Community Offseason Part Four: The Maine Niese situation
by METSMETSMETS on Oct 16, 2009 11:08 PM EDT
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Congrats community! You have just signed John Lackey to a 5 year contract worth $80 million! Out of 75 votes, Lackey received 24 of them, with Joel Pineiro in a distant second place with 13. The community has $2.4 million left to spend for the rest of its positions, and a key issue is coming up!
Odds are, the Mets have a rotation of 5 people, and with Santana, Pelfrey, Perez and Lackey all but locks for their jobs, John Maine and Jon Niese are left to fight for the fifth spot in the rotation. This decision effects the Mets payroll for relief pitchers, catcher and first base indirectly as well, as payroll is becoming more and more finite.
So here are the options:
1. Start John Maine, start Niese in AAA - The advantage of this is that the Mets have John Maine in the rotation who is more of a guarantee than Niese, who hasn't had significant time in the MLB and is coming off of a big hamstring strain. Maine is a pretty solid pitcher who is pretty much a guarantee to get at least a 4.80 FIP and 5.30 tRA with the ability to bring it up to 4.10 and 4.30. Maine's issues are with injury (40 starts in past 2 years) and with some declining numbers (K/9 from 2007 to 2009: 8.48, 7.84, 6.09; tRA: 4.27, 4.90, 5.32) and also his troubles with command (nearly a walk every 2 innings). Niese would always be available to fill in for Maine if this is the chosen scenario. keeping Maine would subtract $0.3 million from the available payroll
2. Start Jon Niese, move John Maine to the bullpen - The advantage here is that the Mets already have a solution to their ailing bullpen in house, and it also gives a good young pitcher a chance to start. John Maine always had trouble the second time through the order, and perhaps a move to the bullpen will help this and allow his high walk rate. It's the same hit to the payroll, and kills two birds with one stone. The question is, how much do you trust Niese?
3. Start Niese, trade Maine away - The principle to this is the same as #2. It's that Niese should be entrusted a rotation spot for possibly the entire year. The difference between this and #2 is that the Mets get rid of Maine, a solid pitcher who could have been beneficial in multiple ways, and instead free up $2.7 million of the payroll to perhaps add a catcher, 1B, RP or a bench player or two. In return, the Mets could see a decent return in prospects or perhaps another player who could be beneficial. If you vote for this option, PLEASE provide a possible team to take him and/or possible players in return
4. Start John Maine, move Niese to the bullpen
This FanPost was contributed by a member of the community and was not subject to any vetting or approval process. It does not necessarily reflect the opinions, reasoning skills, or attention to grammar and usage rules held by the editors of this site.
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Hi, new here.
I voted other. Unless Ollie shows very refined control (think -5 BB/9, which is still pathetic) in ST, I don’t see why we should keep on sending him out there. He already hamstrings us with that contract, why allow him to further hamstring us with his performance? Being a relatively new baseball fan, I think but am not sure we can send him to AAA without any problems? It’s not like anyone claiming him would be bad, they pick up the salary don’t they? Now if he does return to ‘07 – ’08 levels, then I would trade Maine, but that may just be because I’m personally huge on Niese.
he's going to be a major leaguer.
and nobody’s going to claim him.
We’re stuck with him and he’s a major leaguer.
by METSMETSMETS on Oct 17, 2009 12:14 AM EDT up reply actions
Options are up
Sadly, he can’t be sent directly to the minors. He would have to be Designated for Assignment, and then placed on waivers. If a team claimed him, they would take on his contract, but given his current status, that seems unlikely, in which case he would be given the option of accepting an assignment to Triple-A or declaring himself a free agent, leaving the Mets are still on the hook for his remaining contract. He would obviously choose the latter, in which case, the Mets would still be contractually obligated to pay him the remainder of the money they guaranteed him when he signed his contract, while he could still sign on with another team at the Major League minimum. Its similar to the situation that yielded the Mets Gary Sheffield, where the Tigers felt it was more important to get him off the roster than move his salary, so the Mets were able to sign him for a pittance while the Tigers picked up the tab.
"All energy flows according to the whims of the great magnet
What a fool I was to defy him"
-HST
by Mark Himmelstein on Oct 17, 2009 2:38 AM EDT up reply actions
Bill Hall another recent example. In his case a deal was worked out to pay a small amount of his salary.
the difference is
Bill Hall wasn’t a guy who had one, bad, injury-prone year. He had three crappy years even when he was healthy
The Mets’ FO knows that Perez can at least contribute as a back end starter if healthy, and so they aren’t going to get rid of him right now because they’d get absolutely nothing in return.
by METSMETSMETS on Oct 17, 2009 11:26 AM EDT up reply actions
but I guess
if you want to get rid of him while freeing up little to no payroll and put in Maine and Niese you could….
by METSMETSMETS on Oct 17, 2009 11:27 AM EDT up reply actions
For much would you guys think would be too little for the other team to pick up if trading Ollie?
I’m thinking if we are still paying him more than 5m, might as well keep him. Don’t see a team picking up 14m over the next two years though, so I guess it’d be wisest to keep him.
