Time For The Mets To Switch Things Up

Unless you've been spending the first few months of the 2013 season in seclusion, you know that the Mets are off to a less-than-spectacular start.  Through 56 games, the Mets have a disappointing 23-33 record.  The only teams in baseball that are more than ten games under .500 are the Milwaukee Brewers, Houston Astros and Miami Marlins.

One of the reasons for the Mets' poor start is their inability to hit.  New York ranks 29th of 30 teams in batting average, with only the Marlins (.227) possessing a lower team batting average than the Mets' .228 mark.

The Mets' lack of success at the plate is more noticeable when two statistics are considered.  New York's right-handed batters are hitting .225 versus right-handed pitchers and their left-handed batters hit a mere .210 against southpaws.  Ordinarily, a team would combat this by employing a switch-hitter or two.  That way, there would be more lefty-righty matchups, which have traditionally favored the hitters.  There's only one problem with that.  The Mets don't have any switch-hitters.  And it's not like they have many switch-hitting options in the minors, either.

Last of the Mohicans?  Not really.  But Andres Torres was the last switch-hitter to bat for the Mets.

New York's current 40-man roster does not feature any switch-hitters.  But wait, there's more.  Their Triple-A affiliate in Las Vegas had only one switch-hitter on the roster.  However, that dually skilled hitter (catcher Landon Powell) was only batting .159 in 82 plate appearances and was released today.  The Mets also have just one player who bats from both sides of the plate at AA-Binghamton.  But switch-hitting second baseman Daniel Muno is only hitting .217 in a team-leading 241 plate appearances.

Unless the Mets make a trade for a switch-hitter, it does not appear as if they will have one on the major league roster at any point this year.  The only other season in which the Mets did not have a single at-bat credited to a switch-hitter was 1964, almost half a century ago.

In late inning situations, opposing teams usually have left-handed pitchers available to face lefty hitters.  Similarly, they use right-handed relievers against right-handed hitters.  But with the Mets not having any switch-hitters on their active roster, they're forced to use their bench players or keep their starters in the game for a unfavorable hitting matchup.

An average starting pitcher can go about six innings.  Therefore, innings six through eight are usually reserved for tiring starters and/or middle relievers.  Any batter should be able to hit a tiring starter.  Likewise, a switch-hitter would have no problem against a middle reliever because he can bat from either side of the plate.  So how are the Mets doing at the plate in innings six through eight?  They're hitting a paltry .211 in those innings with a .273 on-base percentage - numbers that are considerably lower than their overall figures (.228 batting average, .295 OBP).  Makes you wonder if those numbers would look better if the Mets had a couple of switch-hitters in their employ who could foil potential lefty-lefty and righty-righty matchups in the later innings.

When constructing a roster, teams always try to have a lefty or two in the bullpen.  The Mets currently have two such pitchers in Robert Carson and Scott Rice.  But teams should also have their share of switch-hitters on the roster.  The Mets have zip, zilch, nada.  Their inability to send a switch-hitter up to the plate in the late innings has made them very vulnerable against an opponent's bullpen.  That makes it exceedingly difficult for them to erase late-inning deficits.  (The Mets have been outscored, 97-71, from the sixth through the eighth innings.)

The Mets need many things.  They need a dependable bullpen.  They need better outfielders.  They need to clone Matt Harvey.  But one thing they also need is a switch-hitter.  After all, they already have a bullpen (sort of).  They have outfielders (or guys who play outfielders on TV).  They even have a Matt Harvey (and his achy breaky back).  But they don’t have a switch-hitter.  It’s time for the Mets to switch things up if they want to fix that gaping hole on the active roster.

Pros And Cons For Signing Michael Bourn

So far this off-season, three outfielders have said their final goodbyes to the Mets.  Jason Bay took his strikeouts and pop-ups to Seattle.  Andres Torres left in search of a ring in San Francisco.  And my wife's ass is now on new Cubs outfielder Scott Hairston's Wikipedia page.  It goes without saying that the Mets are in serious need of some outfield help.

