David Wright and his agents were not going to gamble on having a bad year….and like Reyes….once the season started…there would be no more contract talks….

But look on the bright side, the Mets will have room for a guy like Hicks. What a joke. David Wright should have gotten the hell out when he had the chance.

Either he sucks vs LHP and they keep playing him (No Accountability)
or they do what I said and don’t really have an option who can steal his job from him and then have fewer options to hold anyone else accountable after that….

Then he will be weaned off LHPs on Days terry stacks the lineup with RHB (remember all the B Team remarks vs LHP last year?) and then it’s just a coin flip on which LHB sits on any given LHP facing day. My Guess is Baxter will get the nod over Duda if Duda continues to struggle vs LPH and they decide platooning him is in order…

I just used Cowgill as an example by the way could have used any RHB Platoon partner in his place for the purposes of what I was getting at.

With our shortage of RHBs on the 25 man, it will be quite difficult to bench anyone who bats RH because there are few options to go to that are any better and can cost the player being benched.

Which means you can bench a guy for a day or two but you will not remove the guy from the OF by committe because there is no one else to take his place…At Best what might happen is NO ONE has a regular role it will ust be decided on who Terry thinks is the hot bat on any given day…And then accountability really doesn’t apply because no player has a job he can lose for not being accountable.

Do you expect tejada to only play 130 game again this year and didn’t we solve that problem when we passed on Reyes?

Why are we so worried about SS and why would we keep the LHB SS who doesn’t hit all that good instead of the RHB Clutch hitter who can also play 2B, 1B and 3B just in case Wright’s back acts up?

Not to mention the need for good RHBs to come off the bench in key situations.

However uncomfortable he might be playing SS the solution is to keep tejada healthy not get rid of one of the few good RHBs we still have on the roster….

Terry is not really in control of who is on the 25 man Roster here….Most Managers aren’t so not any shaking news there but Collins has a bit less control and influence than the others.

He gets his say in the meetings and even gets his way sometimes (See Ike remaining with the team when they considered sending him down, Terry and Hudgens said let him fix it here, the others wanted him to go down and Sandy (smartly) went with Terry on that one…

He may have even had an influence on the final decision to bring Harvey up after the guys above him said no…Can’t speak to that because there were no reports on how they arrived at that decision, He was deemed not ready when the FO Guru’s went to see him and one shaky start after that something (obviously not Harvey’s performance) changed thier mind…

Maybe Terry had something to do with that or maybe seeing they couldn’t get anything for Hairston (who they should have traded then) they changed thier mind and made being .500 the goal instead and in that thinking Harvey is ready…

But the point I’m getting at is in the end you can only hold people as accountable as you have options to replace them! And an Option that can surpass what they were doing and cost them regular playing time.

If a guy can’t hit and you bench him for someone else who hits just as bad he isn’t going to work harder to get his job back because he will simply say Hey I’m as good as that guy you replaced me with, put me back in!

Accountability only works as well as your options to replace a player and get more than his underperfoming self.

And those options are not decided by Terry, It’s all about what Sandy left him to work with.
If you want to see this principle in action look no further than the last two years and Josh Thole….

He should have been benched for not producing but didn’t because the option that would replace him was no option or upgrade…Thole knew any benching would just be a temporary thing and not make the effort.

I can bet you money that if a guy like Cowgill sucks and deserves a benching that benching will only last until the next LHP is scheduled because there are no other RHB options to take his platoon spot. And since there isn’t anyone to outperform him and take his job there will not be much motivation to do more to get it back.

But lets not forget that Turner is about the best Clutch Hitter we have on this team…

Career .318 Hitter w/RISP
Career .301 w/MOB
Career .429 w/RO3
Career .362 w/RO1-2
Career .400 w/Bases Loaded
Career 73 RBI in 641 ABs

While Quintanilla had a good stretch subbing for the injured Tejada we eventually let him go for cash last year….
I’m not sure I want to give Mr Clutch in favor of a guy who is only worth cash Considerations….
I’m sure Sandy does because he seems to value money more than performance in every decision he makes.

Let hicks compete for a roster spot. Why not?

I really hate how the bloated pens these days leave the bench so short.

Anyway Alex, that’s what I hope he meant.