Mets Sign K-Rod!
Even the Associated Press is reporting it, so it must be true — the Mets have signed Francisco “K-Rod” Rodriguez to a three-year, $37M+ contract.
Supposedly, the contract is two years guaranteed, with the third year vested based on appearances. Or something. Who cares? The Mets have their 2009 closer, and can now move on to more pressing matters. Such as, who the heck is going to pitch the first eight innings?
K-Rod may be in NYC tomorrow for a physical, with the official announcement to be made soon thereafter.
Nice, fair deal for both sides.
See more news and opinion over at ‘Ropolitans, to whom I owe a hat tip. Also hat tip to Mark Healey of BaseballDigest and GothamBaseball, who was twittering this from Vegas about 20 minutes before it was announced.
About the Author
A Mets fan since birth, Joe Janish began MetsToday in 2005 to provide the unique perspective of a high-level player and coach -- he earned NCAA D-1 All-American honors as a catcher and coached several players who went on to play pro ball. As a result his posts often include mechanical evaluations, scout-like analysis, and opinions that go beyond the numbers. Oh, and he's often a bit cranky.
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I wonder if it’s possible the Mets construct the 2009 pitching staff like the 2006 version: that is with 2 or 3 big starters, a bunch of fill-ins at the #4 and #5, and a stacked-ass bullpen. Johan, Pelfrey, and a healthy John Maine give the Mets 3 10+ game winners, with Neise, Parnell, and Vargas on the back-burner. Signing Krod is huge, but the Mets need more bullpen help. Hypothetically, if the Mets acquire Street and sign someone like Hoffman, and couple them with Feliciano, Show, Sanchez, and Heilman (all of whom should have better seasons than last based on the fact that they shouldn’t need to appear in as many games), then maybe all the Mets need is a Jon Garland or to bring back Pedro and roll the dice on a strong bullpen and powerful offense. If the team is hanging around midseason, make a trade for another starter (a la El Duque in ’06) and see if the recipe is for success as it was in the past. I’d love to go for broke and sign Sabathia or Manny and really stack the house, but if it doesn’t look like those are realistic options, then why not go for what’s worked for you in the past?
Not a bad plan, makes a lot of sense.
I don’t think they get Street now, though, nor Hoffman. My bet is they sign Chad Cordero and a few other questionable, but cheap guys (Kyle Farnsworth? Izzy? bring back Ayala?). I wish like heck they’d bring ChadBrad back.
I’m going to go on a limb and say that now that K-Rod is all but wrapped up, Omar is going to make a blockbuster and another signing. I smell Ryan Church leaving and Raul Ibanez coming in.
I’m not in love with Mr. Church, but why Ibanez?! I’d rather take a chance on basket-case Milton Bradley than that guy. Why is Omar so enamored with a 37 year old outfielder?
I think Church, and schneider are done. I think both represent ML talent in the ‘affordable’ category that teams might entertain. I think church could be a monster in Coors subbing for holiday. Schneider and red sox have been linked. Then the Fish are looking for catching now.
Bottom line tho, Accurate (?) has already calculated K-Rod would have restored 10 games to the Mets last yr….even with Sho and Heilman….that is 99wins…..hmmm.
hmmm …. how many games did the Mets lose in the 9th inning? I don’t remember, and not sure where to look for those kind of stats. I know they had a lot of “blown saves” but most of those were leads they had in the seventh inning, right?
I don’t know that K-Rod, by himself, is going to make the bullpen a tremendous upgrade over the time that Billy Wagner was healthy. Until he started having arm issues this year, Wags was one of the most proficient and dominating closers in MLB — despite what Mets fans want to think. K-Rod is essentially taking Wags’ place. Now what about innings 6-8? We’ll see.
Joe, I actually asked the same question my-self yesterday, and here’s the break-down of all 29 “blown saves” of the Mets this season: Wagner 7, Heilman 5, Schoneweis 4, Smith 3, Ayala, Stokes, Feliciano 2, Vargas, Figueroa, Sanchez, Muniz 1. Innings-wise, the stats are as follows:
6th inning: 5 (4-1)
7th inning: 7 (3-4)
8th inning: 7 (2-5)
9th inning: 10 (3-7)
(The numbers in brackets indicate the W-L result after the blown save.) It’s interesting to note that the Mets lost ONLY 7 games due to a lost save in the 9th inning. Considering that the team also accrued a total number 43 saves, and K-rod has a slightly below 90% save percentage, it would not be realistic to conclude that K-rod would have won more than 4 additional games for the Mets last year. Of course, these 4 games would make all the difference.
Great work upson!
I may want to write a full post citing those stats …. where did you get them? I know they’re available in a dozen different places, but I’m lazy and want to know which place spells all that out most easily.
Thanks for sharing!
Joe, I’m sure there are sites to find this directly, but I actually took the hard road. I went through all Mets pitchers, found the games they blew and put it into one spreadsheet. I’d be happy to hear about a better way.