21
2011
He Did It! Turner Sets New Rookie RBI Record For Mets
An article by Hojo's Mojo
Justin Turner drove in a run for the seventh straight game, establishing a new franchise rookie mark. Swoboda had RBIs in six straight games in August 1965. Turner’s line-drive single to right plated Daniel Murphy as the Mets took a 2-0 first-inning lead. Unfortuantely the Mets got clobbered 7-3, but let’s hear it for Turner.
Way to go Red!
Original Post 12:30 PM – The Justin Turner Craze
Just when things were starting to look up for the Mets, the Rapture has to come along and end all the excitement. Tonight might be the last chance we get to toss a no-hitter… Can Capuano deliver the goods?
One player who has been delivering the goods again, and again, and again, is none other then Justin Turner or “Dead Red” as some are beginning to call him.
Unless you were out buying white robes for todays big event, you already know that last night Justin Turner tied a long-standing franchise record that hasn’t been duplicated since 1965.
The 26-year-old infielder matched Ron Swoboda’s franchise rookie record with an RBI in his sixth straight game. Turner’s fourth-inning single tied the game and helped the Mets beat the Yankees 2-1 in front of a packed house at Yankee Stadium.
According to Adam Rubin, Turner’s Twitter follower total — his handle is @redturn2 — jumped from 1,830 to 2,598 in the three hours after he produced Friday’s RBI. That’s pretty awesome.
Even more awesome was what went on in the Twitterverse all throughout the game as Mets fans had fun tweeting accolades for Justin Turner with this tag: #JustinTurnerFacts
“If you would have asked me five years ago if I thought I’d be having this kind of success in the major leagues, I would have probably said, ‘Yeah. OK. Whatever.’ Take it with a grain of salt,” Turner said. “But I feel like I put in a lot of work and a lot of time. Right now, the game is just rewarding me. I don’t know. I’ve been on the other end of it too. I don’t want to take it for granted.”
Here are some of the many funny ”Justin Turner Facts” I came across, beginning with the one I believe started it all from the Daily Stache:
◊ He asked Bob Sheppard to announce his name, but Sheppard didn’t feel worthy.
◊ Robert Redford after breaking his bat in The Natural borrowed Justin Turner’s Bat.
◊ He knows what Meatloaf won’t do for love.
◊ Justin Turner played Rusty Staub in the school play.
◊ Justin Turner knows how many licks it takes to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop.
◊ In a 400m dash, he gave a cheetah a 300m head start and ran backwards on his hands. The Cheetah still lost.
◊ Sandy Alderson talks to Turner before making any move.
◊ He has personally postponed the Rapture till the subway series is over.
◊ Bill James comes to him for ideas about Sabermetrtics.
Justin Turner is hitting .364 in 55 AB this season, and in his last ten games he is batting .405 with 11 RBI and six runs scored. Tonight he can set the Mets franchise rookie record for consecutive games with an RBI.
Go Gett’em Red!
About the Author: Rob Johnson
50 Comments + Add Comment
NL East Standings
| Team | W | L | Pct. | GB |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Braves | 23 | 18 | .561 | - |
| Nationals | 23 | 19 | .548 | 0.5 |
| Phillies | 20 | 23 | .465 | 4.0 |
| Mets | 16 | 24 | .400 | 6.5 |
| Marlins | 11 | 31 | .262 | 12.5 |
Last updated: 05/18/2013
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I want a Justin Turner jersey!!!
Without Ike, Wright, Pagan, and for all intents and purposes Bay….
We have won a lot of games…
And people CONTINUE to claim we have the worst Farm in Baseball?
Might actually be true if you don’t count all that farm that is up here winning these games for us!
Pridie, Turner, Luis Hernandez are all guys waived by their team that no one else wanted but at 25, 26, 27 can be “hold the fort” type guys until we can repair the roster. There is no reason why Minaya couldn’t have nabbed a bunch of these guys, as well as some career minor leaguers, rule 5′s, non tenders or players taken off the 40 without options before 2010.
There are plenty of guys like this every year that get caught in a roster glut like Heath Bell, Matt Lindstrom or Darren O’Day.
It would have made a lot more sense to have a feww pre thought out answers when the need arose rather than having to hope an Alou could last a season or a GMJ or Jacobs could do something. Omar was good at this kind of thing, it just wasn’t on his radar until the disaster of 2009.
What a fool…. Minaya brought these guys in. You have done nothing but beat on him endleo away., The kkk could use jerks like you.ssly. You are a hate monger. At asthe guys Minaya brought in can do something. You hate on him when almost every guy Alderson brought in has been a total failurte. You need to take your hate to hate sights. Alderson gave us Hu Eamus, Hairston Harris, Young Boyer Capuano. Omar’s left overs have kept this team decent. Only a totla loser and hate monger such as you t agee would come up with the pure lies that you do. G
Don’t call me racist jackass. My opinions about Minaya have ZERO to do with race and everything to do with his record.
