11
2013
MMO Flashback: Mets Were Never Known For Having Strong Outfields
An article by 
This article which was originally published on January 25th by Mitch Petanick, is worth a second look in light of recent events.
Mark Simon did a piece on ESPN New York yesterday which ranked the top five infields in the team’s history, as well as the top five outfields. His rankings were pretty solid, although he had the 1999 Mets outfield ranked as No. 5 snubbing a very solid 2006 outfield. Let’s be honest, 2006 was more deserving of the No. 5 spot. Just as a reminder, that 2006 Mets team had Carlos Beltran, Cliff Floyd, Endy Chavez and Xavier Nady.
However, when looking at Simon’s rankings you can only come to one conclusion–the Mets have never been known for dynamite outfields.
Having an outfield ranked as the fifth best in team history that included the likes of Benny Agbayani, Roger Cedeno, an aging Rickey Henderson and Darryl Hamilton, with a sprinkle of Shawon Dunston, is proof positive that the Mets were never known for solid outfields.
It’s funny how some things change over time, but some things stay the same.
The Mets once again find themselves in a position to not only keep the tradition alive, but could quite possibly be putting the worst outfield that they have ever had in their history on the field in 2013.
The Mets have had solid outfielders through the years, but aside from a few teams, never had an outfield worth bragging about. Maybe it’s because the outfielders that they draft never seem to pan out–not since the 1980s anyway. The Mets often find their better outfield talent in the free agent market.
Here are some names of outfielders that the Mets have drafted that turned out to be absolute busts: Lastings Milledge, Jason Tyner, Alfred Shirley, Christopher Roberts and Robert Stratton. All of those picks were first round selections by the Mets, which brings us to the next point.
When looking up and down at the Mets’ first round selections since 1990, less than ten of those picks lived up to their first round pick status. Actually, one could argue that it’s less than five.
Here is the list of Mets first round picks that have made an impact at the major league level: Jeromy Burnitz, Preston Wilson, Scott Kazmir, Philip Humber, Ike Davis and Matt Harvey.
After looking at that list, you will notice that Burnitz, Wilson, Kazmir and Humber were all drafted by the Mets, but spent the majority of their careers with teams other than the Mets. And Humber probably wouldn’t have even made the list if not for throwing a perfect game in 2012. Harvey and Davis have barely spent enough time at the major league level to guarantee them not to be busts (although it certainly looks as if they won’t be).
Why is this important?
This is exactly why the Mets should not let a first round pick come between themselves, and getting an impact player like Michael Bourn to play in the outfield. It boils down to the simple fact that these first round draft picks that are treated like a bottle of water in the desert, turn out to be more of a bust than a boom the majority of the time.
Giving up the pick isn’t the end of the world. The Mets will be able to save the money that they would potentially be wasting by paying a first round draft pick millions of dollars before he ever steps foot on a professional baseball field. They can do that, and then improve the outfield at the same time. That’s smart.
Now the question is are the Mets willing to pay the price for a player that they can build their outfield around? Or is this just Sandy playing the part of One-Eyed Willie from the Goonies with another one of his tricks? Either way, the Mets shouldn’t let the loss of the first round pick get in their way. Maybe it’s time to start changing history.
About the Author: Mitch Petanick
Mitch is currently an Editor and Minor League Analyst for Mets Merized Online. His baseball experience includes being a former All-Conference collegiate baseball player who had numerous professional tryouts, and he is currently a hitting instructor. He has been involved with the game of baseball for over 30 years now as a player, coach, and consultant. Mitch is also a former Featured Columnist on Bleacher Report. You can follow him on Twitter @FirstPitchMitch.
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NL East Standings
| Team | W | L | Pct. | GB |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Braves | 22 | 18 | .550 | - |
| Nationals | 22 | 19 | .537 | 0.5 |
| Phillies | 19 | 22 | .463 | 3.5 |
| Mets | 15 | 23 | .395 | 6.0 |
| Marlins | 11 | 30 | .268 | 11.5 |
Last updated: 05/17/2013
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Great post! I agree completely!
I for one only want this deal to transpire if it is short-term (3 years or less), and we do NOT have to surrender the frist round pick. I want to be consistent here, I like Bourne (not love) and I am aware that our outfield needs a serious talent injection but I do not want this contract to turn into the next Carl Crawford. These speed guys tend to loose it quickly and without much warning.
Bourne, to me is better suited for a team that is already contending. That being said under the terms I stated earlier, I would ok (at best) with this.
7 Playoffs appearances in 7 years, guess it’s also safe to say the mets were never known for making the playoffs right??? Just because you are not known for being a team with a strong OF in years past means you need to continue that trend, i mean, isn’t that what most of you keep talking about when refering to this FO? how they’re not doing the same thing we were doing in years past? well, i guess the SG are right, they’re not, because we arguably have the worst OF in baseball, but hey, 2015 right?? It’s ok to have yet another wash year because that draft pick we’ll get will be awesome!
Hey last time they had “The worst outfield in baseball” they went to the world series.