No team would take him
unless the Mets were paying $10 million or more.
To get rid of Hall the Brewers had to eat $7.1 million of his $1.3 million contract to trade him to the Mariners and they got nothing in return.
by METSMETSMETS on Oct 17, 2009 12:05 PM EDT up reply actions
Wait, what?
The Brewers had to pay 546% of Hall’s contract to move him? That doesn’t look right.
by BobbyV_Incognito on Oct 18, 2009 1:04 AM EDT up reply actions
sorry
meant to say $7.1 million out of $8.4 million (Mariners pay $1.3 million)
by METSMETSMETS on Oct 18, 2009 1:15 AM EDT up reply actions
dude
u were looking at his K/BB for 2008
as a starter this year it was 4.66 BB/9
by METSMETSMETS on Oct 17, 2009 5:40 PM EDT up reply actions
Actually, I was wrong.
Perez in 14 starts had a BB/9 of 7.91 (!!!!) in 2009, with a WHIP of 1.92. That’s historically atrocious for someone making that sort of money. 66 IP is obviously not a full season, but for him to make that in line with his career norms, Ollie would have had to have something like a BB/9 of 3.55 and a 1.23 WHIP over an additional 135ish innings. That would mean pitching like the Ollie of 2004, which if you look at his velocity, obviously no longer exists.
"I dunno. I never smoked any Astroturf"
-Tug McGraw
Ah, I see.
In which case I’d rather move Maine to the pen or trade him. Again, I’m big on Niese and would think a 4.30 FIP/ERA is definitely within is range, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see him lower than that.
Move Maine to the 'pen
And start Niese.
"We're investigating the investigative procedure of the investigation of Tony Bernazard"---Omar Minaya (he really didn't say it but he would"
Hm. This is interesting.
On the one hand, I think Niese will pitch better than Maine, and I think he’s ready right now. On the other hand, a young pitcher with options is pretty valuable.
I’ll go with Niese starting, though.
"I dunno. I never smoked any Astroturf"
-Tug McGraw
I'd start the season with Maine as a starter and Niese in AAA
Then I’d play it by year and see how things work out. That leaves you the most options for later.
If Niese tears up AAA and Maine continues to only go 5 innings its far easier to move a guy from the rotation to the bullpen then the other way around.
I know they will never do it, but I’d love to see them trade KRod for what ever they can get and make Maine the closer. That would free up a ton of money to fix other problems.
But then
But then the Mets would be off the hook for his $17.5 million vesting option in 2012. Even if he’s better than most closers out there, is he $17.5 million better?
I don't care.
It’s not my money.
I just want to see a parade for the WS champs that doesn’t involve the Yankees.
It's not your money
but its Wilpon’s and that makess it damn finite.
by METSMETSMETS on Oct 17, 2009 11:18 PM EDT up reply actions
Based on what???
His FIP and tRA have both been progressively increasing in the past 3 years, his K/9 is dropping like a rock and he walks guys at an Oliver Perez type of rate.
I voted
Start Maine (yuck), and Niese on AAA only because I want to see Niese at 100% before he comes up.
I am sick of John Maine, but I think he’ll be around.
How could you be sick of John Maine? By all accounts, he's a good guy.
Not his fault he’s been injury prone. Doesn’t mean he isn’t useful.
"I dunno. I never smoked any Astroturf"
-Tug McGraw
He may be a good guy,
but he isn’t a very good pitcher.
he basically only has one above average pitch, and doesn’t really throw other pitches enough….
I’m sure he is useful as maybe the long man out of the bullpen, but I’ve had enough of Johnny as a starter, and I don’t think he can close.
Why couldn't he close
I’m interested to hear a reason there.
Also, while he would certainly benefit from another pitch he does have enough to be an effective starter is he is healthy. Its just a matter of whether or not he’s ever healthy.
This is an interesting question
According to fangraphs, Maine’s fastball is pretty good. Per 100 pitches, it was 0.55 runs above average in both 2009 and 2007, and even better in 2006, though it was just about average in 2008. Its also interesting to note that 2008 was also the year in which Maine posted a career high average fastball velo, at 92.1 mph, while in his better years, he was in the 91.0-91.5 range.
What can we infer from this information about a trial move to the pen? Well, the rule of thumb is to subtract about 0.50 from tRA, which would probably leave Maine in the 4.00-4.25 range, which is on the poor end for a closer. We can also guess that his fastball would gain a tick in velocity. Given the information about how the increased velo actually seemed to hurt him in 2008, you may be right that this just might not be the right fit. Then again, throwing harder in shorter stints may allow him to command the pitch better. Either way, Frankie posted a 3.84 tRA in 2008, which really isn’t that much better than what we might expect from Maine. I don’t think its so cut and dry that we should immediately dump Frankie and slide Maine into the closer’s gig, but if you move Maine to the pen this year and he does perform well, a move like that would make a ton of sense next offseason.
