Friday, November 30, 2007
Ridiculous
Prior to today, I thought the Mets had been having a decent offseason. They hadn't made a big splash, but they had said goodbye to their two worst everyday players, Paul Lo Duca and Shawn Green, making room for better, younger players. The starting rotation would be the same as the one that started 2007 except that Tom Glavine would be replaced by Pedro Martinez, quite a swap if Pedro stays healthy. The 2008 Mets weren't going to be a great team, but they were going to be good. And if they could have added a good starting pitcher, who knows?
They made a trade today, giving up one of their talented young players, but they didn't get that starting pitcher. Lastings Milledge was sent to the Washington Nationals in exchange for Ryan Church and Brian Schneider. The best thing I can say about this trade is that it's not the worst the Mets have made in the last three and a half years.
Ryan Church has hit .271/.348/.462 in 997 at bats over four years in his major league career. In 2007 he hit .272/.349/.464 in 144 games, slightly better than Milledge's .272/.341/.446 in 59 games. And Church was playing in a tougher hitting environment at RFK Stadium. So he may very well be a better hitter than Milledge right now. Church is also said to be the better defender of the two, but Milledge hadn't had much of a chance to adjust to playing right field in the majors after playing center for the majority of his minor league career. Most importantly, Church is twenty-nine years old, so he's about as good as he's going to get, whereas Milledge will turn twenty-three in April and is still improving. I am far from certain that Church will be a better hitter than Milledge in 2008, let alone four or five years down the line. If these two players had been traded for each other straight up it would be perplexing from the Mets' perspective.
The addition of Schneider doesn't make it any easier to understand. The thirty-one year old catcher hit .235/.326/.336 in 129 games this year and has a .252/.323/.377 line for his eight year career. He's an even worse hitter than Paul Lo Duca, though he is younger and better defensively. That defense is apparently what spelled the end of Ramon Castro's days as the Mets' primary catcher. It was a fun couple of weeks, but now Schneider will play every day, making outs as prolifically as his predecessor.
To consider this a good trade for the Mets, one has to believe that Milledge isn't going to get any better than he already is, that Castro can't be counted on to be more than a backup and that Schneider's defense will significantly improve the team. I don't believe any of these things and thus I'm quite upset. Lastings Milledge has a chance to be a star, but he never got that chance with the Mets. Yes, injuries cost him some opportunities in 2007, but even when he was healthy Willie Randolph and Omar Minaya always seemed to be looking for ways to give his at bats to a mediocre veteran with a reputation for being a "gamer." That the Mets would give him up in this trade, not notably improving the team in the short term, still lacking the starting pitcher they covet and likely hurting team in the long term, shows how little the team really thought of him.
This is probably the biggest trade the Mets will make this season as they can't really afford to part with any more young outfielders in search of a pitcher. They should sign Livan Hernandez any day now to fill out this 2004 Expos reunion tour. At least we'll get to see Milledge nineteen times a year. Maybe he'll have a nice battle or two with Scott Kazmir in an All-Star Game someday. I just hope Carlos Gomez and Fernando Martinez get good and quickly. I'd really like to get more than Ryan Church and Brian Schneider back when Omar trades them. ¶ joe | 7:28 PM |
Prior to today, I thought the Mets had been having a decent offseason. They hadn't made a big splash, but they had said goodbye to their two worst everyday players, Paul Lo Duca and Shawn Green, making room for better, younger players. The starting rotation would be the same as the one that started 2007 except that Tom Glavine would be replaced by Pedro Martinez, quite a swap if Pedro stays healthy. The 2008 Mets weren't going to be a great team, but they were going to be good. And if they could have added a good starting pitcher, who knows?
They made a trade today, giving up one of their talented young players, but they didn't get that starting pitcher. Lastings Milledge was sent to the Washington Nationals in exchange for Ryan Church and Brian Schneider. The best thing I can say about this trade is that it's not the worst the Mets have made in the last three and a half years.