With Justin Upton joining brother B.J. and second baseman Dan Uggla in Atlanta to form the Underachieving U's (quick, contact Ugueth Urbina's agent - Urbina's out of jail and needs a place to fail!), the Mets have now set their sights on former Braves outfielder Michael Bourn.  His acquisition would instantly give the Mets a proven major league outfielder.  It would also give the Mets a number of problems.

Here are three pros and three cons that have to be considered by Sandy Alderson in a potential signing of free agent outfielder Michael Bourn:

Goodbye Jason Bay, Andres Torres and Scott Hairston.  Hello, Michael Bourn?

Pros:

1)  Michael Bourn would instantly give the Mets a legitimate stolen base threat.  In 2011, both Jose Reyes and Angel Pagan surpassed the 30-steal mark.  Last year, David Wright led the team with only 15 thefts.  As a team, the Mets' 79 stolen bases in 2012 marked the first time they failed to steal 100 bases since the Art Howe era.  In addition, no Met has stolen 40 bases in a season since Reyes swiped 56 bags in 2008, the same year Michael Bourn began his current streak of five straight 40+ steal seasons.

2)  The Mets have only had two outfielders win a Gold Glove Award.  Tommie Agee was the first in 1970 and Carlos Beltran won three consecutive Gold Gloves from 2006 to 2008.  Bourn has a Gold Glove pedigree, taking home the hardware in 2009 and 2010 as a member of the Houston Astros.  It should be noted that Houston's Minute Maid Park has one of the most spacious and trickiest center fields in baseball, with Tal's Hill, a flagpole and various outfield wall angles to contend with.

3)  Lucas Duda is pegged to be a corner outfielder.  That's bumbling, stumbling, "I can't move furniture without injuring myself" Lucas Duda.  How bad is Duda in the outfield?  Let's just say George "The Stork" Theodore shakes his head whenever he sees Duda chasing a fly ball.  In other words, the Mets desperately need an outfielder that can cover all the ground that Lucas Duda won't.  That's where Michael Bourn will help the team the most.

Citi Field might see lots of this if the pros outweigh the cons.

Cons:

1)  For a leadoff hitter, Bourn doesn't have the most impressive on-base percentage.  He has compiled a .350 on-base percentage just once in six full seasons in the majors and has maintained a .339 career OBP.  He also averages nearly 2½ strikeouts for every walk he draws, a number that is far too high for a player who is expected to be a table setter at the top of the lineup.

2)  In 2011, Bourn batted .294 with 61 stolen bases and 140 strikeouts in 656 at-bats.  Last season, Bourn's average dropped to .274 and he only swiped 42 bases.  His strikeouts also increased to a career-high 155 while his at-bat total shrank to 624.  Although he stole 19 fewer bases in 2012, Bourn still led the majors by being caught stealing 13 times.

3)  Michael Bourn has been an All-Star and a Gold Glove winner because of his legs.  But all of his accolades and stolen base totals were achieved while Bourn was in his 20s.  Bourn is now running on 30-year-old legs.  As shown above, it has become easier to throw him out on the basepaths, and Bourn is also taking off fewer times after reaching base.  His natural decrease in speed will eventually affect him in center field as well, as fly balls he used to track down with ease can now potentially elude his glove.

A quick strike by Sandy Alderson might lead to quick strikeouts by Michael Bourn.

Every player has pros and cons.  Michael Bourn is no exception.  But with the Mets trying to build a contending team without sacrificing their future, every pro and every con has to be considered before making any player decision, including whether or not Bourn is worth the potential loss of a first-round draft pick.

Michael Bourn is clearly an above-average centerfielder.  But is he an eight-figure a year player, especially now that he's on the wrong side of age 30?  Bourn also saw decreases in his stolen base total, as well as a lower batting average and higher strikeout rate.  Is his play in 2012 the sign of a decline or was it just a blip on an otherwise successful career chart?

Clearly, the Mets cannot go into the 2013 season with an outfield of Lucas Duda, Kirk Nieuwenhuis and Mike Baxter.  But is Michael Bourn worth the money he'll be seeking to play at Citi Field?  Is he the short-term answer that will lead to long-term success?  It's certainly going to be an interesting couple of weeks for Sandy Alderson as he weighs all the pros and cons of a potential Michael Bourn signing.

