Yesterday's post praising the Mets for going beyond slot recommendations for Steven Matz may have been premature. It turns out that the Mets spent the least money on draft picks in the first ten rounds of any team in baseball - a sure sign that they are still not flexing their financial muscles nearly enough.
The Mets spent nearly $1.9 million to sign seven of the nine players they drafted between rounds 1 and 10. Their total spending came in just under the Texas Rangers to clinch the bottom spot in the table and represents more than $9 million less than what the Washington Nationals spent.
Now, simply looking at the overall amount of money spent somewhat skews the picture against the Mets. They signed only seven players which, along with the Rays and the Rangers, were the lowest total of any team. The Baseball America article also notes that overall draft spending won't be available for several weeks, so that list may present a different picture.
For me, though, the money quote was this:
"Jim Callis, Baseball America’s executive editor and an expert on the draft, says the Mets have been less than bold in the draft ever since they signed Mike Pelfrey for $5.3 million with a $3.5 million signing bonus in 2005.
'To say they are not aggressive in the draft isn’t adequate,' Callis said. 'They are nothing close to aggressive.' ”
What has sapped the Mets' aggression since drafting Pelfrey? That pick culminated a four-year period where the Mets drafted Scott Kazmir, Lastings Milledge and Philip Humber. Kazmir and Milledge both fell to the Mets because of signability concerns (although dubious concerns about Milledge's make-up played a role as well). Humber was generally considered the best player available at the spot, although I'm sure the Mets would draft Jered Weaver, Billy Butler or Philip Hughes if they could do it over again.
Kazmir, Milledge and Humber have all since been traded by the Mets - the first two for pennies on the dollar and Humber as part of the Johan Santana deal. They have all played in the major leagues; Kazmir and Milledge have been successful at the MLB level, although both are struggling badly this year. Pelfrey is still with the Mets, although 2009 has brought concerns that his ceiling is that of a #4 starter, not the #2 starter fans thought they were seeing emerge last summer.
Nevertheless, drafting aggressively in the first round yielded four major leaguers in four years for the Mets. This is important, considering those drafts produced only five other major leaguers (Matt Lindstrom, Brian Bannister, Carlos Muniz, Jon Niese and Bobby Parnell).
The Mets have drafted terribly even when they were being "aggressive" between 2002 and 2005. If, as Callis asserts, there has been a shift in thinking since then, take a look at the results:
Buffalo Bisons (AAA): 48-72, worst record in the International League
Binghamton Mets (AA): 46-73, worst record in the Eastern League
The Bisons and the B-Mets play at the two highest levels of minor-league baseball and a case can be made that each are the worst team at their respective levels. It is a direct result of poor drafting and, more recently, a reluctance to use natural financial advantages to the benefit of the minor league system.
Would pursuing a more aggressive draft strategy in the last four years have yielded better results? Let's put it this way - could it have made things any worse?
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Get While The Gettin' Is Good
Steven Matz is the property of the New York Mets today, foregoing a college scholarship to sign a minor league deal that including a signing bonus of nearly $900,000. Mets fans should be excited today; although the bonus was lower than what Matz was reportedly demanding, it was still beyond the commissioner's office recommendation for a second-round pick.
The amateur draft, as currently consitituted, has begun tilting the playing field toward large-market clubs like the Mets. I expect that shift will be corrected in the next collective bargaining agreement, but for now high-revenue clubs should be increasing their spending on the amateur draft. The ability to give out higher bonuses means the ability to sign high-level talent that the cheaper and more cowardly teams pass on because of "signability concerns."
The Mets are risking the wrath of the commissioner's office by signing Matz; ownership should expect an angry phone call or email from one of Bud Selig's minions in the coming weeks. Who cares? MLB cannot punish teams in any way for ignoring slot recommendations, so a few hurt feelings is a small price to pay for improving your franchise.
The more interesting negotiations took place in the nation's capital, where the former Montreal Expos finally signed San Diego State pitcher Stephen Strasburg to a four-year, $15 million deal. The negotiations went down to the final minutes, but the Nationals got their man and Strasburg got the richest deal in the amateur draft's history.
