Mets Need To Rethink Veteran Approach

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Yesterday, the Mets sent out an e-mail, apologizing for the worst late-season collapse in the history of baseball and twice thanking fans for their “record-breaking support.” (Thank you for shopping, please come again soon.) Even more notable than its groveling tone, though, was a single sentence neatly nestled into the second of the e-mail’s four brief paragraphs, which in a line described all the problems the team has had and will have.

“Omar,” it read, “will be meeting with Ownership shortly to present his plan on addressing our shortcomings so that we can achieve our goal of winning championships in 2008 and beyond.”

One easily imagines all the rewriting an e-mail like this must take, all the good arguments rejected as insufficiently abject in tone. It wouldn’t be helpful to point out that the Knicks are far more embarrassing than the Mets, for instance. Nor would many depressed season ticket holders reconsidering their investment of thousands of dollars take well to an e-mail pointing out that after all the Mets did finish with a winning record for the third year in a row, which they hadn’t done in six years.

Still, allowing that the team needs to be seen striking an appropriately determined posture, it’s beyond me why they would announce that general manager Omar Minaya will be presenting a plan on how to win a championship next year. The Mets are getting well ahead of themselves. The question isn’t how the Mets will try to win the World Series next year; it’s how hard they should try. This is the question that determines everything.

The Mets will, of course, contend next year. Minaya would have to actively try to harm the team to make them a good bet for less than 85 wins next year, and that’s enough to contend in the National League. Still, there is a real difference between building a team that could win it all with the right breaks and building a team meant to win it all. The Mets tried the latter the last two years, and it hasn’t worked. There’s no reason they have to try it again.

Much of the Mets’ problem is that they’re just old. Tom Glavine (41), Paul Lo Duca (35), Orlando Hernandez (41), Carlos Delgado (35), Billy Wagner (35), and Moises Alou (41) were all injured or spent down the stretch.

How, though, do you solve the problem? There are no good young pitchers or catchers on the free agent market, and the Mets don’t have the prospects to compete for any true superstars who might become available in trade. Glavine and Lo Duca, among others, will likely be gone next year, but they’ll probably just be replaced by slightly younger, but essentially identical, players. There will perhaps be an ancient Ivan Rodriguez instead of Lo Duca, or Livan Hernandez rather than Glavine — the same team with new faces. Most teams that aren’t good enough to win a championship but are too good to rebuild bet the season on museum pieces. It’s an asinine idea. If the Mets make room for the kids, they might only win 83 games, but they also might win as many as a dead-bodied crew of free agents. Lastings Milledge may be vaguely indecorous, but he’s hit the ball every chance he’s had when it mattered. Mike Pelfrey didn’t do much out of the rotation, but his heavy fastball and stamina could make him a brutally effective reliever.

At least these two had chances. In Phil Humber’s last two starts in AAA, he pitched 13.1 innings in which he allowed three hits, two walks, and one run, and struck out 14 men. Over the next month, Humber pitched three relief innings and one start. Coming on September 26, more than two weeks since his last appearance, it failed to save the season.

A decision like the one to not use Humber or Milledge is ultimately Willie Randolph’s responsibility. He didn’t use them, and it’s not as if his decision was irrational: It wasn’t in his interests to bet the season on unproven players. The problem is that it just as obviously won’t be in his interests to do so next year. A manager with his job on the line is a manager who will favor old players. The decision to retain him inherently commits the Mets to trying to win a World Series next year at all costs. Barring some brilliant maneuvering by Minaya that would bring on someone like Johan Santana, that’s probably not a good idea. They already bet on age, and it failed as badly as any bet in the game has ever failed. It’s time for a new course. If that doesn’t coincide with the manager’s best interests, the manager is the problem.

tmarchman@nysun.com


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