R.I.P. "My Wife's Ass Is On Scott Hairston's Wikipedia Page"

On April 9, 2011, my wife – a veritable Gal For All Seasons – was invited to take the field prior to the game against the Washington Nationals as part of the Mets’ season ticket holder appreciation program.  I was unable to attend the game because I was coughing up a lung, kidney, gall bladder, and I think a gerbil came up as well.  Therefore, my Studious Metsimus co-blogger, Joey Beartran, accompanied my wife on the field.

Each season ticket holder invited to partake in the pre-game festivities was assigned a position on the field where he or she would be met by the starting player at that particular position.  My wife was hoping not to get second base because Chin-lung Hu was starting there on that night (come to think of it, I think I might have coughed him up as well).  Fortunately, she did not get Hu on second.  Instead, she was sent out to left field, which would have led to a tête-à-tête with Jason Bay had he not been on the disabled list to start the season.  The player starting in left field that night was Scott Hairston.  And so began the “wife’s ass” craze.

I'd be smiling, too, if I went out to my position and found THAT waiting for me.
(Photo by Sharon Chapman)

According to my wife’s report, Hairston gave Joey a high-one (Joey doesn’t have fingers, hence the high-one instead of a high-five) and was quite engaging in the short amount of time they shared together in left field.  Friend of Studious Metsimus, Sharon Chapman, took the above photo of the meeting and submitted it to Wikipedia, where it has been ever since.  The rest, as they say, is history.

For the remainder of the 2011 season and the entire 2012 campaign, any time Hairston made a positive contribution to the team –and there were plenty – my wife would tweet about it and:

• remind us all of the online reader-edited encyclopedia where her derriere could be found
• occasionally add the hashtag, #MyAssIsOnScottHairstonsWikipediaPage

After two seasons in New York, including an unexpected 20-homer season in 2012, Scott Hairston is now a former Met, taking his powerful bat and Wikipedia references with him to the North Side of Chicago.  The Mets’ refusal to give Hairston more than a one-year deal led to his decision to abandon Citi Field for confines that are rumored to be friendlier.  The Mets, already lacking outfield depth due to the departures of Andres Torres to San Francisco and Jason Bay to Siberia (a.k.a. Seattle), now have to cope with the loss of their most consistent bat in the outfield, one that finished third on the team in home runs.  But that’s nothing compared to the loss my wife and her Twitter followers are experiencing.

Scott Hairston is now a Cub. The real question is, will my ass still be on his Wikipedia page?
— The Coop (@Coopz22) January 24, 2013

For the time being, my wife’s ass is still on Scott Hairston’s Wikipedia page.  But now that Hairston’s ass will be bombing Wrigley Field (as in home run bombs, not what your 12-year-old mind is thinking), it’s only a matter of time before his photo is replaced by one of him in a Cubs uniform.  It’s now up to the Mets to find themselves an outfielder that will approach the numbers Hairston gave the team in 2012.  If they can’t replace his 20 homers in the outfield, it’ll be the front office that’ll look like a bunch of asses.

Song Parody: Centerfield

So far this off-season, Mets outfielders are leaving New York faster than Vince Coleman can light a firecracker.  First, we saw the departure of Jason Bay, who recently signed a one-year deal with the Seattle Mariners.  Today we didn't see a Bay leave, but we did see an outfielder leave one Bay for another, as centerfielder Andres Torres was spotted leaving on a jet plane flying over Flushing Bay on his way to the west coast and his old haunts in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Torres signed a one-year deal worth $2 million to return to the Giants, the team that traded him to New York last off-season for Angel Pagan.  Torres will become Pagan's neighbor in the outfield, playing left field alongside the newest member of the "former Mets who won a World Series ring after leaving New York" club.

With two-thirds of the Mets' 2012 outfield now playing out west and part of the remaining third (Scott Hairston) considering his options, the outfield is beginning to resemble John Rocker's brain.  Basically, it's empty.  And there's less than four months to go until the curtain rises on the 2013 campaign.

Will the Mets go with their highly flawed current cast of backups and bench players in the outfield?  Will fans clamor for the days of Benny Agbayani, Jay Payton and Derek Bell?  Will Vince Coleman and John Rocker join Mensa?

