Mets offseason

Well, we are now in the baseball free agency season and so far I'm not thrilled, but I'm trying to be realistic.

We have resigned a lot of our bench in Damion Easley, Ramon Castro, and best of all, Marlon Anderson. I'm very happy with that. I had no problem not getting Alex Rodriguez. I like our lineup and I didn't want to deal with the baggage he would have brought to an already turbulent clubhouse. Unfortunately, the Mets couldn't pry Jorge Posada away from the Yankees to be their catcher. He would have been a great leader on that team on the field and in the clubhouse. But I understand, he's a lifelong Yankee.

I really liked Paul LoDuca when he was here. He was a gamer, he was tough, and played with New York attitude. And too many players on last year's team were way too passive. There was not enough attitude and that's one of the reasons they choked the division away so dramatically. But Omar Minaya lets LoDuca go and immediately goes out and signs Yorvit Torrealba to start at catcher for three years and 15 million. Torrealba is barely better than our backup, Ramon Castro. I compared them in 14 offensive and defensive categories and the only one where Torrealba had the decided edge was batting average, and he's only batting about .255 for his career. I'm okay not bringing LoDuca back, he is getting older. But I would have preferred Michael Barrett or even Rod Barajas over Torrealba.

This team needs pitching more than anything. But our minor league prospects are simply not good enough to net that top-flight starter. The big free agent starter I hear out there is Carlos Silva! Well that's great... if he's your fifth starter and you pay him 3-4 million a year. But he wants 40 million over 4 years! The market for these pitchers has become ungodly. I guess I would trade outfield prospect Lastings Milledge for Joe Blanton from Oakland or Matt Garza from Minnesota, as I hear those guys are available.

So the Mets' big holes in my eyes now are the bullpen and second base. If they can't resign Luis Castillo, I want Tadahito Iguchi, who just became a free agent. He's a very good number two hitter and puts the ball in play. David Eckstein would also be okay. Marcus Giles is completely washed up.

As for the pen, Aaron Sele and Brian Lawrence will be gone, by the grace of God. If Duaner Sanchez can rebound from his injuries and pitch like he did in 2006 as our 8th inning guy, that would be ideal. I would like to see them bring back Octavio Dotel. Of course, if Mariano Rivera would be willing to come to Flushing...

And a few other things. I love this. Guess who the Cubs really want to sign. Kaz Matsui! They've reportedly offered this stiff 3 years and 15 million dollars. Why are the Cubs stockpiling all these middle infielders. How many is that now? DeRosa, Theriot, Fontenot, Cedeno, Infante, they had Izturis. I guess they just like second basemen who can also play short. I can't wait to hear Ron Santo whine over the failure this guy will be in Chicago. I don't dislike Matsui as a man, but he was amazingly brittle and disappointing in his three plus years in New York. Then he goes to Colorado (in exchange for the immortal Eli Marrerro, who lasted about one month on the Mets) and becomes All-World. It just drives me crazy.

And Tom Glavine seems well on his way back to Atlanta. As I've said before, he can go, I don't ever want to see this guy near a Met uniform again. And when he goes into the Hall of Fame, there will be no Met fans cheering for him.

Omar, please make an impact.