28
2012
Mets Don’t Need To Extend David Wright Just Yet
An article by 
David Wright has been the star of the Mets this year. He is an early contender for the MVP award. He’s hitting right around .400, and he’s dominated at the plate. His fielding has looked a lot better this year too. Those are good reasons to offer him an extension now, but I think the Mets should wait. I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that the Mets will extend him, but remember he also has a team option for next year. So, they really have until the end of next season to extend him. There’s plenty of time left, no need to rush it now.
There are quite a few reasons that people think that they should resign him now. One reason is because of the Jose Reyes situation that took place this past offseason. However there’s quite a few differences between the situations. One big difference is that now the Mets aren’t dealing with the Madoff situation, so they can actually afford to extend Wright. Also, Wright gives 100% all the time, and Reyes didn’t. Disagree? Wright has never been benched due to lack of effort while Reyes has. I also think Wright actually wants to be a lifetime Met, while I was never really all that sure that Reyes did. Wright is also willing to negotiate during the season, which is something that Reyes refused to do. Wright is a leader on this team, and the face of this franchise. I can’t think of a time where I ever considered Reyes either. So I highly doubt it’ll get anywhere’s close to the Reyes situation, as they are two totally different players and thus two totally different situations.
Another argument for extending him now is so they can officially name him captain and put the “C” on his chest. However, the only things that really does is put a “C” on his chest and give the executives a chance to officially name him captain. It doesn’t really change anything though. He has been the captain for a while now, and both the players and fans know this. He does need to have the “C” stitched to his chest to be a leader and captain. So rushing the extension process just to put a silly “C” on his chest makes no sense to me as it changes nothing.
Again, I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that he’ll be extended, but I realize we have a year and a half still to extend him before he’s a free agent, why do we need to rush and extend him now? Let’s let him focus on playing right now, and wait until later in the year, or even the beginning of next year to do it.
About the Author: Tyler Moore
Tyler is a lifelong Mets fan and tries to attend a few Mets games each season. Among the most notable games he's attended are Mike Piazza's first game in 1998, Todd Pratt's postseason homer game in 1999, and Mike Piazza's last game as a Met in 2005. He's been blogging about the Mets since 2009. He also Co-Created and Co-Hosts the Mets Madness Podcast.
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NL East Standings
| Team | W | L | Pct. | GB |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Braves | 23 | 18 | .561 | - |
| Nationals | 23 | 19 | .548 | 0.5 |
| Phillies | 20 | 22 | .476 | 3.5 |
| Mets | 16 | 23 | .410 | 6.0 |
| Marlins | 11 | 31 | .262 | 12.5 |
Last updated: 05/18/2013
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Like them or not, if nothing else, this FO does not seem to make moves based on the whims of the fans. So IMO they aren’t going to sign him to “make up” for Jose.
And the captain thing is just silly. No indication from the team that they would even do it, and Wright doesn’t seem to be all that interested. Just extending him to make him a career met would serve the same purpose.
I think they should do it right at mid season (7/1 ish) for a practical reason: it will be easier to do, and cheaper. The sooner it happens, the more risk the Mets assume, and you have to pay for that. If they sign the deal now then no matter what happens in the nest 1.5 years, it is the Mets problem. Slump, injury, whatever, he still has the contract. Plus, david would be buying security (knows he will be in NY, no chance of a trade, along with financial). And of course, he would eliminate the whole circus.
The closer to the end of a deal you get, the more likely the player is to just ride it out and play the market. and unless he has a major problem by then, that is not likely to make it cheaper for the Mets. You can also come up with “fair market value” but at an auction (which is what FA basically is) one person with a big checkbook going nuts can blow that out of the water.
so sign him now, and it should be for a hefty yet still team friendly deal.
I don’t remember the Mets ever having a FO that did things based on the whims of fans.
Actually so far this FO is not very good either.
This.
Makes sense to me.
you forgot one thing any – why would Wright sign with a FO that he knows will try to get him as cheap as posslble. What would you do? You would not want to wait to hear how much MONEY other teams will offer?.
I think you would and so would I.
Bayonne — You’ve just given the reason our front office wouldn’t make the first bid. You just said you’d wait until others made their bids.
Sandy Alderson is a lot more savvy in business deals than any player on any field. It’s expected. It’s what he does all the time.
Yet Jose and his agent Peter Greenberg tried to sucker them in by demanding the first bid so that later the Mets would wind up bidding against themselves. Dumb move by Jose. He needs to remember that Greenberg wants his money and doesn’t want to be sued later for malfeasance by trying to strike an unreasonable deal. So Peter sets up Jose for the offer that never really came.
Jose is left holding a $100 Mil Plus bag. But not to worry, since the Mets will pick him up in about 2014 or later. That’s when the Marlins will have gotten all their publicity out of Jose that they can get and his annual salary really starts hiking upwards. Maybe Jose will come to the Mets with cash after Miami decides it’s cheaper to unload him.
I believe that heavily back loaded contract was with the mindset of trading him before the big bucks kick in. Hence the absence of a no trade clause. Not Miami’s style to give out those.
I think he’ll wind up back in NY but unfortunately not in Queens.