Those questions will all be answered by April 1, 2013.  (Spoiler alert: Coleman and Rocker were just seen shopping for a "Mensa For Dummies" book.)  For now, please join me as I present to you the latest Studious Metsimus song parody, based on - you guessed it - the lack of outfielders at Citi Field.  I'd like to thank John Fogerty for singing the original version of "Centerfield".  Without him, I would never be able to butcher his lyrics the way Lucas Duda butchers routine pop-ups.  Enjoy!

The season’s done, Sandy’s on the phone to see who he can trade 
To war again with new guys on the field 
He gave the word, Bay’s got a new home - it’s a part of Sandy’s plan
Andres Torres is gone as well, so here’s the deal

Oh, put me in coach – no one else can play today 
Put me in coach – the outfield’s empty at New Shea 
Look at the
Tumbleweeds
In center field

Well, your fielders have to add up to nine – I’m countin’ 'em from the bench 
You got rid of some chumps when Torres and Bay skipped town 
So listen, Sandy, sign Hairston – oh, please don’t let him go 
Don’t save all the dough, it’s time to pay him now

Oh, put me in coach – no one else can play today 
Put me in coach – the outfield’s empty at New Shea 
Look at the
Tumbleweeds 
In center field

Hey!  Who’s got it?  Who’s got it?

Got Lucas Duda, a homegrown Bax, and Kirk Nieuwenhuis too 
You know it’s almost time for den Dekker to arrive 
Who will get the call to defend that wall – what’s our outfield become? 
(CRAP!) Pagan just won after he said goodbye!

Oh, put me in coach – no one else can play today 
Put me in coach – the outfield’s empty at New Shea 
Look at the
Tumbleweeds 
In center field

Oh, put me in coach – no one else can play today 
Put me in coach – the outfield’s empty at New Shea 
Look at the
Tumbleweeds 
In center field

Danger In The Outfield

Although the Mets bullpen was the worst in the majors this year, the top priority for Sandy Alderson this offseason (after resolving the David Wright/R.A. Dickey contract extension issues) should be to improve the outfield.  No Met outfielder has reached 70 RBI in a season since the team moved to Citi Field (Scott Hairston and Lucas Duda tied for the team lead in RBIs by outfielders with 57).  How sad is it that Angel Pagan's 69 RBI in 2010 represent the highest RBI total for a Met outfielder since Shea Stadium closed its doors for good?

Remember in 2000 when everyone said the Mets won the pennant despite having an offensively-challenged outfield?  Well, the trio of Benny Agbayani, Jay Payton and Derek Bell all hit at least 15 HR and drove in a minimum of 60 runs that year.  Believe it or not, that's the last time the Mets had three outfielders reach those numbers in the same season.

Bullpens are unpredictable from year to year.  As bad as the relievers were this year, they could be better than expected next year. But a revolving outfield of Scott Hairston, Lucas Duda, Kirk Nieuwenhuis and Mike Baxter (and perhaps Andres Torres if he's re-signed) just can't compete with the more powerful outfields in the league.  The Mets need a significant change in the outfield if they want to improve in 2013.

The Mets' competition in the division all have at least one, if not more, solid outfielders.  The Nationals have the best outfield in the NL East, with Michael Morse, Jayson Werth and Rookie of the Year Bryce Harper.  The Braves have 20/20 man Jason Heyward (betcha didn't know Heyward stole 21 bases to go with his 27 HR), while the Phillies have a tremendous outfield prospect in Darin Ruf, whose minor league numbers (.317, 38 HR, 104 RBI) carried over into the majors last September after he was called up (.333, 3 HR, 10 RBI in 12 games with the Phillies).  Even the depleted Marlins have a top slugger in Giancarlo Stanton.  The Mets have the guy whose Wikipedia page proudly features my wife's ass.  And that's only if the Mets can re-sign him.

It's been said that pitching wins championships.  That's true, as the Giants have won two of the last three World Series with a strong pitching corps.  But they had outfielders that came through more often than not.  In 2010, it was Cody Ross, Pat Burrell and Andres Torres (with Torres producing a career year for the Giants).  This past season, the names of the outfielders may have changed, but the productivity did not, as Angel Pagan, Gregor Blanco and Hunter Pence all contributed to the Giants' latest title.

