From Mets PR:

METS STATEMENT REGARDING David Wright

“Last night, David Wright jammed the fifth finger of his right hand. An X-ray revealed a small fracture at the middle joint of the finger. This is a non-operative injury. The finger will be splinted and reevaluated tomorrow. David can return to baseball activity as tolerated.”

As a catcher, I’ve fractured both of my pinkies countless times but never missed a game because of it. However, I have no idea of the extent of Wright’s fracture nor the pain — every break is different. From my own experience, such an injury shouldn’t have any effect on his throwing, but it will affect his hitting — which is a damn shame since he started out red hot. From my perspective as a righthanded hitter, a broken right pinky is not as bad as a broken left pinky; but, in my swing, the bottom hand was more dominant as I tried to drive the bat down to the point of contact and put backspin on the ball (which required the bottom hand to lead and control the swing). If Wright’s style is similar, his swing shouldn’t be affected too adversely.

As for putting the pinky in a splint, well, I never did and have two crooked, crazy-looking pinkies to prove it. Ronnie Lott would probably suggest that Wright have his little finger removed if it can get him on the field faster. Not sure I’d go that far, but, that’s what Ronnie would do.

In the meantime, we’ll likely see Ronny Cedeno and Justin Turner taking turns at the hot corner. If Wright heads to the DL — which I cannot imagine happening — perhaps we’ll see Jordany Valdespin promoted and installed at 2B, with Daniel Murphy moving to 3B. I know, I know — Terry Collins insisted that Murphy would stay at 2B “no matter what” but he also said that Murphy wouldn’t be removed in the late innings of games when they were ahead, either. On the other hand, natural third baseman Zach Lutz might also be an option, as well as Josh Satin.

Let’s keep our, ahem, fingers crossed that David Wright won’t be out for more than a day or two.

With pitchers and catchers reporting to Port St. Lucie tomorrow, we have one more question that needs to be answered during Mets spring training: who will be the 25th man on the Opening Day roster?

With ten days before pitchers and Molinas report, let’s look at who might be the PSL “phenom”.

Nearly every spring training, there is one youngster who tears it up, or lights up the radar gun, and performs so overwhelmingly impressively that we fans are convinced we’ve seen the next Mets superstar … or at least, an All-Star. It’s that player who proves the philosophy of “hope springs eternal”, or “spring training hopes are eternal”, or something like that.

In the recent past, the “phenoms” of spring training have included Lastings Milledge, Fernando Martinez, Brian Bannister, and Ambiorix Burgos, among others. Sometimes — like Dwight Gooden — the phenoms pan out. Other times — like Gary Rajsich — things don’t quite work out so well once the regular season begins.

Considering that the Mets are entering a rebuilding year centered around their youth, one would think that this is a good opportunity for at least one “phenom” to emerge. Who might that be?

The best guesses are Jordany Valdespin, Reese Havens, Kirk Nieuwenhuis, Matt Harvey, Jeurys Familia, and Zack Wheeler. But those are easy, right? OK, I’ll pick a few “no-names” to throw in the mix: Kai Gronauer, Zach Lutz, Matt Den Dekker, and Cesar Puello. Those last four have no pressure on them, not much in the way of expectations, and nothing to lose, so my bet is that they’ll be aggressive, feel loose, and as a result have a good shot at gaining spring training stardom.

What say you? Who do you think will establish himself as the “phenom” in Port St. Lucie this spring? And what phenoms do you remember from spring trainings past? Answer in the comments.

Yesterday Buster Olney suggested that Dan Murphy could be a fit for the Tampa Bay Rays, and that the Rays could have the young pitching that the Mets desire.

To be clear, this was not a rumor that Olney heard, but merely an idea that he proposed as realistically plausible. This isn’t the first theory focused on a trade of Murphy to another club; in fact there have been several this winter. But let’s consider this — would the Mets trade Daniel Murphy, and if they did, would they get a worthwhile return for him?

A grand slam that turned into a single,

A backward-diving bare hand catch that caused them to mingle,

Those are the memories that I have as a Mets fan,

Maybe one day I can be the man,

Who’s manning third.

Ten years ago the Mets added a free agent who became a fan favorite: Robin Ventura, who is now the skipper for the Chicago White Sox. Who can forget the slick glove work displayed by Ventura or the miraculous walk-off grand-slam single in game 5 of the 1999 NLCS?

Another fan favorite — Edgardo Alfonzo — manned the bag for one season in 2002, followed by the then-lackluster Ty Wigginton, who kept the hot corner warm until the young man who was supposed to be the Mets ‘franchise player’ arrived, David Wright. Arguably one of the most beloved Mets players in franchise history and one of the most productive, David Wright is staring into a path of uncertainty. It would have been ludicrous to think of trading David Wright three years ago, but here we are, reading different writers offer up crazy trade scenarios. As Sandy Alderson said during Spring Training last season, no Met is safe.

So what would happen if the Mets trade away David Wright? Either A, that player will become the most hated player since Oliver Perez, or B, the Mets throw Daniel Murphy into the position to become the consistent topic of discussion as to why the Mets lost the previous night’s game.

Surprisingly, there may be an answer in the minor leagues. But how long are you willing to wait?