I’m already on record that Phillips was the worst GM we’ve had here in 20 years and that Duquette’s one year at the helm was the worst single year a GM has ever had since our inception. I’ve also made mention many times at how much those two negatively impacted Omar’s chances here.
Any examination of Minaya’s six year track record always comes with a detour by his sycophants because they know his record cannot stand up to scrutiny.
They never try to refute the substance of what you write, only sidetrack it onto a different topic.
Nice try Ribant.
He had two answers to every issue. The checkbook and other team’s rejects. That’s why we are enduring our 3rd crash of the Wilpon error and here in what would have been year seven of his regime, have next to nothing in AAA or AA and the devoted followers point to Murphy, Thole, Parnell, Duda, Fern, Pelfrey as if they were Infante, McCann, Kimbrell, Prado, Hanson or Heyward. Their not.
Ike, Niese and Gee were all good picks. Omar has put a lot of depth into the lowest area’s of the farm and some of it has true talent that may translate up here and that is the difference between him and Phillips but they both required a big assist from a Division rival just to obtain the modicum of success that they did and then they threw good money after bad and that was because neither of their plans were sustainable.
Many of his IFA’s have panned out as well as his expensive free agent busts. Pena, Marte, Fern. Flores is still playing SS. Kirk is thought to 50/50 in CF and if not, then a 4th OFer at best. Aderlain Rodriguez isn’t going to make it at 3B. Vaughn has a huge hole in his bat. Mejia lost a season last year and now another one so even the guys who have played well are more questionable than most prospects their age.
But much better than Phillips and Duquette. Much better. But again, anything to divert the issue away from the examination of their Swami’s record.
Good sychphant Ribant.
t agee is not a hate monger and there is no need to drag your debate to the sewer. Me and him almost never agree on Omar, but his issues with him are not racist.
Thank you Maniac.
It’s been a great ride so far. My mind says, “Let the good days continue.” Thanks Justin.
Thank goodness a wrong (Brad Emaus) has been righted and Justin Turner is on the 25 man roster where he always belonged after a solid season in Trilpe-A where he batted .333 with a .906 OPS for the Mets and earned a promotion. The kid is legit.
Brad Emaus is a legitimate prospect while Turner is a legitimate fluke. I’m happy for the kid, but let’s not go making asinine comparisons based on a small sample size and not grounded in years of statistical data and scouting reports.
at least he has a sample size.
Turner is a a fluke, yet the guy who was cut to make room for Turner is the prospect.
The saber community strikes again. Be damned the real world – just stick to excel spreadsheets.
You can’t make this stuff up, unreal
kinda weird that you guys use OPS to praise Turner but mock saber stats and OBP? Isn’t it?
No but it is weird that the value system you believe in says a player you think is worthless is good isn’t it?
Maybe Sabers say he is a good player…
If you disagree then guess what?
Either your opinion of the player or the evaluation system you subscribe to is wrong!
Like I have always said Sabermetrics can lie if you don’t take a lot of care to remove bias from the metric Such as the just awful OPS metric.
You know what OPS actually does?
Jams together every high OBP and high SLG player into one list regardless if they actually suck at one or the other.
OPS statistically say that a guy with 100 walks in 100 PA is just as good as a player with 25 Hrs in 100 PA
Both have that 1.0 OPS Are they really the same? One drives in a ton of runs the other does not!
The fact that Turner actually comes out good in the evaluation system you like is the problem. Not our use of your faulty Evaluation system. You see we believe that a lot of the players who come out looking good using those Sabers are not REALLY good but you statistically biased your evaluation to just the things that player does good!
I am not saying that Turner is a great Baseball player, but then again I don’t look for the things a saber rattler would look for. I use BA which tells me better than any Saber the ability and skill of the guy to hit. Cause if the BA is up there he will stick and stay!
There is nothing wrong with using the evaluation system YOU believe in to try and convince you that either your wrong about the player or your wrong aboput the system. In ether case a point is being made here!
What statistical data?!?!?!?!
Are you referring to the ONE good season EMAUS EVER HAD playing in one of the minors best hitter’s parks???????
You are so lost that you’ve completely sailed off of the map of the world.
Oh don’t worry he is probably using some wierd biased Sabermetric that favors a walker over a hitter because it thinks a walk is as good as a hit and an RBOE is a bigger accomplishment of a hitter than an actual hit is!
And worth almost half of what a HR is worth!
