I just wanted to throw down some quick thoughts on the centerpiece of the Mets' haul for Carlos Beltran:

Obviously, the star of this trade will be Zack Wheeler, no matter who else the Mets get, and he's a tough pitcher to peg down. He doesn't fit easily into any of the usual molds most young pitchers do. At a glance, some might read the velocity reports (low-to-mid-90s fastball) and the subpar walk rates and think Wheeler's just another guy who's more of a thrower than a pitcher. I believe that's inaccurate: he has a surprising amount of pitching accumen for a young guy. The way he uses his breaking ball, for example, is quite interesting. It's possible to look at the breaking pitch and see a below average offering. He throws from a lower arm slot that's not very conducive to curves, and true to form, the pitch can be very slurvy. But where most pitchers either scrap the pitch and start over or resign themselves to a career in the bullpen, Wheeler's smart enough to turn it into a positive. He'll vary the velocity and break of the pitch by subtly (or even not so subtly) adjusting his arm speed and angle to create an appearance of having more than one breaking pitch. You could even argue that he does throw a spectrum of breaking pitches ranging from what is nearly a traditional curve to a traditional slider. On top of that, Wheeler's fastball also has a lot of life—specifically sink—giving him another potential avenue for getting hitters out. Thus far, he's shown reasonable ground ball rates (his 2011 numbers are somewhere around 50%), though those numbers fall short of classifying Wheeler as a ground ball pitcher in my mind.

Unfortunately, Wheeler doesn't really look like a pitchability guy either despite his natural pitching intelligence. He's improved his changeup, but it's still not average yet, and his arm angle suggests it might never be. His command ranges from below average to terrible, and the fact that he's had as much success in the California League as he has speaks more about the quality of hitters he's facing than his actual ability. He has a lot of difficulty hitting his spots, especially down in the zone. Right now a lot of batters are still chasing, but that may change once he starts facing more disciplined hitters. The good news is that he doesn't often elevate his pitches when he misses; he tends to either miss down or away. That will help him to continue to limit the home run, but if hitters do start to lay off, he'll find himself intentionally elevating instead.

I'm not really sure how I'd go about teaching him better command. Forcing him to be more consistent with his arm angle would help, but it might also impair the effectiveness of the breaking ball. Instead, I'd consider either shortening his stride a touch or continue streamlining his arm motion. In high school, Wheeler's delivery was decidedly whip-like, and he had a pronounced inverted W. He's still pronating his elbow too late, but he's shortened the back end of his motion considerably, which does help speed up his tempo. Further efforts may improve his command and prevent future shoulder injuries. Shortening a pitcher's stride is something I rarely suggest, but it does sometimes help aggressive pitchers from getting their bodies too far in front of their arms during delivery. Again, it might help. Otherwise, all you can do is trust in Wheeler to learn how to locate better.

All in all, Wheeler seems like an appropriate prospect to get in return for a rental like Beltran and one with substantial upside at that.

I just wanted to finish up covering the final 25 rounds of the draft. At this point, a team drafts very few players with any chance at becoming impact players; it's mostly organizational guys and raw high school players with price tags that don't measure up to their ability now. But every once in a while someone interesting does pop up in the draft's later rounds, so I'm going to hit on what I feel are the highlights over these 25 rounds. Just in case you missed our previous installments: Brandon Nimmo, Michael Fulmer, Cory Mazzoni, Logan Verrett and Tyler Pill, Rounds 5-10, Rounds 11-15, and Rounds 16-25.

26th Round: Casey Hauptman, RHP, Nebraska. Hauptman has a big body at 6-4, 205 pounds, but the senior pitched almost exclusively out of the bullpen during his college career. He's an extreme strike-thrower—he walked three batters in 62.1 innings this season, and that is not a typo—but the two-seamer sits in the mid-to-high 80s and the soft breaking ball is not going to fool many. He's a smart kid with a deceptive delivery, though, so he has a chance to fill in the back end of a bullpen, provided he can either sharpen his curve or add a little velocity. Hauptman's already signed.

27th Round: Randy Fontanez, RHP, South Florida. Another soft-tossing strike-thrower. He was a four-year producer at South Florida, and he sits 88-91, and both his curve and slider can be average pitches. He's on the small side, and the mechanics are a little rough around the edges, but he's a potential reliever. Like Hauptman, Fontanez signed quickly.

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We'll pick up right where we left off yesterday, but we'll look at the next ten rounds instead. Just in case you missed our previous installments: Brandon Nimmo, Michael Fulmer, Cory Mazzoni, Logan Verrett and Tyler Pill, Rounds 5-10, and Rounds 11-15.

