2
2012
How Long Can The Average Mets Fan Hold On?
An article by 
Six years and counting…That’s how long it’s been since the Mets reached the postseason. While not the worse drought in franchise history, this particular layoff comes on the heals of what was a brief era of promise as a result of big spending. That spending is at least partially at fault for the teams current situation, but in the eyes of many fans that is the Wilpons’ problem, not ours. Therein lies the divide…
If the Mets are going to resolidify their place as a legitimate contender in the NL East and beyond, there has to be spending. Although there is plenty of merit in Sandy Alderson’s “build through the farm system” mentality, at some point people need to get paid. Rather than waiting for things to fall into place, fans want to see the team’s front office push the issue. And so, we wait…
The question I ask is, how long do we wait? I realize there is a portion of the fanbase that will never give up on the blue and orange. Unfortunately there is a larger portion, “casual fans” we’ll call them, who will eventually turn their sights elsewhere. While your probably muttering to yourself “they’re not real fans”, the fact remains that those casual fans are even more important to the overall well being of the franchise, than the die hard faction you probably call yourself a part of.
You see it was the casual fan that was missing in September when the Mets were playing in front of crowds struggling to reach 15,000 in actual attendance. It’s one thing for those fans to lose interest as a lost season plugs along, it will be another thing entirely should they check out before things get under way if the Mets return a team with little hype and an even slimmer chance of competing yet again.
While you and I may be able to get ourselves wrapped up in the development of young players and the execution of the long term plan for another 162 games in 2013, it’s a fair assumption that the average fan won’t. The average fan is only interested in wins that allow them to show their tempered fandom with pride, brag to their buddies and have a reason to spend their hard earned dollar. Another season of sub .500 baseball won’t give them that…and for the a seventh year in a row there may be little to brag about.
The actions, and equally as much, the inactions, of the Mets in recent years has driven a wedge between the franchise and it’s fans. Everyone wants to root for a winner, but for a large portion of the fanbase the normal feelings of hope and promise have been replaced with apathy and indifference. It’s easy to say we don’t need fans like that, but the fact is the team does, and if we’d like to see winning baseball return to Queens sooner than later, we need them too. However, in what’s shaping up as a winter that will produce little reason to get excited for 2013, how much longer can the average fan hang on?
Follow me on Twitter at @RobPatterson83
About the Author: Rob Patterson
Ultimately, I owe nearly thirty years of Mets related torture to my mother, who is the reason I became a fan. I was too young to remember the 86 run, but hope to see one I'll be able to recall much sooner than later. I enjoy writing about the team and welcome your feedback on my posts. Oh..and I am not with 28!
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In addition to the casual fans that will turn their back, sabermetrics has bred a new group of fans that follows GM’s who are advocates of saber. Take for example this site, as soon as Alderson became GM 20-30 new commenters showed up under the guise of being Mets fans. They never commented here before but now evolved out of a love for the man behind the curtain. Strange, but true. Since their arrival the only comments made are in defense of the front office, not the team. Bad moves for the team are defended because of the person who made the moves. An us vs them divide started that still continues today. If they could order Alderson jerseys they would. I call them the bottom feeders of the fanbase and the most disloyal to the team with no concept or desire for winning. They want to dumps stars and go on a permanent rebuild cycle even though this philosophy has never won a world series. There was guy named t agee who commented here for years longing for an all homegrown team, when he finally got his wish he disappeared, no doubt hiding in shame.
Not only that, but they won’t get off your lawn either. And they play their damn music too loud.
It is amazing that you could write something so utterly false and completely fabricated as this comment Met Maniac.
But, when you are so addicted to nonsense, I guess you have to create straw men to rail against.
Wow.
Hang in there. We’ve had tougher times than these. Things can only go up after 2011-2012, that’s our rock bottom.
I don’t know about that statement…nothing amazes me with this ownership group who cannot be embarrassed.
Where else am I going to go? If I still kept them a my team through moving to VA, the Nats moving close to me and well, the agony of 35 years as a Mets fan…
I’ve been a Met fan since the days of the Polo Grounds so you could say I’ve seen it all and the only time I lost hope and stopped caring and going to Shea was the Lorinda DeRoulet/ M. Donald Grant years when I thought the ownership was so out of touch they just didn’t care.
When they finally sold the club to Nelson Doubleday and the Wilpons I took interest again because I believed the ownership along with us had a desire to succeed.
However, since the time that the Wilpons were able to buy out Doubleday I have once again become disillusioned about the team and where ownership is taking it.
Starting with the Citifield fiasco of turning it into an ersatz Ebbetts Field including a shrine to a non Met who never had anything to do with the organization. (Shea may have become a dump by then but a least it was our dump).
The general ineptness has shown itself in poor planning, poor organization, poor spending, poor communication that are making the M.Donald Grant years pale in comparison.