Is it worth pointing out that Turner is 2 years older than Emaus and Turner 2 years ago would have been run out of here just as you did to Emaus?
I’m happy about Turner, I hope Emaus gets it going somewhere… but I still don’t really understand why a Rule 5 draft pick in a position where the MEts had no guarantees is harped on so much?
It wasn’t being harped on Jessup. but It was at some point HYPED on.
This and my reply was really about the “Grass Is Always Greener” principle!
People on a Daily basis HARP on the notion that our MiL farm sucks.
Well it MAY very well NOW that all the good players are on the big team and helping it to win games while all of our big bats save Beltran are on the DL!
Why was Emaus selected? Because perception was we didn’t have a good 2B to bring up instead.
What is the truth of that though?
Well the truth is the guy they thought was better was NOT better than two or the three guys we have played there since he left!
the Grass was NOT greener though was it?
I’m certainly not blaming the FO for being wrong about Emaus (My comment was more about what Nester said not what Sandy did) But the disease called CHANGE for the sake of CHANGE has caused everyone to despise and downplay anyone who ALREADY wears a Met Uni!
I personally have no problem that they went and got Emaus in the R5 Draft and that he failed…It happens.
But what I do have problems with is the fact that you guys go by some 3rd party list of top prospects (lists guy like F-Mart were on for YEARS) instead of what the guys do when they get their chance in the MLB!
Pete Rose was never a highly touted Prospect either and I’m sure if there WERE lists back then he would not have been on one!
But what did he do when he got to the MLB?
If you guys insist on ASSUMING every guy we own is worthless you will at some point have to expect to be wrong and look foolish.
And when we trade that “WORTHLESS PLAYER” and he comes up to the MLB with someone else and tears it up most who said it will change the subject to the FO being an idiot for trading him away despite the fact a lot of people applauded and agreed with the move at the time!
Bottomline is you should not make assumption or guesses about players. If you do you will make mistakes!
I don’t know if Turner at the end of the day if going to stick.
Could just be he was hot in Buf, they brought him up while he was hot and at some point he will cool off and come back to his actual average.
But to continue to say our MiL sucks when every guy that we have brought up from it has helped to make us a .500 club after the very deep hole we were in due to the slow start is just NOT RIGHT and UNFAIR!
Take off you HATE EVERYTHING about the Mets glasses you put on last year and start looking at what the guys seem capable of doing!
Then you might see our Minors are not as bad as some people say, Other players on other teams may not look BETTER than what we have, and maybe we will see we have a pretty good team to build around as soon as we figure out who out of the big contract guys are going to stay a Met!
The guys that have come up here and “held the fort” really aren’t the kinds of guys that go to All-Star games. Good pickups for sure but more of an afterthought type. Turner and Pridie were cut by their teams, passed through waivers and we nabbed them. That’s exactly what a team in our position should have done…..all along.
Gee, who I like a lot, and Davis were probably the only prospects who have come up here since Wright who were ready to help us win baseball games when they got up here.
Milledge, Fern, Gomez, Humber, Pelfrey, Kunz, Thole, Parnell, Murphy, Vargas, Tejada, Mejia, Duda, Evans, Niese. Tell us. Which one of them came up here ready to play winning baseball on both sides of the ball?
I’ll tell you who. The afterthoughts. The 24 year old 21st round draft choice with four full seasons in the minors. The 26 year old with 6 minor league seasons under his belt. The 27 year old with nine minor league seasons.
Ike Davis is just the exception to the rule, not the reason to rush everyone else.
None of the highly thought of guys did a damn thing up here in either their first or second go around. Most of them still haven’t.
The guys with true talent haven’t done ****. So if anything our system was rated better than it had a right to.
The combination of poor overall talent AND the immediate promotion due to need is how we earned all those mid 20 rankings.
If you don’t think being listed as a top 20 prospect in your league isn’t a good harbinger of being a top shelf starter in the Majors you are in a very small minority.
A full 25% (6 per team) of last years playoff teams were made up by guys who at one time or another were a top 20 prospect in say the Fl St. League, Eastern League or some other minor league as compiled by Baseball America.
We wouldn’t know. We don’t get to the post season very often. Four times since the Wilpon became a full 50% partner (once at the tail end of the 80′s Cashen/Doubleday teams) and only once since they bought out Nelson. A full 3 of the four playoff appearances we have had, had as much to do with the finances of one of our Division rivals as it did with anything else. That and the entire NL tanking in 2006.
Maybe the lack of productivity from the farm has been a big reason for that. Maybe the lack of talent in the farm is what caused us to go out and sign Weathers, Bonilla, Coleman, Cedeno, Appier, Zeile, Matsui, Perez, Castillo, Alou, Redding, Wagner, Bay, Schowenweiss and Mota. Maybe the bleak prospects on the farm were the reason we went out and traded for Vaughn, Alomar, Taylor, Burnitz, Schneider, Church, Francouer.
