Mister, Fred, Bernie, and The Donald

Oh you poor, poor Mets fans out there. In truth, I am partially one of you (although I am a bigger Red Sox fan of course). Mister Met has the right look there. The mess that has been made of the Mets organization now (and going forward) is amazing and I ain't talking about the Amazins.

So, Fred Wilpon et al decided to put all their investments into funds with that upstanding citizen Mr. Madoff. And then, when the market crashes, and their funds keep going up and up, they don't stop for, oh I don't know, two seconds, and ask themselves why that is the case? Yeah, I don't think that they did anything technically wrong, but the amount of stupidity is just unreal. How did this happen? Why did it happen? More importantly, how is Freddy the head of a major corporate entity such as the New York Mets? It is just tragic, that's what it is.

And now, what does he want to do? Well, Freddy is trying to sell a portion of the team. But no, oh no, he still wants to be the guy making the decisions, so there will be no majority sale of the team. We all know that Freddy makes such great decisions, don't we? Why wouldn't a new minority owner want him to be the guy heading the show? I mean, it's a no brainer right? According to the Wilpons, they have lots of interest in someone buying a minority share.

Yes, I will believe that when I see it. Why would anyone do that? What possible reason? Not only are you buying into a team that has had some remarkably bad press (I mean really, they are connected to the scum of the past century in Bernie Madoff), but the team is a true mess on the field. Add to that that the Wilpon's have the entire team ALREADY borrowed against and that silly little BILLION dollar lawsuit going against them in court now and you have what makes little sense for anyone to want to get involved with this team. But they have a lot of interest. Yup.

So, now we get to The Donald. Not going to say too much about him, but he has supposedly contacted the Wilpon's about purchasing a majority of the team. Well, this is definitely unlikely right now since of course the Wilpon's don't want to sell said majority. And then, beyond that, do you think Bud Selig and his fellow cronies want The Donald as part of baseball? They didn't want Mark Cuban*, so why would they want another over-the-top personality like The Donald?

So what is this going to do to the Met's team on the field? Initially, not much. The team is what it is though. Not much in the way of new free agents or players that are received via trade. So, the team you saw out there on the field last year is likely to be the same one you see this year. In other words, it may not be pretty. Johan Santana is out to start the season. Hopefully he will be back sometime during the season. But, there isn't much otherwise. Some decent pitchers in Pelfrey, Niese, and Dickey. But, nothing spectacular there. Offense has lots of injury prone guys like Jose Reyes, Carlos Beltran, and Jason Bay (sort of with the latter). The team could be decent, but likely isn't going to be great. And in the NL East, that just isn't good enough. Atlanta and Philly are just better teams. Well, Philly is at least. And Florida isn't so bad either (although losing Uggla hurts).

But, we are really going to see how things are affected following the draft and especially next offseason. The draft will tell us if the Mets are going to actually pay to get the good picks. That remains to be seen. Next offseason, the Mets have a TON of money coming off the books as well. I doubt they will sign Reyes. I know they won't sign Beltran. Castillo and Perez will be lucky to make it through camp on the team (and this would be bad.... real bad.... for the Mets as a team). So, if they are somewhat aggressive on free agents next offseason, then we will know that the team is a bit more solid than it appears right now. But, I am not sure that that will happen. I think this is a sinking ship. Sandy Alderson and his team in the general management office have a lot of work ahead of them. Thankfully, they are good and are likely to be able to keep things going there. There is likely few who could do better in this situation. But, oh, what a mess. This will be a tough year or two to follow the Mets.

I still am not sure I see a situation where the Wilpons manage to hold onto this team, but Bud and the gang may be able to work something out for them. I just don't know how it will happen, and it scares me what damage this will do to the team itself.

*By the way, MLB made a huge mistake in not giving Cuban a shot with a team, but that is another story entirely.

Recent MLB Moves

Just wanted to put some quick thoughts out there on the recent flury of early off-season baseball moves.

Let's start with the move that sent Cameron Maybin to the Padres for Ryan Webb and Edward Mujica. I love this deal for the Padres. Yeah, they had plenty of OF's already, but Maybin could be exactly what they really need out there. He is a speedy, rangy CF'r that they need in that outfield. He appears to be competent in the outfield (although tough to be sure without a larger sample size). If he can manage to get that K% down a bit, his speed will shine through and you could be looking at a really special player. Webb is a nice looking player as a reliever. Mujica is ok, but is prone to the long ball (not to mention he is arb eligible this year). So, I think the Marlins sold low on Maybin. They didn't get completely fleeced or anything but I like the Pads in this move.

Next one I wanted to hit on was the Uggla to the Braves for Infante and Mike Dunn. Either the Marlins know something we don't about Uggla, or they made another losing move here. Uggla is good, not great, but a nice bat for the Braves for sure. They can move him around there and start the season at 3B with Prado at 2B. When Chipper is ready to come back, they could even move him over to 1B (where they always seem to need help). Infante was ok, but he isn't anything really special. Dunn looks like a solid reliever. But, infielders that can hit 30 HRs don't just grow on trees anymore. Solid move for Braves.

Ok, now on to the John Buck to the Marlins for 3 years and 18 million. Seriously? They may not have gotten killed on the first two deals, but is Buck really worth this? Seems like a big time overpay in my book. Maybe there was that much interest in Buck, but could it really have been that much? I just don't get it. And I keep reading that he is a great handler of pitching staffs. Well, if that is the case, sign Brad Ausmus for a league minimum and go with that. Buck has a better stick, but he will not have an OBP over .300 next year, count on it. That will be ugly.

Final move I wanted to comment on is the one that just happened a couple of hours ago. The Tigers signed Joaquin Benoit to a 3 yr/$16.5mil deal. Ok, are they smoking something? He is a freaking middle reliever! Small sample sizes here people. No way is he good as his numbers showed this year. Yes, I think he IS good though. Just not 3/16.5 good. NO middle reliever (and very few relievers in general) is really worth that kind of money. A gross overpay by the Tigers and one they will grow to regret. He could still be very solid and it would be an overpay.

So, is this how the rest of the off-season will work out? Jeez, it is ugly so far. Interesting for sure, but ugly. We will have to see.