Tuesday, May 30, 2006

Milledge gets the call

Sorry for the long hiatus. A lot has happened since my last post.

The trade of J. Julio for O. Hernandez is a little bit frustrating. I never quite came around on Julio, despite the legitimately impressive peripherals he posted in his fairly limited workload with the Mets. But El Duque hasn't been good for a very long time, and may not even represent an improvement over John Maine. And Dave Williams? I mean really.

It's early yet, but a substantive move still needs to be made. Steve Trachsel needs to be made our fourth starter. I'm not sure what will be available, especially since so far this season there appear to be an unusual number of contending teams. That's a bad thing for the Mets, both because the NL East is a good example of that parity and because it makes for fewer sellers come the trade deadline.

With Xavier Nady placed on the DL, Lastings Milledge made his debut with the big club tonight, going 1-4 with a double. He hit the ball hard in his first plate appearance, but right at Hanley Ramirez at short. I wasn't expecting him to be up so soon, but he may be ready.

Monday night's game was incredibly entertaining. Aaron Heilman's worst outing of the season almost cost the Mets the game, but Reyes, Lo Duca and Wright came up big in the bottom of the 9th to win it.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

looks like julio is goin to be the closer in zona. after all the crap you said about julio it looks like he might actually have some value to more than omar and myself. but even after sayin all that, you lament the fact he was traded. what were you expecting to get for someone you thought so little of? an ace? hernandez's numbers have been good outside of arizona. hes no ace but is still better than most other options. they filled a need. that bein said, they are goin to miss julio in the pen, so i hope bell or someone learns how to pitch soon.
and why even complain about williams? the team needed arms for the minors with all the injuries, and he is just a guy who at least has a shot at improving and helping out sooner than what he was traded for.

Brian Doyle said...

Is this your big moment of vindication? That Julio was flipped to the D-Backs in exchange for a recent non-roster spring training invitee? It’s proof that Omar knows what he’s doing!

You make a lot of points, but none of them good enough to merit individual debunking. I’ll just let you revel in how much better our rotation is for Minaya’s wizardry.

Michael Deuser said...

The Backs would be foolish to use Julio as their closer. He'll get roasted and toasted in the high-pressure Arizona sun. Even on his best day, he's not as good as Jose Valverde, Valverde's recent troubles notwithstanding. I agree the talk coming out of Phoenix right now makes it sound like we'll be seeing Julio in the ninth. But let's see what happens once he's got a few games under his belt. In his full last season as a closer, he had a WHIP of 1.45. Before May 19, Valverde's ERA was 2.20. Everyone hits a rough patch every now and then, but Julio's made a career of it. Only Shea could make a fat-ass career bust look as tasty as he did in his 20 innings this year.

In other news, Doyle, what impact do you think the retuyr of Clemens will have on major league baseball? On fantasy leagues?

Anonymous said...

i need no moment of vindication. it just seems to me youd complain about any move that this team does before you see any results. is this how you make yourself feel good? its like you cant wait to be the 1st to say i told you so when somethin goes bad. but guess what, it hasnt been goin bad. julio was an asset, which you hate to admit. benson would still be a liability, look at his line. ill say it again, every move doesnt have to be a major upgrade. in fact there doesnt have to be an upgrade as lond as a need is being filled.
mdk, if the dbacks use julio as their closer is not relevent here. he was pitchin well since those 1st couple of outings which may be attributed to no spring training. what irks me is when fans hate a guy from the get-go. like doyle did with julio. then they turn around and bitch when those guys they hate are traded for something other than a cy young winner. fact is, the rotation was hurting and you arent going to get major help there when so many teams are still in the race. this filled the need with a decent starting pitcher, not great, decent. the d-backs traded vazquez for him, so they must have thought he still had somethin left as well. who are you goin to believe? doyle, who complains about trading for a guy to fill a hole at AAA, or the heads of 2 playoff calibre teams?