Jose Reyes, Scott Hairston, Willie Harris, Chris Young, Chris Capuano, Miguel Batista and Jason Isringhausen were among the 148 players who filed for free agency today.
The Daily News reported on Friday, that the Mets will not re-sign Reyes during their exclusive negotiating window which expires on Thursday, November 3rd. Instead they intend to let other teams set the market for the NL Batting Champ. Once that market is set, sometime around late December or January, the Mets will decide if it’s reasonable and either make an offer or simply move on without ever making an offer to their homegrown star.
Newsday reported that if the Mets fail to re-sign Reyes, “they are highly unlikely to be high-end shoppers” this offseason, so don’t expect any significant additions despite the losses of Reyes, Francisco Rodriguez and Carlos Beltran, plus $65 million dollars of added flexibility. As for all that freed up cash, only $15 million dollars will be reinvested on the roster as payroll is expected to be a reported $100-110 million dollars.
The Mets have plenty of work to do this offseason including many of the same exact problems as last offseason – only worse…
The bullpen still needs a major overhaul and this time they need a closer on top of everything else.
Last week, 38-year old Tim Byrdak (3.82 ERA/1.47 WHIP) was re-signed, and 35-year old D.J. Carrasco (6.02 ERA/1.68 WHIP) is also signed for 2012. After that it’s anybody’s guess who will be back. You have to think Bobby Parnell and Manny Acosta are assured of spots.
Choose your poison as far as all the questions on offense go…
The Mets have no sure things at catcher, second base, shortstop, left field and center field. Ike Davis is still not out of the woods yet with his ankle, and what kind of seasons will we get from Jason Bay and David Wright in 2012? Can they make up for the losses of Beltran and Reyes in the line-up and the clubhouse?
For the life of me, I have no real sense of what direction the Mets are going in for next season…
We just completed a throw-away season even though we were told repeatedly last November that it wouldn’t be… I’m thinking 2012 will be more of the same, maybe even worse…
Somebody asked me if there’s any way the Mets can avoid a 100 loss season next year. I guess they could, but that all depends on what changes they make in the next 12 weeks.
My feeling right now is that this roster is worse today, than it was one year ago. For the first time in ten years, Jose Reyes is not on the Mets 40-man roster… For the first time in 13 years, Jose Reyes is not a Met. Wow…