With the exception of Alfonzo, Wright, Reyes and Ike where has all the real talent come from? That spans a period from 1992-2008. Four great players in 17 years. Two IFA’s and two 1st round draft choices we got for “losing” players
Hampton, Leiter, Johan, Ventura, Olerud, Piazza, Delgado, Beltran, K-Rod. Where did all those players come from? It sure wasn’t the farm.
Don’t you think it likely that if we had saved our #1 pick in 2007 instead of handing it over for Alou, AND drafted Mike Stanton it would have prevented the need to go out and spend another #2 and 80 M on Bay? If we had Stanton don’t you think that 80M could have gotten us a starting pitcher? Hmmmm. A better LFer AND another starting pitcher. How would that not be better.
The mere fact that we always have to go out and import SO many players year after year is reason enough to realize that our farm system sucks and if anything has been OVERRATED ever since the Wilpon became a full 50% partner.
That being said Emaus was over hyped and when you look as bad as he did it’s not going to lead to a lot of dinner invitations. Good thought process, good try, bad example to choose as your reason for liking a particular philosophy.
The only philosophy that is guaranteed to do no harm is to flood your system with as many safe bets and as many high ceiling prospects as possible. Deal your surplus hits for where you’ve missed and fill in, inbetween from ALL of the other available sources. Trades, Type A AND B free agency, rule 5, non tender and waiver wire acquisitions like Turner and Pridie.
The prospects in the farm will always sort themselves out. Having guys like Pridie and Turner can help save your season and allow time for more talented players to develop and every once in a while come through even better than that.
More importantly than that they can help keep you from making the kind of franchise crippling decisions that we have made over and over and over again and then seek to justify with the same tired question “well who else we’re we going to get?” as if that’s any justification for all these horrendous acquisitions of all the freaks, mutants and blowhards we have brought in through the years.
The answer is always more prospects, not less.
“The guys that have come up here and “held the fort” really aren’t the kinds of guys that go to All-Star games.”
And you know this how? Was it predicted by the same guy who predicted I couldn’t type this because I would be dead in the rapture?
You don’t know what the farm or the guys who recently came up and carried us will do in the future anymore than you can predict who will be the next guy who gets hurt on the MLB squad and needs replacing!
You don’t want to believe your eyes because they can mislad and then use those SAME MISLEADING EYES on that farm and pronounce it a Prospectless SHAMBLES!
It is the POV leading the assesment that is misleading you not the data that is being observed!
Yopu chose to believe your eyes on some things and when the proof shows you were wrong you REFUSE to believe it and claim the eye has tricked you!
No one predicted Ike was a Prospect and now we have managers holding back Lefties to face him!
What would trading Ike net you on the open market? Huh? Not a prospect?
Well if thats not a prospect what the hell is?
If Turner winds up at a 100 RBI pace regardless of all the other statistics you can look at that is a PROSPECT because guys who have 100 RBIs make the BIG BUCKS! People WANT THEM!
So I don’t know what scale is being used to judge prospects but I know all those lists you guys look at say FMart was a can’t miss prospect and Ike wasn’t even worth mentioning!
Great Advice there! Thats all I’m saying…
The guys who have come up from the Minors have played every bit well enough to say they ARE major leaguers. Gee, Ike Pridie, Turner, Murphy, Thole…
You can say they may not ALWAYS play good but you also have to admit you can’t by any stretch of the imagination say any one of them have played BADLY!
They have been competent and solid major league players and have done their part.
And even if you don’t think they are All Stars or going to the Hall, You then at least have to admit that THESE ARE THE TYPES OF PLAYERS you have claimed over and over again should be used to TRADE and bring in the better players who can fill the holes this team is about to need filled!
This is the type of farm where you make all those McIlvane trades you love so much.
It is the type of deal that gets you Cliff Lee at the deadline or Alex Rodriguez for half price!
THIS iS THE FARM YOU INSIST we need to have to wheel and deal top get those All star prospects that will make one less hole to have to draft for instead of the best player available!
Is it filled with Prospects right now?
No because we already promoted the Ikes and Nieses and Pelfreys we had. But we still have Harvey and Holt who have both remain prospects despite their recent struggles.
They are not ready. weren’t you the one who didn’t want to rush them as well?
A Prospect label in the minors means nothing more than COULD be good if he does what I think he can.
Doesn’t mean he did it and doesn’t mean he will!
But when a guy does come up and DOES WELL, isn’t he a prospect? Does the fact you were WRONG about what he could do mean what he did is irrelevant and therefore can NEVER BE a prospect!