Ryan Church has hit .271/.348/.462 in 997 at bats over four years in his major league career. In 2007 he hit .272/.349/.464 in 144 games, slightly better than Milledge's .272/.341/.446 in 59 games. And Church was playing in a tougher hitting environment at RFK Stadium. So he may very well be a better hitter than Milledge right now. Church is also said to be the better defender of the two, but Milledge hadn't had much of a chance to adjust to playing right field in the majors after playing center for the majority of his minor league career. Most importantly, Church is twenty-nine years old, so he's about as good as he's going to get, whereas Milledge will turn twenty-three in April and is still improving. I am far from certain that Church will be a better hitter than Milledge in 2008, let alone four or five years down the line. If these two players had been traded for each other straight up it would be perplexing from the Mets' perspective.
The addition of Schneider doesn't make it any easier to understand. The thirty-one year old catcher hit .235/.326/.336 in 129 games this year and has a .252/.323/.377 line for his eight year career. He's an even worse hitter than Paul Lo Duca, though he is younger and better defensively. That defense is apparently what spelled the end of Ramon Castro's days as the Mets' primary catcher. It was a fun couple of weeks, but now Schneider will play every day, making outs as prolifically as his predecessor.
To consider this a good trade for the Mets, one has to believe that Milledge isn't going to get any better than he already is, that Castro can't be counted on to be more than a backup and that Schneider's defense will significantly improve the team. I don't believe any of these things and thus I'm quite upset. Lastings Milledge has a chance to be a star, but he never got that chance with the Mets. Yes, injuries cost him some opportunities in 2007, but even when he was healthy Willie Randolph and Omar Minaya always seemed to be looking for ways to give his at bats to a mediocre veteran with a reputation for being a "gamer." That the Mets would give him up in this trade, not notably improving the team in the short term, still lacking the starting pitcher they covet and likely hurting team in the long term, shows how little the team really thought of him.
This is probably the biggest trade the Mets will make this season as they can't really afford to part with any more young outfielders in search of a pitcher. They should sign Livan Hernandez any day now to fill out this 2004 Expos reunion tour. At least we'll get to see Milledge nineteen times a year. Maybe he'll have a nice battle or two with Scott Kazmir in an All-Star Game someday. I just hope Carlos Gomez and Fernando Martinez get good and quickly. I'd really like to get more than Ryan Church and Brian Schneider back when Omar trades them. ¶ joe | 7:28 PM |
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Joe,
this has the stink of ownership all over it. Clearly, the Mets lost patience with Milledge and opted for a classic need-over-value trade. Additionally, rival GMs have pegged Milledge as a "center fielder only" because the power hasn't developed yet, thus lowering his value on the market.
What leaves me scratching my head on this trade though is that Omar really likes this kid--a lot. He's stuck up for Milledge after some pretty immature episodes, some of which were been blown out of proportion. Additionally, need-over-value hasn't really been Omar's m.o. If anything, he's prone to value "talent" to a fault sometimes.
So I have two theories: 1) Omar is saying the power and/or plate discipline will never develop and this kid is only going to tease; or 2) This deal is part of a purge of the elements thought most responsible for "The Collapse." Omar was given a mandate and just had to get what he could get.
I find myself more worried about WHY the deal was done than that it was done.
this has the stink of ownership all over it. Clearly, the Mets lost patience with Milledge and opted for a classic need-over-value trade. Additionally, rival GMs have pegged Milledge as a "center fielder only" because the power hasn't developed yet, thus lowering his value on the market.
What leaves me scratching my head on this trade though is that Omar really likes this kid--a lot. He's stuck up for Milledge after some pretty immature episodes, some of which were been blown out of proportion. Additionally, need-over-value hasn't really been Omar's m.o. If anything, he's prone to value "talent" to a fault sometimes.
So I have two theories: 1) Omar is saying the power and/or plate discipline will never develop and this kid is only going to tease; or 2) This deal is part of a purge of the elements thought most responsible for "The Collapse." Omar was given a mandate and just had to get what he could get.
I find myself more worried about WHY the deal was done than that it was done.
