A former Met joins our team!
Plus arbitration numbers and international free agency begins
Good Morning,
We’re excited to welcome former Met (and the last one to get a postseason hit) Ty Kelly to our team! He’ll be a regular contributor, adding a unique player perspective to our daily conversation about the Mets. In light of the Francisco Lindor trade, Ty’s first piece today talks about what it’s like for a player when a new star joins your team. But first, as always, we start with the news.
⏰ Catch me up in 60(ish) seconds…
🍎 SIGNING: Mets signed 1B/OF/DH José Martínez to a one-year split contract that will pay him $1 million ($225,000 if in minors) and up to $500,000 in incentives based on the number of plate appearances he sees in the majors.
WHY? Martínez gives the Mets a right-handed bat who has hit 45% above league average against lefties throughout his career.
TEAM CONTROL. Martínez has two minor league options remaining, which allows the Mets to either use him on their bench or send him to Triple-A. He also has two more years of arbitration eligibility before he becomes a free agent.
PERFORMANCE. After a solid start to his career with the Cardinals, the 32-year-old has struggled over the past two seasons, and particularly in 2020, when he was first traded to Tampa Bay in the Randy Arozarena trade and later to the Cubs where he went 0-21 with 7 strikeouts in 10 games played.
✍️ INTERNATIONAL SIGNINGS: Today marks the beginning of the international free agency signing period. Baseball America has a great preview, but here are some key notes:
After the Mets paid out one of the biggest bonuses of the 2019 class for Dominican center fielder Alexander Ramirez, they “seem to be taking a different approach, with no projected seven-figure signing at the moment, but a significant volume of players in the $100,000 to $600,000 bracket.”
Per Baseball America, the Mets are expected to sign outfielders Johairo Cuevas (DR) and Gustavo Marquez (Venezuela); pitchers Elian Nuñez (DR) and Enderson Arevalo (Venezuela); Venezuelan shortstops Diego Mosquera and Samual Camacaro; Venezuelan right-handers Lennerd Ramos and Aaron Martinez; with five other players connected to the team from the Dominican Republic and Columbia.
👩⚖️ ARBITRATION: Today is the deadline for the Mets to agree to terms with 9 of their unsigned arbitration-eligible players. A deal must be reached by 1:00 PM ET or the two sides will head to a hearing to decide the player’s 2021 salary.
🚨 BREAKING: As I was about to hit publish, it was reported Dom Smith settled with the Mets for $2.55 million, per USA Today. You can see in the table below that is a bit below his projected value.
2020 was a crazy year for everyone reading this newsletter, and obviously the pandemic impacted baseball in cutting the season to 60 games. It’s unclear how arbitration hearings will account for the shortened season in evaluating player performance.
PAYROLL. Any projection on the amount of payroll the Mets have already used in relation to the luxury tax is based on arbitration projections (as shown in the table above). Depending on where final contract numbers end up, the Mets could have somewhere in the range of $20-$30 million to spend before reaching the initial luxury tax threshold.
🤚TALK TO THE HAND: The Mets remained “heavily involved” with free agent reliever Brad Hand, per MLB insider Jon Heyman. They are also considering bringing back LHP Justin Wilson if they fail to reach an agreement with the southpaw, Hand.
🗣 SPRINGER WATCH: Appearing on WFAN on Thursday, Heyman also said there is a “good chance” the Mets still end up signing free agent outfielder George Springer.
🍒 EXCITEMENT: Trevor May sounds as excited as Mets fans about the possibility of the team signing free agent Springer: “I think that would be — I don’t even want to call it a cherry on top, because I don’t know if [the Mets] would even be finished at that point,” May told the NY Post. “But [Springer] would be phenomenal. I can’t imagine what the buzz in the Mets’ world would be with the fans, I can’t even wrap my head around it.”
⚾️ PITCHING SHOWCASE: The Mets were one of 25 teams in attendance to see starter Corey Kluber on Wednesday. It turns out the event also included Anthony Swarzak and Steve Cishek (per TB Times) and AJ Ramos, as Cishek revealed on MLB Network Radio.
