Apr
28
2012
28
2012
Imagine There’s No Heaven
An article by Craig Lerner
- Imagine if the Mets had signed Victor Martinez for 4 years, $50 million?
- Imagine if the Mets had signed Adam Dunn for 5 years, $62 million?
- Imagine if the Mets had signed Heath Bell for 3 years, $28 million?
- Imagine if the Mets had signed Carl Crawford for 7 years, $142 million?
- Imagine if the Mets had signed Albert Pujols for 10 years, $250 million?
- Imagine if the Mets had signed Jose Reyes for 6 years, $106 million?
- Imagine if we still had a GM who took his marching orders from the fans?
Lets Go Mets!
About the Author: Craig Lerner
I'm a data analyst and researcher for a leading news agency who loves life and is hooked on the Mets. I love following the Amateur Draft and have a particular fondness for the Mets Minor Leagues who I follow each day. Give me a cold beer, a summer day, and a Mets game, and I'm good to go.
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Seriously. The fans are hind-sighted.
“Imagine if we still had a GM who took his marching orders from the fans?”
We did. That’s how we got Jason Bay.
*shudders* If we still did, we be in deeper caca and not have the young nucleus.
That same GM is the reason why we have a young nucleus.
Yes, and if not for the Madoff crap, we would still be up to our neck with overpaid guys and some of the young guns dealt.
Omar very rarely traded prospects that were acquired under him. The only two that I can think of were Deolis Guerra and Mulvey in the Santana trade – He didn’t like trading his own prospects.
Point made. To this I say onward and upward. Lets go Mets!
I was behind the idea of trading Ike in a package for an ace and signing Dunn before the 2011 season, but not for nearly that much. Baseball works in wierd ways. Dunn gave the Sox nothing, but Ike gave nothing after April, either, and still hasn’t. I wonder what ace could have been had for a package centered around Ike and what he would have done for the Mets. To dream…
If Ike was in the deal, Grienke or Garza were available options at the time.
I wouldn’t have traded Ike for Garza, not at all.
the key is, make sure you nothings are cheap, and not locked in for many years to come.
I remember the “trade Ike” debate. That was a case where I could have been convinced either way, depending on the return. I really liked him, but would have parted with him for the right return. One reason was the large number of guys coming up (such as Duda) that needed to play 1B most likely.
Of course, there are no guarantees. Look at the Yankees giving up some prime prospects for Pineda (sp?). That didn’t quite work out as expected!
But Duda is not 1/100th the firstbaseman Ike is. Ike has defense over anybody else. A good firstbaseman is the glue to the infield and can save a lot of throws, play the bunt well, and overall make your entire infield defense better. You need to have that
- Imagine Sandy Alderson having the 3 year pennant drive Omar Minaya had while GM of the Mets.
- Imagine Sandy Alderson leading the Mets to the post season in his 2nd year as GM like Steve Phillips and Omar Minaya did. Even though Sandy Alderson inherited a better major league roster then both of those 2 did
- Imagine Sandy Alderson spending smart and trying to compete his first 2 offseasons with the Mets
- Imagine Craig Lerner being honest
- Imagine Sandy Alderson building up the farm system the way Omar Minaya did
HAHAHA!
Imagine Sandy signing Jason Bay.
Sir, your idiocy is appreciated by the Wilpon family!
- imagine we didn’t SECOND GUESS because you can’t say that until finding out later on that it’s not working out. Oh forgot….ha ha ha.
- Imagine besides that, the the team you’re watching right now is almost entirely built by Omar Minaya
- Imagine Sandy’s contributions to this team are 12 million of Francisco and 3.5 million to Rauch
Imagine coming to the comment section and not having to sift through Bayawn’s drivel. It’s happened. Briefly. It was glorious. For an even bigger feat, imagine Bayawn is intelligent.
I gotta say, I find it so funny that people who absolutely loathe Alderson use Francisco’s total contract value against him.
It’s almost like you’re hoping somebody reads that and thinks Francisco is getting paid $12 million this year. It’s almost like everybody who tries to knock Alderson down does it.
It’s almost like you hope we don’t remember the KRod deal or you try to act like Francisco’s contract is the same as KRod’s?
Francisco is getting 5.5 million. Rauch is getting 3.5 million and Ramirez is getting 2.65 million.
That’s 11.65 million for 3 relief pitchers. In 2011, Francisco Rodriguez made 11.5 million dollars, had they kept him he would have made $17.5 million.
Give me Francisco+Rauch+Ramirez over just KRod any day.
- Imagine that signing Francisco for 12 million meant….he was signed for 12 million
And I find it funny how people who loathe Omar hold Castillos 2M more per year than Francisco as worse when he at least played everyday and was muc more effective at his job!
