21
2012
Mets Sign Three To Minor League Deals
An article by 
The Mets announced the signings of two pitchers to minor league deals with invites to Spring Training, Scott Rice and Carlos Torres. Additionally, VP of amateur scouting Paul DePodesta tweeted that the Mets have signed outfielder Jamie Hoffman to a similar minor league deal.
Rice, 31, a 1999 first-round Draft pick of the Baltimore Orioles, has never made it to the majors but has 14 years experience in the Minors and independent leagues (including in 2008 with the Long Island Ducks). He pitched last season for the Dodgers’ Triple-A affiliate, the Albuquerque Isotopes, posting a 4.40 ERA and nine saves in 54 games.
Torres, 30, drafted originally by the White Sox organization, made 31 relief appearances for the Colorado Rockies in 2012, posting a 5.26 ERA. As for his time in the minors this year, Torres had much more success in Triple-A for the Colorado Springs, going 5-4 with a 3.98 ERA to boot over 13 starts and lone relief outing.
As for Jamie Hoffman, 28, he was signed by the Dodgers in 2003 as an undrafted amateur free agent and spent last year with the Orioles at the Triple-A level. Hoffman hit .254 with 11 homers and 44 RBIs in 366 at-bats for the Norfolk Tides in 2012. Although what probably appealed most the Mets organization was his walks, Hoffman has a career .286/.356/.419 line in eight season in the minors, averaging around 45-55 walks per year over roughly 400 at-bats.
Personally, I really like the Hoffman signing, He has pop, can walk, and can steal 10-15 bases per year. As was stated before, all have invites to Spring Training, so keep an eye on them to see if they can make a run to break camp with the big club.
About the Author: Clayton Collier
Clayton, a Long Island native and die-hard Mets fan, started writing online about three years ago. He is currently a Journalism major with a minor in Broadcasting at Seton Hall University. Although very disappointed with the current state of the team, Clayton remains hopeful that the young prospects in the farm system will bring the Mets back to a respected franchise in baseball once again. Besides writing for MMO, Clayton is also a staff member at 89.5 WSOU, Seton Hall's modern active rock radio station. You can contact Clayton by following him on Twitter: @Clayton_Collier or E-mailing him at MaybeNextYearMets@yahoo.com
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Oh boy, Sandy and his boys are pulling up their sleeves and going to work. It should be a great offseason.
“Rice, 31, a 1999 first-round Draft pick of the Baltimore Orioles, has never made it to the majors”
“Torres, 30, drafted originally by the White Sox organization, made 31 relief appearances for the Colorado Rockies in 2012, posting a 5.26 ERA”
“As for Jamie Hoffman, 28, since been drafted in 2003 he’s only appeared in the majors one season and had 22 at bats with 1 HR”
Lmao, at this point this is laughable… After 3 straight years this bullshit still going on… and as we have seen, the gooners and sandy lovers will come and say teams do this all the time, NO THEY FUC**** DON’T!!! they don’t sign a ton of rejects every year to try to find magic in a bottle, this is getting more pathetic and ridiculous by the day… they’re stragedy is perfect, sign all kinds of garbage and POS’s NOW then sign wright & dickey to an extension and pretend all went well during the offseason.. At some point we must’ve pissed off the baseball gods to deserve this… Seriously, At this point the Kansas City Royals fans are laughing their asses off at what’s been going on in queens the past seasons under sandy alderson & his goons!
This is it Mets fans……the final pieces to put this team over the top. Can we purchase our playoff tickets now.
Every other team is doing the same, signing these types of players. Nothing to see here. Move along…
No they don’t. Every team does not just sign this type of crap the Mets have been doing the last 3 offseasons. They’ve done more signings like this then try to fix the major league roster.
Every team does NOT do this,that’s just a load of crap. Show us. Let’s see a comparison.
Yes, they do.
Cards just signed Jamie Romak. The BJs just sign Negrych. The Twins just signed 12 of these type. The list goes on and on.
This stuff happens all the time, with every club. You need to stop getting PO’d that every signing isn’t Reyes or Pujols or “insert future All Star here”. The Mets signed some minor league filler. Take note, then move along. Nothing to be blasting the team about.
Again, nobody is saying sign a superstar like Pujols and I wish you people would stop using examples like that when NOBODY here says that. Just how about helping the major league roster already and enough with this garbage. Stop defending the GM so much and start being a fan of the club again like you were pre-Alderson.