After being swept in rather embarrassing fashion at the hands of the playoff-bound Milwaukee Brewers this weekend at Citi Field, it became clear to Mets players, fans, and management that this incarnation of the New York Mets has no shot at reaching the 2011 MLB playoffs. So the prudent move right now for the organization to do is to utilize the last month and a half of this season to deeply evaluate the organization’s talent levels especially in the upper tiers (Double-A on up to the Majors). The best possible way to do this is to get some of these young players actual MLB game experience, which is exactly why the MLB created the whole “expanding rosters to 40 players on September 1st” rule. Here are some top candidates for the Mets to call up from he minors to fill out the up-to-40 man roster:

In many ways, this 2011 season is reminding me of 2005 — though, in reverse.

Many of you may have seen the Mets first televised spring training game of 2011, played against the Braves on Saturday afternoon. These games don’t count for much, so I won’t go into detail about what happened, but there are things we can take away from them; here are notes regarding selected players.

Jenrry Mejia
Velocity looked good, and he mixed in some good downward-breaking curves, though his ability to command it was inconsistent. In fact his command overall was inconsistent on all pitches. His mechanics look fairly similar to what we saw last year — all over the place, inefficient, and dangerous, particularly when he overthrows. He’s out of control and without balance at the the knee lift, causing him to have to adjust his upper body balance which in turn causes him to open up his front side too early and fall over toward 1B. Strangely enough, it seems his mechanics go more out of whack from the stretch; usually it is the other way around because there are less moving parts compared to the windup. I wonder if it’s because he is rushing his motion with men on base?

Josh Thole
Thole struggled a bit behind the plate in the first inning with Mejia on the mound, with balls popping out of his glove and getting by. There are a few reasons to explain the issues. First, it was the first game of the spring, so there is going to be some nervousness and rust to shake off. Second, he might have been using a new glove — maybe not brand-new, but possibly new in terms of game use (i.e., the one he was breaking in last year for game use in ’11). Third, Mejia’s command was off, and it’s difficult to adjust to a pitcher who throws 92-95 MPH and isn’t hitting spots. Fourth, at least one time it appeared as though Mejia crossed him up; Thole looked like he was waiting for a pitch to break inside to a LH hitter — i.e., a cutter — but it stayed up and away and by the time Thole adjusted, the ball was moving too quickly and deflected off his glove. Finally, I still don’t like the way Thole sets up behind the plate, with his upper body leaning forward — it makes him vulnerable to being handcuffed by pitches that break late. More than half of MLB catchers use a similarly inefficient stance, but can make up for it with supreme athleticism and anticipating the flight of pitches. Thole might be athletic enough to get away with it too, but time will tell. I talk about this a bit more on a video chat with Kerel Cooper coming soon at OnTheBlack.

On the one wild pitch by Mejia that allowed a runner to score from third, Thole made the mistake of trying to catch the ball with his glove — as an infield might catch a ground ball — rather than keep his glove down to the ground and block the ball with his body. So when the ball took a wicked hop, it skipped off of his glove instead of getting absorbed by the chest protector. I’m not going to blame Thole, though — that was a very tough pitch to stop and it might have skipped past him even if he did execute proper blocking mechanics. But spring training is about the process, not necessarily the results.

Freddie Freeman
This kid was a one-man wrecking crew for the Braves. I know it’s only one game, and it’s spring training, but
wow, this young man can swing the bat. And he’s only 21 years old.

Pedro Beato
His mechanics look pretty good in that he stays on a straight line toward home plate and gets momentum going forward. Though, he doesn’t get his head and upper body low enough at and after the release, which is strange because he used to get his “nose to toes” in the past. As a result his release is a bit on the high side and he cuts off his arm deceleration. I wonder if he was just jacked up and over throwing? Otherwise his velocity looks good and he gets heavy sink, which led to a bunch of ground balls. His one mistake was hit over the fence — a high, flat fastball that got too much of the plate.

Luis Castillo
Luis looked smooth turning the DP, but has not regained any of the range he’s lost over the years. At the plate he was his usual underwhelming self.

Taylor Buchholz
Buchholz showed he has a sharp 12-6 curve, and his mechanics are fairly efficient in that he has good balance through most of his motion. From a distance, and with a very quick look at him from the chest up, he sort of resembles Aaron Heilman (facial features, not mechanics).

Mike Nickeas
I like Mike’s footwork behind the plate and his quick release on throws to second. I don’t love the way he drops to a knee upon receipt of nearly every pitch; that is partly related to the Thole’s aforementioned issue with leaning forward in the stance, but also is attributed to not being familiar with the movement of a pitcher’s pitches. Otherwise, he looks relaxed, comfortable, and confident back there. At the plate, though, he looked a bit overmatched.

Zach Lutz
This young man does not get cheated on his swings; he kind of reminds me of Mike Hessman in that way. However, there was a situation where the Mets had a man on third and less than two out, and all Zach needed to do was get the bat on the ball. He had a 3-0 count and was given a meatball but he took it for strike one. Since it was ST and the Mets needed a run, I’d be surprised if he didn’t have the green light there. Eventually, Lutz struck out taking two huge hacks at tougher pitches. Not great situational hitting; I’d have preferred to see him cut down his swing a bit and either lift or stroke that 3-0 pitch into the outfield to get the run home.