Imagine Sandy Alderson making a good move. Nah Never will happen. Imagine one of the Sandy lovers thanking Omar for all these kids. Nah, their hatred prevents honest appraisal.
Most likely, you were one of those Omar haters till Sandy came along, but of course, you wont admit that. As far as not making a good move, he got rid of that bonehead Pagan so good enough for me.
But imagine if we had signed C. J. Wilson and Edwin Jackson?
…..Or Mark Buehrle. He has a 2.63 ERA and a 1.06 WHIP so far this season.
True!
Now it’s quite interesting that this topic was raised today because at the 50th Met Anniversary at Hofstra today, a friend of mine’s presentation was why the Mets have sucked the past 20 years or so. And he related it to all the free agent signings of over the hill players to multi year contracts by all the GMs during that time, citing how other teams went for younger players still in their prime.
He was not wrong with that one. From Bobby Bonilla through Todd Zeile and onto Jason Bay, the Mets have indeed been guilty – not of spending , but of not spending wisely. And it was pointed out, just like it was mentioned here, that Bernie Madoff put an end to that.
But my friend is also a Sandy Alderson die-hard and finished his presentation saying he’s glad we now have someone else in the front office who is different and he sees better days ahead. Since we’ve been having our own private on-again, off-again exchange of emails on this very subject I did not raise my hand to ask a question or make a comment. But I was able to zap him earlier when his laptop was not working for his video aid – I yelled out “Hey Bob, that doesn’t say much for modern computer analysis”. It got a laugh.
As we know, I do not like Sandy as a general manager and, in fact, suspect it is more Paul DePodesta than him making the personnel calls – but under Sandy’s strict spending guidelines. But I do beg to differ with his appraisal that Sandy is taking a different approach – not with the signings I listed yesterday. The only difference is financial.
All the young players on the club and those ready to make the jump perhaps by next year were all signed under Omar’s regime. Where Madoff comes to play is that I must agree with my friend that had circumstances been different, Omar (or whomever would have been hired as general manager – it certainly would not have been Sandy) might have continued signing the likes of Castillo or Bay and not giving all these kids a shot for the future.
That’s why I agree Bernie Madoff has more to do with the Mets better future than Sandy. Omar might not have been the right general manager but certainly he did accomplish the near impossible – taking a 71-91 team and leading it to within one amazingly deceptive curve ball from the world series two years later, refreshed a farm system that produced two gems in Reyes and Wright – but nothing else – and gave us a competitor year after year. 2009 we were decimated by injuries and Citi Field. We bounced back in 2010 making a run at Atlanta until the all-star break when it became apparent that other than Bay (no comment) the moves made to fill in the holes were the likes of Gary Matthews, Jr. indicated something was wrong with the front office financially.
I think this was then proved beyond a doubt when Bud Selig had to convince Sandy Alderson to apply for a job he really wasn’t interested in and that the Wilpons in turn went ahead and hired someone who wasn’t so enthusiastic about the position to begin with. I mean, who ever heard of a selection committee’s recommendation being somebody who didn’t even want to apply for the job to begin with and only did so from the coaxing of his boss who happened to be a personal friend of the owner? Sounds like Kevin Bacon who didn’t want to “appear pushy” when joining Faber’s elite fraternity.
Was your friends name Tagee?
LOL
LOL, Metsi,
No, it wasn’t our buddy whose moniker was taken after my all-time Met center fielder….., unless T hasn’t revealed his true identify to me.
Now because I am biased on the subject, please correct me if I’m wrong. But when he’s interviewed, does Sandy make more general statements about players or prospects (like we see him as a potential starter or outfielder, he can field great, a good base runner, has shown progress, has a good batting eye, etc.) instead of being specific like “he has a devestating curve to go along with a fastball, is trying to develop a third pitch, his mechanics are similar to this player or that, he’s cutting down on his swing and not being fooled by breaking pitches like he used to, etc.”)?
That’s why I agree with you about the role of Sandy being more on the business end than the player personnel end. If the Madoff situation never happened and the front office still wanted to replace Omar, I think Sandy would have had his original wish and had remainded working in Venezuela.
It wasn’t Madoff that caused Sandy to be hired it was the loan from the MLB which was solely about the loss of attendance! The MLB Owners got a bad taste in their mouth from taking over the Expos, And were uneasy with the takeover of the Dodgers and just could not stomach taking over yet another large market team due to financials. Since the Mets were not that deep in the financial hole, Installing Sandy was the solution to make sure they never got as far as the Dodgers did.