🏈 TEBOW: If you were somehow worried that Tim Tebow would jump back to football after Urban Meyer was hired by the Jacksonville Jaguars, don’t be. When asked about it by TMZ, Tebow said: "For me, I'm super excited about spring training. So, that's where my focus kind of swirls right now."
A New Superstar in the Clubhouse
By Ty Kelly
With the Mets trading for Francisco Lindor and Carlos Carrasco, you might be wondering: What happens to a clubhouse when a new superstar is brought in?
He gets two lockers to himself, that’s a certainty. But, what about the clubhouse dynamic? Will he mess with the team chemistry? Will he be able to learn a new handshake with every player on the team? Will he be too outspoken? Too soft-spoken? Too…medium-spoken? Will he show up and ask for more than two lockers? More than three bowls of porridge?
The first year of Robinson Canó’s 10 year, $240 million deal with the Seattle Mariners came in 2014, coinciding with my first full season in the Mariners organization, as well as my first Major League Spring Training invite.
I was starstruck — for obvious reasons— but so was everyone else. As a rule, Major League Baseball players don’t ogle or show excessive admiration for any other MLB players — due to deep-seated toxic masculinity and inferiority complexes — except when it comes to superstars. When you start getting into “top 25 player in the league” category or “future Hall of Famer,” the adulation begins to pour in. Everyone wants to know what he’s all about: what makes him tick, what he eats, how he dresses, whether he uses a loofa, whether he was friends with a guy on his former team who I am currently friends with. Also, baseball stuff.
Some guys are probably so starstruck that they discretely snap an iPhone 5 photo of King Felix in the locker room and still have it on my phone to this day. Still have it on their phone to this day. It’s still on my phone.
I spoke to Cano twice that Spring Training. The first instance came at second base shortly after we took ground balls one day. Grounders arrived, we fielded them, we tossed them into a pile on the ground. An empty bucket was run out by a coach so the balls could find a way back to the fungo hitter to be peppered at us again. The optimal way to fill said bucket with said baseballs is to put the bucket about 10 feet away and shoot every ball toward it, a la Shaq from the free-throw line. As a former high school basketball “standout” and perennially overzealous competitor (again: toxic masculinity), I took the opportunity to sink many more shots than Robbie and let him know I was unimpressed by his game.
“Do they not play basketball in the Dominican?” I asked, feeling far too confident in myself.
“No, they do.”
And that was pretty much it.
The second time we talked was in the batting cage before the day’s scheduled workouts began. He mimicked my swing.
“This is you,” he told me.
I knew; it was a passable impression but I was extremely flattered. He was watching me, and I assume he took a picture of me in the clubhouse also.
Every interaction with a superstar on your team is meaningful. Canó was open at the time about not wanting to act as a coach to the younger players on the team and in the organization: he just wanted to be a player and worry about living up to his huge deal. But when you’re larger than life, you’re influential whether you like it or not. Guys watch the way you go about your business: for the rest of my career, I never placed a ball in a bucket. But, when you have as sweet a jumper as I do, you don’t have to.
At Spring Training 2015 with the Cardinals, Jason Heyward was new and hit every morning in the cage with Matt Carpenter. They bounced ideas off each other, as other players — young and old — watched. (He also broke Matt Holliday’s long-standing grip strength record, while physically breaking the grip strength device in the process. He did not teach any of us how to do that, though.)
With the Phillies in 2017, we were the youngest team in the league toward the end of the season, as we had traded all our veterans at the deadline to let the prospects get a free MLB tryout. Our lone remaining “star” was Freddy Galvis — a star to the team, if nothing else. He was quiet but absolutely our heart and soul. We went through many losing streaks but he came to the field with the same quiet confidence every day. Doing his extra work, studying film, playing every single day at shortstop, picking who would control the clubhouse music for the day — no one could hope to be more consistent.