Everyone is professing to be happy with the deal, of course, but if you scratch the surface it would seem to me that Strasburg should be the only one smiling. He's a multimillionaire today, based on three years of dominance in the Mountain West Conference. He could blow out his arm tomorrow and be financially set for life.
The Nationals are taking on an enormous financial risk - there's no guarantee that Strasburg will be an effective major league pitcher, no matter how good he was in college. Washington is one of the many teams in baseball that simply cannot paper over a $15 million bust - a fact not lost on most owners.
Stasburg's agent Scott Boras exploits the inefficiencies of the amateur draft system as well as anybody, but he understands that his commission would've been a lot larger today if his client was on the open market. It would be bad for baseball, of course - imagine the Yankees having already signed Strasburg and any other first-round pick they so desired! - but Boras's job is getting his clients (and himself) paid, not competitive balance.
The MLB Players Association can't be too happy either. Strasburg will be a member of their club soon enough, but the MLBPA has greater obligations to its current membership. In a year where veterans like Frank Thomas, Jon Lieber and Jim Edmonds couldn't get a job in baseball, it has to rankle union membership that a college kid who hasn't even thrown a pitch in the minor leagues has gotten a four-year deal at nearly $4 million per year.
Like I said earlier, I expect the next CBA negotiations will keenly focus on the amateur draft, since the system is only rewarding high school and college players who are still a long way from The Show.
The amateur draft, as currently consitituted, has begun tilting the playing field toward large-market clubs like the Mets. I expect that shift will be corrected in the next collective bargaining agreement, but for now high-revenue clubs should be increasing their spending on the amateur draft. The ability to give out higher bonuses means the ability to sign high-level talent that the cheaper and more cowardly teams pass on because of "signability concerns."
The Mets are risking the wrath of the commissioner's office by signing Matz; ownership should expect an angry phone call or email from one of Bud Selig's minions in the coming weeks. Who cares? MLB cannot punish teams in any way for ignoring slot recommendations, so a few hurt feelings is a small price to pay for improving your franchise.
The more interesting negotiations took place in the nation's capital, where the former Montreal Expos finally signed San Diego State pitcher Stephen Strasburg to a four-year, $15 million deal. The negotiations went down to the final minutes, but the Nationals got their man and Strasburg got the richest deal in the amateur draft's history.
Everyone is professing to be happy with the deal, of course, but if you scratch the surface it would seem to me that Strasburg should be the only one smiling. He's a multimillionaire today, based on three years of dominance in the Mountain West Conference. He could blow out his arm tomorrow and be financially set for life.
The Nationals are taking on an enormous financial risk - there's no guarantee that Strasburg will be an effective major league pitcher, no matter how good he was in college. Washington is one of the many teams in baseball that simply cannot paper over a $15 million bust - a fact not lost on most owners.
Stasburg's agent Scott Boras exploits the inefficiencies of the amateur draft system as well as anybody, but he understands that his commission would've been a lot larger today if his client was on the open market. It would be bad for baseball, of course - imagine the Yankees having already signed Strasburg and any other first-round pick they so desired! - but Boras's job is getting his clients (and himself) paid, not competitive balance.
The MLB Players Association can't be too happy either. Strasburg will be a member of their club soon enough, but the MLBPA has greater obligations to its current membership. In a year where veterans like Frank Thomas, Jon Lieber and Jim Edmonds couldn't get a job in baseball, it has to rankle union membership that a college kid who hasn't even thrown a pitch in the minor leagues has gotten a four-year deal at nearly $4 million per year.
Like I said earlier, I expect the next CBA negotiations will keenly focus on the amateur draft, since the system is only rewarding high school and college players who are still a long way from The Show.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Looking For Fights In All The Wrong Places
The talk today is not about another home run given up by Francisco Rodriguez, and how the multi-year contract he was given in the off-season is being to look mighty worrisome. It's not about the grit that the Mets' Quadruple-A lineup showed in scoring three runs in the eighth to temporarily tie the score in what eventually became a 5-4 loss.