Round 16: Bradley Marquez, CF, Odessa HS (TX). The 16th-rounder has tools galore but especially speed. One of the nation's top running back recruits, Marquez has a long stride that helps provide him with plus speed. He currently plays shortstop for Odessa, but it's obvious he'll end up in center: his actions at short are very awkward, and I don't think he'll ever develop the hands or the footwork required of a pro infielder. In the outfield, he can use his speed to its fullest extent. At the plate, he's short to the ball with a quick bat, and he gets great hip rotation, leading me to think that some of that raw power could manifest during games once he fixes some timing issues. However, his swing path is very, very flat, and he'll sometimes even swing down at the ball. He'll also need to watch his back side, which will sometimes collapse on him. He's a good prospect, at least as good as Joe Tuschak in the sixth round, but with a two-sport commitment to Texas Tech, he's probably unsignable.

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Today we'll look over a very intriguing five rounds from last week's draft, a set that might be more impressive than the previous five picks, provided everybody signs. And just in case you missed our previous installments: Brandon Nimmo, Michael Fulmer, Cory Mazzoni, Logan Verrett and Tyler Pill, and Rounds 5–10.

Round 11: Christian Montgomery, RHP, Lawrence Central HS (IN). In the 11th round, Montgomery is an excellent pick. A couple rounds earlier, and he'd merely be defensible. And any earlier than that would have been a seriously poor use of an early pick. But in selecting Montgomery here, at this point in the draft, Chad MacDonald has provided the Mets with a high schooler who is both pretty likely to sign and could provide some serious upside. Last summer, there was a lot of buzz about Montgomery due to a string of performances on the showcase circuit that put his fastball in the low-90s with a clean arm action. He paired that with a hard upper-70s downer curve that had excellent break and an occasional slider. The Major League Scouting Bureau even gave him a first-round grade.

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After profiling first-rounder Brandon Nimmo last week, as well as the Mets' next four picks—Michael Fulmer, Cory Mazzoni, Logan Verrett, and Tyler Pill—I wanted to write a few more quick scouting reports on the the remaining draftees. I'll be posting them for the remainder of this week. Sorry I wasn't able to post this sooner, but I needed a couple days to recharge my batteries in the aftermath of the draft.

Round 5: Jack Leathersich, LHP, UMass Lowell. A short lefty who put up some crazy numbers in Division II. Leathersich has been known to bring 95-mile-per-hour heat in short outings. As a starter, his velocity drops down to about 88-91. His mechanics are on the ugly side, however—kind of a high elbow in back, lots of recoil, doesn't land consistently with his striding foot and occasionally throws across his body—but they don't seem to hinder his ability to throw strikes too much. I haven't seen too much of Leathersich, however—just his MLB Scouting video—but what I've seen jibes with the reports. The breaking stuff is very fringy. You can see the awkwardness in his throwing arm when he's about to spin a curve, like he's gearing up to throw it. According to Baseball America, he throws two breaking balls, a curve and a slurve, but if that's true—sometimes a misthrown breaking ball gets labelled as a separate pitch—he should dump the slurve. It's an ugly pitch that doesn't serve him well at all. If he can learn to throw the curve at the slurve's velocity, he'd have something. Chad MacDonald has suggested that Leathersich may start, but considering his lack of secondary offerings, rough mechanics, size, and reduced velocity in longer outings, I'd say that's crazy talk.

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While I wasn't crazy about the Mets' second-round draft pick, I do like their third and fourth rounders a whole lot, and they're actually pretty similar players, so we'll deal with them at the same time.

Logan Verrett, a 6-foot-3 righty from Baylor, has just average velocity at the moment, but he may be able to squeeze out a little more in the future. He sits 88-92 with his fastball right now, but he's been known to touch 95, and he still has the room to add at least a little muscle on his 185-pound frame. He could also lengthen his stride a little, but I'd be hesitant about making any changes to his delivery. It's mostly fine as it is: smooth, simple, and with a clean arm action. There's an occasional timing issue where his arm will jump a little ahead of his body, increasing the effort in his delivery, and I do wish he had more torque in his torso to generate velocity, but it's really nit-picking. Suffice it to say, this is a nice combo of mechanics that are fine as is, but offer some intriguing promise with some tweaks.

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With their second-round pick, the Mets selected righty Cory Mazzoni, a guy who brings a lot to the table but has a couple of glaring weaknesses. Mazzoni's principal asset is velocity; as a startern for North Carolina State, Mazzoni's fastball sat in the low-90s and occasionally crept up into the mid-90s. His peak velocity is 97. That's premium arm strength, and he maintains it pretty well. While he doesn't have a lot of size at 6-1, 194, he has an athletic build, which certainly helps his endurance. The other big asset is his control. That facet of his game improved greatly in 2011, dropping to 2.3 from a 3.9 figure in 2010. He's been helped by a smooth, simple delivery. Scouts also love his attitude on the mound; "bulldog" is frequently heard in connection with his name. He goes right after hitters, throws strikes, and dares them to hit it.

