Brodie Van Wagenen is at it again. The New York Mets
braggadocios General Manager once again put people on notice with another blank
check statement that is sure to get him in hot water with both fans and the
press.
During the introductory press conference for reliever Dellin
Betances, Van Wagenen boastfully proclaimed the Mets current bullpen as one of
the best in baseball.
That’s right, the
same bullpen that still has Edwin Diaz and Jeurys Familia slated to patrol the
late innings is, according to Van Wagenen, right up there with the likes of the
Houston Astros and New York Yankees.
“This signing was
intended to blow the cover off our ceiling,” Van Wagenen was only warming up.
“we believe that a healthy and dominant Dellin combined with Seth Lugo, Justin
Wilson, Edwin Diaz, Jeruys Familia, Brad Brock and Robert Gsellman. This
collective group has the potential to be one of the best in baseball.”
You got to be kidding me, right?
That is one heck of statement by VanWagenen, considering the
Mets were ranked 25th in Major League Baseball in total bullpen ERA
at 4.95. How bad is that statistic? The
Detroit Tigers who lost 114 games last season had a better bullpen ERA than the
Mets.
What’s more the Mets were ranked 21st in all of
baseball in save percentage at 58.46 percent.
The biggest culprits in blowing games on a regular basis of
course were Diaz and Familia. Diaz had an ERA of 5.59 in 66 games, blowing
seven saves. Familia’s ERA was 5.70; he blew four saves and never once nailed
down a game. Things got so bad with Familia and Diaz last season that
then-manager Mickey Callaway had to go to Seth Lugo as the team’s late inning
reliever just to give his team a chance to win on a regular basis.
As for Betances, the Mets are taking a risk with a reliever
who spent almost the entire 2019 season on the injury list with arm and leg
injuries; the most serious being a partial tear of his Achilles Tendon in
September.
When he was healthy, Betances was indeed one of the most
dominant pitchers in the sport as the Yankees set-up man. But this is 2020 now,
the Mets have to see whether Betances has fully recovered and can return to
form. That is why they went with a short-term, one-year deal.
Meanwhile, the only other addition to the bullpen, Brad
Brach is a total mystery. He pitched to a 5.47 ERA last season with the Cubs
and Mets last season.
Brach has been the proto-typical reliever throughout his
career. Some years he has been really good, like he was for Baltimore in 2016
where he posted a 2.05 ERA in 71 games out of the pen. Other years, Brach has been less consistent.
In many ways the argument could be made that the Mets should
add at least two more arms to the pen before Spring Training even begins next
month. The more experienced arms the better.
For Van Wagenen to proclaim at this juncture that his
bullpen has a chance to be one of the “best in baseball” is a fool-hardy
statement by a man who wants so desperately for his acquisitions from last
season (Diaz and Familia) to work out, and thinks his fan base is either too
dumb or didn’t watch a single game last season to even notice.
And people wonder why the fan base sometimes labels Van
Wagenen a ‘used cars salesman.’
No comments:
Post a Comment