Very True Srt
It wouldn’t be the first time the Yankees went into a rebuilding phase using formet Met players to keep fan interest.
Jeter isn’t getting any younger here! They will need a replacement for him right around the time Reyes’ big bucks kick in.
Glad you were in the meeting room to be privy to all that info Des and very nice of you to share that exclusive with MMO.
Des I have a question….
Who has to bid more? The guy who bids first or the guy who bids after him?
If we had made an initial Bid BEFORE the Marlins did you might have gotten Reyes then.
We didn’t and waited until someone else bid and priced us out of getting Reyes altogether!
This Idea of Bidding against yourself is just plain dumb!
You can’t bid against yourself unless you make a SECOND bid!
If we had made the first bid then someone paid more you didn’t bid against yourself you bid against the second bidder!
Only if you make a bid and then Bid again without another bid can it be called bidding against yourself!
Metsie — It’s not dumb. It’s my understanding the Mets would bid when they knew what the market was for Reyes. That’s just being smart. But Reyes was reacted to the Marlins like a scared kid whose bluff was called. He was locked up by the only team that had a chance to bid. Foolish.
Recommendation to Reyes:
1) Fire Peter Greenberg who is incompetent. He gave Reyes bad advice to negotiate through the media. Stupid idea unless you’re Albert Pujols.
2) Don’t try to outfox a guy (Alderson) who has already done it more than you’ll ever do it in your life.
3) Does it mean anything to you that no other team made a bid?
Des do you know what the market was for Reyes at the time?
ZERO there was NO market, No Competition, NO PRICE AT ALL!
And if you make an offer for 5/90 or whatever it was you wanted to sign Reyes for there was a chance he would say “Thats Enough I’ll Stay!”
Once you let the Market get involved and they bid 100Mil did your Bid have any chance of succeeding?
So you saved nothing by making no offer the only one who SAVED money was the Marlins!
They only had to beat a bid of ZERO. They offerred a 100 because that what Reyes said he wanted.
And tyhe truth is the whole argument for not making an offer was because people thought 10 lousy Mil was enough to make the deal a bad one!
It was just dumb, you make you bid and THEN if he doesn’t take it and another offer comes you decide the n if you want to up your bid.
But waiting until someone else bid saved you ZERO dollars! All you gained was a disadvantage by giving up your chance to make a bid with NO competition!
Metsi — Try as you will, you’re not able to resuscitate the Reyes self-imposed fiasco. i liked Jose on the field but to me he was a dunce off of it. Peter Greenberg is just a Iriving (PickPocket) Picard, but without the talent. There was no market because the geniuses on the Reyes team didn’t know how to cultivate it. Don’t blame Sandy for waiting for the market which never materialized. He’s not responsible for the Reyes team overplaying their hand.
Now, let’s remember that speculations of what could have been is the stuff of the vanquished. The Mets were in a tight spot because of the law suit (regardless of what they are now saying to affect normalcy) and Jose is a better player than negotiator. Greenberg is a charlatan who also isn’t very smart.
Des what are you talking about no Market?
The guy got 106 Million dollars!!!!
How can you say there was no market because he didn’t get Crawford money?
He had plenty of Market it’s just that the Marlins came out strong and at a price other teams didn’t want to beat.
They were willing to pay the price, and the years!
We weren’t even willing to bid before that!
If we had the Marlins maybe can’t make that offer at all!
Metsi — He lucked out because Miami wanted to create a buzz to sell tickets for their new stadium. It was a market technically, but only one team made an offer. Then he took it and tried to play the press. Maybe we’ll get him back in 2-3 years at cents on the dollar.
Regarding Peter Greenberg, it’s common practice to encourage taking an offer, even though better deals might be in the offing. Greenberg had to be worried that despite his brinksmanship he could have been sued later by Reyes for not providing competent advice. These lawyer/agent/player relationships are complicated and Greenberg certainly didn’t want to lose Reyes and his fees/commissions. But there was never talk from the Reyes camp of a WIN-WIN deal with the Mets. It was some minor brinksmanship which failed. I think it’s likely that Greenberg and Reyes, each for their own set of reasons, panicked when Sandy didn’t bite right away. Just my opinion, but so far Wright’s team has been much cleverer.
Well the if there was no market for him why didn’t we make our cheap bid that no one else would have bid against?
Really Des it’s just not making any sense to say making a bid was bidding against ourselves and then trying to say there was no market because The Marlins were the only ones bidding!
Reyes is making 106 Mil…Now it’s fine to say we wouldn’t want to pay that much and outbid them but it’s dumb to think not bidding before they could bid was going to save us from what they bid or that it was going to save us money by not making one!
In either case the Marlins made the offer they made and while making the first offer may not have saved US money it might have cost the Marlins some more money than they paid which can only help the NEXT time we both want a player in free agency.
Why do you have insert Reyes? Reyes didn’t give his 100% while Wright did?
Grow up , little boy.
Truth hurts, doesnt it?
You want the truth? Guess you haven’t been watching Wright jog to 1B on infield ground balls. Just the other day he almost STOPPED before reaching 1B on an infield ground ball.