Of course, he can be hit. Mazzoni has a little bit of what an old Red Sox-loving friend of mine called Alan Embree disease: "95-mile-per-hour fastball, straight as an arrow." Mazzoni's height and true three-quarters arm slot don't give him a lot of downward plane on the ball, so there's little sink. Mazzoni gave up eight home runs in 114 innings this season, and while that may not sound like a lot, remember that the NCAA has seen a tremendous drop in home run rate in 2011 due to the new bats. One number I saw suggested the drop is somewhere around 60%. And in fact, Mazzoni has one of the lower ground ball rates in the college ranks, which is none too surprising. And this is where his competitiveness gets him in trouble: he goes right after hitters, daring them to hit a fastball right down the heart of the plate. Location is suddenly extremely important, and despite Mazzoni's control, his command can give him trouble.

Second, while his curveball can be a good pitch with drop, he doesn't always spin it consistently, and sometimes it'll come out of his hand decidedly flat. He's been somewhat more consistent with the pitch, which is why his strikeout rates rose, but it's a concern. That won't help his home run rate as a pro either. His third pitch also isn't a true change but a splitter, but some scouts would prefer he develop a true change to give his velocity differentials a little more dimension. Otherwise, hitters might have too much success taking him the other way. The final issue is though the delivery is smooth, he does have late elbow pronation, which can stress the shoulder.

Here's the big question: what role does Mazzoni ultimately fill? While he has the arm strength to be a starter, I see him as more of a reliever, due to the limitations mentioned above. In the bullpen, Mazzoni will be able to move quickly, especially with his control, and the velocity will rise up to the higher end of his spectrum. He'll also be able to use his more limited arsenal to greater effect.

So I was unable to check into the open thread today due to a truly horrific work schedule, but that doesn't mean I don't have an opinion on what the Mets did. Some picks I like, others I'm ambivalent towards, but a couple of threads did emerge: this draft is a lot more athleticism- and youth-oriented than the Terrasas drafts really were. That's good. There were a couple of guys they took a chance on that will take some effort to sign—and there a good chance they won't, no matter their efforts, but it's an improvement on the old regime that seemed so hesitant to take chances.

I'll have more later, but here are the first thirty selections in table form. I'll also have the first scouting report, on second rounder Cory Mazzoni, up shortly.

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Unfortunately, I'm not going to be around today until later in the afternoon—work should be optional on MLB draft day. But when I do arrive later today, I'll be sure to let everyone know who the Mets picked and what I know about them. I may check in once or twice during the day if my schedule allows.

In the meantime, my scouting reports on first-round picks Brandon Nimmo and Michael Fulmer are available. In retrospect, I'm far warmer than I was about the Nimmo pick. Nimmo is exactly the sort of player the previous regime wouldn't have made—Terrasas almost never picked prep position players high, and the only outfielder I can think of off the top of my head is Dan Stegall, whose swing was far more problematic (and unsurprisingly ended in disaster). In that regard,it's refreshing to at least see a new approach.

I'll also post my shadow draft selections later on today. As of right now, my two picks are short Vandy righty Sonny Gray and prep righty Kyle Crick, who's a bit of a project as a starting pitching prospect, but he has a clean arm action and I really love the arm strength and the athleticism. Sometimes, you just get a feeling about a guy.

With the 44th pick the Mets grabbed another guy who might be tough to sign in Oklahoma prep righty Michael Fulmer. Fulmer has a commitment to Arkansas, and the team will have to buy him out of that commitment. I haven't heard any specifics, but it's unlikely that he'd be a bargain.

Fulmer is an attractive combination of stuff and polish. After a velocity bump this past spring, Fulmer is now throwing in the low-90s and can touch 95 from time to time. With a 6-3, 200-lb. frame, he might have a little bit more projection left in the tank, but the body is pretty mature right now. He's actually bordering on soft-bodied, and conditioning will be important for him going forward. In addition to the fastball, he throws a curve (which I've also seen referred to as a slider) and a changeup. While Fulmer's coaches even refer to the pitch as a slider, it acts more like a curve, but whatever you call it, it's impressive. He throws it with tight rotation and it has big downward break, coming in around 78. Even better: he can throw the pitch for strikes. He also has a changeup, but that's pretty much a non-factor right now, as is common with high school arms. But despite that, it's rare to see a prep curve ball as consistent as Fulmer's and it implies that he might move a little faster than most high school arms.