I'm seeing a lot of articles today saying how this trade may end up haunting the Mets, Milledge could end up being this superstar, Manny Acta could really help him develop, whatever. And I agree with you in that I don't like this trade (though I had, by this point, conditioned myself for the inevitability of Milledge being traded, so I didn't really get mad), though that's probably because I liked Milledge and not because I thought he was better than Church/Schneider, who I knew really nothing about.
However, my question is this: Where were all of these articles BEFORE Milledge was traded? In the talks of pitcher trading it seemed that everyone was calling for Milledge to be traded first, especially above Gomez and Martinez. Maybe it's because the Mets are going to now have to trade one of those guys to get a pitcher, but I keep wondering where all the pro-Milledge articles were before this. I don't think I saw a single, "The Mets should not trade Lastings Milledge" article out there. Hell, I didn't hear it from anyone besides you and I. But now that he's going to the Nationals it's "The Mets have made a grave mistake" and "This trade could HAUNT THEM." Maybe I wasn't looking hard enough but all I heard during the season was how he was immature and did whacky dances and such. After the season ended all I heard was how the Mets should (and would, most likely) be including him in a trade package. Hell, there was even a poll on the Mets website that said, "Assuming Lastings Milledge is included in a trade package for a starting pitcher, which one of these prospects would you NOT trade." Everyone wrote him off and then seemed to realize what the Mets had done after he was gone. Oh wait, we didn't mean that. He has such a bright future. He has the potential to be a superstar. This could be the worst trade since Scott Kazmir to the Pancake Fish.
BULL SHIT, says I. No one spoke up when bashing Milledge was the hip thing to do. Now that he's gone all the reports of his potential upside emerge. Well guess what, he's gone. And like the guy above me said, I don't know why he's gone, but at some point Omar made the decision to go through with this, even though he (and Willie) seemed to like and support him. Maybe he cowtowed to the media pressure, or pressure from the Mets organization, or maybe he figured that since he was probably going to be traded anyway for a pitcher and no one cared if he was included in a trade package or not, he might as well try to get some other players out of it.
I don't know what's going to happen to Milledge, I think he'll only get better personally. I just wonder if those same people who wrote him off when he was a Met are going to be the ones who bash Omar for trading him when that happens.
However, my question is this: Where were all of these articles BEFORE Milledge was traded? In the talks of pitcher trading it seemed that everyone was calling for Milledge to be traded first, especially above Gomez and Martinez. Maybe it's because the Mets are going to now have to trade one of those guys to get a pitcher, but I keep wondering where all the pro-Milledge articles were before this. I don't think I saw a single, "The Mets should not trade Lastings Milledge" article out there. Hell, I didn't hear it from anyone besides you and I. But now that he's going to the Nationals it's "The Mets have made a grave mistake" and "This trade could HAUNT THEM." Maybe I wasn't looking hard enough but all I heard during the season was how he was immature and did whacky dances and such. After the season ended all I heard was how the Mets should (and would, most likely) be including him in a trade package. Hell, there was even a poll on the Mets website that said, "Assuming Lastings Milledge is included in a trade package for a starting pitcher, which one of these prospects would you NOT trade." Everyone wrote him off and then seemed to realize what the Mets had done after he was gone. Oh wait, we didn't mean that. He has such a bright future. He has the potential to be a superstar. This could be the worst trade since Scott Kazmir to the Pancake Fish.
BULL SHIT, says I. No one spoke up when bashing Milledge was the hip thing to do. Now that he's gone all the reports of his potential upside emerge. Well guess what, he's gone. And like the guy above me said, I don't know why he's gone, but at some point Omar made the decision to go through with this, even though he (and Willie) seemed to like and support him. Maybe he cowtowed to the media pressure, or pressure from the Mets organization, or maybe he figured that since he was probably going to be traded anyway for a pitcher and no one cared if he was included in a trade package or not, he might as well try to get some other players out of it.
I don't know what's going to happen to Milledge, I think he'll only get better personally. I just wonder if those same people who wrote him off when he was a Met are going to be the ones who bash Omar for trading him when that happens.
By the way, this doesn't include you. Because, like I said, you and I were the only ones who I heard from that did not want Milledge to be traded.
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