The Mets did not have great outfielders when they advanced to the World Series in 2000.  But as a unit, they were more productive than any other outfield the team has put on the field ever since.  It's not a surprise that the Mets have failed to return to the World Series since the days of Agbayani, Payton and Bell.

Assuming the Mets don't trade R.A. Dickey before the beginning of the 2013 season, they'll have a formidable staff.  With Dickey leading the way, followed by the combination of a healthy Johan Santana, the ever-improving Jonathon Niese, the wünderkind Matt Harvey and the return of Dillon Gee (or even Mike Pelfrey if the Mets choose to go that route), starting pitching won't be a problem in 2013.

We know the Mets need to upgrade their bullpen.  But what the Mets truly need are dependable outfielders who are going to be out there 162 games a year.  The rest of the division already has them.  The Mets need to follow suit.  The 2000 pennant winners have been the team's most complete outfield for way too long.

There's An Oblique Outlook In Mets Camp

I woke up this morning, realized it was an hour later than it was at this time yesterday, remembered that I had not disrupted the space-time continuum overnight, then went about my usual Sunday morning routine.  Today's routine involved looking forward to Johan Santana's second spring training start and checking out Twitter and the rest of the Mets blogosphere to see if anything interesting happened overnight while I was dreaming about DeLoreans and manure.  (I really hate the latter part of my dreams sometimes.)

There was one tweet in particular on the Mets' official Twitter account that caught my eye.  Perhaps it'll catch yours too:

Injury Updates: Tim Byrdak has a sore left left knee and Kirk Nieuwenhuis has an injury to his right oblique.
— New York Mets (@Mets) March 11, 2012

Tim Byrdak's injury is understandable.  After all, he's been channeling the ghost of Hulk Hogan despite the fact that Hogan is still very much alive.  That in itself could give him a sore left knee.  It could also be the fact that he's 38 and knees tends to get sore at that age.

But Byrdak's injury wasn't the part that caught my eye in the Mets' tweet.  It was the part featuring the Sultan of Spell Check himself, Kirk Nieuwenhuis.  The Mets' young centerfielder is no stranger to injuries, so that's not what got my attention.  It was where he got injured.  Kirk Nieuwenhuis has an injury to his right oblique.

Watch that bat, Kirk!  You might injure your oblique!  Crap.  Too late.  Never mind.

If you've been following the Mets during spring training, you'd notice that obliques and the Mets have not been getting along.  First, Scott Hairston went down to an oblique injury, an injury from which he's not progressing.  At the same time, David Wright also suffered an injury to his oblique muscle, although some reports are disguising the word "oblique" with "rib cage", which is similar to disguising an ejected manager with a fake mustache and dark sunglasses.

Now Kirk Nieuwenhuis has injured his oblique, thereby preventing him from committing more Nieuwen-heists in center field for the time being.  Are oblique injuries like the flu in Mets camp?  Can they be passed around from person to person?  Or was Digital Domain Park built on top of an old Indian burial ground?  It might be neither, as I found this interesting tweet from San Francisco Giants' beat reporter Andrew Baggerly, which he originally posted almost one year ago to the day:

Andres Torres (sore oblique) isn't starting because Bochy doesn't want him swinging from right side yet. He's hitting off a tee.
— Andrew Baggarly (@CSNBaggs) March 6, 2011

Andres Torres missed time last year in spring training with a sore oblique.  This is the same Andres Torres that is penciled to be the Mets' Opening Day centerfielder.  Do you see what I'm getting at here?

Methinks Andres Torres must have something to do with the oblique injuries that are running rampant at Digital Domain Park.  Either that or I'm going with the Indian burial ground excuse.  Or perhaps Fred Wilpon was right and "we're snakebit, baby".  Regardless of what the reasons are for the Mets' slew of injuries before the first week of the Grapefruit League schedule is over, there seems to be a pattern forming here.

The Mets' outlook for the 2012 season wasn't very bright to begin with.  They were not expected to compete with the Phillies, Marlins, et al. for the National League East crown.  But what started out as a bleak outlook on the season has somehow turned into an oblique outlook, especially for a number of everyday players.  The Mets might indeed be snakebitten, and that snake appears to be spraying venom into the obliques of the roster.