No, the talk today is apparently about how many ways the New York Mets - and presumably their fans - can desecrate the bloody and beaten corpse of Matt Cain.
Cain is a marked man today, for having the temerity to lose the handle on his fastball in a 0-0 game in the fourth inning with a man on first and nobody out. Mets fans at the game, momentarily stunned into silence by the sight of their last remaining superstar face down and motionless beside home plate, began to roar their disapproval for Cain as it became clear that Wright was going to leave the field under his own power.
Cain certainly did not help matters with a saucy tip of the cap to the Mets fans has he departed to boos in the eighth inning, with the Mets in the early stages of a game-tying rally. And Wright's beaning surely was a scary sight, especially from my vantage point in Promenade 516 Row 16.
Angst and I, sitting together at a baseball game for the first time this season, heard the sound of the ball cracking Wright's helmet even from the top of the stadium. Since we were so far away from the action, all we could see was Wright lying completely motionless; we could not see any of the subtle movements that TV viewers saw just moments after the beaning.
But that doesn't mean that Matt Cain tried to hurt David Wright yesterday.
He threw an inside fastball that veered too far inside and ended up richocheting off of Wright's head. It was ugly and it was scary, but it was not an invitation to violence. Mets fans have no reason to revile him today - Wright's beaning was an unfortunate accident that can happen within a game that can never fully correct for simple human error.
Cain was not trying to hit Wright; the Giants are actually in a playoff race and can ill afford to give games away to bottom feeders like the Mets. There's no history between Wright and Cain or Wright and the Giants, so intentionally hitting the batter in that spot means nothing more than another baserunner in what was shaping up as a tight, low-scoring game.
It's a sad commentary on society today that baseball fans have become so bloodthirsty for violence that they expect batters who have been hit by a pitch to attack the opposing pitcher and to start a brawl in the middle of a sporting event.
Wright, of course, was so incapacitated that there was never any thought that he was going to charge the mound on Cain. However, reading my favorite Mets blogs this morning and remembering various conversations I've had over the past 24 hours, I find myself puzzled and saddened by the lust for mayhem on the diamond so many people seem to have.
Charging the mound is stupid, plain and simple. Baseball players are generally not fighters, and the whole thing often disintegrates to amateurish slap fights and tackle fests that do nothing but make the combatants look childish. The batter is always suspended and sometimes the pitcher as well, which does nothing but hamstring their respective teams. On occasion a player also ends up seriously injured, making the whole spectacle even more costly and ridiculous.
The unwritten code of the game is that someone on the Giants had to expect retaliation from a Met pitcher. (By the way, I wish someone would write this code down one day, so we could all marvel at its stupidity and myopia. Every moronic and ill-advised rationale for nonsensical behavior on the baseball field inevitably harkens bask to this "unwritten code.")
Johan Santana wasn't going to intentionally put a runner on base with a 1-0 lead, but once the Giants scored three runs in the top of the sixth inning, the stage was set. Santana intentionally threw behind Pablo Sandoval to lead off the seventh, and Sandoval was spared only because of an awkward fall that somehow allowed his body to miss the flight path of the ball. No easy feat, for a man whose rotundity as earned him the nickname "Kung Fu Panda."
We all know what happened next - a long home run from Sandoval gave the Giants a 4-1 lead and left Santana with egg on his face. He successfully plunked the next batter, Bengie Molina, and retired for the day to cheers not entirely befitting of his performance.
I wonder - how many fans left the stadium at that point, disappointed not only in the Mets but also that the price of admission did not provide them a bench-clearing brawl for their enjoyment?
No, the talk today is apparently about how many ways the New York Mets - and presumably their fans - can desecrate the bloody and beaten corpse of Matt Cain.
Cain is a marked man today, for having the temerity to lose the handle on his fastball in a 0-0 game in the fourth inning with a man on first and nobody out. Mets fans at the game, momentarily stunned into silence by the sight of their last remaining superstar face down and motionless beside home plate, began to roar their disapproval for Cain as it became clear that Wright was going to leave the field under his own power.
