Worrisome
Orlando Hernandez, who was bothered by a bunion all last season, is still bothered by it after being told that surgery would require two years to recover. He did, however, have related surgery on a toe, and has yet to do more than throw half-speed bullpen sessions. With only the untested Mike Pelfrey as a viable option behind El Duque for the fifth spot in the rotation, this lingers as a major concern. Fortunately, Pelfrey has been effective thus far—but unless he’s getting hitters to swing and miss more than last year, it is hard to see him approaching Hernandez’s effectiveness.
Ryan Church and Marlon Anderson, meanwhile, collided on Sunday, giving Church a concussion and Anderson a bruised chest and jaw. Church has no memory of the collision, and Anderson is still hurting. While Anderson is likely to return to action soon, Church’s Grade II concussion will need to be watched carefully. And if he doesn’t recover as quickly as hoped, the Mets’ best right field options, since Lastings Milledge is gone, are now Brady Clark and Angel Pagan.
Bad
Carlos Delgado’s sore hip led to a trip to New York this week for an MRI. The diagnosis is “hip impingement”, which is suspiciously like the injury that kept Delgado out for several weeks in September. It is hard to imagine that if a winter of rest failed to heal Delgado, a summer of playing will do the trick. The Mets lack first base options, should Delgado be injured or ineffective. The main choices appear to be Damion Easley and Marlon Anderson.
Repoz
Posted: March 06, 2008 at 02:19 PM |
48 comment(s)
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Yes and no. Schneider had on and off again hamstring problems throughout his time with the Nats.
Here's last year. He missed about 2 weeks in '06 with hammie problems. He missed Sept. in '05... I think that was an arm injury though.
Abdominal hernias are fairly common among athletes, especially male athletes, regardless of age.
To the Mets credit, they Alou's quickly, instead of misdiagnosing it for months as strained a groin / abdomen muscle.
Assuming Delgado misses time, I wouldn't be surprised if Pagan could sniff league average for CF while providing plus defense. I don't think he'd kill the Mets out there as long as it wasn't a long-term solution.
Plus if Beltran could play first (no idea if he could), it would help save his legs a bit, and it would hopefully keep the Mets from having to rob Peter to pay Paul (i.e., trading Sosa/Pelfrey for a spare part).
But like I said, it may sound crazy.
Geez, grow a sense of humor.
Still, isn't it only a matter of time before Luis Castillo starts complaining about his "arther-itis?"
I blame our intelligent designer.
Sounds like an opening for David Wells and his gout.
"...it would hopefully keep the Mets from having to rob Peter to pay Paul (i.e., trading Sosa/Pelfrey for a spare part)."
Don't know whether the Mets would do this, but I bet the Pirates would trade Nady for Pelfrey.
I'm looking forward to Pedro's complaints about "the lumbago" and Billy Wagner coming down with poor man's gout.
Have you accepted Calvin Klein as your personal tailor? Do it todayyyyyo!
Blessed Regards
St. John of the Apocalypso
Sorry too easy
You know, as I've raged on and on about how bad it has been to let the roster get so old and laden with Proven Veterans™ while sending away all the prospects instead of working them into the line-up, it really didn't occur to me that the chickens would be coming home to roost quite this soon, or with so much fury, or all at once. This really is exactly what will (or at least can) happen when you do two things simultaneously:
1) stock your roster with a whole hell of a lot of really old players with big-time injury histories, and
2) deplete your farm system of almost every major-league ready prospect who could fill in for those really old players with big-time injury histories.
You can get a train wreck. You might get lucky and avoid the wreck, or you might get semi-lucky and have the train wreck early in spring training when there is time to get things back together before it destroys your season. But if the Mets do get semi-lucky and heal up in time to have the season they hope for, I hope they get the message about roster construction and realize that Willie's way is a path to long-term destruction. This spring is a sign of the disaster that awaits if they don't get younger. Period.
I remember this because he said he wanted to build around pitching, youth and "athletickism." [sic]
So how did Willie end up winning this battle?
The Mets knew they weren’t getting 162 games from Alou and were prepared to live with Endy for a couple of weeks or four. Losing Alou this early AND being uncertain about Delgado at the same time is the problem. Omar was clearly negligent in getting a back-up 1B (and RH outfielder to platoon with Church), unless he believes his own posturing that Abreu or Saenz are viable options. They didn’t even invite Carp or Evans to camp (though Evans played a few innings yesterday).