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And with the 13th pick of the MLB draft, the Mets take ... Brandon Nimmo? From Wyoming?

He's not totally coming out of left field, because the Mets were linked to Nimmo early in the draft preparation period, but with most analysts focused on the college arms available in the draft, Nimmo started to fall under the radar a little. I didn't even write a profile for him here because I didn't think the Mets would go overslot so early. It seems that the Mets intend to spend this year and spend big, because word on the street is that Nimmo wants a bonus of $4 million or more. But what kind of player can he be, and is he worth that kind of money?

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The draft gets underway in less than an hour, so please feel free to use this as an open thread/chat. The Mets have the 13th and 44th pick today, and they'll have a bevy of talented player to choose from in the deepest draft class in a long time. This will also be Sandy Alderson, Paul DePodesta, and Chad MacDonald's first draft at the helm of the Mets, so it'll be interesting to see what kind of philosophy they enact.

I'll provide updates here as we move along, and I'll provide analysis of the Mets' picks as soon as they happen. In case you missed it, you can find my preview here.

For those looking for a live feed of the draft via MLB's website, you can find one here.

The amateur draft officially begins tonight at 7:00. I’ve been running a series of scouting reports on players I think the Mets could end up choosing, but unfortunately I can’t guarantee that they’ll pick one of the half-dozen or so guys I’ve already covered. So, instead of just leaving it at that or trying to write full profiles on all 12 guys with a remote chance of having his name called, I’ll briefly mention them. But before we move on, here are the players we’ve already profiled:

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With the Rule 4 draft coming up, I’ve been examining some potential first-round picks for the Mets. In case you missed my previous profiles, you can find them here: Levi Michael, Taylor Jungmann, George Springer and Mikie Mahtook, Taylor Guerrieri

Sonny Gray

Position: Pitcher
School: Vanderbilt
Level: Junior
Birth Date: 11/7/89
Height: 5-11
Weight: 195 lbs.
Throws: Right
Bats: Right

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With the Rule 4 draft coming up, I’ve been examining some potential first-round picks for the Mets. In case you missed my previous profiles, you can find them here: Levi Michael, Taylor Jungmann, George Springer and Mikie Mahtook.

Taylor Guerrieri

Position: Pitcher
School: Spring Valley H.S. (SC)
Level: Senior
Birth Date: 12/1/92
Height: 6-3
Weight: 195 lbs.
Throws: Right
Bats: Right

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I’ve been running down a few potential selections the Mets could make with the 13th pick in next week’s draft. For those interested, you can find my previous profiles here: Levi Michael and Taylor Jungmann.

For this draft profile, I’m going to do something a little different. Two of the players the Mets should be considering with the pick hail from the college ranks, and both play the same position: center field. While it’s a relatively weak year for college bats, but these two guys stand out as consistent producers at the college level. Despite these similarities, they’re actually fairly different prospects. Let’s take a look.

Background:

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With the Rule 4 draft coming up, I thought now would be as good a time as any to start looking over some potential first-round picks for the Mets. In case you missed my first profile, you can find my writeup on UNC shortstop Levi Michael here.

Taylor Jungmann

Position: Pitcher
School: Texas
Level: Junior
Birth Date: 12/18/89
Height: 6-6
Weight: 220 lbs.
Throws: Right
Bats: Right

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The Rule 4 draft is less than two weeks away, and I wanted to start throwing some scouting reports out there for guys who the Mets could be targeting with the 13th overall selection. We’ll start with a guy Peter Gammons recently mentioned as a target for Chad MacDonald, who will be entering his first season as the Mets’ scouting director. It’s no secret that I was never a big fan of former director Rudy Terrasas’s drafts, so I’m especially eager to see whether a new regime means a change in draft philosophy.

Levi Michael

Position: Shortstop
School: North Carolina
Level: Junior
Birth Date: 2/9/91
Height: 5-10
Weight: 180 lbs.
Throws: Right
Bats: Both

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The Mets received Joel Youngblood from the Cardinals in exchange for infielder Mike Phillips on June 15, 1977. That same day they also traded away Tom Seaver and Dave Kingman. Hard to believe Youngblood didn’t capture any headlines, right?

