Category: General

Delgado Is Dead Weight And I’m Mad!

New York Mets first baseman Carlos Delgado before a Mets/Devil Rays spring training game at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida.Image via Wikipedia

Question: How do you get rid of $16 million worth of dead weight?

Answer: I have no idea.

I’m exasperated watching Carlos Delgado. He’s completely lost it. If he had any respect for himself he would return most of the money the Mets have paid him last season and so far this season and retire. He’s hurting the team. That’s what it comes down to.

The problem for the Mets is that there’s no solution to this problem. There isn’t another player on the team or in the minors that can play first base every day. I know about Mike Carp. He’s not going to play every day for this team. So, forget it.

There’s no way to get rid of Delgado without releasing him and paying him. It’s been done before. Damion Easley got released by the Tigers and they owed him $14 million. So that’s a possibility.

Delgado can’t be traded… Nobody would take him. I can’t even blame Omar Minaya for bringing him here. I went back and looked at his numbers. His last year with the Marlins was excellent. He was a .300 hitter. Since the 2006 season his skills seem to have just dropped off a cliff. He’s barely a .200 hitter now.

It’s also really bothering me that Willie won’t move him down from fifth in the lineup out of respect for Delgado. Forget respect, Willie! We’re trying to win games here. Delgado should be hitting sixth or seventh. Based on his performance, there’s no denying that.

The mainstream media is all over the topic too with columns here, here, and here.

What would you do with Delgado and first base after he’s gone?

On Deck: Monday April 21, 2008

New York Mets (10-7) at Chicago Cubs (12-6)     7:05pm

John Maine (1-1) vs. Carlos Zambrano (2-0)

TV: ESPN Radio: WFAN

What to watch: Zambrano’s a great pitcher, so this could be a real pitchers duel. Maine looks like he’s getting his spring training form back. The Mets begin their two game series in Chicago with a national TV game and then head to Washington on Wednesday.

D-Backs Front Office Blogger

The Arizona Diamondbacks logoImage via WikipediaI’m sure you all know about Curt Schilling’s 38 Pitches blog. There are other baseball insiders blogging too. I read in The Hardball Times today that A.J. Hinch has a blog as well. He’s the Director of Player Development for the D-Backs. His blog is called D-backs On Deck. It’s very interesting reading.

Although we haven’t seen the D-Backs yet this season, I’ve seen plenty of highlights on my favorite show, ESPN’s Baseball Tonight. Everyone knows about Brandon Webb and Randy Johnson but they’ve got a ton of really good young players on that team. They could contend for years with that team.

The success of the D-Backs makes Hinch’s blog especially interesting. Check it out.

Manny Acta Orders Haircut for Young

Washington Nationals manager and former Mets coach Manny Acta ordered Dmitri Young to get a haircut after their loss Thursday to the Mets. Young agreed to cut his hair in Miami and showed up sporting a new ‘do. Apparently, Young’s personal barber is in Miami. Acta cited team “structure” as the reason for the order.

I’ve never heard of anyone’s hair being a distraction to a team before. Young’s hair was pretty wild so I’m not surprised that Acta said something to him about it.

Read more on this hilarious story at Babes Love Baseball.

Schneider, Johan Santana Working Together

Jack Curry of the New York Times wrote a good article for the New York Times today about the working relationship between Johan Santana and Brian Schneider. It looks to me like Schneider’s working well with all of the Mets pitchers.

I have to admit that I didn’t like the Milledge for Church/Schneider trade but it’s working out pretty well so far. We won’t know the full implications of the trade for a few years when Lastings Milledge gets into his prime playing years. He just turned 23 last week.

Paul LoDuca has been dreadful for the Nationals and I was really never a fan of his anyway. Read a Nationals blog post here. If you’ve read some of my previous posts, you know that my opinion of him is that his mouth is bigger than his bat or glove.

If Brian Schneider can keep up a little bit of hitting, and he’s over.300 right now, he’ll have made the trade much more palatable.