With the return of Daniel Murphy, Dilson Herrera has been relegated to the bench with the regulars back on the field. Although he’s not in the starting lineup anymore, Sandy Alderson and Terry Collins seem confident in the 20 year old second baseman is ready for the majors.
“With a little work on certain aspects of his game. So hopefully he’ll play a little winter ball” Alderson said before the game. “He’ll be ready to go for spring training. We’ll all get to see him hit” (NJ.com).
As far as whether or not the Mets have seen what they need to see from Herrera, Alderson added “I think so” saying later that “We’ve gotten a pretty good look. That’s probably what we’ll have to go on going into the offseason.”
Clearly the Mets don’t see Herrera getting a lot of playing time with Murphy back but now the question becomes, what do you do about 3rd base. With David Wright on the shelf for the remainder of the season, the Mets have the option to shift Murphy to 3rd temporarily and see more of Herrera at second.
After the game, Murphy told MLB.com‘s Anthony DiComo that he’d be willing to play 3rd base if the Mets want to see more of Herrera at second.
We’ll wait to see who gets the bulk of the playing time at second and third but one thing is for sure, the Mets front office doesn’t seem ready to look past Herrera despite Murphy’s return.