As for what Sandy says, 1) I don’t think he says anymore or less than any other GM does about his players, he knows who he has in a general sort of way and rarely ever speaks specifics of thier talent in any meaningful way and 2) Most of his conversations speak to philosophy and approach whenever a move is discussed.
That said (and this is where the Sandy people get me all wrong) I have no issue giving the GM credit for the success/failure of his franchise regardless of how much input he gives to player personnell provided he is the true architect of the front office and the management team especially in regards to the Baseball Operations.
In Early Oakland days he was not the architect it was the presidents staff that Sandy merely handled the day to day comings and goings and took daily issues to that president and even then the baseball decisions were brought directly to the president by the Baseball Operations guy bypassing Sandy for the most part!
but here in NY Sandy is the architect of the front office, Sandy chose the staff and they take issues to him. Like any good manager for any company he gets credit for the success of the staff he has assembled and their performance which is why I also give Omar Credit for Wright and Reyes to some small degree since the scouting department was largely of his creation and the IFA was directly under his control. Phillips gets credit if for no other reason than hiring Omar!
As for what Sandy knows about the players I don’t know how important that really is. A General in war doesn’t know which of his men is the best sharpshooter or has the best velocity and distance throwing grenades, His Lieutenants and Captains know those things and may never mention the specific skills of the men to him. Yet when those men win a battle the general gets credit for the victory. He then may get a recomendation to honor one soldier in the battle but that too is suggested by his staff not because he knows what any one man’s contribution was.
The General tells his captains where to go and what to get (objective) but he rarely tells them the manner in which they are supposed go about doing what they were instucted to do.
It is the same thing with Sandy (and probably many GMs) they hire the staff they trust to do what they ask and they get credited based on what that staff does or does not do.
If Sandy’s moves turn out to be mistakes then regardless of how much input he had in that move he shares blame for hiring the staff that made the mistake and not stopping them from doing so and if they succeed he gets credit for hiring the guy who made the right choice.
In the case of oakland he did not hire the staff that brought them the 89 WS but he did hire the staff that brought him some sccess in the mid 90′s. That staff consisted of Billy Beane who regardless of what I think about his philosophy obviously has an eye for talent as that success continued after Sandy had left and Beane took over. He gets the credit for Hiring Beane but maybe not as much credit in the baseball evaluation part of that success.
We will soon see how much DePo knows and if his role in Oakland was as significant as Beane’s. Can’t say that since leaving Beane that DePo has had a significant impact anywhere he has been since. Maybe he has that impact here. Time will tell.
No matter what the GM knows he is only as good as the staff he hires.
And he will be credited based on what they do in either side of the pass or fail coin.
To think because Okaland had some success he will succeed here is folly! Unless he has the same staff that made that success there is no guarantee.
and IMO it is dubious to call what Oakland did in the mid 90′s a success at all!
While many like the philosophy they used the truth is the guys who used the opposite of that philosophy were the ones who got the gklory and knocked them out of the playoffs every year!
Craig,
Good points. Some avoided with skill, some with luck.
Omar is a very talented scout. Not as talented as a GM.
Hi Metsi,
Didn’t expect such an extensive and prudent answer to what I thought was a simple question. LOL
The interjection of Madoff was meant to be more as a reference point than actual fact.
But I do think Sandy’s actual knowledge on the game on a professional level (thus holding it up to a higher standard than just fans like you, I and others) is quite limited and more focused on the business tools, whereas Omar, whether we agree with his moves or not, did have inside knowledge of the game itself and it was reflected in the way the organization underneath him was run.
Of course, being a baseball insider doesn’t mean one has a good analytical mind, either. Omar with his multi-year contracts at tremendous salaries doomed us to failure because it kept us committed to using players no other team would take off our hands, thus not allowing younger players to get their chance or the making trades or free agent signings for ones who could do batter and we were not like the Yankees who could simply absorb the contracts as a loss and release players outright.
That is why I just don’t adhere to the feelings of others that Sandy is setting a new tone for the club and that better days are ahead because of him. He is strictly a business person so what type of philosophy can he put into place other than fiscal? And if being fiscally prudent expands to fiscal restraint then what happens with our young players if they reach real stardom – do they too go the way of Jose Reyes? Or what it appears might be the case of David Wright?
That was my point to begin with – Sandy is a professional front office executive , not a professional baseball man and if his philosophy is more relying on baseball people that agree with his take on sabremetrics and/or money ball, we are in trouble because computer programmers are detached from the actualities of the game itself
That’s also why those involved strictly with player management, from the front office down to the coach in low A-Ball, needs to take their cues from a baseball man, not a statistics one.
