Mets Hot Stove: We need pitching
The Hot Stove season is finally here!
The Mets have 8 players who are free agents this season: Jose Reyes, Chris Capuano, Scott Hairston, Chris Young, Miguel Batista, Jason Isringhausen, Dale Thayer, and Ryota Igarashi.
The Mets also have five players who are eligible for arbitration this winter: Mike Pelfrey, Angel Pagan, Manny Acosta, Ronny Paulino, and Taylor Buchholz.
Seeing the list off free agents this offseason, it’s clear to me what our greatest need is: pitching. Sandy Alderson said himself that our next closer is not in the organization. So I guess the Bobby Parnell experiment is over.
Pitching can only do so much. I’m sure the Mets will talk seriously with Jose Reyes about re-signing. A player can say he wants to stay with the Mets forever, but a team could offer him more time, more money and he can immediately jump ship. The Jose Reyes situation could go either way and I wouldn’t be surprised.
But we need pitching, more specifically bullpen help. This past season, I cringed every time we had to go to the bullpen, cringed every time we sent Parnell in to pitch the 9th. Just because he has a 100 MPH fastball, it doesn’t make him a closer. We need a closer. We need a reliable guy to pitch the 8th inning. We need a more reliable bullpen. R.A. Dickey had a great season; his record doesn’t reflect that because of a combination of lack of offense and a crappy bullpen.
I’m cutting the offense some slack because we basically had a team of rookies, and Jason Bay. Plus Ike Davis will be back so that instantly boosts your offense. Also, as long as Daniel Murphy bats third, we’ll be okay. We just need an outfielder with some pop. More pop than Jason Bay.
I’m curious to see what the Mets do this offseason to try and get the players they need, while at the same time cutting down the payroll. Should be interesting to watch.
It's All Mets to Me 
This off season will indeed be interesting to watch, but I’m not getting my hopes up for 2012. Some idiot will be willing to overpay Reyes so I do not expect him to be back. Pelf is OK as a 5th starter but nothing more. Pagan should be trade bait if we can get through arbitration. If we can trade a bad contract as in Bay for another bad contract who needs a change in scenery we should do it. Here’s to not hearing “In any other ballpark that would be a home run!” less often with the reconfigured dimensions. Nice post, and I’m looking forward to your future posts as the off season progresses.