N.Y. METS ~ New Front Office Is Officially On The Clock

From the desk of:  HEAD-BUTTING MR. MET


NEW YORK METS:  It's Time For The New Front Office To Start Earning Their Money.   For Paul DePodesta and J.P. Ricciardi,  June 6th is upon them.  That means Amateur Draft Time.  For Sandy Alderson, It Means Cracking His Knuckles In Preparation for July.


Quiet time?  Grace period?  Or what ever we call it, ...is over.  It's time to step out from behind the shadows, show themselves, and start the reconfiguration of the Mets in earnest now.  June 6th ushers in the Amateur Draft.  And for Paul DePodesta and J.P. Ricciardi, it means they're officially on the clock.  Let's see what assortment of goodies they can reap starting with tomorrow's opening rounds of the June harvest.

While tomorrow's opening of the June Draft will largely determine what Brooklyn Cyclones I'll be rooting for in Coney Island this summer, the bigger picture belongs to the parent club.  By GM Sandy Alderson's own assessment, the Mets minor league talent pool is dry.


Drafting players in Baseball isn't the science it is as in say, Football or Basketball.   In Baseball, all these kids are rough, ugly rocks.   The good talent evaluators see the jewels within.  Other speculators spend their time mining Fools Gold in these drafts.


They way DePodesta and Ricciardi were touted on their way into Flushing would have us believing they are diamond cutters.   Look..., just go out and find this organization some good shiny gems will ya?


DePodesta and Ricciardi are Sandy Alderson's hand picked henchmen and they were brought here in large part to start fixing the Mets starting tomorrow.  J.P. and Paul's record with the Mets, and the future of the Club's organizational course and philosophy, all start to get rewritten, now.

In name, this is a very high profile Front Office.  They haven't been spoken about much since the season started.  But for all the monetary compensation these gentlemen receive from the Mets since their hiring, they had better be as smart as they say they are because they haven't done anything we can talk about ...yet.  For all METropolis' intent and hopes, damn I hope they did their homework!


Yet, so much of this year's draft, and future Met drafts depends on the Wilpon's willingness to stray from the unofficial slotting policy they adhere to.  The Wilpons do not go over slot for prospects and as a result, trap themselves in mid-level mediocrity.  This organization has a verifiable history of not paying and a decade's long list of players hitting the wall once they reach Binghampton; the level most prospects start to get weeded out and separated from ball players.


That's where Sandy Alderson comes in.  How much autonomy does he really have?  And has he ever managed to convince the Wilpons they've made a matter of slotting policy one of their hugest mistakes as owners?  We know when push comes to shove -  money talks.  And the Wilpons don't have any extra cash lying around.  But when we are talking compensation at this level; maybe a $7 million dollar commitment to a high prized prospect, for a New York team, we should be far from talking about accounting nightmares. 


That was Omar's and Jeff's folly; ...too much dumb money on the big club and no smart money spent on the rookie levels.  If you need proof of that assertion, Kazmir, Wright, and Reyes, whom Omar inherited, were the last impact players developed by this system.  Over this year and last, have we finally seen promotable and contributing players but they come almosst a full eight years since the last substantial crop (Reyes, Wright, Kazmir).  So I ask you where has the impact rookie been in all these years?  The answer hasn't been anywhere near Roosevelt Avenue.


And since I brought up Omar Minaya, I think we all understand we are still looking at his team and handy-work.  Jon Niese; Pelf;  R.A. Dickey; Dillon Gee;  even Ike Davis,  ...and the rest of the Flushing Bisons and New York Mets still here are his collection.  So, there is a chance that some of my fellow Met fans have confused today's current state and related it to some kind of picture of the future.  As if this is still salvagable and just needs healthy players and tweeking.  But while some of the players currently on the roster I truly hope are part of our future, I would suggest you take your last looks around at what will soon become what things used to look like around here.


June Sixth folks; consider it the first day the Mets new Front Office officially has to report to work and start fixing this MESS from the bottom, up.  That includes Sandy Alderson, and not just Ricciardi and DePodesta.  Those two have their work to do starting tomorrow.  Sandy?  It's June so you know what that means right?  The trade deadline is one page flip of the calendar away.


Yep, yep, yep.  ...Time to get up.  Have a good stretch and grab a cup-o-java to go.  It's time for this Front Office to get to work.


Over the past two months, the Mets have played gritty baseball under Terry Collins.  It's gotten the Media to treat them less derisively and instead has them theorizing their own solutions for the Mets problems.  But so much of everything Mets these days is overshadowed by Fred Wilpon's woes.  And in a sense it's provided a calm before the storm in regards to this current roster.


Ridding the team of Luis Castillo and Oliver Perez earlier this season were no brainers.  Anyone who ever stayed in a Holiday Inn even knew that.  But that's nothing.  We haven't seen anything yet.  I believe that, and just reaffirmed it because I like to be consistent.  That's why if you've noticed, I haven't been too concerned with wins and losses.  I believe in busy hands being happy hands and micro-matters like Dillon Gee, Thole, Niese, Parnell, Ike, and a few others occupy my concerns until Sandy's renovation goes full blown.


It's time for the Front Office to get to work and June 6th is as good a date, and symbolically relevant as to why the new regime starts getting graded now.  This will be their first draft.


For the New York Mets' new deputies, partly recommended by MLB (Selig), in the form of Sandy Alderson and his hand picked lieutenants Paul DePodesta and J.P. Ricciardi, consider this Groundbreaking Day in the rebuilding of a new METropolis.


Or so I (we?) hope.






Mike.BTB