Perfect example is Brian Kenny. The other night he was professing the success of extreme shifts against certain players and crediting this to saber charts (though acknowledging that Lou Boudreau employed such a shift against Ted Williams decades before those “saber charts” were available) and emphasizing that these types of shifts should be used more often against more players. Al Leiter shook his head in disgust as Kenny was finishing his remarks and said employing those types of shifts too often would completely mess up a pitcher’s game because he would then be altering his approach to each shift.
That’s why I say leave the baseball operations to the baseball people.
And those not willing to commit a club to certain free agents that fits into it’s needs due to an unwillingness to spend and a belief that money ball is the solution will be unable to compete year after year simply based on the baseball world as it actually is, not what one feels it should be. Oakland under Billy Bean put together roster of good talent that slowly dropped in quality as the good players jumped ship for greener pastures. On the other hand, Tampa Bay has already increased it’s payroll by nearly $24 million from last year to avoid the same slide. And they still have many young players who are not yet eligible for free agency or arbitration as the attached indicates, so they are going to need to increase that payroll a lot more over the next few years in order to remain competitive.
If the same success happens with our young talent, Sandy is going to have to sign them to longer term and more expensive contracts as well. Not many will take a deal like Jonathan Niese .
https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/TBR/2012-roster.shtml
I agree Sandy isn’t a gy like cashen who can look at a guy and know if he is good or not.
Bt what I was getting at is just as the president of the US isn’t an expert in economics, Military Tactics or the various differences in Diplomacy needed in every country, that does not preculde him from succeeding as manager of the staff that does!
If he picks the staff that fails him then he gets some blame, If he picks the staff that scceeds then he gets some credit.
In our old discssion of Oakland it wasn’t until 1992 that Sandy was picking the staff!
Which means he gets little credit for anything before he started doing that!
Hi Metsi,
Another point is the one on top not taking the advice of those underneath when he or she doesn’t like how it appears as an expense in the ledger books. Also, that lack of understanding could very easily put the wrong people in charge and set the wrong tone up and down the hierarchy. That’s why my reference to Al Leiter’s reaction regarding those saber charts plus our debate about the importance of on base percentage when looked in terms of a high left on base percentage (who made the most of their base runners this afternoon, the Mets or Colorado?)
We saw last season the moves made caused R.A. Dickey to say the front office not believing in the players was hard to swallow. It also showed that immediate salary dumping took priority over what what happening on the field. That’s why I’m afraid we are headed to a return of the Grant era and the the Wilpons were unable to even sell minority partnerships in a big market team like the Mets. Look at the players he (or his staff) have gone after the past two winters. Cost effective, even if not effective on the field
Well thats why it’s much harder to assign credit and blame for decisions to people who don’t make them.
Sometimes they can be overridden for the best and the worst by their superiors.
Of course, craig great job at just pointing the obvious… Funny how the whole mets team is pretty much omar minaya’s team.. Except for david who was here when he arrived, but Thole, Ike, Muphy, Tejada, Kirk, Duda and pretty Much any SP it’s omar’s doing… I did not like omar the GM, but the knocking of omar minaya the scout it’s just out of pure hatred from the sandy lovers.. Pathetic, but you can expect that from craig, he’s been one the unofficial president of the We love Sandy fanclub.. Can’t you for once write an article not taking a shot at jose reyes or omar minaya just to make your boys look good???
As I have suggested, wait till July when the Mets are again in the thick of things and see if Sandy sends off Santana and Wright for some more top prospects, citing rebuilding, Santana not being in our future, next season David is going to command so much money, no longer committing so much of the payroll to just a few players, the team is losing $70 million again this year, yada, yada, yada.
This same bunch of guys were in the thick of the wild card hunt last season when many still said they were just a .500 club playing over their heads and that we should take advantage of getting something for these veteran players now. Would it have hurt our future by keeping Beltran and KRod for the rest of the year and instead of the front office showing the team that it did not believe in them (as R.A. Dickey said) it was instead yelling “LET’S GO METS”?
No matter what type of talent he has, did our future make or break with Zach Wheeler? Was it worth giving up the season and not allowing the young kids to get their feet wet, experience pennant race pressure and build up a winning attitude? Were there not other prospects out there or in our own minor league system that our front office threw in the towel and replaced it with underdog tee shirts?
Sandy was urged by Bud Selig to apply for the job. He admitted at the time he preferred staying in Venezuela and wasn’t interested in the position. That the Mets hired a businessman and lawyer who had to be coaxed into applying to begin with shows that straightening out the financial mess Sterling Equities is in is more urgent than the performance of the team. Why else for the fire sale last summer? “Ya Gotta Believe” it was money and not for the sake of rebuilding.