Cain certainly did not help matters with a saucy tip of the cap to the Mets fans has he departed to boos in the eighth inning, with the Mets in the early stages of a game-tying rally. And Wright's beaning surely was a scary sight, especially from my vantage point in Promenade 516 Row 16.
Angst and I, sitting together at a baseball game for the first time this season, heard the sound of the ball cracking Wright's helmet even from the top of the stadium. Since we were so far away from the action, all we could see was Wright lying completely motionless; we could not see any of the subtle movements that TV viewers saw just moments after the beaning.
But that doesn't mean that Matt Cain tried to hurt David Wright yesterday.
He threw an inside fastball that veered too far inside and ended up richocheting off of Wright's head. It was ugly and it was scary, but it was not an invitation to violence. Mets fans have no reason to revile him today - Wright's beaning was an unfortunate accident that can happen within a game that can never fully correct for simple human error.
Cain was not trying to hit Wright; the Giants are actually in a playoff race and can ill afford to give games away to bottom feeders like the Mets. There's no history between Wright and Cain or Wright and the Giants, so intentionally hitting the batter in that spot means nothing more than another baserunner in what was shaping up as a tight, low-scoring game.
It's a sad commentary on society today that baseball fans have become so bloodthirsty for violence that they expect batters who have been hit by a pitch to attack the opposing pitcher and to start a brawl in the middle of a sporting event.
Wright, of course, was so incapacitated that there was never any thought that he was going to charge the mound on Cain. However, reading my favorite Mets blogs this morning and remembering various conversations I've had over the past 24 hours, I find myself puzzled and saddened by the lust for mayhem on the diamond so many people seem to have.
Charging the mound is stupid, plain and simple. Baseball players are generally not fighters, and the whole thing often disintegrates to amateurish slap fights and tackle fests that do nothing but make the combatants look childish. The batter is always suspended and sometimes the pitcher as well, which does nothing but hamstring their respective teams. On occasion a player also ends up seriously injured, making the whole spectacle even more costly and ridiculous.
The unwritten code of the game is that someone on the Giants had to expect retaliation from a Met pitcher. (By the way, I wish someone would write this code down one day, so we could all marvel at its stupidity and myopia. Every moronic and ill-advised rationale for nonsensical behavior on the baseball field inevitably harkens bask to this "unwritten code.")
Johan Santana wasn't going to intentionally put a runner on base with a 1-0 lead, but once the Giants scored three runs in the top of the sixth inning, the stage was set. Santana intentionally threw behind Pablo Sandoval to lead off the seventh, and Sandoval was spared only because of an awkward fall that somehow allowed his body to miss the flight path of the ball. No easy feat, for a man whose rotundity as earned him the nickname "Kung Fu Panda."
We all know what happened next - a long home run from Sandoval gave the Giants a 4-1 lead and left Santana with egg on his face. He successfully plunked the next batter, Bengie Molina, and retired for the day to cheers not entirely befitting of his performance.
I wonder - how many fans left the stadium at that point, disappointed not only in the Mets but also that the price of admission did not provide them a bench-clearing brawl for their enjoyment?
Friday, August 14, 2009
No Respect!
So I've sent the link to this site to Metsblog.com something in the range of 30 times over the last year. For some reason, I can't seem to crack their blog roll. Perhaps it is because Metsblog gets an enormous amount of traffic (averaging nearly 90,000 hits a day this week) and I get virtually none - approximately 11 hits a day this week. I need him far more than he needs me!
Today, to add insult to injury, Metsblog linked to my short piece on Steven Matz yesterday. Of course, they linked to the excerpt from Mack's Mets and credited Mack with the piece! Actually, I have to consider this a sign of progress - hopefully Metsblog will take notice of PO and CJ's existence and add me to the reading list. Being on that list would certainly increase my visibility.
(IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: No knocks here on Matt Cerrone, who has clearly set the standard for success with Mets blogs. Metsblog links the Mack's Mets version of my piece, and even the second-hand exposure increased traffic here over 1,500 percent! Matt, if you're reading this, thanks for sending your readers my way!)