There are organizations (not the Yankees) like the Cards, Braves and Dodgers (before the divorce disaster) who for decades have had organizations that kept the team at least competitive. Hope for me is dwindling I don’t have that many years left to watch these fools try to get it right and screw it up again. My hope is that they sell to someone who has the bucks and the desire to build a winning organization from scouting on up. An organization that other clubs would want to use as a model not as a joke.
You are 100% correct.
Depends on their grip.
Hi Robert,
I have to disagree with you completely that the spending has led to some of our problems today.
With what the Wilpons spent they made more than enough back with revenue. It was not a question of money as it might have been bad investments. By spring training 2011 Castillo and Perez were gone so there were no roster spots or positions they were holding up. Never has a payroll caused a team to financially collapse. And in New York, the biggest baseball market in the country, it would take the magnitude of the Bernie Madoff scheme combined with too much debt taken on all at once and losing revenue by losing the fan base by thinking they could make more in a smaller capacity park and fans would pay whatever they wanted being they were a monopoly as far as the Mets were concerned. That, and the ball park itself in certain ways being an insult to many fans with blocked views, etc. which turned off many to going back. Had the Wilpons showed they were more in touch with the fan base, perhaps they would be supported because the support was mutual.
And as Maniac has suggested, the hiring of Sandy Alderson had been very well scripted to make one think we were bringing in some sort of baseball legend (sabermetrics and money ball) instead of a businessman who knew how to corporate downsize with the best of them.
So it was the perfect storm of all these factors together that has put the Mets in the situation they are now, not the payroll.
I probably should have included the work irresponsible in my spending blurb, but at the same time I mention that these guys have to get paid. Your right that the team has to act like a big market club, but I think the fact is that the Wilpons were/are financially fractured. I’m not sure when that ends..but we apparently haven’t reached the end of that rope yet.
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I was one of the few who went to games even in the late 70s. It was bad, but I wasnt going to trade in my mets cap for the hated yankees, no way. Now the yanks have problems of thier own so thats not really a place for the front runners to go either. I live in Arizona. I never paid much attention to them except in 2001 because they played the stienbrenner gang in the WS. Now I may spend a little more time watching them. Their system is stocked so well they have 3 pitchers rated higher than wheeler and 5 tool OF prospects as well. Mets will always be my number one but its just depressing right now.
I’ve always considered myself a diehard fan… but earlier I read an article on ESPN suggesting that they Mets should/could trade Wright to the Red Sox and I had to think about which I would continue to support; Wright or the Mets?
Hard times for sure.
Reyes was one thing, Dickey is an acceptable casualty.. David Wright on the other hand….
LMAOOOO
then u guys wonder….
Yeah, this is nuts.
Based on Metsblog comments, I really think there is a sizable part of the fan base which would rather the Mets lose with David the Magnificent than win without him.
Crazy. But not as crazy as giving him this contract would be.
It really goes against the logic Sandy explained in 2nd generation contracts last year…
which i totally understand where he is coming from…
this is why before Beltran was signed, Omar had Ricco run statistics on players declining value and found that on avg. after age 35 a player starts to give a diminished rate of return. They used Bernie Williams career path as an example.
In 6 years as a GM, Omar gave out 2 contracts that were 5 years or longer..
Beltran and Johan
what people dont realize….is that the wilpons actually were making money off the deferred salary structures..
Beltran + Johan + Pedro + Glavine + Wagner + about 5 more players… total amount of money in deferred contracts roughly 30 mil..
they were getting returns in the double-digits…and paying the players 1.5%…
To put it in simple terms…
You agree to work for company X for 100,000 a year…for 7 years…total amount = 700,000
Company X says that they will pay you 85,000 a year instead…and give you 15,000 a year back with 1.5% interest compounded 7 years from now
Company X takes your 15,000 and invests it with Bernie…for 7 years…and plan to make back 700,000….giving you back 150,000 ( 105,000 + 45,000 in interest )
you make your money
I make my money off of your money
It’s a win/win for everyone on paper
Now the mets have to pay back ALL THOSE guys with the agreed upon interest rates…but w/o the cash cow that enabled those deals in the 1st place
Whats crazy is that they give inaccurate estimates on Johan’s 2013 salary and make NO MENTION of the above ex-players still owed money
I guess I’m not an average fan because this isn’t a thought I could even imagine having. I’ve been with them this long, I’m certainly not just going to turn my back now. I love the youth movement and that’s how teams who have won more than 1 world series over the last 15 years have done it….
I think average mets fans have already “let go”. average met fans are not the passionate fans who fill up the comments on mets blogs.
For met fans who are still holding on, I think they continue to hold on no matter what.
that said, the wilpons better open their wallet when their best prospects (read harvey & wheeler) show they’re legit and ready to contend… in other words, 2014. I think it was pretty obvious from the time Sandy came on that until the Omar contracts run out, he’s not going to be able to do anything. With santana and bay coming off the books, they’ll have money to spend, and Sandy, in his infinite “saber-wisdom” have to show that his thinking makes winners. no other excuses.
next offseason. that’s what I’m looking for.
