Free Freddie
Buck Showalter on analytics, prospect grades and more
Good Morning,
We are three days away from MLB’s supposed hard deadline to reach an agreement on a new CBA before regular season games are lost. The players and owners have been meeting everyday this week (and plan to meet again today), but no real progress has been reported.
It is going to take a major concession by one of the two sides, particularly on the competitive balance tax, to get the ball rolling in the right direction. Deals get done under the pressure of deadlines, that’s why the league is refusing to budge off Monday’s date, but the players have a trick or two remaining up their sleeves (such as refusing to agree to expanded playoffs if they aren’t paid for a full season), so negotiations could leak into next week without causing impact to the schedule.
If an impasse continues deep into March, games will eventually be cancelled, with Jared Diamond of the Wall Street Journal reporting the league doesn’t plan on re-making the schedule whenever a deal is reached, teams would simply pick up the schedule at whatever point the season begins.
This could make for some interesting logistics with teams playing unbalanced schedules and the slight possibility of an uneven number of games, which most infamously happened during the 1972 strike-shortened season when the Red Sox lost the division by a half game to the Tigers after playing one less game than them.
To distract you from lockout talk, we will discuss an exciting free agent possibility and let you know what Buck Showalter thinks about analytics. Plus, the latest on Marcus Stroman, and much more.
Without further ado, let’s get into it!
🕊 FREE FREDDIE
The Mets are one of the teams that “checked in” on free agent Freddie Freeman before the lockout, according to ESPN’s Buster Olney.
“This was the most interesting thing that I heard,” Olney said while appearing on The Michael Kay Show on Thursday. “There’s a perception in the industry that Freddie Freeman is not going back to the Braves,” Olney explained. “Last summer, that was assumed, like ‘Yeah, eventually he’ll go back there.’ Now, they don’t believe that, and here’s an interesting thing. One of the teams that checked in on the Freddie Freeman availability before December 2nd were the Mets.”
🔹 WHAT THIS MEANS: Mets fans need no introduction to the 32-year-old first baseman who has made a living beating up on their favorite team (against whom he has a career .305/.390/.499 slash line with 28 home runs and 115 RBIs).
Coming of a World Series championship with the only franchise he has ever known, it’s hard to believe this would be the end of the road for Freeman in Atlanta, but there’s a strong indication he could be looking elsewhere, with Chipper Jones recently offering that Freeman was “probably a little frustrated” an extension wasn’t reached last Spring Training.
🔹 SUITORS: Freeman has also been linked to the Yankees, as well as the Dodgers, who have Corey Seager money to spend and can offer him a return to his home roots.
Plenty of speculation, but the strong possibility remains for the Braves to decide it’s worth perhaps overpaying for a first baseman on the wrong side of 30 because he is Freddie “freaking” Freeman, after all.
🔹 BIG SPENDERS: Let’s face it, the Mets are the new Yankees. While it’s exciting to think about the possibility of adding another expensive superstar to the roster (pushing Pete Alonso to DH and Dom Smith out of town), don’t believe every rumor you read. Steve Cohen is a market-setter for the stock market, art and now free agents, alike. Agents will use reporters to generate a market for their clients. If the Mets are in on Freeman, maybe the Yankees, Braves, or a mystery team decides to up their price, or so the logic goes.
MARCUS STROMAN
Marcus Stroman has never been shy about sharing his feelings on Twitter, and that approach has continued into the lockout after his signing with the Chicago Cubs.
🔹 EPPLER: Earlier this week, Stroman tweeted (since deleted) he was “beyond thankful to be gone from that organization” in reference to the Mets, while also calling out recently-hired Billy Eppler. In alluding to the Tyler Skaggs situation, Stroman said, “[Eppler’s] lack of awareness is being exposed to the public now.”
🔹 THREATS: After receiving criticism for his comments highlighted above, Stroman expanded on his personal struggles pitching in New York, saying he received “endless death threats” and racial insults, while “playing for a front office who didn’t care about any of that.”
