New York Nine

Okay okay lame headline, but if you're a met fan its really not to far from the truth. Indeed, the last two years have been excruciating for the Mets fans to say the least, wrought with two consecutive September collapses, fans are looking for SOMETHING to be happy about. Well they didn't exactly light the world on fire this off-season, a lot of very valuable free agents were there for the taking and for the most part the Mets did not bite, GM Omar Minaya addressed the most glaring weakness and made it a strength.


If you want to make any Met fan wince in pain just mention the names Heilman and Schoenwies and they'll be in tears in seconds. Okay, maybe not but these two and many others in that disaster of a bullpen really ripped the heart right out the Mets and into second place pretty quick. Indeed, especially in the second half the Mets bullpen was to put it bluntly, absolute shit. Consider of the six relievers Jerry Manuel has called upon most frequently, five have second-half ERAs above 4.90: Ayala (5.54, including his Washington stint), Pedro Feliciano (6.38), Aaron Heilman (6.75), Duaner Sanchez (6.00), and Joe Smith (4.91); Scott Schoeneweis (4.50) is the exception. When Schoeneweis is the leader in the clubhouse with a 4.5 era you've got some serious problems.


So Omar said you want a bullpen, I'll give you one, signing the single season saves leader K-Rod and then subsequently trading for the stellar JJ Putz to set up. While K-Rod had a record breaking year his numbers last year were a down year in stats that matter, namely strikeouts per nine innings walks and WHIP, but when you consider who he's replacing, well he's not too bad. In addition Putz is brought in to set up for him and you could argue he's better than K-Rod posting more impressive stuf and the control to back it up. In this regard I give the mets very high marks, you could argue that this was what kept them from winning the division and they went out and made their bullpen an asset.


However while this was a big problem this was not the only problem of the Mets. Indeed, while their roster is quite star-studded they also have a great deal of lineup spots that are pretty much automatic outs (I'm looking at you Luis Castillo and Brian Schneider). Especially in a National League lineup where you have the pitcher hitting if you have two or three guys out there that you have no faith in to be productive you're going to be exposed, which is what happened. In addition, the Mets got no real production from the corner outfield positions, two spots that are usually very productive, getting virtually nothing from Ryan Church after his two concussions and not much at all from Fernando Tatis, Trot Nixon, and pretty much any other replacement-level player they threw out there. While there's a lot to like in David Murphy and you can hope that Church comes back thats a lot of if's and when there are proven guys like Bobby Abreu, Adam Dunn, Ken Griffey, Garrett Anderson and a host of other solid corner outfielders available for very cheap you have to wonder why they didn't improve themselves.


I'll give the Mets a B/B+ but it could have been a solid A had they just got a decent bat in that lineup to compliment Wright, Reyes and Beltran. They're solid players for sure, some of the leagues best but that's not a team and unless some guys step it up or have some serious bounce-back years I dont see this team being actually better than the Phillies. While their starting pitching is strong and the bullpen is looking real solid, you'd have to be pretty foolish to think that judging from last year that this lineup is as good as the Phils. Time will tell on that and stranger things have happened, but its going to be a fight to the end with the Phillies.