They’ve lost about a million and a half ticket sales AFTER establishing their Network and opening a new ballpark. The baseball operation is now losing 50 million dollars a year.
I’d say The Average Met Fan STOPPED Holding On about 4 million ticket sales and 150 million dollars ago!
Fairly well written, but please learn when to use an apostrophe.
You’ll have to cut me some slack.. This was written in fifteen minutes on my Ipad in a rush. I didn’t even proof it…
I am an absolute die-hard, but I am getting closer to the end of the line.
I’m sure I will get sucked back in next year at the beginning of the season, but fading into irrelevance in July or August while playing in the country’s largest market is simply unacceptable.
For a front office staff that’s supposedly built on smarts, where is ONE low impact signing that turned out well? It says alot that these guys can’t even find one “Fernando Rodney” type to hang their hat on.
There is no such thing as an average Mets fan. We are way above average and there’s nothing short of dementia that will take me to another team …
There is no guarantee with either approach. The problem with Sandy is that he has never won when in charge, except for 1 steroid infused team back in Oakland. This moneyball approach is all fine, but it is also predicated on identify market inefficiencies and exploiting them before everyone else catches on. Its no longer rocket science to suggest someone with a high OBP is a good ballplayer, thats not a secret. The current FO was banking on relief pitching becoming the new market inefficiency, and yet just totally invested in all the wrong relief pitchers, but they are so finicky from year to year, that the bullpen was god-awful is not on the FO. What should be talked about is how that last offseason, they invested all of our money on the bullpen. That is terrible. And anyone who watches baseball or follows statistics knows the two guys they brought in as free agents were terrible without single redeeming qualities. That’s on them. And, with the new drafting system, its not as easy to build the farm system as it was in years past, and soon the rules on international free agents are changing as well. Keeping prospects is all fine and dandy, but there needs to be spending. The majority of minor leaguers are just that and never amount to anything. When good players become available, via trade or free agency, sometimes you need to go after them. All the Brandon Nimmos in the world may never even become a Lucas Duda. And we all remember the promise of Generation K and Gregg Jeffries and Lastings Milledge. There are very few minor leaguers that become even serviceable major league players, even fewer that become stars. When you get lucky with some of your home-grown talent, you need to build around it. These Mets won’t be competitive for a while. That’s why RA Dickey, David Wright, and are more valuable to the Mets if they are on other teams.
Blasphemy! We could have ran the other way when we traded Seaver and ushered in Grant’s Tomb. We could have ran when Bonilla wanted to show beatwriters the Bronx and Coleman threw cherry bombs at a group of fans. We could have ran when Mo Vaughn tried to swallow us whole and we traded Kazmir for Zambrano. But here we still are! They dont make ‘em stronger than us. Lets Go Mets!
Good job!
I am by no means a “casual fan” but am I really supposed to be excited for a team that has zero chance of competing for the foreseeable future? Wow, another pitching prospect, maybe he’ll win 15 meaningless games for us in a couple years. Sorry, but as long as the Wilpons own this team, they will never win anything. We all know it. Let’s stop the denial and accept the terrible situation for what it is. I won’t root for anyone else but I also hate to spend even $1 to give to the Wilpons lawsuit fund.
Never!!!!
I lived through the days of Doug Flynn and Eliot Maddox. I remember when Joel Youngblood resisted the move to 3rd. There was a time when Kingman was the only thing to root for. Many recall the fiasco of Vince Coleman…followed by Bobby Bo (twice). 2000 was followed up by Art Howe and that mess…2006 by collapse after collapse after collapse.
Those of us old enough to remember the late 70s know that the organization turned the corner the day Frank Cashen took the helm. His answer to the problem was simple: it will take 5 years. So while George was signing Dave Winfield, Steve Kemp, and Dave Collins to free agent contract, Cashen went about building an organization. Trades brought in Darling and Terrell (who became HoJo). Sid was acquired for Bob Bailor. Gooden, Straw, and Dysktra were all drafted. While all this took place, ’80, ’81, and ’82 Met fans starved. George and the boys appeared in the WS in ’81 (losing to the Dodgers) and then traveled into obscurity for the next 14 years winning zero. The Mets, starting in ’84, became contenders owning the NY baseball scene through the rest of the decade. That run ended with the dismantling of that team and replaced with FA signings (ala George) of the likes of Bobby Bo, Eddie Murray and Coleman. The 2000 run ended with the importing of high priced talent like Alomar, Appier, Vaughn, Estes, and Burnitz.
Those who forget history are apt to repeat it. Met history is filled with attempts at buying titles. An expanding of payroll is not the answer although many claim it is. Look at the list of FA signed over the years. Also, seek the trades made where high priced “stars” were acquired. How many titles did they amount to? Since 2005, what have names like Pedro, Bay, Johan, Alou, Delgado, Glavine, Castillo, Perez, and KRod brought to NY? 1 playoff appearance. That is it. These guys were nothing more than remakes of the 2001-2003 and the 1991-1994 Mets; hired guns who didnt work out.
