Cleaning Up a Mets

Coming into this baseball season, it looked as if the New York Mets were destined to finish as one of the 5 worst teams in baseball. They had Reyes, Wright, Beltran, and Bay, but not much else. At the end of last year, they lost Johan Santana into a greater part of this season. The media - in particular, the PepeVibe - were all over them, saying that they would struggle. Certain bloggers predicted they would trade away both Jose Reyes and Carlos Beltran prior to the trade deadline.

According to certain "respected media outlets".....this trio is supposed to be getting split up at some point this year.

They had a rather ordinary, if not disappointing, offseason. Their starting pitching needed to be addressed, so they picked a couple of reclamation projects off of the bottom of the heap – Chris Young and Chris Capuano…..both former all-stars who had found themselves one step from being out of baseball.  Chris Young had been an up-and-coming young arm before getting injured….and getting injured again….and again. Capuano had done a complete nosedive from a top-of-the-rotation lefty to an innings-eating long reliever in the bullpen. While the Mets did not invest much money into these two, their satisfaction with rounding out the back end of their rotation with them was puzzling. It seemed to signify that the team conceded that they would not be a factor this year, and needed some stopgap pitchers until free agency the following year. To “bolster” their bullpen, the  “Amazin’s” signed Jason Isringhausen. Isringhausen, one of the dominant closers of the 2000’s, had not had a productive season since 2007.

Once upon a time, Capuano represented the senior circuit in the midsummer classic. Of recent, he had been relegated to sparsely-used bullpen material with a consistently bad ERA.

Offensively, they seemed to have some of pop with a top 5 of Reyes, Pagan, Beltran, Wright, and Bay. However, they were going with uncertainty nearly everywhere else. Could Ike Davis continue to develop and improve upon his decent rookie year? Could the tandem of Thole and underachieving journeyman Ronny Paulino handle the duties behind the plate? How about the carousel of youth at 2^nd base?

 After reading the introduction, you might think you have an idea of where this blog is going. If you are a regular PepeVibe reader, then you have seen the shots I have taken at the Mets from time to time. At the very least, I’ve had some fun at their expense.

"The Vibe?....That guy can kiss our ass" Minaya (right) and Ollie P (left) were targeted in a spring training blog on the New York Mets. Perez is now in the Nationals organization working on his command. Minaya is somewhere out there working on speaking into a microphone without stammering.

But if that’s where you think this is going, you are wrong.

I’m writing this to point out that, to this point in the season, the Mets have done a really nice job. Don’t get me wrong, the beginning of this season has been littered with “here we go again” moments for them. However, their response to these moments has been quite different from years past. Injuries to Angel Pagan, David Wright, and Ike Davis. Ineptitude by the Mets training staff (Davis’ injury turned from a possible week or so problem to potentially season-ending). We witnessed a period of time in May during which their regular lineup was:

C Josh Thole

1B Daniel Murphy

2B Ruben Tejada

SS Jose Reyes

3B Justin Turner

LF Jason Bay

CF Jason Pridie

RF Carlos Beltran

Aside from Beltran, Bay, and Reyes, how do you fill out the rest of the lineup card? All other players combine for fewer than 20 career home runs. On the mound, Chris Young looked to be finding the magic again, but the injury bug hit him again.

Ginger extraordinaire Justin Turner probably figured to be wearing this Buffalo uniform all year long. He's gotta be happy. It has to suck to play baseball up in Buffalo. Did anything good ever come out of there anyway?

But a funny thing happened while all of this was going on….the Mets started to win games. The feisty, hungry minor league call-ups that the Mets have run out there have not been an easy out for teams this year. While none of them really can be considered a breakout star, they played well collectively and got contributions from different people on different nights. Most do not project to starting roles in their future, but are players that any team would like to have in the fold. To fill the void left by Chris Young, the Mets have gotten an All-Star-esque season from rookie Dillon Gee, who was not supposed to be in the majors this year. Gee, unlike the other role players, DOES look like he could be a special player in his future.

If Gee strings together a few more quality starts, he could be looking at an all-star selection as a starting pitcher. If he gets to 9 wins, he's in the mix.

It used to be that while all the injury bugs were biting the Mets, and while all of the circus of incompetence was going on off the field, the team was equally as frustrating on the field. Oliver Perez, Luis Castillo, Jerry Manuel (uhhhh…uhh).

This team has done enough to give the Mets fan something to watch this season. Are they setting the world on fire? No. Will they make the playoffs? Probably not. But they are competitive, and will be competitive moving forward.

The difference for them, in my opinion, is in their leadership. Terry Collins does not possess the “let’s just make it thru this” approach that Jerry Manuel had when injuries and misfortune struck the team. Collins attitude is “we still need to go out there and get it done.” Sandy Alderson is cut from the Billy Beane mold, which means that he is likely to find good, productive players on the cheap. Omar Minaya was cut from the…..well, I’m not sure what mold he was cut from, but it wasn’t a good one.

Uhh...we're just gonna try...uhhh...to tread some water...uhhh....until we get our guys back. 

I’m not saying that we should now dismiss all “same old Mets” feelings we might be having. Jason Bay sucks and will get $66 million of the Mets money. Injuries still plague the team. They still toy with the emotions of their fans. They’ve been within a game or two of .500 for SOOO long, and they never seem to be able to turn the corner and make a run to get above .500.

All that considered, the Met fan has to be feeling good about the way they have performed this year, and the way things project for the future.

You're welcome, Mets fans.