Very shortly after the end of the All Star game last night in Arizona, the New York Mets announced that they had traded their closer, Francisco Rodriguez, to the Milwaukee Brewers. The move wasn’t entirely unexpected as Rodriguez has a vesting option in his contract that guarantees him $17.5 million next season if he finishes 21 more games this year.
Though the move wasn’t out of the clear blue and made sense financially, there will inevitably be a outcry of disapproval from some fans and media members over the Mets trading their closer with a 46-45 record at the All Star break. Those people believe that the Mets have a shot to make the playoffs this season and will also likely be upset when the Mets trade Carlos Beltran at some point before the July 31 deadline. This is the kind of attitude that sets franchises back years and eventually alienates the very fan bases that are now trying to convince the team to win.
Before I begin to explain what I mean, I should clarify what I consider a successful franchise. For me, success is measured by the ability to compete for a championship every year or a number of years in a row. Though the Milwaukee Brewers are having some success this season and are trying very hard to win this year, I’m not sure I would consider them a successful organization because they weren’t really in the mix last year and aren’t likely to be next season either. The Boston Red Sox are a successful organization, as are the New York Yankees, Philadelphia Phillies, St. Louis Cardinals, San Francisco Giants and some others to varying degrees. There is, in my evaluation of on-field success, obviously a large grey area between success and failure where a majority of the teams like the probably one-hit wonder Brewers would go.
The Mets are not in position to be a successful team right now. Everyone knows that. They were expected to fare poorly this season and are not ready to contend for multiple championships as presently constructed. It is Sandy Alderson’s job to create a team with the potential for multi-year success. Though they have been surprisingly good this season, it is important not to mortgage the ultimate goal of a successful franchise in a hopeless pursuit of a little success this season. It’s stupid for two reasons. First, if the Mets held on to K-Rod for the remainder of the year and made a play for the playoffs, they would end up stuck with his astronomical salary for next year (another fantastic relic of the Omar Minaya era) and thereby handcuff their own ability to resign Jose Reyes or go after other free agents. Same deal with Beltran. If you trade him now, you can get something for him. If you wait until he walks away, you get a measly draft pick as compensation. The second reason the Mets shouldn’t go for it this year is that it’s not possible. It’s not like Mets are a game over .500 and one or two games out in the division, they’re a full 11 games behind arguably the best team in the Majors, the Phillies. And that’s not all, the Braves are sandwiched in there too. Both of those teams are flat out better than the Mets. More than that, they’re better than most everybody else too so even if the Mets were to rattle off a 9 or 10 game winning streak, they may only pick up 1 or 2 games in the standings.
Lucas Duda, Josh Thole, and the Mets are simply too far out it to make a serious run. It’s nice that Terry Collins’ team is doing as well as it is but this season is a throw away year regardless. If the Mets get sucked in to believing that they are in a better position than they are and that they can win in the long term with guys like Daniel Murphy, Duda, Thole, Mike Pelfrey and others than it almost would have been better if they had lost 15 more games in the first half. Fortuantely, the trade yesterday of K-Rod showed that Sandy Alderson is prepared to stay the course and ignore the calls for an attempt this season. Look for Beltran to move shortly and for the Jose Reyes situation to be right up there with Prince Fielder and Albert Pujols and the big deal contracts of the off-season.
-Max Frankel