"All energy flows according to the whims of the great magnet
What a fool I was to defy him"
-HST
by Mark Himmelstein on Oct 19, 2009 2:27 PM EDT up reply actions
to me,
a closer has to be able to dominate. Maine doesn’t seem to have that putaway pitch, where BB-Rod does have a killer changeup.
I’m not saying I want Frankie, because I think he was overpaid, and is too much of a high wire act, but as far as Maine, I see him far down in the closer rankings if that would ever come to pass, and then everyone here would be bitching about how we don’t have a closer.
Its true even this year Frankie's Changeup was awesome
But according to Fangraphs, his fastball was actually below average, as was his breaking ball. And very quietly, it seems like Maine really has brought his changeup along nicely. His slider has been consistently decent for a while, but his changeup has increased in value per 100 pitches in every season he’s been with the Mets, from -2.10 runs in 2006 to 1.09 runs this year. With a fastball and slider that are above average but not dominant, and what is developing into a very nice changeup, Maine may not have the dominant kind of single pitch of a guy like Frankie, but he does have three effective weapons.
Plus, its not just about the positive value Maine could contribute, but even if he’s a neutrally effective closer, that’s plenty good enough to justify trading K-Rod away, not because he’s not talented, but because otherwise the Mets will likely be spending about a quarter mil per mediocre Frankie inning in 2012.
"All energy flows according to the whims of the great magnet
What a fool I was to defy him"
-HST
by Mark Himmelstein on Oct 19, 2009 8:45 PM EDT up reply actions
Maine in the rotation, Niese in the 'pen
WIth Ollie and Maine in the rotation there’ll be plenty of long relief opportunities for Niese. I don’t think he has anything to prove in the minors, so let’s keep his arm on the ML club. I also happen to like Earl Weaver’s approach, of letting young arms work long out of the pen. Maine is good enough that he’s deserved a chance to keep doing what he has proven he can do (when healthy). If he’s struggling one option is to move him to the pen with Niese taking his place in the rotation. If both Maine AND Niese are pitching well (I can dream), then we might consider trading Maine or, if Ollie shows no signs of getting himself together, we can ask him to take an assignment to the minors, or bite the bullet and DFA him.
To the author....
Thanks for doing this, METSMETSMETS. It’s been a lot more fun than the regular season. Seriously, I really appreciate this site and the work that goes into it. My thanks to all involved.
Niese in the rotation
He owned AAA in his last like what 8 starts their.And for some time he was our 2nd best pitcher.We all ready know what Maine is.he is an always hurt 4 or 5th starter who does not have a put away pitch and only goes 5 innings per start.We don’t know what Niese is.Is he going to be a good #3 for the mets or a bust.It time to find out in 2010
Gangsta
by Jadden Hopkins on Oct 18, 2009 12:37 PM EDT reply actions
Niese in the 'pen
I don’t see him starting—not at the beginning of the season. Niese pitched only 120 innings last year. That’s not a pitcher who’s going to hold up to a full season of starting in the majors. I want him to build up arm strength, continue to learn while pitching long relief, and ease him into a starter’s role around mid-season. And if he’s terrific out of the pen and one or both of Maine and Ollie are terrible—that’s the only situation in which I’d consider moving him into the fifth starter’s slot before July.
And how about boosting Maine's value before trading him?
Another advantage of starting the year with Maine in the rotation and Niese in the pen is that Maine’s value is currently quite low. His four starts since June 6th didn’t go nearly far enough towards proving he’s back. We’d get next to nothing for him if we traded him before Opening Day 2010. By giving him a chance to prove he’s back, we give ourselves a chance to maximize his value. Besides, by trading him, what do we do if Niese struggles and Ollie tanks again (not at all unlikely, imo)? Even adding Lackey leaves a rotation with real uncertainties. I don’t want to compound that by getting rid of a guy who has a pretty good chance of putting up an ERA of 4.50 in 150 innings.
Um.
They can just let him walk, get nothing for him, and it won’t cost them any money.
On the other hand, if you sign him thru arb or as a FA, and he sucks again or gets hurt again, then you owe him money, and he has no value.
The idea of boosting Maine's value
was in response to posters suggesting we trade him in the offseason. I think he has a good chance of putting up an ERA of around 4.50 in 125-150 innings, and that would be worth substantially more than the 2.5 I’m guessing he’ll get in arbitration. Trading him now, though, might get a B and C prospect in return. Surely nothing more than that. Maine had a serious injury going into 2009, got hurt again, and didn’t come back well. No one’s giving up a minor leaguer likely to become a solid major leaguer—or anything close to it—for that.
Seriously—who do you think we’d get for him? And would it be anyone who’s likely to help in 2010?
by SeanSchirmer on Oct 22, 2009 5:12 AM EDT up reply actions
His value
isn’t really that bad right now, he still has some youth. I just think his type of risk doesn’t fit on the Mets. He could get a good yield in prospects or a similar WAR position player and be a #5 starter on another team.
by METSMETSMETS on Oct 19, 2009 4:45 PM EDT up reply actions
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