Howard, what’s up with Ben Johnson? He can be Nady2…
Nah. Because that will open the door for them to call me to be the # 5 starter by early June. I'm probably a little too old, but probably less injury prone than most of the roster is right now. All in all, pretty much right up their alley.
Wilson failed a physical.
He's still recovering from a broken ankle, and has yet to play in a spring game.
Personally, I am not overly concerned with the injuries considering the date. Castillo, Endy, Delgado, Beltran, Schneider, and Gotay should all be playing games in the next week or so and that would give them plenty of time to get ready before Opening Day. Even Duque has enough time to get ready by the time the Mets will first need him, around April 12th.
Alou getting hurt is expected and unfortunate. The Mets were never going to get much more than 100 games from him and they still might so this injury isn't going to change my outlook on the season.
Sanchez's "soreness" is worrisome to me. He didn't look great on the mound the one game he pitched and hasn't pitched since.
No, #26 has it right. It would be a nightmare. In the long-dead world of 1998-2004 (or any of his other years even) it would be ok, but now? HELL no.
The surgery Beltran had wasn't major. I don't anticipate that he'll be anything less than good in CF.
Bonds isn't a realistic option. Kenny Lofton might be.
The Pirates might do Nady for Niese. I think I would, but my vote doesn't count.
Niese's numbers weren't very impressive last season but he impressed me with his stuff in his spring training outing. Fastball that maxed out at 92, mostly 88-90, and a nice curveball. An inconsistent changeup but that isn't that odd at that stage of development.
I'd be upset if they made that trade. I think he is going to have a nice year this season.
They may not have a choice.
I'd be upset if they made that trade. I think he is going to have a nice year this season.
I think the Mets have gone too far down the "win now" road to stop.
Antone but F Mart has to be fair game.
Yeah, I'm a bastard that way. What of it?
From the Pirate perspective, I don't like him as much as Niese. I think he's a reliever in the bigs, and we already have enough of those.
I'd probably rather shake the tree again in SD and see whether something better than Hundley falls out this time.
Russlan's right. There's no reason to panic. Omar certainly should be looking for cheap pickups at 1b and in the OF, but he should have been doing that regardless of the latest injuries. Signing Lohse to a reasonable two-year deal, if possible, was a good idea before El Duque got hurt. It's still a good idea.
Pagan's range in CF, fwiw, is pretty poor. I haven't seen him play center, so I don't know how he'd be out there. Does anyone else have an opinion? His bat, for a CFer, isn't too bad...
It probably sounds crazier than it is, but I still wouldn't do it. If Beltran ever played first, it had to be earlier than his Gulf Coast League days. For the slight theoretical edge you might get at the plate, I can't help but think you'd pay for it in other ways. Whatever wear and tear you miss on your legs I'm confident you increase, due to inexperience, your injury risk in other ways: improper positioning, and thereby getting spiked on a close play at the bag, to raise one example. I have to think it would also distract and thereby detract from every other aspect of his game.
edit: for clarity
So they’ll look for someone better than Pagan and Chavez, preferably right-handed, preferably with options or wouldn’t mind a bench role, and won’t cost too much. Eh, we’d probably end up with Preston Wilson or Reggie Sanders.
That may be true, but I read an article this week stating that Beltran still can stop or turn and is nowhere near ready to play CF.
Here it is:
http://www.newsday.com/sports/baseball/ny-spmets055602157mar05,0,4009250.story
Ruben Tejada is no touch as well.
Trot Nixon's OPS+ was 78 last season and it has gone down 4 straight seasons. He has never been able to hit lefties and the Mets need a righthanded bat. Nixon can't help this team. He isn't any better than Pagan at this point of his career and at least Pagan can play defense.
Thames makes sense but the Tigers need him as well to platoon with Jones. Smith would be too much to pay for him. Smith had an uneven rookie year but he did strike out more than a batter an inning while posting a 2.9 g/f ratio. He's still really young as well.
awesome ...
Patiently awaiting Johan's visit to Dr. Yocum!
great stuff!
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