Flores isn’t here yet….Sandy feels he needs to make trades to fix his OF. He is fresh out of Superstars to trade for what he wants.

Now he is forced to work on secondary tier trades.

As for Murphy being a Utility I don’t agree….
His Bat is too good to keep out of the lineup, and he is worth more to us in trade to someone who needs 2B, 3B or 1B than he is as a Utility bench guy.

If you only give him 1 or 2 PAs per game that bat he has will go away….
And his fielding is not all that special that you want to move him all over the place with his glove.

That said I think we should KEEP him…I think he is more to this team than just what we see in the boxscore…He is a warrior and we don’t have many of them…Turner is about the only other guy who seems to have that kind of fight.

But I do believe Sandy will trade him if he can get something good for him…
Especially if Valdespin can play 2B and start hitting.

I am willing to bet that Flores never wears a Met Uni for more than an audition….
Until such time as Wright gets traded.
Which is a longshot at best.

As for the Duda-Stanton comparison, in terms of physical size/strength, I would agree. They tend not to make too many that size who can hit the ball that far. I remember reading an article last spring, I think it was by Rubin, about walking behind the back fields and a ball landing in front of the reporter. He asked Ike if he was the one who hit it and Ike, when told where the guys was, said that Duda was the only one who could hit the ball there. Nevertheless, that is where the comparison to Stanton ends.

Leave it to the Mets to have a problem in the OF and to put Valdy back in the IF. I am not sure if this is Alderson’s or Collin’s decision, but this is a mistake. Take a look at the IF, where does Valdy fit in? The only possibility is 2B and that position looks like it is Murphy’s for now, and depending upon Flores, his in the future. So why even mess with him in the IF; he will not hold a position in the major leagues. Of course, it would make sense to put him our in RF and let him compete with Baxter. The guy is the most athletic player the Mets have anywhere near the major leagues. Baxter is most likely nothing more than a bench player yet they are moving Valdy to the IF where things are clogged up.

But then again, we really do not know if Valdy can hit major league pitching since Collins sat him on the bench the last 6 weeks of the season even though the Mets were 20+ games out of first place.

All that says to me is that they feel Murphy is the next guy they look to trade. And playing Valde in the IF may just be a way of avoiding the issue they have with Why is there no OF?

If they play him out there the stories about WHY we didn’t work harder to get someone in the OF that would prevent us from having to play Valde out of position.

Once the OF picture is more settled later in ST they will go back to playing him in the OF.

If Duda can just figure it out at the plate – realize that potential he obviously has – he won’t be the first power hitting OF that sticks even though he’s got limited range.

imagine what would happen if we found out valdespin could hit .290-.300 with 20 HR and speed on the basepaths…

“He played a lot of outfield in winter ball. This spring, we need to put him back in the infield a little bit,” Collins said. “We know if, need be, we can play him in the outfield. We need to take a look at him in the infield right now.”

-On Valdespin playing the infield instead of the outfield

I remember reading and hearing about this comparison, and this is not the vibe I got from what Terry said. I took it as strength, not power hitting. Terry Collins truly believes that Lucas Duda is one of the strongest guys in the league, and generally speaking who are we to argue? Other players on the team have admitted that they are all in awe of his strength, and none of know how much these guys actually lift, so in terms of ACTUAL strength, Lucas Duda could be stronger than Giancarlos for all we know, the problem is translating that energy into the baseball when you are swinging the bat.

http://newyork.mets.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20130215&content_id=41667808&vkey=news_nym&c_id=nym

^^ watch the home run after he throws a guy out at home, THATS PURE STRENGTH. period.

I’m rooting for Duda but won’t be surprised if it’s a failed experiment.

he did have an exceptionally good 2011, and once he started playing everyday, in the 2nd half (about 300 ABS fromt he end of June) he pretty much put up AS numbers with the bat. He also had back to back AAA seasons with an OPS above 1.000

so the hitting ability is in there, if someone can knock the mopey/nerves out of his head! And maybe the mechanical work they are doing with him will translate.

Duda does have tremendous power the other way, so no need to be pull happy. And when he was hitting well, he really used the whole field. Needs to get back to that.

If nothing else, this looks like a situation where the player really needs a quick start to get him going. 2 HRs and a nice running catch opening day, and off to the races! Unleash the Beast!