2016 MLB Thread

[Toe]

The Jays got Melvin Upton Jr. and I'm so excited!

[thatshortguy]

Yeah, but damn if he ain't markedly improved.  A .256 average may as well be .400 after his Braves tenure.

[Toe]

I guess he's insurance in case Bautista isn't back next year? For this season, he's going to be an extra guy on the bench. I guess if the Padres are eating a huge chunk of the salary, then it's not a huge deal.

[gunnar hendershow]

Padres eating the salary, get prospects, and Jays get an insurance option in case they lose Bautista. Really solid deal. Orioles were in on him and were going to dump Ubaldo on the Padres, but Angelos apparently interfered and modified the deal that was being discussed.

[Toe]

On 2016-07-26 at 17:29, damshow said:

Padres eating the salary, get prospects, and Jays get an insurance option in case they lose Bautista. Really solid deal. Orioles were in on him and were going to dump Ubaldo on the Padres, but Angelos apparently interfered and modified the deal that was being discussed.

Its decent, but I can't get excited about it. I know he's having a good year, but when I think of Melvin Upton Jr., what I think of is his two years in Atlanta and his massive number of strikeouts.

[MalaCloudy Black]

 

[The Buscher]

Jeurys Familia hadn't blown a regular season save since July 30th of last year.  He's now blown two in less than 24 hours and the offense continues to look horrible just as it has since May 1st.  They are under .500 since then and are only in contention coasting off of a huge April.

I was totally against giving Cespedes the 6-year megadeal he was seeking last offseason.  Now I'm at the point where I may just be done with this franchise altogether if they don't lock him up this winter.  He's their entire offense.  Nobody else has a clue how to hit and just go up there swinging for the fences rather than doing any sort of situational hitting.  It's painful to watch.

[DYSI]

Only the Mets can lose fans a year after a WS appearance.

 

You can't blame Sandy too much, who knew they'd get hit with all these injuries they've had on both sides of the field? Losing Murphy is really making them look bad though, guy is playing his ass off.

[Meacon Keaton]

4 hours ago, DYSI said:

Only the Mets can lose fans a year after a WS appearance.

It's why New York will always belong to the Yanks.

[The Buscher]

14 hours ago, DYSI said:

Only the Mets can lose fans a year after a WS appearance.

 

You can't blame Sandy too much, who knew they'd get hit with all these injuries they've had on both sides of the field? Losing Murphy is really making them look bad though, guy is playing his ass off.

The problem is that they spent several years selling fans on the future behind this pitching staff, yet they might now be letting the only guy capable of carrying this offense walk.  Pitching might win in the playoffs but you need an offense to get there.  If a New York franchise allows its star player to walk simply because they aren't willing to match his price tag, they may as well go back to another decade of irrelevance because the window will be slammed shut.

As for Murphy, I really can't blame Sandy.  I knew he'd kill the Mets head to head but nobody could have imagined he'd magically transform into Ted Williams.  I doubt he'd be doing this if he was still a Met because their approach at the plate is 100% based on Moneyball - high strikeouts as batting average is ignored in favor of trying to work out walks or swinging for the fences.  It is so bad to watch.  Murphy himself is probably pissed off that he had to take the contract he did.  If he was heading into this weak free agent class after this year he'd easily make $100 million.
 

10 hours ago, Meacon said:

It's why New York will always belong to the Yanks.

Probably.  Most kids in the '80s became Mets fans when they were great from '85-'88 while winning the '86 title all while the Yankees were terrible.  But it all flipped so heavily in the two decades that followed that Mets lost an entire generation of fans.  It would take a Mets dynasty paired with the Yankees being completely irrelevant for ages to potentially turn the tables, and that's all just highly unlikely to happen.

I've actually noticed Mets fans around my age tend to gravitate towards each other.  If two people in Yankee gear cross paths nobody notices or cares.  Two people in Mets gear cross paths and they're highly likely to acknowledge each other.  Especially here in my part of Connecticut which is probably 75% pro-Yankee.

[thatshortguy]

Twins send Eduardo Nunez to the Giants, who will promptly platoon Nunez and rid him of damn near all his value  

[Meacon Keaton]

It's not MLB, but my wife's cousin who pitched and played first base for St. Joe's has officially been invited to play in the Coastal Plain Summer League down in North Carolina. He's a Fayetteville Swampdog! So proud of him.  

[MalaCloudy Black]

I had a cousin that played in a league like that. I can't remember which one it was, but he seemed to like it - he also played for a MiLB team, albeit unsigned by the team's MLB affiliate. I always thought that was pretty neat, but congrats to your wife's cousin, who is basically your cousin now!

[The Buscher]

Busy day for trades.  First the Pirates deal Mark Melancon to the Nationals.  And then the Indians show they're all-in on this season by snagging Jonathan Lucroy from the Brewers and Andrew Miller from the Yankees.

The Miller trade is particularly surprising given that the Yankees were reluctant to trade him with 2 years left on his deal.  That tells me they may have already reached a pocket deal with Chapman prior to trading him.

[gunnar hendershow]

Miller took less money and less control to be a Yankee and now he's getting shuttled off to Cleveland. That Houston deal was so much better and included a no-trade clause but he wanted to sign with NY.

Clint Frazier is a decent pickup for the Yankees, will make a good offensive bat if he projects well. 25 HRs, 20 SBs kind of player.

[The Buscher]

Lucroy has stunned the Brewers and Indians by exercising his no-trade clause and blocking the deal!

Come on Sandy - please bring in Lucroy.  I think the 2016 season is a lost cause but he's signed for next year so he'd be a great piece to have aboard.

[Meacon Keaton]

We weren't going to be making the playoffs this year or next. I absolutely love what we're doing. We have gotten four Top-100 prospects over the last week for two relief pitchers. One of which we could possibly end up getting back in a couple months anyway.

We're going all in on Bryce Harper, Manny Machado, and Jose Fernandez in the 2018-2019 free agency class to team up with these young bucks we're bringing in. The Yanks will rule again.

Edited July 31, 2016 by Meacon

[Lowerdeck]

On 7/29/2016 at 09:30, Busch Piazza said:

Especially here in my part of Connecticut which is probably 75% pro-Yankee.

 

I'd say 60-65% Yankees, 30-35% Red Sox, 5% other.  Mets are probably the largest of other at 1-2%

Much of eastern CT is Red Sox territory, but it's 1/4th the population of the west.

[The Buscher]

58 minutes ago, Lowerdeck said:

I'd say 60-65% Yankees, 30-35% Red Sox, 5% other.  Mets are probably the largest of other at 1-2%

Much of eastern CT is Red Sox territory, but it's 1/4th the population of the west.

Here in Danbury second place seems to be split relatively evenly between Mets and Red Sox while it's far and away a Yankee town.  I remember only knowing of a few other Mets fans in high school.  Then starting senior year in fall 2006 and just seeing the hallways be filled with people wearing blue and orange (and not just because it was our school colors).  There was Mets gear all over the place.  I wanted to roll my eyes a bit because most of these people were too ashamed to rock their Mets gear when they were bad, but it was still so cool to see the Mets be relevant for one year. 

Supposedly Lucroy nixed his trade to the Indians because they told him he'd be a 1B/DH next year and serve as the backup catcher to Yan Gomes.  He asked them to instead rip up his 2017 option so he could be a free agent and he refused.

Clearly the Indians didn't view him as that much of an improvement:

[thatshortguy]

Matt Kemp to the Braves in exchange for Hector Olivera.  I actually don't mind the deal, as Olivera is terrible everywhere and Kemp's only bad on the field.