occur at all different times of the games. they had a SOLID lineup and since they were scoring so much, so often, and so early than maybe their starting pitchers didn’t need to finish or just didn’t happen to finish games as much as they could have.
You score a lot of runs first a lot it changes the game for the other team immensely because now they have to play catch up all the time. So yes the numbers for pitchers may not look as good as they could but also if you’re pitching with a lead early a lot your concentration may not be as good as if you were in tight games all the time.
Which in 2006, the Mets were NOT. They only had to fight once they reached the playoffs.
..so that being said, I don’t care how you add up your numbers. The Mets WERE NO FLUKE in 2006. And there could be many other factors too. Reyes and Deluca worked very well together as a 1 & 2 combination. You could have a 2 hitter who may be not as good as letting the leadoff guy steal a base or not as good moving a runner over. Paul LoDuca was outstanding as a #2 hitter that season and when Willie moved him out of it for awhile the experiment fell flat so he put him back. That’s a dynamic that could be VERY vital to a good teams success. No numbers needed in my explanation. Of course, both of them hitting well helped too. There’s so many factors I could go over but i’m really not about to get into a tagee type post here.
So that’s what you’re going with? The Mets score early and often so…….starters don’t start enough games? How’d you even arrive at that? How does that make sense? Relates to nothing I said. Unless you invented an argument again to fit what you were saying, which happens all the time.
And thanks for bringing up LoDuca. Perfect example of the fluke. He had better numbers in 2001, but then showed up on the Mitchell Report, so it’s very possible that 2006 was his real best season. He had a great year. Was a terrific number two hitter. He had his best year in 2006, as did many, many others. Career years all at the same time = fluke.
It’s so much easier to pitch WITH a lead it’s not even worth discussing. Anyone who has ever played or managed knows that.
If your pitching with a lead early in the game your thinking about one thing. Getting the win.
No one was going to be asking Trachsel, Glavine, Martinez and Hernandez at their age to go 9 too often anyway.
You serious?
Not so much a fluke, more like a confluence of events. The biggest one being our main competition in our Division (Atlanta) dropping from 90 wins to 79 and suffering their first losing season in 16 years. Our record against them improved from 6-13 to 11-7 a difference of 5.5 games in the standings (they finished 18 behind us)
Our other main competition subtracted their starting catcher and first basemen and traded them to us. Obviously we were going to be better simply for the addition of La Duca and Delgado, and the Marlins worse for their loss. That helped us AND hurt them.
The NL as a whole only had one good team that year, us. Normally speaking the NL would have at least 3 teams with 90 or more wins each year. 2006 produced just one.
SD won the division with 88 games, LA got the Wild Card with the same and St. L won their Division with only 83 wins. Philly (85) and Houston (82) were the only other teams to even be .500. Quite a mediocre bunch overall.
We won twice as many 1 run games as we lost. That’s how teams usually get good records but is hardly indicative of dominance. More likely it was a case of a talented and deep bullpen all having good years. Wagner, Feliciano, Bradford, Hernandez, Sanchez, Oliver and Heilman plus Moto’s 18 innings in 18 games with only 2 runs against. Plenty of options for Randolph and he used them skillfully.
Great years from 2 bench players (Chavez and Valentin) show the bench (Castro too) was well conceived, the line up went 7 deep instead of 5 which makes a huge difference.
We never again had a line up, bench or bullpen that went that deep and with the age and injury status of the starting rotation hadn’t a prayer of staving off injuries and decline.
We were clearly better than everyone else that year. We only had a losing record against two teams (Balt & Boston) and only 1 month under .500 (Sept) but if you were going to quickly put together a “one and done” type of team 2006 was the year to do it due to both of our Division rivals taking a step backward and the rest of the league being overall very mediocre.
How could you call 2006 a fluke? Especially in light of the fact they backed it up in 07 and 08 by missing the postseason by one game. They could have easilly had a three year run, that is not a fluke. Where do you eggheads draw the line at pomposity and prepsoterous remarks?
One game winning hit by Wright during in his-so called excellent Septembers when he struck out 24% of the time while batting a bry hollow .350, and we might have more to show for in 06-08 than one NL East title.
Why dont you place the blame where it belongs, the bullpen.
I love how Wright’s numbers are the only hollow ones and his name comes up by you and your clique of 3 people every time 07 and 08 comes up and you all conviently leave out what the bullpen did or I should say did NOT do, but not doing their job.
Don’t worry no one will come take your Manhood cards if you stop bashing the only consistent player on the team for the last 6 years.
Yeah, the bullpen was clutch with those 28 blown saves in 2008. Clutch, real clutch.
The bullpen blew games and we also had chances win games offensively too and blew that too. It was both. The bullpen blowing games AND we did not get big hits in big spots and certainly Wright left a helluva lot of baserunners on in September of 08 regardless of his Sept AVG.
How many games did Wright leave on base late in the game in September of 07 and 08?
How many games did anyone else on the team leave on base late in the game?
Why is always about Wright.
You guys and your obessession with killing this kid is unreal, although now it’s a close second to unreasonable and ridiculas bashing Alderson.
Considering how many blown saves our bullpen had that year (28) Each and every run driven in was vital. No lead was big enough for this bullpen to blow. Wright had 21 and 20 RBI in August and Sept. That’s 2 less than Beltran, 4 more than Delgado, 18 more than Schneider, 28 more than Church and 41 more than Alou.
More than just numbers, their relevant numbers and their your preferred numbers, the one’s that you claim matter, except of course when they don’t.
Sorry 23 more than Schneider. Can’t understand how this guy gets a pass. At least Church had a couple periods where he was looking like a good player. Schneider played like s*** from day 1. I know Omar knew him (and Church) from Montreal but he deserved a lot better especially from Schneider.
Don’t you understand maniac. This agee guy lives in pure hatred of Omar Minaya. Theefore, he has to tell you that it was nothing but luck or a fluke. Agee equals pure hate.
You calling out someone for pure hate is quite ironic. Have you started a petition yet for having Alderson fired?
It really wasn’t the same team in 2007. Gone from the pen was Bradford, Oliver, Hernandez. Schowenweiss was a terrible replacement as were Sele and Sosa. Moto went from a 1.00 ERA to a 5+ ERA, Sanchez never made it back and Wagner went down in Sept, Health Bell had a 2.00 ERA.
Alou, Valentin and El-Duque were lost, Pedro made only 5 starts and La Duca fell off the cliff and before you claim the injury excuse, at their age how could that have been a shock to anyone?
New older guys dissapointed, Newhan, Defilice, Conine, Ledee, Alomar.
New younger guys did the same, Gomez, Pelfrey, Johnson.
Perez, Maine, El-Duque, Wright, Beltran, Delgado, Reyes and Alou (for half a season) is what kept us in it. Age, depth and off season moves, especially in the bullpen that went the opposite way in 2007 from 2006 is what cost us.
Lots of new faces on this team from 2006.
I knew Harris had played 2B but didnt know Hairston played there as well. Considering that was his main position in the minors, I would imaging without batting an eyelash that he is infinitely better than Daniel Murphy. After they moved him from 2B his rookie year and saw he was gold glove caliber in the OF they kept him there. I wonder how good or bad he was defensively at 2B compared to Emaus and Murphy?
Well he had a .977 fielding pct in his rookie year I think, So he’s no Roberto Alomar but neither are any of the other candidates.