I also have to thank Mack again for being kind enough to allow me to link and contribute to his blog - Mack's Mets has been responsible for directing quite a few new readers my way. If you are a Mets fan and you aren't visiting his site every day, you are missing out on consistently terrific and informative pieces about the big club and the minor-league system.
Today, to add insult to injury, Metsblog linked to my short piece on Steven Matz yesterday. Of course, they linked to the excerpt from Mack's Mets and credited Mack with the piece! Actually, I have to consider this a sign of progress - hopefully Metsblog will take notice of PO and CJ's existence and add me to the reading list. Being on that list would certainly increase my visibility.
(IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: No knocks here on Matt Cerrone, who has clearly set the standard for success with Mets blogs. Metsblog links the Mack's Mets version of my piece, and even the second-hand exposure increased traffic here over 1,500 percent! Matt, if you're reading this, thanks for sending your readers my way!)
I also have to thank Mack again for being kind enough to allow me to link and contribute to his blog - Mack's Mets has been responsible for directing quite a few new readers my way. If you are a Mets fan and you aren't visiting his site every day, you are missing out on consistently terrific and informative pieces about the big club and the minor-league system.
The Future Of Daniel Murphy
Daniel Murphy's numbers since moving to first base on May 20: .237/.295/.353 with 4 home runs in 232 at-bats.
Those are not the numbers of a major league first baseman.
I like Murphy, and I'm glad that he's gotten an extensive shot to play first base this summer, but it looks like the experiment has failed. This is not all Murphy's fault, of course - he has almost completely skipped Triple-A ball and probably should've spent the entire 2009 season in Buffalo. Had he failed in left field there and made the transition to first base in the International League, I'd feel a lot better about going into 2010 with him penciled in at first in New York.
For the past few months, I've been saying that the Mets should nevertheless give the first base job to Murphy in 2010 and give him a final opportunity to be a starter at this level. Now, I'm not so sure. If an established first baseman can be had for $4 or $5 million on a one-year deal next season (I'm looking at you, Adam Laroche), he may be the better option for a team that could be forgiven for losing faith in Murphy.
The Mets do not need to sign a first baseman to a long-term deal - and hopefully they will not. Ike Davis has shown potential across two levels this season (.293/.377/.503 with 16 home runs in 392 at-bats). He'll start 2010 in Buffalo and, if he succeeds there, could be the Mets' first baseman on Opening Day 2011.
Murphy may only have six more weeks to give the Mets a sign that he can be the .300/.380/.450 hitter some people think he can be. Now would be a good time to go on a late-season tear similar to what he did in 2008.
EDIT: Dammit, Mets Today beat me to the punch, and it was good enough to be linked at Baseball Think Factory. Click the link and read the article - it's like what I said, but better and more comprehensive.
Those are not the numbers of a major league first baseman.
I like Murphy, and I'm glad that he's gotten an extensive shot to play first base this summer, but it looks like the experiment has failed. This is not all Murphy's fault, of course - he has almost completely skipped Triple-A ball and probably should've spent the entire 2009 season in Buffalo. Had he failed in left field there and made the transition to first base in the International League, I'd feel a lot better about going into 2010 with him penciled in at first in New York.
For the past few months, I've been saying that the Mets should nevertheless give the first base job to Murphy in 2010 and give him a final opportunity to be a starter at this level. Now, I'm not so sure. If an established first baseman can be had for $4 or $5 million on a one-year deal next season (I'm looking at you, Adam Laroche), he may be the better option for a team that could be forgiven for losing faith in Murphy.
The Mets do not need to sign a first baseman to a long-term deal - and hopefully they will not. Ike Davis has shown potential across two levels this season (.293/.377/.503 with 16 home runs in 392 at-bats). He'll start 2010 in Buffalo and, if he succeeds there, could be the Mets' first baseman on Opening Day 2011.
Murphy may only have six more weeks to give the Mets a sign that he can be the .300/.380/.450 hitter some people think he can be. Now would be a good time to go on a late-season tear similar to what he did in 2008.
EDIT: Dammit, Mets Today beat me to the punch, and it was good enough to be linked at Baseball Think Factory. Click the link and read the article - it's like what I said, but better and more comprehensive.
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