Since 1988, but for ’99-’00 and ’06, Met fans have nothing but disappointment. There was plenty of spending and little results. For that reason, I applaud Alderson for approaching things like Cashen. People can complain about the lack of spending but the facts show how that doesnt work. Both recent and extended history point to the same end. The only true method is develop talent through the farm system. Not only did the Mets in the 80s prove this, but so did the recent Phillies (Rollins, Howard, Utley, Hamels), the Braves (many players over 15 years) and the Giants (Posey, Timmy, Cain, Sandoval).
Cheer up Met fans. At this time in 1983, after a 90+ loss year, the only thing to cheer for was the naming of a Met as ROY. During the off season, they resigned their FA first baseman to a 5 year deal. Hopes were not high going into ’84 with a pitching staff of an aging Mike Torrez, Bruce Berenyi, Ed Lynch, and a couple of kids names Darling, Terrell, and Fernandez. The lineup included such threats as Backman, Oquendo, Fitzgerald, Mookie, and an aging George Foster. Murderers row they werent. However, in may a kid arrived named Dwight Gooden and somehow this time shocked the baseball world by giving the powerful Cubs a run at the division title. A team that won 68 the year before punched out 90 victories. The lean years were finally over. And this will happen again. 2013 might be the parallel to 1982. Or 1983. But mark my words, if this path is followed, we will hit 1984 again.
well done, taskmaster. We can only hope that sandy can replicate cashens success as well as his strategy.
We are at a “incipient moment” or “crucial point no this is not politics although applicable it also applies to our team. No individual is greater than the team. Few see in the post Madoff crisis the opportunity during this forced budget cap to rebuild. Oh t”rebuildig” to alot of Met fans a very ugly word I take umbrage of the remark made that those who advocate it aren’t real Met fans. First: We are not going to finish ahead of Nats or Braves for awhile, we are cash strapped and (2) by rights deserve to have had owners who could always make this team competitive. That is reality for the first and not reality or the second statement.. Actually I advocate cutting payroll and make rebuilding in a measured three year plan the way to go in view of reality and the circumstaces we face. It is one step back too steps forwrard. The path we are on is limbo and oblivion of a 70 something fourth place team as the Knicks were and maybe still are. They gave up on rebuilding. There is talk of trading Ike, and Niese which to those who advocae that are not real Met fans. They want Wright and the Uptons and no Niese and Ike. A three year window then sign FA back to Omar ways. Again: No one not even Pujols is bigger than the team. On a 100 payroll DW can’t do it alone.
My Mets are like the fruitcake my late Aunt would send me every Christmas. You hate the damn thing but you can’t stop loving her.
I don’t think it is a question of loyalty – those of us who have loved the Mets from the beginning will always love, live and die with them. Our rooting allegiance is secured and deep rooted and always will be.
But there is the matter of spending our money – even if it means subscribing to SNY. I will be damned if I am going to give this ownership one red cent of my money when even before the Madoff situation occurred we found that their only real concern with the fans was how to fleece them for all that they could with higher ticket prices. After 2007, they raised ticket prices twenty percent on average and in 2009 restructured it’s tier of top games making most more costlier. Not to mention, fans not being able to purchase individual tickets for opening day or the subway series but having to buy them in packs connected with other teams.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/08/sports/baseball/08tickets.html?_r=0
Taskmaster, where are all of these shrewd Cashen like moves by Alderson?
Tell me what moves Cashen made in his first two years (80-81)? Trading Omar Moreno for an over the hill Randy Jones. Not exactly a spectacular start to a very successful career.
Even the Mazzilli deal was in ’82.
Drafting Darryl Strawberry for starters…
True. But I was referring to non draft actions i.e. trades or free agent moves.
And drafting 1st in the entire draft helps. Of course, he followed that up by grabbing Billy Beane.
He did grab Clemens in ’81 but couldnt sign him.
The point is that Cashen didnt have a first couple of years with any smashing success.
….and Cashen didnt inherit a club that had 6 or more very good trading pieces
Beltran
Wright
Reyes
Dickey
Niese
Ike
I have NO, ZILCH and ZERO tolerance for those who advocate the trade of Ike and Niese. I know it’s not you because you have Beltran on th list too. Yes they should have resigned him, kept Reyes and have a 140M payroll which the owwners did not want. You protect your younger players you do not sacrifice them. Wright and Dickey have no place on a 100 M payroll which makes them irrelevant.It so obvious. But some people think by last years good start that we can do it with smoke and mirrors.
Well in this lil side discussion, someone is comparing Sandy Alderson’s lack of activity to Frank Cashen’s lack of activity…
completely ignoring the fact that Sandy had 6 trade pieces when he took over this team in 2010 compared to the mets in 1980 ( who were more like the astros of 2012 )
Niese u can keep…
Ike on the other hand probably wont resign here…would u after the way they betrayed him?
Ike is going to be arb-eligible after this year….so he will begin to be in the unaffordable category pretty soon…
UNLESS you can sign him to a sensible extension and buy out a couple of free-agent years…cost-controlling 1B for the next 5 years…you def have to have Ike on the table.