He does it every game
Reyes never did such things, Wright does it everyday all the time. Watch him jog to 1B on an infield ground ball today too.
Oh no! Anything but that!!
Bayonne always needs a reason to deny achievement and greatness. He complains, gripes, and grouses. C’mon Bayonne wake up and analyze the game beyond the players you hate and those you have a love affair with (Ike and Ruben). Oy vez.
He is the only player in the history of MLB to every not run out a ball 100% on a bang bang player. It’s never ever happened by any other player. NEVER, only DWright has ever done that.
You sir are a member of the Wright haters club you and your three friends.
You watch game simply to watch him make a mistake and harp on it for years, yet turn a blind eye to those that you like.
Worst imaginable fan ever, and you make these funny claims to have coached the game. So when you were coaching, did you have an irrational hate for one of the better players on your team, just because?
WRONG needs more GRITZ! I wanna see grunting, and arms flailing on every ground ball. Run through the base…at LEAST 20 feet into RF!!!!! OK?!
Well Tyler you seem to have missed the #1 reason to extend Wright sooner rather than later…
The longer you wait the more chance some other team will pay stupid money to a Wright-Lite type player that will inflate the price tag on keeping Wright!
Truth is there is little to be gained by procrastinating on this. He isn’t going to get cheaper unless he starts hitting a buck twenty and if that happens we won’t want to extend him then anyway!
The fact he is hitting close to .400 isn’t going to add a lot of extra money to a contract he signs now, could add to a contract later on though if he maintains it and ends the season hitting above .300 and wins the MVP!
So while there is no risk of losing him forcing us to make a deal now, if you are interested in getting a good price there is no BETTER time like the present to make the extention offer, get it out of the way and do it now before it becomes a distration or Wright does something to make him a 20 Mil Plus commodity. Cause if that happens chances are very likely we won’t re-sign him then!
While I agree with the title of the post, the dig at Reyes was unneeded. David Is having a career year. Go Wright! Lots can happen in the next Year and a half. Why rush?
I don’t think its true that Reyes didn’t give 100%…I think he tried…maybe the occasional concentration lapse or whatever…but I don’t think it was that the guy didn’t try.
The reasons not to sign him were mainly health-related…giving a guy like that 6 years and big money is risky. For all the talk about Wright’s off years in recent history (not that it wasn’t warranted…it did seem like he was declining)…Reyes wasn’t all that great before getting hurt in ’09 and was pretty bad in ’10 (worse than Wright’s “bad years”)…so there was some concern about consistency as well. And mainly with the whole Madoff thing the Mets finances were very much up in the air at the time.
As far as when to sign Wright. There is still time…I think the earlier the better in terms of saving money. And things are going well for the Mets right now…the mood around the team is good…so maybe Wright would be more willing to sign now than if the Mets start to slip a bit. So there is no need to rush into anything, but there are advantages to trying to do it sooner than later.
I am so sick of newspaper articles and such saying lock up DW. Where is he going, exactly? He could get a serious injury and be useless to this team. Don’t these people want their FO to be responsible? I am tired of stupid writers who know nothing about good business.
No Jdon they don’t really cvare about how much it costs the Wilpons they want the FO to build a winner and Money should be no object!
How it could be suggested that baseball executives have no idea what the market could potentially be for a free-agent before his services become available? Stock brokers calculate which stocks to buy not on what they are worth now but what they project the stock to be worth in the future. The same holds true front office executives. They too project in advance what a player could potentially be offered based on current salaries, contract lengths, teams that might be interested in a certain player and how much (or little) they might offer based on their current spending traits and revenue assets, etc.
So in the case of Jose Reyes, Sandy stating he wanted to wait to see what other teams would offer before he would sit down with Jose’s agent was only for public consumption — as a business person with an analytical mind he can project what the possible market condition for a certain player can be down the road with confidence. He is no dope in these matters.
I believe Sandy Alderson already has an educated figure in his mind to anticipate how much David Wright could potentially demand as a free agent. And so does David’s agent. However, I don’t know if it is either in the team’s interest or even if it is necessary to begin negotiations now instead of the the winter. But in the least, Sandy could let David’s agent know when the Mets would be interested in beginning those formal talks – which is at least a first step in letting David know the Mets are actually interested in him.
Not opening up negotiations with Jose’s agent at all was the way the Mets let it be known they were not interested in re-signing him and if we are eventually told the Mets want to see what offers his agent might get first before making their own offer, take it as a sure sign the Mets are not be interested in retaining his services.
Of course it’s a gamble – just like all our own investments are as well.
is t ot predict. After all the hoopla, only one team came after Jose. I am for waiting. No negotiating with a .400 hitter in May. You negotiate with a healthy .315 hitter after the season. And the jury is till out on how much of a “winner” DW is.
If the Mets were interested in re-signing Jose, negotiations would have begun and there would have been a good chance that Miami would not have even come into the picture. The fact is that the Mets decided to pass on Jose which opened the door for the Marlins to make such an outrageous offer.
It is not unusual for teams re-sign players on the last year of their contract prior to declaring free agency. Didn’t the Mets do that with their third baseman and shortstop a few years back?