The lists of what is a prospect and what is not is WRONG!
It’s not about what they are doing but what they think they might do!
And it has no method of changing the list when it lists one guy as a no who is a YES when he finally comes up to the Majors!
Hindsight shows that they are wrong more often than they are right!
It would be interesting to see them post an update of how many prospects that year we had based on what they actually did in the MLB!
Cause you might find we had a ton of Prospects no one knew we had!
There is so much wrong here I just don’t know where to start.
Ike was never a prospect? How’d he get on the US Olympic Team? How’d a non prospect get ranked #77 out on the top 100 prospect list?
How do I know that Pridie, Turner and Thole won’t make an All Star team? It’s my opinion. Want to make a wager?
“If Turner winds up on a 100 RBI pace.” Don’t delude yourself Metsie. Nobody is as good as he looks when he’s going to great or as bad as they look when their going bad. Turner has shown he deserves a full look. That’s it. He’s not Joe Morgan. He’s a useful decent looking somewhat older prospect with a lot of minor league experience. Probably an upside of four year starter or an Omar Infante type role. Upside. Meaning at most. Not a Posey, Heyward, McCann, Dominick Brown, Mike Stanton.
These “hold the fort” guys are better than a lot of the expensive guys brought in here but that’s not saying much.
I have not claimed over and over we should trade our prospects. We don’t have that kind of depth to do that. I have repeatedly said we need MORE prospects. Mcilvaine was able to make trades to get us competative in the Major Leagues with moves for Gilkey, Johnson, Everett, Olerud, Rick Reed without giving up the good players we had in the farm. Dotel, Alfonzo, Isringhausen, Ordonez, Burnett, ect. Sure, if we could make a few of them great.
Who was I wrong about? I said we should have been nabbing the Turners and Pridie’s (and Luis Hernandez’) all along until our talent level is such that players put on waivers do not represent an upgrade. What is that proof of?
There is nothing in the farm we can spare for a Cliff Lee. Get real.
If our farm system was so great why would we have had to import the entire bullpen? Harris, Haiston, Hu, Young, Capuano, Paulino? Cause we’re saving them?
Your points are all confused. The farm has sucked for years and years. We haven’t gone 3 deep in quality starting pitching since 1990. Where you been?
You had me right up until the point you said…
“Brad Emaus is a legitimate prospect…”
In Which League Japan?
Turner a legitimate fluke? A guy who’s been a consistent .290-.300 hitter in the minors that is finally given a chance in the major leagues and (surprise!) hitting .300+ is a fluke? You have your priorities backwards, son.
They’ve both put up good numbers throughout their minor league careers. Emaus just didn’t seize the golden opportunity he was handed. At 25 that’s not good. Turner should have been a Sept call up last year. Why not?
The facts are that both were 7th to 11th round. Both were available to anyone that wanted them as pro’s too. Turner’s made the most of his opportunity so far and Emaus didn’t.
Some guys progress later than others. Some earlier. Frequently a less talented player in his prime will out produce a former All-Star who’s past his prime.
Both of these guys were obtained for nothing. Both were worth giving a chance to. Personally I didn’t see anything in Emaus that would indicate he had any confidence in himself and in Turner I do.
Turner has two more seasons of pro ball under his belt. Maybe that’s the difference. He was a good waiver pick up and helped win three games for us. Maybe Emaus will do the same for someone else in a couple of years but he sure didn’t look like his numbers do to me.
As always the answer is more options, not less. The more options you have the less mistakes you’ll make that cripple your team, payroll and entire organization. If we had a 26 year old Turner in the system in 2007 maybe we don’t trade for or sign Castillo. Maybe we win another 3 games in two years.
Both were worthwhile acquisitions because they were better than anyone we had in the system.
You can parralell their history and past performance all you want.
Bottomline is ONE HAS PERFROMED as a MLB player, the other one did not!
The only Questions you can ask is will Turner maintain that or will Emaus reverse that!
When you don’t do well once you get to the MLB the chances you will get another chance are much slimmer!
The ones who usually stick are the ones who start off hot and then cool off. And if they make the adjustment they ALL need to make at some point they will STAY MLB playes!
Ike is a classic example of that, He startd off HOT, Got very COOL and then adjusted well. Anyone think he is going back to be a MiLer anytime soon?
Other than Injury Rehab that is!
Turner was selected by the New York Yankees in the 29th round of the 2005 MLB June Amateur Draft and the Cincinnati Reds in the 7th round of the 2006 MLB June Amateur Draft. This guy is upwardly mobile.