Unfortunately, 2013 is probably about re-establishing his trade value…
Parnell, Murphy, Duda, Ike, Tejada all started their arb clocks….and are not in the cost-controlled section…until they are, u have to have them on the table
We are not getting 2nd generation contract guys with big cash…
if anything, we are getting guys in the minors or with less than 1 year service time
Maybe my memory serves me wrong but wasn’t one of Cashen’s early moves trading for Dave Kingman. Then he later traded for George Foster and making him the highest paid payer in baseball? Wasn’t Foster the first $2 million dollar a year player?
Cashen did two things that Alderson hasn’t done yet and remember that the attendance situation was dire back then- more dire than today.
He inherited a farm system that had Mookie Wilson, Hubie Brooks, Tim Leary, Wally Backman, Jeff Reardon, Jesse Orosco, etc. His first two drafts- or should I say Lou Gorman’s first two drafts yield Strawberry, Billy Beane, John Gibbons, Rick Ownbey, Jay Tibbs and Lloyd McClendon, Lenny Dykstra, John Christensen. Follow that up in 1982 and you get Gooden, McDowell, Floyd Youmans, Gerald Young and Wes Gardner. Names we look at now as who were they- but names that would be used to trade for guys named Hernandez, Carter, Ojeda, Teufel, and Ray Knight as well as smaller pieces like Bruce Berenyi and a washed up Tom Seaver. Obviously- Mookie, Straw, Wally, Orosco, Doc, and Lenny speak for themselves.
He did stupidly trade Jeff Reardon for Ellis Valentine.
While he was doing that- he needed to give fans a reason to watch the team- so he brings back Kingman for Steve Henderson. Removing a stain of the Seaver trade and replacing him with a guy who hits balls 500 feet. They resign Rusty Staub, and trade for George Foster. He didn’t expect them to win- but needed to put a product on the field.
Alderson has given no reason to go to games. The jury is still out on the draft picks.
Reply
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I basically agree. Niese is an absolute keep. Ike will remember how he was treated here. We must correct this fiasco and do damage control. Instead of DW extension and Dickey for that matter: Approach Ike about an extension of 50M five years and ask him he wants Dave Hudgens fired. Make Ike and Niese the new cornerstones for 2013 and beyond with Harvey and Wheeler to be added as the Mets nucleus.
They lost me as a customer long ago.
Wrt Frank Cashen, he was honest with a fan base that had everything taken away from it in the previous 5 years to 1980–Staub, Koosman, Seaver , Kingman, Matlack and told us it would take a while.
Also, by 1979, the franchise had hit rock button. 63 wins and 788,000 fans.
Alderson is not Frank Cashen. He was hired by MLB to untangle this mess. If you know anything about the Wilpons and the way they do business, they hire yes men and sycophants, not executives with fresh ideas.
We better hope that.once Fred and Saul leave this world that their other children have an interest in this team. Otherwise, we will be stuck with the special son for the next 35 years.
Cashen did two things that Alderson hasn’t done yet and remember that the attendance situation was dire back then- more dire than today.
He inherited a farm system that had Mookie Wilson, Hubie Brooks, Tim Leary, Wally Backman, Jeff Reardon, Jesse Orosco, etc. His first two drafts- or should I say Lou Gorman’s first two drafts yield Strawberry, Billy Beane, John Gibbons, Rick Ownbey, Jay Tibbs and Lloyd McClendon, Lenny Dykstra, John Christensen. Follow that up in 1982 and you get Gooden, McDowell, Floyd Youmans, Gerald Young and Wes Gardner. Names we look at now as who were they- but names that would be used to trade for guys named Hernandez, Carter, Ojeda, Teufel, and Ray Knight as well as smaller pieces like Bruce Berenyi and a washed up Tom Seaver. Obviously- Mookie, Straw, Wally, Orosco, Doc, and Lenny speak for themselves.
He did stupidly trade Jeff Reardon for Ellis Valentine.
While he was doing that- he needed to give fans a reason to watch the team- so he brings back Kingman for Steve Henderson. Removing a stain of the Seaver trade and replacing him with a guy who hits balls 500 feet. They resign Rusty Staub, and trade for George Foster. He didn’t expect them to win- but needed to put a product on the field.
Alderson has given no reason to go to games. The jury is still out on the draft picks.
If attendance is any indication there is no one left who could let go they all let go a year ago!
The whole “saber” approach to building a team argument has to go out the window…Since the late ’90′s, ALL teams have used advanced stats for building a team including ours. Minaya himself was using it. EXAMPLE: Doesn’t anyone remember the charts of overlaying Bay’s HR production in Fenway his FA year over Citifield? The charts were then so in depth that on days HR’s were hit by Bay every factor including velocity, environmental factors, etc. were adjusted for Citi. Every conceivable factor was implemented, plugged in and a computer model of projected production was generated, even historical factors such as the players natural decline through his age were used for subsequent seasons to project production. Nevermind using WAR, UZR, advanced batting statistical analysis to support and augment the argument for his signing. Do you think ANY organization lays out and bestows tens of millions of dollars without using advanced metrics and stats? fuggheddaboutit! Stop that argument here and now.