In some ways it should have been impossible to ignore Joel Youngblood. He was a good-looking kid, at least until he removed his cap to reveal a prematurely receding hairline. And he had personality too, possessing an amiable-but-intense energy that frequently went over well both with fans and teammates. As Craig Swan said, "He was definitely a character." Like many southern players, he was an avid hunter, and he would grow a beard in September to mark the transition from baseball season to hunting season. Swan once made the mistake of going hunting with him. Upon realizing that Youngblood just wanted someone to flush out turkeys—a task Swan balked at, saying he wasn’t a dog—he never went again. He was even more memorable on the field. Originally a shortstop from a Houston-area high school, Youngblood had been the Reds’ second-round pick in the winter phase of the 1970 draft. We’re often taught that major league utility players are born solely from grit: while short on talent, they always run hard to first base, they slide in to second harder than anyone, and they never fail to eat their Wheaties. They make up for their shortcomings through sheer heart. Youngblood was different; he oozed talent. He was fast and had raw power. He had a real howitzer for an arm. And his best trait of all may have been his batspeed, frequently fawned over by scouts and coaches throughout his development. He could have been a star.

The problem was he was what prospect mavens call a tweener. He was strong, but he was a little on the short side, without a true power hitter’s frame. He was fast, but the speed wasn’t blazing, so he didn’t really grade out as a true center fielder. Nor were his hands good enough or his feet quick enough for any but the most optimistic to consider him a long-term shortstop. In fact, it would have been a stretch to even call him a future second baseman or third baseman. So Youngblood didn’t really have the hands or feet of an infielder, the speed of a center fielder, or the typical power of a corner outfielder or first baseman. At the same time, the bat was special enough to warrant everyday play somewhere. It was just a matter of where, and that is something Mets GM Joe McDonald should have been thankful for; otherwise, he’d never have had the opportunity to trade for Youngblood on that eventful day in 1977.

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"When I said that Carney Lansford was an awful third baseman, I didn’t mean that he was as bad as Bobby Bonilla. Bonilla, listed at 240 pounds, has played about 8,000 career innings at third base, so I suppose that makes him a third baseman, and if you sent him into space a few times I suppose that would make him an astronaut, but apart from that, he was no more a third baseman than he was an astronaut. But he never gave up; he never let the position beat him, like a lot of people do."

That comes from Bonilla’s comment in The New Bill James Historical Abstract, and it’s one of my favorite passages in the book. It’s certainly a funny comment, but that isn’t why I love it so much (well, it’s not the only reason). Here’s what I find so appealing: in one brief comment about his defense, James has somehow encapsulated the entire Bobby Bonilla experience. It was always easy to watch Bonilla and become so absorbed with what he couldn’t do that it was easy to miss all the ways he was actually making the club better.

Problems of perception began following Bonilla before his Mets career even got underway. After top-three MVP finishes in 1990 and 1991, there was a belief that Bonilla was an elite player. In retrospect, this idea was fairly silly. Voters were merely enthralled by high RBI totals generated by playing in the same lineup as stars Barry Bonds and Andy Van Slyke, as well as solid regulars like Sid Bream, Jay Bell, Jeff King, and Don Slaught. Because of this, when Bonilla hit free agency after 1991, teams seemed to mistake Bonilla for Bonds, a proposition that was as silly then as it appears today.

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He was the odd duck of the 1986 Mets’ rotation, the one who didn’t quite belong. He wasn’t homegrown like Doc Gooden or Rick Aguilera, nor was he a young pitcher shrewdly bought on the cheap, like Ron Darling or Sid Fernandez. And despite being the oldest by three years, he wasn’t a part of the 1985 rotation either, having been brought over from Boston during the offseason. He wasn’t a power pitcher in any way shape or form, unlike each of his fellows—Roger Craig once said that he "couldn’t cut me if he hit me on the lip with a fastball." No, Bob Ojeda didn’t blend in at all, but he might have been the best pitcher the Mets had in their best season.

While the other four starters had relatively easy paths to the big leagues—all were high draft picks who quickly evolved into well-regarded prospects to various degrees—Ojeda had trouble just getting noticed. He was left-handed, but he was also short, slight, and had trouble cracking the upper 80s with his fastball. Scouts weren’t terribly impressed. Two years toiling at a community college in Visalia, California, surely didn’t help, and Ojeda went completely undrafted in 1978. He was signed as a free agent by the Red Sox on a scout’s recommendation based on a performance several years earlier, one in which Ojeda had no difficulty getting noticed for once: "I hit six batters in a row," he recalled years later. "Maybe that’s why he recommended me—I wasn’t afraid to pitch inside."

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A few quick thoughts on the Eddie Kunz-Allan Dykstra swap:

Eddie Kunz, as a pitcher, does nothing right: he can’t throw strikes, he doesn’t have a good enough breaking pitch to get strikeouts, he doesn’t have great stamina, his ground ball rates last year weren’t anything special, and his command of the written word is appalling. Any opportunity to get anything in return for him should be seized upon; Kunz was never going to be anything in the Mets organization.