Yeah, They had the BEST infield in the majors, or arguably one of the best ones, defensively were strong up the middle, great bullpen, really good SP, the best hitting C of all time, one of the most clutch hitters in mets history in alfonzo, good balance in the lineup, good coach who made the best out of what he had and a GM willing to push the buttoms to help the team..
This version of the mets is like the opposite, in Offense we have Ike Davis as the lone power hitter, no clutch hitters to speak of, weak defense to say the least, horrendous bullpen, below avg coach and a GM who frankly, don’t give a f***. oohhhh, and did i mention the WORST OF in the majors??? yeah, don’t use winning with this team ok… thanks
Quick, get the Bromo Selzer and … no make that an ambulance. Alex68 is assessing the Mets as only he can!!!
For your information Alex, the Mets Ike Davis disagrees with you. He says he and David Wright are currently the Mets power hitters. And when Lucas Duda relaxes, according to Ike, the Mets will have three power hitters.
For years, pre-Wright, we heard about the revolving door which was 3B. I remember announcers periodically mentioning what number 3B a particular guy was. Yet, before reading the article yesterday, I never thought about the fact that other than Straw, the Mets havent done so well in RF either. Since that time, Burnitz is the longest tenured RF in terms of games played; how pathetic.
It is interesting that you mentioned 1990 since that is the time frame I like to look at. Some posters go on me about looking back over that period but that is basically when the sanity that was the Cashen era left the building (although he started to rip apart his success before that). Since that time, Fred’s desire to solve baseball problems with money took over. And we have two decades of results to judge by.
Overall, the Mets have done a terrible job of drafting AND developing talent. Most choose to focus upon the draft but the development of these players is equally as important. What was the Mets problem over the last two decades, drafting, development, or both? I do not know. The simple fact is the talent coming out of the minor leagues has been less than admirable. The article mentions the OF and how few good players emerged while pointing to the draft. How about middle infielders? Since 1990 the Mets arent very good there. Catchers? Not exactly an AS group there. Closers? Again, none that really come to mind. Even starting pitching is rather weak when you consider only a handful made much of an impact (Bobby Jones, Pelfrey, Niese). Fortunately, we all believe the SP is changing.
One of the best posts I read about the Mets recently was by someone who said the Mets needed to do an organizational “reset” after the run the beginning of the last decade. After the 2000 era team was broken up, the Mets should have started with renewed focus on the minors to develop some talent which would improve the major league teams. Instead, like in the early 90s, Fred pulled out the checkbook and brought names. Some performed, others did not. Met fans were given a 3 year run of competitive teams only to see the inevitable collapse. Met history certainly does repeat itself. Now we are mired in 4 straight 4th place finishes while taking an approach that should have occurred 10 year ago.
One final thought on this topic, if you want to see how inept the Mets are pertaining to every day players, just look at the all time batting stats and how easy it is to break into the top 50 in most categories. In many instances, if a player puts together a good year and a half, he will be in the top 50. And this from an organization that is around half a century.
The whole idea about bringing in the current FO is to change the way we were doing things. Including having a lukewarm approach to the draft.
” It boils down to the simple fact that these first round draft picks that are treated like a bottle of water in the desert, turn out to be more of a bust than a boom the majority of the time.”
Which is why you want more high talent guys in your system. If 4 out of 5 bust, so what? You have over 200 guys in your system at any one time. that 5th guy who isn’t a bust is going to be a difference maker if you do thigns right.
You also can’t ignore the fact that free agents also bust. This also includes the can’t miss big money guys. Like Jason Bay.
Look at it this way. Most teams entire draft class for 1 year costs less than $10 million. Jason Bay made $16 million a year and occupied a starting spot on the big league roster.
So what is worse: your big money long term free agent busting, or your draft pick busting?
What has a better payoff: MVP performance from your free agent or MVP performance from your prospect?
Jason Bay was a mistake – we can’t be afraid to sign free agents because Jason Bay burned us. More first rounders go bust than free agents who are already established major leaguers.
THIS!
And again, what happens when a draftee busts? You move on.
What happens when a free agent busts? …they stay around…
Were the Mets in a better position to compete with the big club, I’d be more enthusiastic about the free agent market. But free agents are a patch. You can’t build on them. Not if yo uare making a sustainable winner.
Yes but when an FA busts he still serves and contributes to the MLB team…
Much more than that kid you drafted who busted and never even gets there!
While you might consider BOTH to be a fail….
One Fail gives you nothing while the other gives you WAY more than the other because at least he is good enough to stay in the MLB!
“Yes but when an FA busts he still serves and contributes to the MLB team…”
How? Are the Mets really better for having Jason Bay? What did he bring that any of the guys we currently have on the 40 man don’t?
Better than they got from F-Mart didn’t they?
For an extra $15 million+ a year? No.
By the way, PROSPECTS become good, they wanna get paid too, so what are you gonna do then?? not pay them and let him walk out and start again!?!?!!? And what if that prospect is good then once he gets paid he becomes a PO’s?? then what?? Isn’t that the same as signing a FA and that FA not panning out?? The stupidity of some people….