The quote i read above is from 1 commenter about history is true, but it really should read “History tends to repeat itself again and again”
The true nature of baseball is that it is cyclical. Look at Met history and it will show you that.
Sustainable “models” of consistency like the Braves and Yankees in the last 20 or so years are absolute anomalyous occurences. Don’t get caught in that argument. You’ll get killed in an in depth analysis of MLB and pro sports in general. There is no Sustainble winner theorem that will prove out, only anomolyous occurences of extended winning periods.
The Mets will win again, it is a combination and confluence between smart drafting and scouting, excellent player development, smart spending, and just good old fashioned luck…
You can’t use the Cashen is Alderson argument or Cashen made move X,Y, or Z, why can’t Sandy because too many factors and parameters changed, because even Cashen couldn’t envision a guy like Hernandez becoming available or an anomaly like Gooden occuring….(‘A’ ball to MLB star)
Sandy is smart, but isin’t a BASEBALL guy. GM’s aren’t EX-scouts or schooled in scouting like they once were, (Cashen) they are College guys who interpret and formulate new or present statistical analysis. They are all about tearing the game down to the bare bones of statistical interpetation, Identifying trends etc…
Face it, baseball IS different than it was.
Is Sandy doing it right? We won’t know for awhile because of his drafting and the players development curve. But based off his player procurement skills, i think he’s pretty lousy as a GM for this team. If you can’t identify current MLB talent, and spend money judiciously on the right players, have some luck, then why should I trust his judgement in player development and drafting? The buck stops with him, you can’t argue his underlings are in charge because he oversees and approves and “trusts” those he placed in those important positions.
As for casual fans, they will come back when the team is exciting and begins winning. But with no hope in sight, when will that be? People point to next offseason, what if the further deterioration in attendance causes the team to come back and say well of that 48-50 million coming off the books, we are only going to reinvest 15 million in procuring more help for the MLB Team? What will the PRO-Sandy lobby say then? It’s our casual fans fault? It’s Fred’s fault? Still? What if it’s just Sandy figuring that the available FA’s aren’t what he sees as “good fits”…only time will tell.
“The whole “saber” approach to building a team argument has to go out the window…Since the late ’90′s, ALL teams have used advanced stats for building a team including ours.”
That doesn’t mean it goes out the window. It means it should be standard. It should be one of things every team has. It is true we are at a point were it no longer distinguishes you from the other teams, but that doesn’t mean you ditch it completely.
Look at this way: Most teams that enjoy success on the field do so because they have a good starting rotation. It doesn’t have to be great, but it is usually enought to put them in a position to win. Get your self a couple of guys who go out every 5 days and put you in a position to win and fill out the rest from there.
Now, since most teams know this and attempt to put together the best starting rotation they can, does this mean you turn around and scrap the idea of a good starting 5? Of course not. you may concede that you can’t, for whatever reason, put out a quality startng rotation and work around it, but you don’t say “we don’t need good starting pitching”.
Hi Donal,
Sometimes I think you get nervous if you see the word saber, and think people are going to trash this approach…If you read exactly what i’m saying, in the context it is written, i’m saying eveyone is doing this, so quit arguing about it…It’s ridiculous. It’s sewn into the decision making process of each team and has been for a long time…That means IT’S ALREADY STANDARDIZED!
I never said a word about pitching. If you want to know in fact, I believe Pitching is the best model to build any ‘sustained winning’ or cyclical winning. That and being strong up the middle both defensively and offensively.
As far as Alderson, I see no great advantage he brings, or his underlings. His player procurement skills and his draft team aren’t impressive to me. And if you want to sight Wheeler, he’s done nothing at the MLB level yet, and even if he does, even a blind squirrel gets an acorn once in awhile…
Hi Mike,
Citing saber charts to show Bay’s power is a perfect example of how saber stats are overblown and lack depth in understanding. Those who observed Bay knew his power came from pulling the ball down the line. Those who also know baseball would know that the left field line was only 310 feet away from home plate in Fenway while at Citi Field it was 338 feet. Bucky Dent proved how a short fly hit high enough could clear the green monster.
Also, with Citi Field’s vast outfield dimensions, he would be pitched to differently. With our own death valley in right (at the time) why pitch him inside? We also knew how Citi Field messed up David Wright and Carlos Beltran’s mindset.
Baseball cannot be understood in cut and dry analysis. I forgot who the player was but Brian Kenny made the argument, based on the amount of walks he got as an eighth place hitter and high OBP (compared to his low batting average) that the one in question would be better suited for the lead off spot due to his ability to get on base. Larry Bowa and Mitch Williams dismissed that immediately citing he would not be pitched around and get those walks batting lead off. They cited how many times those walks were situational and the reason he was batting eighth was because he could not hit. They even cited that he was an eighth place hitter even in the minors (something Kenny was unaware of).
