Saturday, December 04, 2004
The Day
Somehow I thought I'd be happier. I mean, Mike Stanton, blower of leads and slaughterer of puppies, is no longer a New York Met! And even better, they managed to trick the Yankees into reclaiming his bloated carcass! And yet, all is not well on what should have been a day of celebration. For while the Mets did manage to rid themselves of one of the most useless members of their roster, they've exchanged him for perhaps an even crappier relief pitcher. Mike Stanton is a New York Yankee once again and Felix Heredia is a New York Met.
Stanton had a pair of awful seasons with the Mets, though in 2004 he managed to post some decent stats like a 3.16 ERA even though his strikeout and walk rates were basically identical to his numbers from 2003, when he posted a 4.57 ERA. Of course, he managed to reduce his home run rate, giving up the same number, six, in about thirty-two more innings. Still, if you look at Baseball Prospectus' stats for relief pitchers and inherited runners, Stanton comes out as the third-worst reliever in the majors in 2004. Now, there's some debate as to how useful these stats really are in determining a reliever's true ability and certainly Stanton's poor showing is due at least in part to the utterly clueless way in which Art Howe utilized him. But even allowing for that, Stanton clearly performed poorly in the job he was asked to do this year and thus the Mets wasted a large sum of money and playing time on a guy who did little to help them win games.
And here's where I think this trade might be okay. Felix Heredia also had a terrible 2004, posting a 6.28 ERA and ranking near the bottom of BP's stats as well. And his resume doesn't even contain any real periods of great success to give hope for his future effectiveness. Sure, he posted some nice ERAs in 2002 and 2003, but he also put up the worst strikeout rates of his career in those two years as well as his worst strikeout-to-walk ratios since his 1996 rookie year in which he pitched just sixteen and two-thirds innings. He appears to have gotten quite lucky regarding his ERA in those two years, and in 2004 his strikeout and walk rates stayed poor and his ERA ballooned. But here's where I'm not too scared. He's not Mike Stanton. And by that I mean he's not some respected veteran guy who's going to get chance after chance despite obvious incompetence. Now, we don't know that Willie Randolph is the kind of manager who operates that way, but given that he presumably learned his craft largely from Joe Torre, we should at least brace for it. But Heredia isn't any kind of "proven veteran" and Randolph saw first hand how awful he was in 2004. And given that even Omar Minaya doesn't seem to be saying much of anything positive about his fellow Dominican Heredia other than that he'll save the team a million bucks, I get the feeling that the team isn't really counting on him to be an important part of the 2005 bullpen.
That 2005 bullpen is still clearly a work in progress with only Braden Looper under contract and a good bet to contribute positively for the whole year. But this move seems at worst to be no big deal and at best to be some addition by subtraction, so while this move isn't quite the excising of a cancerous growth that I envisioned the exit of Stanton from the franchise to be, it's nothing to get too upset about, either. ¶ joe | 2:20 PM |
Somehow I thought I'd be happier. I mean, Mike Stanton, blower of leads and slaughterer of puppies, is no longer a New York Met! And even better, they managed to trick the Yankees into reclaiming his bloated carcass! And yet, all is not well on what should have been a day of celebration. For while the Mets did manage to rid themselves of one of the most useless members of their roster, they've exchanged him for perhaps an even crappier relief pitcher. Mike Stanton is a New York Yankee once again and Felix Heredia is a New York Met.
Stanton had a pair of awful seasons with the Mets, though in 2004 he managed to post some decent stats like a 3.16 ERA even though his strikeout and walk rates were basically identical to his numbers from 2003, when he posted a 4.57 ERA. Of course, he managed to reduce his home run rate, giving up the same number, six, in about thirty-two more innings. Still, if you look at Baseball Prospectus' stats for relief pitchers and inherited runners, Stanton comes out as the third-worst reliever in the majors in 2004. Now, there's some debate as to how useful these stats really are in determining a reliever's true ability and certainly Stanton's poor showing is due at least in part to the utterly clueless way in which Art Howe utilized him. But even allowing for that, Stanton clearly performed poorly in the job he was asked to do this year and thus the Mets wasted a large sum of money and playing time on a guy who did little to help them win games.
And here's where I think this trade might be okay. Felix Heredia also had a terrible 2004, posting a 6.28 ERA and ranking near the bottom of BP's stats as well. And his resume doesn't even contain any real periods of great success to give hope for his future effectiveness. Sure, he posted some nice ERAs in 2002 and 2003, but he also put up the worst strikeout rates of his career in those two years as well as his worst strikeout-to-walk ratios since his 1996 rookie year in which he pitched just sixteen and two-thirds innings. He appears to have gotten quite lucky regarding his ERA in those two years, and in 2004 his strikeout and walk rates stayed poor and his ERA ballooned. But here's where I'm not too scared. He's not Mike Stanton. And by that I mean he's not some respected veteran guy who's going to get chance after chance despite obvious incompetence. Now, we don't know that Willie Randolph is the kind of manager who operates that way, but given that he presumably learned his craft largely from Joe Torre, we should at least brace for it. But Heredia isn't any kind of "proven veteran" and Randolph saw first hand how awful he was in 2004. And given that even Omar Minaya doesn't seem to be saying much of anything positive about his fellow Dominican Heredia other than that he'll save the team a million bucks, I get the feeling that the team isn't really counting on him to be an important part of the 2005 bullpen.
That 2005 bullpen is still clearly a work in progress with only Braden Looper under contract and a good bet to contribute positively for the whole year. But this move seems at worst to be no big deal and at best to be some addition by subtraction, so while this move isn't quite the excising of a cancerous growth that I envisioned the exit of Stanton from the franchise to be, it's nothing to get too upset about, either. ¶ joe | 2:20 PM |