🔹 SUPPORT: After a Mets fan responded to Stroman’s tweet above with, “Not all Mets fans are racist though. Don’t put all of us in one category. I supported you and nothing but nice things to say about your pitching skills,” Stroman replied:
🍎 BUCK SHOWALTER
Buck Showalter joined SNY’s Mets Hot Stove on Thursday to discuss a variety of subjects, including how he plans on using analytics, while trusting his instincts.
🔹 ANALYTICS: “They haven’t changed 90 feet on the bases… yet,” Showalter said of managing today’s game. “We use a lot of analytics to verify what our eyes and our gut felt, so when you get both of those things working together, you can have a pretty good approach.”
“The game has a heartbeat,” Showalter later continued. “There are some things I want to get my hands around and arms around this spring. I am kind of at the point now where I’ve heard enough where I want to make up my own mind and I want the players to know they are getting a fresh start, regardless of what’s happened.”
“Show me how this is going to help us win a game,” Showalter emphasized in explaining his openness to use analytics in conjunction with sound judgment.
👴🏼 OLD TIMER’S DAY
If the current labor negotiations have you thinking back to 1994, a better memory from that season is Old Timer’s Day, which the Mets will finally bring back to the home crowd this August after a long drought dating back to that strike-shortened season.
🎙 In a video conference on Thursday, Ken MacKenzie, Howard Johnson, and Billy Wagner shared memories while talking about the privilege of joining more than 40 former players on the field for the late-season event:
EARLY MEMORIES: “It took a while to realize that the flags [at the Polo Grounds] told us where we were in the league,” said MacKenzie, who pitched as an original Met from 1962-63. “We watched them work their way down all season. It was when they were getting near the end at the roof that we realized we were not going to win any pennants.”
PLANES: “Keith Hernandez told me he wanted to hit when the plane went over because if he missed the ball, they would never really hear it, they’d be a little off their game,” Howard Johnson joked in remembering the planes flying over Shea Stadium. “Who thinks of that? Only Keith thinks of that stuff.”
GOOSEBUMPS:
🔝 PROSPECTS
FanGraphs included four Mets on their Top 100 Prospect list, released on Wednesday.
(7) Francisco Álvarez (60 future value)
(44) Ronny Mauricio (50 future value)
(63) Brett Baty (50 future value)
(64) Mark Vientos (50 future value)
🔹 FUTURE VALUE: FanGraphs maps the 20–80 scouting scale to WAR production, which gives you an idea of the type of player each of the top prospects above could become.
◾️ Josh Reddick (who played a whopping 11 games for the Syracuse Mets last season) signed with the Acereros de Monclova of the Mexican League earlier this month.
🔗 Ambidextrous prospect Carlos Cortes hoping to stick with Mets, by Mike Puma, NY Post: “Cortes, a third-round pick by the Mets in the 2018 draft, stopped playing the infield (throwing right-handed) last season, leaving him for now as a lefty thrower in the outfield. It’s his natural throwing hand, and the one he trusts the most.”
🔗 How an Automated Strike Zone Would Affect the Mets, by Nate Mendelson, MetsMerized Online: “The current system allows for a catcher like Nido to gain extra value to a team with his defensive prowess. But, an automatic strike zone will lead to more aggressive catcher stances and ultimately better chances at throwing out runners stealing, placing a future emphasis on offensive-minded catchers.”
🔗 ‘Couldn’t have drawn that up’: Trade to Cubs brought Pete Crow-Armstrong full circle, by Maddie Lee, Chicago Sun-Times: “‘Baseball knows who Javy is,’ said Crow-Armstrong, who grew up a Cubs fan. ‘Javy’s the man.’ How fitting, then, that the Mets dealt Crow-Armstrong to the Cubs for Baez and right-hander Trevor Williams at the trade deadline in July.”
And we leave you with some thoughts from new Brooklyn Cyclones manager Luis Rivera…
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