With saber charts Kenny suggested each batter be played to an unorthadox shift unique to himself and Al Leiter countered that that would mess up a pitcher’s game by having to adjust for each individual shift and that is why extreme shifts can’t be used for every batter.
All teams employ statisticians but not to the point that the game has shifted. In fact, many GM’s said they rely on that statistical analysis not for themselves but to get a handle on other teams that employ it (i.e., intelligence gathering).
“Citing saber charts to show Bay’s power is a perfect example of how saber stats are overblown and lack depth in understanding. Those who observed Bay knew his power came from pulling the ball down the line. Those who also know baseball would know that the left field line was only 310 feet away from home plate in Fenway while at Citi Field it was 338 feet. Bucky Dent proved how a short fly hit high enough could clear the green monster.”
Actually, advocates of sabermetrics said Bay was a bad signing for the Mets at the time for the very reason you mentioned. It is referred to as Park Factors.
” I forgot who the player was but Brian Kenny made the argument, based on the amount of walks he got as an eighth place hitter and high OBP (compared to his low batting average) that the one in question would be better suited for the lead off spot due to his ability to get on base. Larry Bowa and Mitch Williams dismissed that immediately citing he would not be pitched around and get those walks batting lead off. They cited how many times those walks were situational and the reason he was batting eighth was because he could not hit.”
You mean they used numerical data to prove their point? What a pair of nerds.
“With saber charts Kenny suggested each batter be played to an unorthadox shift unique to himself and Al Leiter countered that that would mess up a pitcher’s game by having to adjust for each individual shift and that is why extreme shifts can’t be used for every batter.”
Defensive shifts have been employed since long before Bill James began his work. In fact, pitchers adjusting their approach to hitters came long before that.
Shifts are complimentary to what pitchers are already doing.
If you said teams seem to be over using them, I would actually agree. They work well against overswinging power lefties because they get in front and on top of breaking balls. But, now teams are using them on guys like Murphy, who has control of the zone and spreads his hits around. that is counter productive.
But hey, if you want to do the name dropping game, I’ll see your Al Leiter and rasie you almost every manager in the modern era.
Hi Donal,
Even before I became aware of saber stats I too felt the signing of Jason Bay was going to be a bad move on our part – simply because of Citi Field. It was obvious power hitters were being short changed and we knew the psychological effect it had. He changed his swing to compensate, like Wright admitted he did in 2009, and just like it did to David, it would also affect Bay’s production on the road (as it did Beltran’s) – a serious factor learned from that first year at Citi Field which those stats – and Fonzie – failed to take into consideration.
As far as that player whose name I forgot, Bowa said he would be pitched to as a lead off hitter and we would see how little he would get on base.
As far as the shifts, even as a kid in sandlot pick up games my friends knew how to play me defensively – just in case I actually got some wood on the ball!
Well Joey why not explain to us all how Jason Bay put up 30 HR seasons with Pittsburgh at PNC park which has DEEPER LF dimensions than Citifeld. Why didn’t PNC Park get into Jason Bays head and Citifield did? Everybody and their Mother knows it got into David Wrights head although he did hit 29 HR’s in 2010 and only 21 in 2012 after moving in the fences. It still did have an affect but how do you explain Bay being a power hitter at bigger PNC and not being able to reach the warning track at Citifield even though it’s smaller than PNC.
You said Fenway is only 310 (309 actually) and Citi 338 (335) but he hit more on the road in 09 and had no problem hitting them out of PNC which is once again deeper than Citi. Obviously the HR totals would go down but to think someone could’ve anticipated a guy that hit over 30 HR’s not only in a hitter friendly Fenway but in a cavernous PNC Park would not even reach double figures is total BS. BTW pro saber people were dead set against the J-Bay contract. Those flyball charts were not saber charts
Hi Fonzie,
You are forgetting the height of the walls at the time in Citi Field which were not factors in Pittsburgh. A player would have to hit a ball much higher and deeper for it to get over the fence due to those heights than in Pittsburgh. And after the 2009 season, opposing players as well as the home team hitters admitted they hated hitting there. Take all those factors in consideration – and use one’s baseball instincts – and it isn’t difficult to determine that Citi Field would have engulfed Bay too. I personally felt he would hit no more than 15 home runs that year and would not be a good long-term signing for the Mets because of those reasons. Forget about the concussion, was I just lucky?
By the way, suggest you first investigate things before making accusations about not checing out facts. Sabers, including Bill James, predicted a good 2010 season for Bay, with at least 29 home runs.
http://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/2010/3/6/1359451/2010-player-projections-jason-bay
Also, what charts were used if not saber ones – Mike gave a very thorough description of the factors that went into it.