Allan Dykstra, on the other hand, was a very interesting and often divisive prospect back in 2008, an odd draft class in that a ton of collegiate corner infielders went in the first round—Yonder Alonso, Justin Smoak, Brett Wallace, David Cooper, Ike Davis, and Dykstra. Dykstra had perhaps the best batting eye in his draft class, and his performance at Wake Forest was awe-inspiring. Many sabermetric types fell in love—2008 was the first draft I live blogged, and several fans in the audience vastly preferred him to Ike Davis.

But his swing was bizarre. Scouts felt there was no way he'd adapt to wood bats, that both the batting average and the power wouldn't show in the pros. And he needed both; he was a "third baseman" in college, but he had a strange body type, very bottom-heavy, marking him as a definite pro first baseman. I was not quite so harsh in my criticism, but I did grade him as a second-rounder with a chance to go in the supplemental if a team liked him. I had him ranked last among the six first basemen, well behind Davis. When the Padres snagged him with their first-round pick, my jaw dropped.

Thus far, the scouts have been right, though a balky hip lingering from his high school days has been partially to blame. An early inability to hit for contact at all—he hit .226 in his first full season—led to swing overhauls and depressed expectations. Even worse, the power many hoped would come from a man his size just hasn’t manifested.

Some might point to last year’s performance as an improvement; they’d probably be right, but it’s a very small one and it still adds up to a thoroughly mediocre final package. Dykstra hit an improved .241/.372/.438 last year, but the California League might be the best hitter’s league in all of baseball, even if Lake Elsinore does not host one of its most batter-friendly parks. Furthermore, Dykstra was not young for the league, and some numbers point to more trouble ahead: his raw walk rate, while still excellent, dropped considerably from the year before, and his strikeout rate jumped from a terrible 25.1% to an abysmal 31.6%. It's not a promising combination.

Maybe Sandy Alderson and company know something I don’t, or maybe Dykstra really aced the essay section of the test, but when you consider Dykstra’s age, surroundings, position, and lack of athleticism, it’s difficult to see someone who will succeed in Double-A. I don’t think he’s any more valuable to an organization than Eddie Kunz despite being two years younger, but I’ve been wrong before, and sometimes just not being Eddie Kunz is enough.

Added by Eric:

I asked Paul DePodesta for his thoughts on Dykstra (we know he liked him in 2008) and he had this to say about the patient first baseman:

"He’s always controlled the zone and has significant raw power. Even when he hasn’t hit for average, he’s been a productive offensive player. An important driver of the deal was that we have a better opportunity for Dykstra here than they had for him in San Diego, and they have a better opportunity for Eddie [Kunz] than we had here."

As first reported by Jon Heyman, the Mets have fired Rudy Terrasas, their director of amateur scouting since 2006. Terrasas had one year remaining on his contract.

As anyone who's followed my draft coverage here can guess, I have not been an admirer of Terrasas's work. I liked his first two selections in 2006 (pitchers Kevin Mulvey and Joe Smith), but the rest of the draft was a huge head-scratcher for me, beginning with John Holdzkom, who is still floundering in the low minors after a series of injuries. And while 2006's draft was merely confusing, 2007's was an obvious disaster, as the team selected the now-infamous "Ruff" Eddie Kunz, a college reliever with a so-so track record, with their first selection.

From that point forward, it was very much a mixed bag with Terrasas, who saw some guys succeed against expectations and others sink immediately. He drafted Ike Davis, Reese Havens, Kirk Nieuwenhuis, and Sean Ratliff in 2008, but also drafted Brad Holt and Dock Doyle (though I liked both selections at the time). I thought that Terrasas had perhaps turned a corner, but the 2009 draft was yet another unmitigated catastrophe, highlighted by the fifth-round selection of Damien Magnifico, a pitcher with only one asset and a price tag nobody wanted. Some other selections I didn't mind as much, but the team still walked away without first-, fifth, or sixth-round picks. Much of that falls on Terrasas's shoulders. The early results for the 2010 draft are more positive, but the oddness of the draft is startling, due to Terrasas's reliance on older college players with some degree of talent but poor track records.

In some ways, Terrasas was dealt a harsh hand. The Mets clearly didn't want to spend on the draft, and that makes any director's job more difficult. But there are ways to have successful cheap drafts, and I don't think Terrasas was able to do enough with even the marginal resources he possessed. It's not surprising at all to see him shipped out.

No word yet on who his replacement will be. There's a possibility that Paul DePodesta will take direct control over the situation, but he's untested in such a role and might be best served in a more supervisory capacity. Expect lots of speculation that Oakland's prodigal son Grady Fuson will take the job. Truth be told, I'm not terribly impressed with his recent work either, so I'd probably prefer a different face. Either way, I think the Mets' scouting department got a little better today.

