**Update 8-12-10**
Adam Rubin tweets that the Mets have decided to use reliever Sean Green’s final option and keep him at Triple-A Buffalo. Green’s rehab assignment was set to expire. He has a 5.40 ERA in seven appearances with the Bisons.
**Original 8-10-10**
Reliever Sean Green appears close to a return to the Mets.
Green, who is the last remaining player acquired from the Seattle Mariners in the J.J. Putz trade back in December of 2008, has made only one appearance for the Mets this season.
He landed on the DL after a relief appearance in April against the Florida Marlins with what originally was diagnosed as a strained rib-cage muscle. Eventually, it was discovered that Green actually had a cracked rib.
In that one appearance, he pitched an inning struck out one batter, gave up two hits and a solo homerun for a 9.00 ERA.
“Initially they thought it was a strained intercostal — like a strained rib muscle,” Green said Monday, before the Triple-A Buffalo Bisons series opener. “I was down there [in Port St. Lucie] rehabbing that for about three weeks and it wasn’t getting any better, so I asked to get reevaluated and got another MRI and they saw the fracture. It was like a stress fracture. It was about seven to eight weeks off completely from that. It’s been a long process. I had to start over, from scratch.”
Green has returned to his standard low three-quarters arm slot, after going submarine with the Mets this year in spring training. He figured the change to the drastically lower arm angle probably this year resulted in the rib fracture. So what was Heilman’s excuse?
Green is finishing up his rehab start and the Mets are not likely to keep him in the minors and burn up his one-year contract so Green’s return is only days away. More bad news for the Mets who already have a basketball full of problems already.
Green is making $975,000 this season and is arbitration-eligible. There’s always a chance the Mets could trade or nontender him this offseason. But because Green is likely not due a pay raise off a lost season, it would seem reasonable to expect he could remain and be a factor in the 2011 bullpen. Sadly it’s true, despite the fact that NO Mets fan wants Green in the bullpen after what we saw from him last season.
Since joining Buffalo, Green has allowed five runs on nine hits and a hit batter while striking out four in 5 1/3 innings spanning five appearances. Yeah, five appearance, five innings, five runs.