During one particular losing streak he snapped, though, and dug into the team, urging us to essentially just not be so bad. There wasn’t much else to say. But he spoke that one time and we listened. We wanted to win for Freddy like he was an injured star at the end of a sports movie. But he was healthy. And so were we; we were just young and bad. No amount of inspiration could save us.
What if you lose a Captain?
In 2016, I was called up as David Wright was at the onset of his spine-related issues. He hit a home run on my first day. He was the unequivocal leader of the team but meant much more than that to our entire operation. It really hurt us as we slowly lost him. The team felt it, the coaches felt it, and the fans felt it. There was something about watching him struggle to move throughout his rehab that was particularly demoralizing.
Luckily for us, David stuck around New York and was in the clubhouse and the dugout for games. Even though he wasn’t leading on the field, he found a way to continue being the Captain. We would have team meetings with the coaches who would lay into us for whatever was going on at the moment. And, when the coaches exited, David would keep the players gathered to let us know what we needed to do.
Sometimes he would echo the coaches’ thoughts, other times he would stray and tell us “this is the way it really is.”
The coaches can only understand what’s happening with the team (and in the clubhouse) so much. The players always know. When David spoke, we all listened. Neil Walker, Asdrubal Cabrera, Jay Bruce: all new veterans that season — all listened.
Superstars enter new clubhouses all the time. And no matter who they are -- whatever their personality, whether they are funny, do good impressions, understand your sarcasm, or watch your web series -- they are thrust into intense scrutiny by the media, coaches, fans, and players. Lindor and Carrasco are known to be great guys, and it will be no different for them.
I’m sure they will choose to embrace the responsibility that comes with their stardom.
If not, they can always try to find shelter in their second locker.
⚾️ Breaking this morning: DJ LeMahieu is finalizing an agreement to return to the Yankees, per Jon Morosi.
⚾️ Theo Epstein will join the Commissioner’s Office as a consultant regarding “on field matters.”
⚾️ Free agent catcher Yadier Molina hinted at retirement in a radio interview this week.
⚾️ Phillies are signing free agent reliever Archie Bradley to a one-year, $6MM deal, per Sportsnet.
⚾️ The Dodgers avoided arbitration and agreed to a contract with reliever Dylan Floro for $975,000, per FanSided. They also avoided arbitration on reliever Corey Knebel with a one-year, $5.25 million deal, per USA Today.
⚾️ San Francisco Giants agreed to a one-year, $3 million contract (with an additional $3 million in bonuses) with left-hander Alex Wood, per NBC Sports Bay Area.
⚾️ The Rockies avoided arbitration in agreeing to a $4 milliion contract with right-hander Mychal Givens, per Jon Heyman.
⚾️ Mickey Mantle baseball card shatters record, sells for $5.2 million.
🔗 In Mets’ ugly history of infielder trades, Francisco Lindor should be different, by Tim Britton, The Athletic: “The point here, though, is to show that the Francisco Lindor trade should be different for the Mets — different than those two other big-time deals for Cleveland middle infielders, different than the last major deal they made for a middle infielder. By examining where and how those trades went wrong, we get a better sense of why this trade should go right.”
🔗 Carlos Carrasco is so much more than just a really good pitcher, by Kory Powell, Amazin’ Avenue: “In addition to his foundation in the U.S., Carrasco and his wife also started a second foundation in his native Venezuela. This foundation partners with other groups to help find ways to distribute toys, medical supplies, and other items to people in need in the country. In 2016, Carrasco estimated he had $500,000 worth of medical supplies to distribute to health centers across a dozen states in Venezuela. He and his wife have also traveled the world to countries such as the Dominican Republic, Columbia, Mexico, and India and assisted in the building of schools in each country.”
🔗 Darryl Strawberry talks Steve Cohen on MLB Network Radio: “(It’s) about time. It’s a new time for them. New ownership, new organization. This guy loves the Mets. He loves the history of the Mets. Spend some money, be like the Yankees, develop your farm system and bring your younger players up so they can develop themselves and play at the major-league level and you’ll become a winner.”
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Very witty-solid article
Welcome Ty ! Interesting piece !