Turner reminds me of Jeff Keppinger who played 2B a bit for us in 2004. Both have a good eye at the plate and have hit for average. Right now Keppinger is recovering from an injury to his left foot. When he gets back to Houston, I’ll be interested in how they handle his competition with Bill Hall for playing time. Biil has a lot of trouble with breaking stuff at the plate.
Turner reminds me lot of Backman (Not personality mind you)…He will never get to the Hall, but is the type of player that everyone will love because he gives you his best on the field, handles the bat reasonably well and seems to focus when there is an opportunity to be had. He’s probably a better hitter than Backman as he has a bit more pop and is not the #2 hitter type…
But if this Kid plays a year or two for us he could give us whatever we think we got from Backmen in the 80′s.
Backman is a nice comparison Metsie. I can see that.
Many forget or don’t realize that you don’t need GREATNESS at every position. Take a look at the 86 Mets…
We think everyone was great but if you hide the fact they were on the 86 Mets, what would people say about Backman, Santana, Mookie if they had their numbers on today’s team?
You don’t need great players everywhere! You just need guys who come to work and do their job, mistakes will be made as will the great play from time to time. If you have guys who do their job you don’t need to have 5 great players on your team.
Or an all star at every position.
You don’t need an All Star at every position. That’s what Omar tried to do. What you do need is a well conceived roster. Some All-Stars but two imperfect players, matched up together can be just as effective.
Backman had Teufel, Wilson had Dykstra, Santana had Mitchell/Hojo. Polar opposites for the most part but the key is they have to be able to do something very well. Hit LHP, Get on and run the bases, provide solid consistent D, something. and then go out and fins their compliment.
If you have the 4 or 5 All stars, a rotation and pen your all set.
Many forget that 1986 baseball does not apply to 2011 baseball too
What is different about the game today? Moneyball? I mean really?
Please the game is exactly the same only the guys doing the thinking have changed and who can say they are thinking right?
Truth is The Yankees and the Phillies have both played the 86 Met game only to much greater success because they sustained it longer.
They built a decent team, solid core, waited till it got to the playoffs and twarted and then Bought tons of Pitching to make sure they didn’t get stopped again!
Pretty much what Omar might have done over the next two years if he was allowed to clear the books of the early HOLD FOR NOW contracts to keep attendance up. Using guys like Turner or Murphy, Ike and Pridie, Mejia, Harvey and Holt, Etc…etc…
The game hasn’t changed, the amount of statistical use may have increased and what they look at has changed but the truth is the game is exactly the same as it was in 86.
You can build but if you want but to go all the way you had better BUY too!
Oakland is living proof of that and they are the ones that people think were responsible for changing that game! Due to a book about them.
In the case of the Yankees and Phillies I would say they may have read moneyball and took the right lessons from it! What NOT to do if you want to win a WS!
Building is part of it but at some point the build has to be COMPLETED and maintained! The only way to do that is to PAY to get what you need and to PAY to keep what you have!
A lesson learned by the Yankees and Phillies by reading the book on 1986 Mets!
You don’t need a book to figure out baseball all you need are two good eyes and a brain!
Statistics are only good for explaining what you saw and communicating it. And something is ALWAYS lost in the translation!
Only question you have to ask is will he keep doing that?
I think he can he seems to be pretty solid to me so far.
Yup, Backman is a better comparison to Turner than Keppinger, but all are good role players. Wally gave you everything he had. That’s all we can ask.
and who said Justin Turner is a role player? He’s new, I don’t know whether he’s gonna be a role player a starter, or what.
Backman was a starter not a role player.
Dude way to misread a statement!
All Des was saying that he fit a role of a good player who isn’t HOF material (yet) and while he may not be an All-Star (YET) he IS an important piece to the oveall team!
Backman was a ROLE player…His role was to give us good defense at 2B, Be a patient #2 hitter and be speed on the bases for the big bats that followed like Hernandez, Carter and Strawberry!
Thats a role and it doesn’t matter if you start or are the 8th Inning guy.
A role (purpose) is filled by that player despite the fact he isn’t Mickey Mantle!
“but all are good role players”
That’s what was said and I responded accordingly – thanks a lot metsie
Backman was platooned, first by Chapman, later by Teufel. Hid D was average but he was an effective player while surrounded with good talent on a winning team. Had he not, his prime would have mirrored Luis Castillo’s last three years.
Effective, expanded role player but fell short of where he was drafted (1st round #16) Could not have held a full time starting position.
LOL Des….But then again if you shave him, mess up his hair and paint a few freckles?
Wayne Garret!
Yes Metsie. You’ve got a keen eye!!!
On another subject, namely role players. Ruben Gotay played for us in 2007 and had a pretty good year. He got some extra base hits and a few home runs. But because of his limited range in at 2B, he wasn’t considered a key part of the team and his offensive skills, though fairly good, combined with limited defense skill, never allowed him to be considered much more than a transient guy on the team. Tommy Glavine recommended him to Atlanta in 2008 and Ruben played there for a year.