@ Mitch- the problem is we would also be forfeiting the slot money assigned to the 11th pick in the draft. So we would be giving up the pick and the money to sign a player who won’t be a drastic difference maker. It seems to me like signing Bourn would be for appearance’s sake as much as baseball purposes because our current OF is so weak. I might be more willing to give up the pick if we could still use that slot money on other players later in the draft but they wouldn’t be allowed to do that.
I dont think they are signing Bourne. SA has said that the mets got into the position they are in because they gave away too many draft picks before he got there. This philosophy IS an organizational shift.
Understood that these players didn’t amount to much, but the Mets did trade Humber for Johan and Preston Wilson for Mike Piazza…if you look at it from that standpoint, it changes things. They still had immense value to the Mets.
Task & Donal
I agree completely with your takes. I like that we now a philosophy in place that preaches development. I’m tired of the long list of OFers and the lack star home grown talent. Call it what you want, we are in a rebuilding mode. Bourne, for as gifted as he is will not turn us into a contender. That is why I only want him short term and only if it doesn’t cost the pick.
This was not written to say that building from free agency and ignoring prospects is the way to go. All decisions should be made on a case by case basis and the current state of the Mets outfield mixed with the fact that first round picks rarely live up to the hype have to be taken into consideration. The Mets are just as likely to find a stud in the third or fourth round as they are in round one – the separation of these players skill levels are miniscule and often times comes down to a player’s mental makeup that determine how far they will go.
“The Mets are just as likely to find a stud in the third or fourth round as they are in round one – the separation of these players skill levels are miniscule and often times comes down to a player’s mental makeup that determine how far they will go.”
That is rarely, if ever true. Even in weak draft classes, there are some very obvious tiers.
There are tiers but the tiers are not separated by much.
And the tiers are hardly about the capabilities of the player and almost always about the amount of work and development needed to get there….
This is Why I get on people rating players based on cielings…
Having a high cieling is usually just saying the kid is already pretty good and doesn’t need a lot of coaching and how young he is at the time he is taken…
And mostly because you can’t really tell how good a kid could be or predict how he will respond to coaching nor how he will grow into his frame.
It is assumed that a guy who needs less coaching will have a higher performance AFTER coaching than some other player who is rough around the edges will…
But thats hardly the case.
Sometimes you are already as good as your going to get or know what it is you need to know (see a Harvey or Wheeler) Sure you can try and tweak and perfect what they know but thats just a minor increase compared to a guy who didn’t know it got picked later and then learned what he needed to become a star (See Ryan Howard)
I’ll say here what I said in the CBA thread….
If you value an UNKNOWN UNPROVEN 1st round pick that won’t be a factor for another 4 years MORE than a KNOWN PERFORMER who will help win games now and for the next 4 years or beyond…
You got bigger problems than just some rule in the CBA….
No question that sometimes the better decision is to give up that 1st round pick for a free agent. The questions I find myself asking is if in this particular case is Bourn the free agent one gives up the 1st round pick for?
He gives the team a Gold Glove fielder in CF that I can imagine will turn a lot of singles into doubles and doubles into triples in Citi Field who is familiar with the NL East along with settling the Mets question of who will bat leadoff. I can envision a Bourn, Tejada 1,2 combo atop of the order.
Looking at it like this I can see why the Mets would consider giving up the pick in an effort to sign him. Though I still have to wonder if going with a Nieuwenhuis or Den Dekker option might not be the better alternative as well.
Then though it comes down to what it would take to sign Bourn and that may make any attempt moot.
Well if this FO was on the ball they would already have done thier evaluations on the draft, What might be there, What might fall to them so they could determine what it is they might actually miss out on if they make the deal and go get Bourne.
How many 1st Round picks become a player LIKE Bourne?
Whats the ratio there?
You weight the draft pick based on what is in it and what you might get against the player who will cost you the pick.
It’s a much tougher decision with the 11th pick than it was when people complained about Omar giving away mid to late 1st rounders to get what he got instead….
More quality stuff Mitch, great post and I agree 100%. MLB first round picks are treated like NFL 1st round picks lately, but that fact is each player is more or less a mystery box in baseball. They’re typically 3-4 years away and won’t make a significant impact in most cases for 5-6.
Are the Mets willing to wait that long instead of filling a gaping hole?
Thanks, Clayton – nice comparison to how MLB is starting to treat first-rounders like the NFL does. Unfortunately, there is a much higher success rate of NFL first-rounders so that logic being used in the MLB is flawed.
Well the NFL guys succeed because they don’t wait 4 years before they get into an NFL game.
Part of this is due to the NFL limiting draft picks to College kids not High School kids which the MLB seems to favor these days due to some Cieling that is percieved and that after 4 years of training they will still be young.
College players don’t need that much time in the Minors and thats why they get through the MiLs quickly.
Also the College system in Football is a much more professional type of a league than College Baseball or Minor Leagues are.
So it’s really apples and oranges comparing first round NFL success with MLB Success…
NFL does it the right way. Their players are smarter and more ready to play (College educated) They don’t hold onto picks for 3-4 years the way Baseball does. They throw them into the NFL and maybe will wean them into the game (ala QBs and CBs) but they get the learning and have to succeed against the NFL players not some trainee in waiting who may never get to the MLB to show they are worth playing for the pro team.