The Mets' Winter Meeting Transactions: Pros And Cons

The snow hasn't begun to fall yet, but we saw a flurry of activity yesterday for the Mets in the Late Fall Meetings (winter doesn't start for another two weeks, so the Winter Meetings are a misnomer).  The Mets needed bullpen help so they stocked up with three veteran relievers.  They also made a "change-of-scenery" trade, acquiring one centerfielder coming off a down year for another.

Let's take a look at what these three separate transactions will do for the Mets and what this will do for the team in 2012 and in the future.

Jon Rauch

Sandy Alderson made it clear that the Mets were in dire need of relief help.  He admitted as much when discussing how the team suffered in the pen after the trade of Francisco Rodriguez last July.  The hodgepodge bullpen featured a combination of inexperienced career minor leaguers and washed-up veterans, and the Mets blew many late inning leads because of it.  A change was definitely needed for the 2012 season.

In his first acquisition of the night, Alderson signed Jon Rauch to be the Mets' primary set-up man.  Before Pedro Feliciano led the National League in appearances for the Mets, that distinction belonged to Jon Rauch.  Rauch made 85 appearances for Washington in 2006 and followed that up with a league-leading 88 appearances in 2007.

His career has been a series of ups and downs since leaving Washington in 2008.  In parts of two seasons in Arizona (2008-2009), Rauch was 2-8 with a 4.87 ERA and 1.42 WHIP.  Then he went to Minnesota for 1½ seasons (2009-2010) and flourished with the Twins, going 8-2 with a 2.82 ERA and 1.28 WHIP.  He also racked up 21 saves as a temporary replacement for closer Joe Nathan.  Finally, as a member of the Blue Jays in 2011, Rauch had a subpar season (5-4, 11 saves, 4.85 ERA, 1.35 WHIP).  He missed time in August due to an emergency appendectomy and ended the season on the disabled list with torn cartilage in his right knee.
 
Pros:  Rauch is nicknamed "The Wookie" for his tall frame and sometimes resemblance to Chewbacca, instantly making him R.A. Dickey's best friend in the clubhouse.  He also has excellent control, walking only 28 batters over the last two seasons (in 109.2 IP) and possessing a career ratio of 2.7 walks per nine innings.

Cons:  Sometimes Rauch can be a little "wild in the strike zone", as evidenced by the 11 home runs he gave up last season in only 52 innings pitched.  Also, as seen in his career recap above, Rauch's performance has varied drastically from team to team.  He can be very good, as he was in Minnesota, or he can be maddeningly inconsistent, as fans of the Diamondbacks and Blue Jays can surely attest.  Will another change of scenery bring out the good Jon Rauch?

 

Frank Francisco

A teammate of Jon Rauch in Toronto last season, Frank Francisco has been a very consistent pitcher since 2008.  Over the past four seasons, his ERA has never been higher than 3.83 or lower than 3.13.  He has also given no fewer than 40 hits and no more than 49 safeties in each of the last four years, while allowing between 20 and 22 earned runs per season.  He has achieved this level of consistency despite having different roles from year to year. 

Francisco served as the set-up man in Texas in 2008, before saving 25 games as the Rangers' closer in 2009.  He went back to the set-up role for Texas in 2010, before becoming a closer for the Blue Jays in 2011, saving 17 games in Toronto.  Francisco will not be continuing his set-up man/closer roller coaster ride for the Mets in 2012, as Terry Collins has already anointed him as the team's new closer.

Pros:  Francisco is a fireballer who will rack up a ton of strikeouts, something that has not been a strength of the Mets' bullpen in recent years.  His 10.5 K/9 IP rate over the past four seasons is among the best in baseball.  Francisco has also proven that he can handle any relief role in the bullpen and finished the 2011 season strongly (1.37 ERA, 0.84 WHIP and held opponents to a .188 batting average after the All-Star Break).