My point is that Ruben, a very likeable guy, wasn’t considered either a long term role player and he wasn’t considered good enough to be a starter. With the Mets, when Ruben played some 2B, Carlos Delgado was at 1B, starting to slow down, before injuries really slowed him down, and Shawn Green was in RF. The Mets were defensively weak on the right side of the field. I think Ruben’s out of organized baseball now.
The majors are very demanding and some really good players don’t last. On a sandlot, they would be killers, but at AAA or the big show, they are marginal.
I counted Gotay out and he isn’t. He’s in the Marlins system, playing at New Orleans. Since 2009, Ruben has been playing only in the PCL. At the AAA level, he’s a pretty good player, typically hitting in the .270-.285 range.
Your correct Des, SOME player simply do not last. It is something that can happen to anyone no matter how good their tools are since the baseline rule is you are dealing with a human being whose body is constantly changing, health is constantly deteriorating (called AGING by some) and even in time when the BODY is healthy there still exists a heavy MENTAL aspect to the game where you need to constantly adjust to the adjustments the other side makes to you.
Ike had to do this last year and did reasonably well, Made another adjustment in the Spring and look at his performance. They will adjust what they do with him again and he will need to counter.
Role players are important because you can’t possibly have an ALL Star or dangerous player at every position. Look at the catcher position in Philly. Ruiz and Schnieder. They still win don’t they? (Note Schnieder hit much better when he was with us!)
Because they have the big bats (whose bats are not really any bigger than our guys when you look at them) and the role players play at a decent enough level to allow that to be enough.
Is Turner a long term option at 2B? Prob not! Backman wasn’t neither was Teufel! 2B is a very tough position to keep a long term player at because it really is a lot about the physical conditioning.
My main issue with some here is the fact that they have this idea in their head that we need prospects to make trades. We don’t! A team will trade for a decent MLB player FASTER than they will for some Kid who hasn’t showed he is worth it.
And while these guys may be role players with us now they still may show us they are MORE than a role player by rising to the occassion. Who thought Ike Davis was a prospect two years ago? What is he now?
We tend to sell our self short more often than not and this is where the mistakes are usually made.
All because somne want change for the sake of it without truly weighing and evaluating what we have.
I don’t know if Turner is the LT Option at 2B I think Murphy may be that guy instead. But that doesn’t diminish what he has done while he has been here. and should be counted in any assesment of the state of our Farm despite the fact he is up here now winning games temporarily until Ike and Wright gets back!
plain and simple Omar saved the season from being 1962 all over again. The new GM has no idea. He’s living 2 decades ago in a roidal era. The guys he brought absolutely are horrid. And 75% of you Omar haters won’t give him an ounce of credit and will rave about the 3 or 4 zewroes Alderson will bring in when he dumps Jose. Alderson will be the worst thing to ever happen to the Mets. what do you expect brought in at the urging of Selig who kept the Brewers in the dumps for years and years.
Plain and simple – you have no clue.
Omar has gotten plenty of praise where deserved, but you are also turning a blind eye to the facts.
NO ONE has raved about any move Alderson has made and you continue to make that up. Just because people are willing to, at the very least, give the guy a season or two to fix this joint does not make them Alderson praisers.
You forget the bad contracts, excessive signings of players over the hill, how the bullpen blew games at a historic rate and he did NOTHING to improve it at the trading deadline, and you call out people for being Omar haters and say Alderson is the worst thing to ever happen to the Mets?
I think the rapture DID happen to your brain.
Omar saves the season. That a good one Ribant. Too bad Omar had no answers when his ship was springing leaks all over the place. He had no answers because he hadn’t even thought of the questions before hand.
He didn’t even put a AAA roster in Buffalo until 2010, after not having anything down there to bring up in 2009 other than Omir Santos.
You would really have thought that by year 5 he could have gotten a waiver wire upgrade here and there, a minor league free agent or two, a couple of non tenders, some placeholders with age still on their side to tide us over until his farm could start working for him. To provide some depth and competition in AAA. but that 2009 Buffalo Bisons team was as lacking in answers as a 56-87 team can be.
A couple of mid season bumps brought Niese and Gee there but other than that the “talent” was ghastley. The following year Minaya started to pay attention to the quality of the AAA affiliate at least partly at the insistence of the City of Buffalo who were understandably upset at having such a poor team. He addressed that issue in 2010 by bringing in Hessman (all time minor league HR champ) Luis Hernadez also DFA’d by Baltimore as well as some of his guys reaching AAA by promotion but as far back as 2009, year 5, no thought given to any method of player procurment other than trade and type A free agency. No thought to injury and competative depth protection. No thought given to nabbing a few career minor league free agents to have at least something at an age where they just might be able to do something if need be. Not someone like Sheffield, GMJ, and Jacobs.