I’ll begin with something of a long, drawn-out disclaimer: I have a high tolerance for pain and an awful lot of patience.

For those who don’t know—I certainly don’t keep it a secret—my favorite football team is the Detroit Lions. And for those who don’t follow pro football, the Lions have been terrible for the longest time. In 2000, after a 9-7 season, owner William Clay Ford hired television analyst Matt Millen to serve as team president and general manager. From 2001 through 2007, Millen’s Lions went 31-81, good for a .277 winning percentage. When he was fired in 2008, the Lions were in the midst of the NFL’s first 0-16 season. Unlike some other terrible GMs you can think of—Isiah Thomas, Mike Milbury—Millen didn’t do anything right. He had no experience as an administrator or negotiator. He couldn’t draft, famously spending four of five consecutive first-round picks on wide receivers, and his track record after the first round was nothing short of hideous. He hired and fired head coaches left and right. He hired coordinators those head coaches didn’t want. He refused to accept advice from his coaches as to what kinds of players fit their schemes. He made bad free agent signings and bad trades. He once shouted a slur at a former player in front of members of the media. He was even terrible at showing up at the office. The reason? He commuted to work. From Pennsylvania. And for all this, Matt Millen was the highest paid executive in the sport, earning a salary of $5 million a season. By comparison, Bill Parcells made $3 million. He lasted nearly eight years. I cannot fathom it despite living through it.

Now, I’m not married, and I don’t have any kids, so I feel free to say this (if also a little guilty). The day Matt Millen was fired was one of more joyous days in my life. I had a smile a mile wide. I danced as I walked. People I barely knew congratulated me, wanted to shake my hand, told me how happy they were for me. It was a moment of liberation, one that almost any sports fan can appreciate even if they never experience it. For one day, everyone in America was a Lions fan.

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Tonight’s game threatened to be just as dull as yesterday’s and I was desperately searching for something to write about. The Mets offense once again was doing nothing. Dillon Gee was pitching well but but not well enough to make up for it. Nobody really retaliated to make up for Chase Utley’s slide the night before. The first six innings were over in a little over an hour and a half. But then Lucas Duda came to the rescue, knocking in three as the Mets scored five seventh-inning runs en route to a 5-2 victory over the Phillies. The win snapped two streaks: the Phillies’ 11-game winning streak and the Mets’ six-game losing streak. It, alongside the Braves’ victory over the Nationals today, also reduced the likelihood of Met fans having to watch a Phillies celebration on the air tomorrow, as the Phils’ magic number remained stuck on two.

Early on, I didn’t think the Mets had a snowball’s chance in hell of winning the game. Like Friday’s game, Philadelphia drew blood early, this time with a Ryan Howard two-run bomb with two out in the first. But Gee, to his credit, didn’t rattle and immediately struck out Jayson Werth. Those two runs were the only ones Mets pitchers allowed. But despite the solid pitching, that 2-0 lead seemed like a two-mile chasm on Jupiter. The Mets bats haven’t gotten anything going lately, and the same was true through the first six innings tonight. Kyle Kendrick—not exactly Roy Halladay, Roy Oswalt, or Cole Hamels out there—was looking lights out. Mets hitters were swinging early and often again, just as they had against Joe Blanton on Friday. Through six innings, Kendrick hadn’t walked a batter and had only thrown 64 pitches.

That all changed in the seventh. Well, Kendrick was still being efficient, but the Mets did more with it. Carlos Beltran led off the inning with a single. David Wright hit into a fielder’s choice, and Ike Davis singled before Angel Pagan hit a sharp ground ball too first that bounced off Howard’s glove and sailed into right. The bases were then loaded for Josh Thole, who singled sharply to right to bring home the Mets’ first run. The Phillies pulled Kendrick in favor of Chad Durbin, and Jerry Manuel did a little maneuvering of his own, calling on Duda to hit for Ruben Tejada. That’s why Jerry earns the big bucks. And Duda came through, smacking the ball into the left-center gap to clear the bases. and give the Mets a 4-2 lead. After Gee struck out, Jose Reyes doubled home Duda for the Mets’ fifth and final run.

But as nice as it was to see Duda with a big hit, it was just as nice to see Gee excel against a solid Philadelphia lineup. He wasn’t extraordinary—five strikeouts, though a career high, is hardly dominant—but he got ahead of hitters, didn’t walk anyone, and kept his pitch count manageable. It’s certainly the sort of performance that inspires some degree of hope.

The rubber game is tomorrow, as Pat Misch takes on Cole Hamels at 1:35.

