What are the Mets clinging to, exactly?
Scott Hairston. Mets.com
5:24 pm Jul. 31, 20123
Tuesday afternoon's nonwaiver trading deadline came and went, and the Mets stood still.
The team's general manager, Sandy Alderson, had publicly disabused anyone of the notion that the Mets were sellers, especially after the team lost 14 of 16 to fall out of playoff contention.
But with the deadline approaching, the Mets had an obvious asset to trade: Scott Hairston, the right-handed hitting outfielder who crushed two home runs on Monday night.
Hairston is the nemesis of left-handed pitchers the world over, with an O.P.S. of .945 against them in 2012. Among outfielders with 100 plate appearances against lefties this year, that ranked Hairston eighth in all of baseball. Among those ahead of him, only Shane Victorino of the Phillies was available, and he went to the Dodgers for reliever Josh Lindblom, reliever Ethan Martin, a player to be named later and cash. If Victorino's defensive reputation improved the return a little, the difference in salaries--$9.5 million for Victorino in 2012, $1.1 million for Hairston--should have more than made up for that gap.
There may not be anything general manager Sandy Alderson could have done, given the fact that the Mets' debt-plagued owners aren't giving him any money to spend.
But the non-move will hardly do anything to improve relations with the fans, after a winter when payroll dropped $50 million and the team's most popular player, Jose Reyes, was allowed to sign elsewhere. The Mets' assurances that a plan is in place now seem deeply cynical.
Holding onto Hairston is especially puzzling, because he is a free agent after 2012. Had the Mets wanted to bring him back, they could simply have traded him to a contender for something useful in the future, then signed him this winter. Keeping him for a lost 2012 season only makes sense if Hairston has communicated to the Mets that he won't re-sign with them if traded, or if they expect to sign him to a below-market deal between now and the end of the season.
Otherwise, the value of owning Scott Hairston's contract through 2012 ends in ... 2012. They've avoided making a move that would have given them some value for the future, even if it turned out to be an A-ball pitcher with a live arm, an effective lottery ticket, that is more useful to the Mets than holding onto their dollar that's about to disintegrate.
The Mets were wise not to be buyers this deadline. The flip side of that equation ought to be selling assets that only help them in 2012. Scott Hairston was a perfect example of that. And the onus is on the Mets now to show some value from Hairston beyond a few home runs in meaningless August games.
Alderson quote from the post-deadline conference call: "Right now he's a very important part of our team. We feel it's important to keep 2012 as competitive as possible."
Really, though?
I don't think Hairston is nearly the chip a lot of people seem to think he is. If I were the Mets looking for a player like that I'd be offering Josh Satin, Eric Campbell hitter types, and Mark Cohoon pitcher types. If I were the other team I would say what's the point of that? I wouldn't dream of dealing a live A ball arm like Tapia, Fulmer. or Matz...
As for saying Hairston is a big part of the team, that's GM rhetoric. What else is he going to say? The market is what defines a player, and I really don't think there was one. We can wish there was, but that's all it is...
Yes, really. There is a value in staying competitive for the rest of the season. The Mets might not be a playoff contender, but if they continue to battle and hover around .500, they will sell more tickets in August and September than they would if they just fold up the tent. A few thousand more fans might be barely noticeable in the ballpark, but it will affect the team's bottom line. It gives them a chance to make a couple milion extra bucks towards offseason spending. That in and of itself is worth more to the Mets than some random organizational player who might have been acquired for Hairston.
I don't really agree with this. One of the points Alderson made in his remarks today was to rebut the idea that, if you're not going to make the postseason, then it doesn't matter how you finish the season -- that there's no particular value to finishing the season well rather than poorly, or in finishing over .500 if you can. Hairston has been an important offensive contributor, and I'd just as soon not watch the Mets field an outfield for the next two months of Bay, Torres, Nieuwenhuis, Baxter, and Duda. In other words, I don't think something that "helps only in 2012" has zero value.
If he is to be believed, Alderson's line in the sand was that he needed to get back a player or players who reasonably could be expected to contribute in 2013. I think that is an entirely reasonable position.
You compare Hairston's OPS/salary with that of Victorino, seemingly as a way of suggesting that the Mets should have been able to get something, comparable to Lindblom + Martin + whatever, for Hairston. But what do we make of the fact that the Dodgers obviously had no interest in getting Hairston rather than Victorino? Alderson surely would have taken that package, or even something a little less, for Hairston. Obviously he got no offers from anyone that were even close to that. Does that make Alderson a genius for signing Hairston this season for $1.2 million? Does it make Ned Colletti a moron for preferring Victorino to Hairston?
You say Mets fans will not like it that no trades were made, but I think they would like it less if Hairston were traded for someone not even on the trading team's top-30 prospect list. That may suggest a lack of sabermetric savvy on the part of those fans, but I just don't think most people can get behind the idea that any return greater than zero is better than having Scott Hairston for the remainder of 2012.