Category Archives: Roster

Jeremy Hefner Starts Against the Nationals Today

Jeremy Hefner

Jeremy Hefner (Photo credit: paul.hadsall)

Talk about a let down for Mets fans after an exciting night of Matt Harvey starting against the Nationals! Jeremy Hefner starts against the Nats today going up against Gio Gonzalez in the “Tough Act to Follow” game of the series.

The sparse crowd at Citi Field last night was rightfully fired up to see Harvey put on another show and go to 4-0 for the season out-dueling Stephen Strasburg.

Unfortunately for Fox Sports, they get the Saturday afternoon game today with Hefner on the mound sporting his 7.20 ERA. Hefner’s certainly wearing the title of “Most Likely to be Replaced by Zack Wheeler” so far this season.

Hefner’s made two starts and got rocked in one for 5 runs in 3 innings. And he got bombed in one relief appearance for 2 runs in 1 inning. It’s become a waiting game to see how long Hefner can hold onto his roster spot with the Mets before being designated for assignment.

Mets Johan Santana May Need Shoulder Surgery

johan satana2Multiple media reports state that Mets ace Johan Santana had an MRI on his shoulder today that indicated a probable re-tear of his surgically repaired shoulder capsule. In all likelihood, Santana’s season is over and so is his Mets career.

Santana will finish his Mets career pitching in four seasons to a 46-34 record with a 3.18 ERA over 109 games. The injuries were a huge disappointment but we’ll never forget the 2012 no-hitter with the game saving catch by Mike Baxter.

The Wilpons must be kicking themselves now for not insuring Santana’s contract against injury. At least this is the last season of the contract. They’ll be finished with Santana after this season on the disabled list.
photo credit: OlympianX via photopin cc

David Wright May Start Season on DL

David Wright

David Wright (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Several media sources are reporting that David Wright may start the 2013 season on the disabled list. He suffered a muscle strain in his ribs while participating in the World Baseball Classic this week.

This is really a team’s worst nightmare about the WBC. The face of your franchise gets hurt in an exhibition away from the team and misses time during the regular season. I’m not a fan of the WBC anyway, but this makes me even less so.

Granted, and injury like this could happen anytime even if Wright was with the Mets. But I have to say that having the WBC games during spring training is the wrong time. Players generally aren’t ready to go all out in the beginning of March. They need more time to get ready and now the Mets are paying the price.

Everyone that bought opening day tickets expecting to see Wright looks like their out of luck this year. What a shame.

“You could just tell. One of the things last year at this time that he really showed was that great feel for the changeup. He was trying to build up some velocity and he didn’t have a real good feel for his release point. But at least he had the arm speed, and the other day I didn’t see much arm speed.”

-Terry Collins of Johan Santana’s spring shut down until March 10-15

Mets Sign Shaun Marcum

English: pitching at Miller Park, , Wisconsin,...

English: pitching at Miller Park, , Wisconsin, USA. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Mets finally signed a Major League free agent today by signing right-handed starter Shaun Marcum.He signed a one year deal but haven’t seen how much he’ll be paid this season. It’s a solid minimal risk signing but should be a huge step down from Cy Young Award winner R.A. Dickey in the rotation.

Marcum’s been in the league for seven years with Toronto and Milwaukee. He’s known as an excellent fielder and solid starter when healthy. He missed a few weeks last year with a bad elbow so he only made 21 starts. The 31 year old has a career record of 57-36 with a 3.76 ERA. Very solid numbers.

If Marcum can stay healthy, the deal will look good. If not, Zack Wheeler could make his Major League debut sooner than we might have thought.

Mets Buy Out Jason Bay’s Contract

Jason Bay

Jason Bay (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Mets and Jason Bay agreed to “part ways” today. From the quotes we got from Sandy Alderson and Bay, it sounded mutual. But we all know that the Mets wanted him gone and so did we. They just had to find a way to get rid of him while still owing him $21 million guaranteed.

In three years with the Mets, Bay played in 288 games and hit .234 with 26 HR and 124 RBI’s…. Combined over three years!!! It’ll certainly go down as one of the worst contracts in Mets history, if not the worst. The 4-year/$67 million deal left Bay and his family financially set for life thanks to the Wilpons but left Mets fans exasperated.

The move leaves a hole in left field for the Mets going into 2013 but we all know that the Mets aren’t playing for 2013. They’re building to try to be competitive again in 2014 after Johan Santana’s contract expires.

The only good thing I can say about Bay is that he always hustled and never made excuses for his poor performance when it would’ve been easy to do so. I have to commend the guy for giving 100% effort during extremely difficult conditions. He just seemed to lose any ability to hit the ball. It’s dumbfounding.

Mets and David Wright Negotiating Contract Extension

There’s no secret that the Mets and David Wright have been talking about a contract extension. Sandy Alderson discussed it openly near the end of the lost 2012 season. Wright has a team option for 2013 at $16 million and the Mets have five days after the end of the World Series to take that option.

Joel Sherman is reporting in the Post today that his anonymous baseball people believe the Mets want to finalize that deal before having to take the option year. That would allow them to package the option year into one large deal in the neighborhood of 8-years/$143 million. That would eclipse Johan Santana’s 7-year/$143 million as the highest paid Mets player ever.

I’m not so sure that the Mets will finalize a deal of that magnitude within five days of the World Series ending. But all signs point to a deal getting done soon that will keep Wright with the Mets for what will likely be the rest of his career. The guy has done everything right since he’s been with the Mets and keeps himself in great shape. So if you’re going to risk a huge contract, I can’t think of a better player to risk it on.