At an event to support a community hit hard by Superstorm Sandy a year ago today, Mets COO Jeff Wilpon was among several representatives from the Mets who were in attendance at a Garfield, New Jersey school. While there, Jeff Wilpon fielded questions from Mets beat writers about the team’s plans for the offseason, the outlook for next season, and of course their financial state.
Mike Kerwick, The Record – Jeff Wilpon said Mets are not handcuffed in any way this offseason. He also said team did not make an offer to Abreu. He also said team has theories for club’s awful home record. He did not divulge those theories. He is not worried that Harvey will rush back from surgery. Said it was important he got it done before Dec. 1.
Kristie Ackert, Daily News – David Wright, Jon Niese, Dillon Gee and Zack Wheeler are the only players solid in their positions for 2014, all other spots are up for grabs. The Mets have a glut of first basemen and teams have inquired about one of them although he didn’t mention any names. The Mets plan to spend the money that is coming off the books this offseason. That would be about $45 million between the Johan Santana and Jason Bay contracts alone that are off the books.
Marc Carig, Newsday – Jeff Wilpon confirmed that the Mets did not offer Jose Dariel Abreu a contract. He also noted that had Abreu been a corner outfielder things might have been different. Message from Wilpon much the same as last offseason. Says Mets are working without financial restrictions of the recent past.
Thoughts from Joe D.
No surprise on Abreu, their interest was never serious and I said there was no chance they’d make an offer…
Notice that Daniel Murphy wasn’t mentioned as player whose job was safe… That’s a bit surprising… Wonder what Murphy’s thinking…
No doubt the first baseman getting interest is Ike Davis, and as I’ve maintained, he won’t be a Met in 2014 even if it means selling low… They will not give $4 million to a player who won’t be starting for them in 2014…
I’ll believe they’re spending when I see it… No reason to believe anything that Jeff and Sandy say on that front… I’m working on a piece about that and will explain more. I can’t believe none of the writers asked him about that huge debt payment coming up in June… Would have loved to see how he responded to that…
Because of their financial situation, one that is still tenuous at best, Lucas Duda is still my guess for your Opening Day first baseman… Get used to it…
More later…