I have 3 questions to anybody who knows. How much do each of these signing cost, how many have the Mets done so far this year (at least 5 right) and how much was JP Ricciardi’s contract. Just went to get as best as possible an idea of how much the Mets have spent so far.
“Stop defending the GM so much and start being a fan of the club again like you were pre-Alderson”.
I think everyone here is a fan of the club, now and pre-Alderson. The NY Mets are our passion and this is the very reason why emotions run so high here. But you and others here speak like some commenters have an allegiance to, or hold some kind of loyalty to Alderson and that couldn’t be further from the truth. Its only a difference how the sides (and I hate using the term sides because we’re all Mets fans) feel in how the team should proceed and the method the team should use to build a winner. So its not Alderson “the man” its a disagreement in how the team is operating.
Personally I hold no allegiance to the man. But like I’ve expressed here dozens of times before, its way to early to close the book and call him (or any GM that was hired) a failure after 2 years. I agree with your post today about all the scrap heap signings, to which there is nothing wrong with if it weren’t the only thing you were doing. If someone put a gun to my head and forced me to give him a grade at this premature time, I’d probably give him a D because of the miserable job he did with revamping the bullpen last year, and letting $$$ stand in the way of signing draft picks.
This off season is huge and we’ll probably have a better picture as 2013 progresses. Hang in there, the team was truly a mess when he took over and I know I don’t have to tell you why.
Hey MetsWatchman,
The only thing I’ll say here is I don’t think the “mess” was nearly as bad as lots of people make it out to be. He inherited a nice roster and a nice farm system. If him, JP, & Depo were able to use their heads and try harder to compete, make trades, smarter signings even his first season here should have been better.
The problem is, these type of deals are 90% of what Sandy has done since arriving…
Chone Figgins is available…
I’d have no problem picking up Figgins.
I advocated trading Bay for Figgins last year
Figgins actually fits well with what we need
He is in a contract year..
needs a new change of scenery
can hit leadoff
has speed
can defend at 2B-3B and OF
Would only be paid a few hundred thousand bucks by the Mets
Signing Figgins would be a SMART move
I wouldn’t say there is nothing to see. I don’t mind seeing information on these minor league signings. This is just a part of the process that all teams do every season. Now if your a frustrated fan of a struggling major league team that needs to vent then showing restraint to these type of signings one has to guess is rather difficult. But that doesn’t change that the reality is so far there has been about 81 minor league free agent signings throughout MLB and there is almost 550 minor league free agents still remaining. So there will be a heck of a lot more of these signings throughout MLB before all is said and done.
I’m not saying it isn’t worth noting. I’m saying it’s nothing to get upset about or attempt to slander the team about. There is plenty to destroy the Mets on. Plenty… This isn’t one of them.
Ah. I agree but you and I know that is never happening.
I must say, at first i was skeptical about the raise of ticket prices, but after seeing this news? i was 100% sold…
Clue in guys. These are guys who are signed to minor league contracts with only an invite. No guarantee and no occupying of a roster spot. Do not forget, there is very little in AAA so a team has to be fielded from somewhere. Do you really think ex all stars will agree to minor league deals? Not likely. But hey, lets sign a bunch of guys and leave some more prospects exposed to the Rule 5 draft.
hey Hoffman can walk!
And as expected the “every team does these types of signing” comment.
No they don’t. That’s ALL the Mets do.
The Hoffman signing could be significant as he looks like someone who can help as 4th or 5th outfielder. He’s kind of toolsy with the power and speed combo and he can get on base. I bet he ends up logging plenty of time on the 35 in 2013.
i don’t want people who “can get on base”. “Getting on base” shouldn’t be a skill listed on a resume because that’s what everybody who has every tried to play baseball in the history of the game AND mankind has always tried to do. That’s the game.
I want players who look like they will be able to drive in runs in big league games against big league pitching, in a city like New York.
Not “hey he can get on base”. People have gone backwards in baseball knowledge.
These players are obviously minor league filler and yes, these sorts of signings are done every year by every team. I strongly dislike Sandy Alderson but ‘Cmon now people – stop being so predictable with these ridiculous complaints getting all up in arms over this yearly baseball happenstance. .
And as I recall, back in 2010, one of these signings had the name RA Dickey. Every once in a while something great happens from one of these players and is bonus.
Obviously this is to distract us from the impending RA Dickey trade.