Cons:  Although he is a strikeout pitcher, his strikeout rate has gone down slightly from year to year (11.8 K/9 IP in 2008, 10.4 K/9 IP in 2009, 10.3 K/9 IP in 2010, 9.5 K/9 IP in 2011).  His WHIP has also increased annually since 2009 (1.12 in 2009, 1.27 in 2010, 1.32 in 2011).

 

Angel Pagan traded for Andres Torres and Ramon Ramirez

After an outstanding second half in 2009 and a breakout season in 2010, Angel Pagan took a step back in 2011.  After managing to keep his batting average around .300 for most of '09 and '10, Pagan could only muster a .262 average last season.  He also had his lowest on-base percentage in four years as a Met (.322) and made too many questionable baserunning decisions.

Andres Torres had a similar situation to Angel Pagan in 2011.  Torres shocked everyone with his breakout 2010 season for the World Champion San Francisco Giants (.268 batting average, 43 doubles, 8 triples, 16 HR, 63 RBI and 26 SB in 139 games).  But he had a miserable follow-up campaign in 2011 (.221 batting average, 24 doubles, one triple, 4 HR, 19 RBI and 19 SB in 112 games), causing him to lose playing time once the Giants acquired Carlos Beltran from the Mets.

Ramon Ramirez had a shaky start to his major league career in Colorado, but has flourished since he left the Mile High city after the 2007 season.  In the four years since his departure from the Rockies, Ramirez has compiled a 2.77 ERA and a 1.22 WHIP, while holding the opposition to a .220 batting average.  But since becoming a Giant at the trade deadline in 2010, Ramirez has been one of the most unhittable relievers in the majors, compiling a 2.07 ERA, 1.09 WHIP and a .194 batting average against him.  He also didn't give up many long hits as a Giant, holding opponents to a .267 slugging percentage and allowing only two home runs to the 388 batters he faced.

Pros:  Angel Pagan for Andres Torres straight up would have been a bad deal, as Pagan is younger than Torres and even with a down season in 2011, still performed better than Torres did for the Giants.  The addition of Ramirez, a quality arm in the bullpen with an extended period of success, makes the deal more attractive.  Plus, Andres Torres can serve as a stopgap in center field until Kirk Nieuwenhuis is ready for the majors (hopefully by late 2012), similar to the way Rey Sanchez held shortstop warm for Jose Reyes until his call-up in 2003.

Cons:  The Mets acquired a centerfielder with 27 HR and 118 RBI.  That's not his total for one season.  That's what Torres has amassed in 1,423 major league plate appearances over parts of seven seasons.  Torres also has 4,444 plate appearances over 1,035 minor league games.  That means Torres has over three times as many plate appearances in the minor leagues as he has in the majors.  When a player who will be 34 by Opening Day can say that about his professional career, that's not something to be proud of.  It also doesn't say much about his ability to stay in the major leagues.  Pagan has a better chance of replicating his 2010 season than Torres has of doing the same.

We owe (the fans), we owe (the fans), so it's off to work we go!

The 2012 Mets improved themselves at the Late Fall Meetings by adding three quality arms in the bullpen.  Jon Rauch will be the primary set-up man and can be counted on to pitch as many days as he is needed.  Frank Francisco may not have dominant numbers, but he has been a model of consistency over the past four seasons and is a legitimate strikeout pitcher.  Ramon Ramirez has the potential to be the best reliever in the Mets' bullpen.  He doesn't depend on the strikeout to retire batters.  Rather, he makes opposing hitters swing at his pitch, and allows mostly singles when he does give up hits, which over the past few seasons has become a rare sight.

I can deal without Andres Torres in the outfield, but at least he does possess some speed, which the Mets will need now that Jose Reyes is no longer on the team.  Plus, there's always a chance that he might be able to find some of that 2010 magic in his tank, although is .221 average and 19 RBI in 398 at-bats last year reminded me a little too much of Luis Castillo.

For now, it appears that Sandy Alderson is trying his best to mold this team in his image.  He is getting quality players without spending top dollar or too many years of commitments.  It's still too early to know what this will mean for the 2012 Mets.  But at least it shows that it won't just be 20 Buffalo Bisons and a handful of veterans sitting in the dugout at Citi Field next season.  For the amount of money Sandy has to play with, I'd say he's doing a pretty good job.