The Mets optioned minor league infielder and second base finalist Justin Turner over to the minors side this morning. Turner was batting .268/.282/.231 over 39 spring at-bats, though he was 1 for his last 10 and was seeing more and more time at third base. In general, his performance looked solid but the presence of minor league options placed him firmly behind the 8-ball from the start. In my chat with Sandy earlier in the spring, the GM indicated in not-so-veiled terms that the idea of optimizing roster depth and flexibility would be taken into account pretty heavily when making this decision.
Realistically speaking, this pretty much hands the starting job to Rule 5 draftee Brad Emaus with reports that Collins sees Dan Murphy more as a utility player. For what it's worth, based on his .333/.390/.516 showing with Buffalo in 2010 @redturn2 had my vote. Despite impressive plate discipline I'm still not sold on Emaus' actual hitting ability and Murphy just plain can't field the position. And erroneous claims from attention-hungry beat writers notwithstaning, Luis Hernandez doesn't seem like a serious contender.
What do you guys think about how this is all shaking out?