Poem by Howard Megdal

Though now among my lesser thrills
It's good to see Mets beat the Phils
Five-run outburst played the Grinch
To the Phillies' home-crowd title clinch
Philly fans will likely brood
And quickly turn to comfort food
And concurrently to booze
And thinking there's a word spelled "Youse"
While word, with Mets in mind, was coined
We'll all enjoy our schadenfreunde

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It was one frightfully dull game. It was so dull that the most noteworthy play of the game was a slide into second base. Thnkfully, it was quick: the game lasted just a little over two hours. But what made the whole thing worse was that it looked like the Phillies fans at Citizens' Bank Park were having such a wonderful time despite the boredom, in part because they won, but also because results still mean something to them. I remember how that feels, and I miss it. Maybe tomorrow I’ll try pretending the game still matters. Or maybe I’ll just cut my losses and take a nap instead.

Anyway, the game got off to a rocky start on the first pitch, when R.A. Dickey served up a long ball to all-round good guy Shane Victorino. Right from the get-go the game felt out of reach. It was obvious that Dickey didn’t have his best stuff: he was missing high often early, though he settled down a little in that regard later on. After giving up the homer to Victorino, Dickey promptly allowed a single to Placido Polanco and walked Chase Utley. Neither man scored, but it just set the tone for Dickey’s outing. A second run came home in the second, when Wilson Valdez, that paragon of offensive fortitude, singled past a diving Jose Reyes and advanced to second on Joe Blanton’s sacrifice bunt. Victorino came back to the plate and doubled to left, plating Valdez. Three cheers for Shane!

The Mets briefly restored a pang of hope in the fourth when Ike Davis singled—Ike was a bright spot once again, collecting two singles and a double we’ll touch upon later—and Angel Pagan hit a no-doubt-about-it homer to deep right, tying the game at two.

The problem: that was pretty much it for the rest of the game. The lineup did zilch against Blanton, who allowed just the two runs over seven innings, walking one and striking out six. Most impressive: he needed only 74 pitches to complete those seven innings. Mets hitters were swinging often and early, and it really played right into Charlie Manuel’s sweaty palms; he got to save both his bullpen and his starter’s arm. The Phils took the lead again in the bottom half of the fourth, when Carlos Ruiz singled home Raul Ibanez, putting Philadelphia up 3-2.

The fifth inning provided the game’s only real controversy, when Chase Utley slid hard into second baseman Ruben Tejada to break up a double play. In my opinion, the slide was not dirty: he kept his spikes down and clearly wasn’t trying to hurt anyone. It was late and pretty unnecessary from a team that needs a healthy Utley more than a victory tonight. What it did cause, however, was an obsession in the booth as to whether the Mets needed to—and would—retaliate. But they never found the opportunity to return the favor to Utley at second, and Pedro Feliciano didn’t give Utley any chin music when he strode to the plate for the final time. For the most part, the slide and its aftermath was a non-event.

The game got a little more interesting the top of the ninth, when the Mets made a valiant effort to tie the game. Ike Davis hit a one-out double off the W.B. Mason sign in left—a ball Gary Cohen incorrectly called a home run initially—and advanced to third on a sac fly by Pagan. Josh Thole walked, and Jerry Manuel shockingly didn’t let Joaquin Arias bat for himself with the winning run 90 feet away. Instead, he sent Jesus Feliciano to the plate, who quickly hit a comebacker to Brad Lidge to end the game.

But it didn’t end the game, because Josh Thole had called time so he could be taken out for pinch-runner Luis Castillo. Charlie Manuel then screamed his head off at the umps for a few minutes then, apparently forgetting that Jesus Feliciano isn’t very good. Feliciano struck out two pitches later. The loss was the Mets’ sixth straight, and the win the Phillies’ eleventh straight.

I’m desperately hoping for something a little more lively tomorrow. In fact, l’m going to try to imagine ways in which the Mets can retaliate against Utley. Dillon Gee, tomorrow’s starter, isn’t exactly a flamethrower, so a dirty play at second may be the way to go. So I’ll suggest the Mets punt defense (hell, punt offense, too) and just play their eight largest players. I’d like to see a lineup like this:

Gotta get the largest guys in there, and Duda’s the largest, so bat him leadoff to get him the most opportunities to reach second. R.A. Dickey gets the nod so he gets the chance to stand up for the guy who took a bruise while he was on the mound. And Oliver Perez can serve as a last-resort kamikaze option. Or maybe a first-resort kamikaze option. I want to see guys sliding into second on home run trots, stretching infield hits into doubles. Ruben Tejada requires vengeance!

Poem by Howard Megdal

The standings change, the games stay static
Phils win it close, but win's emphatic
Utley's aggressive approach to second base
On a date, would have gotten him a slapped face
Or brushed back by a self-respecting team
But with Mets, for revenge, all we can do is dream

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