Next Year

Look Milledge is gone, and unfortunately so is any shot of making a trade for a legit ace, but after reviewing our situation for the short term I honestly feel that we are actually in a good position to win the NL next year. Assuming Omar doesn't blow the rest of our future for a middle of the rotation starter, we still have a number of prospects who will factor into our success this year, and for many years after that. So taking all of that into account I feel as if it is the best interest of the Mets to stand pat and do nothing from now until spring training. If that does happen we are probably looking at the most balanced team in the NL next year. It is very likely that we will have our pitching staff among the league's top 5, and an offense in the league's top 10. One thing Omar has done well this off season, is to return a very successful bench from last year, and to strengthen the bullpen via addition by subtraction (Mota). All reports so far have pegged Sanchez and Juan Padilla to be on track in their recoveries, hopefully allowing them to be major contributors to a relatively shaky bullpen. If it turns out that those two, especially Sanchez, are not on track to be on the opening day roster Omar will most likely make a drastic move to acquire another Bullpen force. Assuming, however, that they are healthy this is what I project the Mets to look like next year.

Note: These are not a ZIPS or any other type of projection, but rather the thoughts of a random person who is assuming that there is no drastic progression or degression from the expected norm of any the players.


Mets Lineup AVG OBP HR RBI SB
J. Reyes .305 .385 15 62 65
L. Castillo .285 .368 2 40 15
D. Wright .333 .401 32 125 30
C Beltran .275 .377 35 110 15
M. Alou .305 .365 23 82 0
C. Delgado .265 .355 26 90 1
R. Church .283 .361 21 79 3
B. Schneider .249 .321 3 30 0


Rotation W L ERA K WHIP
P. Martinez 14 7 3.21 198 1.09
J. Maine 17 10 3.35 170 1.13
0. Perez 14 9 3.42 220 1.11
O. Hernandez 8 5 3.88 140 1.35
M. Pelfrey 9 8 4.11 150 1.31

Bullpen S ERA WHIP W L
B. Wagner 40 2.21 1.01 3 3
A. Heilman 3 3.36 1.21 5 6
D. Sanchez 0 3.21 1.08 4 2
P. Feliciano 0 2.82 1.11 2 3
J. Padilla 0 3.53 1.22 2 2
S. Schowenweis 0 4.21 1.43 2 2
P. Humber 0 3.81 1.19 5 3

Bench AVG OBP HR RBI SB
E. Chavez .301 .375 2 27 11
D. Easley .275 .351 9 31 2
M. Anderson .285 .355 6 35 1
R. Castro .271 .341 11 32 0
R. Gotay .321 .372 5 39 4

Other Contributors AVG OBP HR RBI SB
C. Gomez .262 .348 8 27 18

Other Contributors W L ERA K WHIP
K. Mulvey 3 2 .389 45 1.21

Other Contributors S ERA WHIP W L
E. Kunz 0 4.01 1.31 1 1
J. Smith 0 3.22 1.18 2 1
B. Rustich 0 2.88 .98 2 0

Offensively the only major differences from last year are Reyes' increase in offensive production, and decrease in stolen bases, to what is hopefully a more successful combination of the two. Castillo will probably have a similar season to what he did for the Mets last year, with his main goal being to guide Jose into scoring position for the heart of the order. Take away David's atrocious start from last year and these are the numbers you are probably looking at for him to put up. Beltran has been pretty consistent in his past two years as Met, so it would be a relatively large shock to me if he put up draastically different numbers. I have Alou pegged to play roughly 100 games this year, and if he does so these would be pretty much the same numbers as last year with a slight dip in average. It is hard to do much worse than what Carlos Delgado did last year, so I am expecting (hoping) that he may not struggle as much, but I don't expect to see anything close to the production we got from him in 2006. Ryan Church is interesting, because considering what he did in an even more pitcher friendly park than shea in a part time role last year, I can see him having a very productive year for the Mets, and probably putting up better numbers than Lastings would this year. Schneider on the other hand will be awful offensively this year, but as long as he can keep runners out of scoring position I could care less about how well he hits.

Although it was a very small sample size Pedro looked like an ace again when he pitched last September. Although a sub 3 ERA is not out of the question for him, a low 3s is a more conservative prediction, and ultimately is perfectly fine with me. Maine put up a sub 3 ERA for half of the season last year, and while I don't think he will do that again I also don't think he will struggle the way he did for most of the second half. Ollie last year had flashes of brilliance, but also displayed an uncanny ability to absolutely lose it on some occasions. Through it all, however, it became pretty apparent that when he listened to Rick Peterson and kept his arm slot consistent, he was generally one of the better pitchers in the national league. Although I think he will be more consistent this year it is hard to imagine a season without a couple of Ollie meltdowns. El Duque was one of the strongest pitchers in the Mets rotation last year, until he got hurt. Unfortunately I don't think he will replicate his successful season from last year, and it is probably pretty safe to bet that he injures himself sometime next year. Mike Pelfrey showed the entire grape fruit league why he was considered one of the top pitching prospects last year, but then failed to capitalize on that success throughout most of the regular season. He did, however, have a phenomenal game against the braves last year, and a decent enough second stint to prove to me that he still has potential, and hopefully he can achieve it if he is given an entire season in the majors.

The Bullpen essentially comes down to health, a healthy Sanchez and Padilla means success for the Mets, if not the bullpen is "iffy" at best. I do think that Humber if given the chance to be a long man will pitch surprisingly well, because most teams are not used to seeing the type of stuff humber has come out of the bullpen. Whether or not he will be a successful starter is still in question.

The bench will be almost identical to last year, and it is fairly hard to imagine that they won't replicate the success they had, but if for some reason they don't, they will still be one of the better benches in baseball.

Carlos Gomez will most likely be playing the role of Lastings Milledge this year, and will get most of the playing time when Moises Alou inevitably goes down for an extended period of time. My feeling is that Gomez will begin to grow into his body, and while we will not see a drastic increase in his average, we will begin to see his power numbers begin to surge, as well as a greater base stealing ability that he displayed last year. Kevin Mulvey will probably be the player who fills in for El Duque when he inevitably goes down, and will display why he is the best pitcher of the "big three" (Pelfrey Humber Mulvey) until he gets sent back down once Duque is healthy. In all honesty I think that over a season on work Pelfrey will probably put up the better numbers due to experience, but over a short time period Mulvey will be successful due to his better repotoire.

Finally we have Joe Smith who will spend nearly the entire year on the triple a to the majors shuttle. I willy uses Smith correctly, and does not overwork him as he did early last year, I think that Smith can be very successful. I also think Eddie Kunz will get a few oppurtunities to show himself in the majors, but will not yet be ready. Brant Rustich is my "sleeper" although he won't get to pitch a whole season in the majors. Rustich did no wrong last year in the minors, and from what I understand he would probably have been a higher rated prospect coming out of college had it not been for an injury. Whether he turns out to be a reliever or a starter I feel that he will be the surprise of the season for the Mets.

Based on these projections I have the Mets winning about 93 games next year, which is certainly enough to make the playoffs, and most likely enough to win the NL East.