Maybe, just maybe Omar figured since Bay was a 30 HR hitter in Pittsburgh which has deeper LF dimensions than the old Citifield dimensions, Bay could still be a 25-30 HR hitter at Citifield. Maybe Omar was smart enough to look at Bays numbers both home and away and saw that Bay hit 21 HR’s on the road and only 15 at Fenway. But hey we all know Joey never lets facts get in the way of a good rant.
Hey Joey, analyzing stats to death is here to stay, agree or not. It’s how much credence each organization puts in weighting it to affect their decision making process. To me the lost art is scouting, and baseball has changed in that respect.
Analyzing Stats has been going on since they started recording results in baseball.
The analysis is nothing new only the metrics being analyzed.
And the problem is that most new metrics are made by folks trying to promote (and prove out)a certain baseball philosophy that so far has not proven to actually be correct yet.
Stats are only as good as the components and weights of those components that create them.
Which is why WAR and wOBA fail miserably because the weights used are slanted towards a pre-determined outcome basically putting your hand on the scale to tip it in favor of the outcome you want.
Teams have used stats for over 100 years the problem is now that just about anyone has the ability to mash numbers together in a spreadsheet they can pick the stats they FEEL are more important than others, Give them more weight than others and do all this regardless of any proof or reality that those choices are actually as important as they make them out to be!
Hi Mike,
Agree with you that for the moment, analyzing stats to death is the trend. But I think it is more the fan than the professional for understanding something to the umpteenth decimal is really the most useless pieces of information there is. Notice whenever those who play or manage the game talk about baseball in any manner, they talk in terms of talent, ability, trends, strategy, ways to pitch or be pitched to, etc. They hardly ever refer to stats but to what they’ve seen and analyzed from their observations, experience and astute knowledge of the game.
Stats are fun but cannot be used as the basis of forming professional opinions. As I’ve pointed out, the difference between a .300 hitter and a .260 hitter with 500 at bats is 20hits a season, or one more hit every seventh game. The same math applies to one with a .370 OBP compared to one with a .320 OBP with 600 plate appearances means getting on base 30 more times over the course of a season, or once more every fifth game. In both cases, doesn’t the higher stat appear more impressive than the actual difference?
Yet we have a general manager who wants to talk about PPA and how it related to less offense in the second half – when a few days later Gary Cohen pointed out that the drop Sandy was referring to meant one less pitch every 20 at bats. Again, my point about useless information in the sense of being practical – and we’ve seen the results of that mindset messing up players like Ike Davis and the team in general when opposing pitchers realized they could get quickly ahead in the count.
That’s what happens when we put an “observer” in charge instead of a baseball man.
I agree to a large extent Joey. I get wrapped up in numbers at times when trying to mathematically understand Jason Phillips but that stuff is more for fun. I am not a fantasy baseball guy but I do see people trying to reason decisions or ideas using math which is rigid inflexible and completely incapable of modeling an individual players unpredictable performance. I am a political science guy and often have this same argument with colleagues about the usefulness of statistical modeling as it compares to just common sense when one is paying attention. The only credence I give to heavily relied upon advanced statistics is when its the only information you have available. I have read quite a few books about stats and guess what they only tell what has HAPPENED mathematically, they are relatively as unpredictable as people are. However, they can be used with some accuracy when describing large swaths of people. In other words a model showing the decline of players production as it pertains to pre and post PED’s would be an accurate model. However, this model cannot be counted on when trying to asses any specific players individual decline.
[...] * Robert Patterson over at Metsmerized asks, “How Long Can the Average Mets Fan Hold On?” [...]
I don’t know how the finances of the Wilpons are set up. I do know that people such as this carry tons of debt and their finances are usually sectioned off from one another in order to secure one asset from another. In light of this complete lack of information, I am unsure if the Wilpons can weather this perfect storm of incompetence. The lack of winning has sapped the team of casual fans and it may take another year or two to get a cheap productive team on the field. In this time they may lose enough money to make the team expendable. However, The finances for their other holdings may begin to increase enough so that they will be insulated from any real losses. If this is the case year in and year out they will be able to point to the financial losses of the team as reason for not spending, yet they will be able to maintain ownership. I hope none of this comes to fruition and I hope that they are dedicated to winning. I just haven’t seen it on the field in the past couple years.
Hi Nathan,
I can also describe myself as a political science guy having earned a degree in History and taken some graduate courses as well, along with studies and continued interest in sociology and psychology. Baseball is a human endeavor and thus to really understand and appreciate how it should be taught, played, and how teams should be put together one cannot get too over engrossed in stats. Equating statistical calculation to that of learned knowledge and observation creates a superficial knowledge of facts with no substance or meaning. Again, it’s more for the fan and for marking achievements by players in the record book but it is not the sort of thing professionals rely on to any great extent.
I’m also sure the subject of WAR doesn’t come up in contract negotiations or in arbitration – not with the owners and the agents.
I agree that the Wilpons are holding out in the belief that their long-term financial situation will compensate for the current financial losses they are taking to still own the team. But I suspect they too relied on financial data and projections and did not take into account the adverse reaction of the fans which cannot be appreciated by calculation.