So Omar started looking for waiver wire pickups, nothing wrong with that. A very good way to build competative depth and injury protection when you take over a team that has a barren minor league system but why not long before 2010? Why wasn’t their anything in 2007 and 2008 that could have stepped up and made a start? Closed a game? Shut down a lefty? Could stand in at 2B? Pinch hit? Now we’re going to cannonize Omar for doing in year six what he should have been doing all along, from Day 1. If he had he’d no doubt be here today after all, that was supposedly his forte. Player evaluation. Ability to judge a players ability to get ahead. What stopped him from doing this? The big checkbook? The big star or even faded former star at every position including backup mentality? Shame cause he had a fairly high ratio of hits on guys he gave a shot too that didn’t cost us anything to acquire. I believe he easily could have gotten our minors filled out with suffiecent quantity and an occasional surprise or two id he had spent the time on them that he should have.
A GM has to delegate but putting Tony Bernanzard in charge of player development and the minor leagues was really a disaster and so was putting Ramon Pena in charge of the IFA’s. These two guys really cost Omar big time. As big time as it gets.
Turner was nothing more than a waiver wire acquisition at a position of need who had always shown the ability to do something, hit. There was no cost associated for picking him up. Same with a guy like Emaus. Some work out, some don’t. Giving them a year or two in AAA is good for everyone as different players peak at different times. Turner looks real confidant and seems like a solution to one of our biggest needs but his warts will be on display at times too. but at 26 he could be a real help here until we can find a Pedroia/Cano/Utley ect. Frequently a non tender, guy who get’s DFA’d but still has his prime is a better candidate for good production than an aging type A free agent Like Alou for instance or Castillo. If Omar had built up the farm, picked up guys, even made trades for other teams prospects instead of just relying on type A free agents for every need, we could so easily be poised to compete for an entire decade right now and he would still be at the helm.
But “Omar saved the season.” You are hysterically funny Ribant. Thanks for the laugh.
Well, a lot of the minor league guys called up to replace the injuries to Pagan, Wright, Davis, Young, Paulino, are doing a very good job – We would be doing a lot worse than one game under .500 if it wasn’t for these guys.
Turner: .356 10 RBI in 15 games.
Pridie: 3HR 10 RBI in 20 starts, also gives us good defense
Nickeas: .250 1 HR 3RBI in 7 starts.
O’connor: 0ER in 5 innings, 7K’s.
Gee: 3-0 3.44 ERA.
Isn’t this what you wanted? Guys coming up from the minors and doing a good job when someone goes on the DL? Make fun all you want, but without those guys, our record would be much worse.
I have the wrong stats for Turner, it should be 15 RBI in 20 games.
That’s exactly what we should have. (what any team should have) but we should have had something in 2007, 2008 and 2009 when it would have made a real difference.
The waiver wire, rule 5, career minor leaguer and non tender list just never got a look until the money started getting short in mid season 2009. This is the area of Omar’s greatest strength. The identification of guys who could step in for a year. If that had been a priority in his plan he would have provided some of the solutions that way and kept his picks. How many more solutions we could have gotten out of 10 extra picks? Maybe just three but that would be HUGE.
If he had reestablished value and then traded it or picked up a comp pick for it all the better.
All told that strategy could have gotten us at least a starter, closer and LFer which would have negated the need to go FA for every weakness and played right into Omar’s strengths.
Dude your faulting a guy for not having prospects that jumped two levels in the Minors in a year! (Despite the fact it actually DID happen!)
His very first draft was what year? 2005 wasn’t it?
He took Mike Pelfrey! Made the rotation in 2007 didnt’t he?
You blame him for not having a 1st rounder in 2006 but why didn’t he?
Because he was in a PLAYOFF RACE with what previously was a 73 win team the year before, but thanks to Omar signing Pedro and Beltran, and all those other guys he went a lot further than anyone expected and failed because he had a closer who couldn’t close a paper bag and went after a guy who could actually GET those saves that we lost.
Thats DUMB to you but pretty smart move if you are living in 2006!
Hindsight will always say a deal was bad! They are ALL bad the question is how much bad and how soon.
Injuries killed the plan not the implementation of it and as the MiL call ups are showing the plan wasn’t quite as bad as it may have appeared. If the signings had not gotten injured as often as they did we would be in great shape right now with flexibility to deal those healthy players with a line of of solid minors ready to take their place until they show they are CORE or we go and draft, buy or trade for something better!