Quit Clamoring To Clip Carlos

By Jack Flynn
Posted Wednesday, May 28, 2008

OK, Mets fans, listen up: Carlos Delgado is going to be the first baseman for the New York Mets for the rest of the 2008 season, and there’s not a damn thing any of you can do about it.

I know you think you have a brilliant trade proposal up your sleeve, or that you think some minor-leaguer could do a better job than Delgado has at a much lower cost. You might even think that releasing Delgado will “send a message” to the rest of the team that losing baseball will no longer be tolerated.

I’m sorry, but you’re wrong. There’s no one move that’s going to snap this team out of its season-long funk, and at this point parting ways with Carlos Delgado will only do more harm than good.

So quit begging Mets' general manager Omar Minaya to bench Delgado, or to release him or to trade him. It’s not going to happen. You don’t have the solution to this problem and neither do I. At this point, the only thing left for you to do is cross your fingers and offer a silent prayer that Delgado’s bat will warm up and begin to resemble that of a league average ballplayer. There simply aren’t any other alternatives.

For one thing, there are absolutely no indications that Minaya would even consider trading him at this point. The organization seems to think that Delgado will eventually turn the corner at the plate and that their patience with him will be rewarded. It’s not like his slow start in 2008 is without precedence, anyway; the exact same thing happened last season.

On May 28, 2007 Delgado was hitting .234/.306/.359 with five home runs in 184 at-bats. His batting average and on base percentage are down roughly 20 points from the same time period last year, but his slugging percentage and his home run total are up this season. From that point forward in 2007 Delgado’s numbers improved – a .271/.347/.494 line with 19 home runs in 354 at-bats. It’s a trend in line with most of his career – Delgado has generally heated up in the summer months before cooling down a little bit in September, but still producing at a rate higher than his April and May numbers. Mets fans will have to hope that formula holds true again this year.

Besides, who do you think wants Delgado on their team right now? The only two Senior Circuit squads with a theoretical opening for a first baseman right now are Pittsburgh and San Francisco. Those two teams are going nowhere fast, so there would be no reason for the Pirates or the Giants to acquire Delgado’s services for this season or beyond. There certainly wouldn’t be any reason for either of those teams to give the Mets anything resembling a competent baseball player in exchange for Delgado, even if New York foots the bill for the rest of Delgado’s contract.

Mets fans playing Barstool GM generally try to send Delgado to the American League anyway. Maybe the Seattle Mariners would swap him for Richie Sexson. Maybe the Tampa Bay Rays would like to add Delgado as a designated hitter. The Baltimore Orioles, Cleveland Indians, Kansas City Royals, Oakland Athletics and Texas Rangers are all having problems at first base two months into the season; maybe they would be enticed by Delgado’s bat.

None of these scenarios make a lot of sense, though. The Mets have even less use for Sexson, a poor man’s Dave Kingman who can no longer reliably bat over .200, than they do for Delgado. The money is roughly an equal match ($16 million for Delgado this year, $14 million for Sexson), but Shea Stadium is still death on right-handed power hitters, negating what’s left of Sexson’s minimal value.

The Rays are one of the biggest surprises in baseball and jostling with the Boston Red Sox for the top spot in the American League. They’re doing it with a $44 million payroll and without one regular position player or starting pitcher over the age of 30. And no, they don’t need some veteran leadership, either – the Rays’ bench included part-time designated hitters Cliff Floyd and Eric Hinske that are long enough in the tooth to guide the precocious Rays. Long story short, Delgado is a not a good fit for a team that is doing just fine without him.

The Orioles, Royals and A’s have no reason to add Delgado to their mix – he wouldn’t be a part of their next good team anyway. The Rangers are planning to move oft-injured Hank Blalock to first base and they’re already trying to protect oft-injured Milton Bradley by letting him DH, so there’s no room for Delgado in Arlington. Travis Hafner and Ryan Garko are struggling almost as mightily for the Indians as Delgado is for the Mets, but Hafner just signed a four-year extension set to begin in 2009 and Garko isn’t even arbitration-eligible yet.

So unless the Mets are willing to take on an even worse contract, there is simply no trade market for Delgado’s services. Omar Minaya has his shortcomings as a general manager, but the last thing the Mets need is for him to start acting like Isiah Thomas.

Now I suppose the Mets could bench Delgado and promote someone internally to take over at first base, or release him and eat what’s left of his $12 million contract. (Delgado gets $16 million this year, but $4 million of it comes from the Marlins.). But we wrote about the wasteland that is the New Orleans Zephyrs roster a couple of weeks ago, and only the recently arrived Val Pascucci bears even the slightest mention as a possibility for replacing Delgado on a full-time basis.

Pascucci is hitting the ball well and has made three appearances at first base for New Orleans, but hasn’t faced major league pitching since enjoying a cup of coffee with the Montreal Expos (remember them?) in 2004. I’m not very optimistic that Pascucci is going to become the breakout star of the 2008 season. The Mets have a few intriguing options at Double-A Binghamton, one of whom (Nick Evans) is already being used an emergency left fielder with the big club. Evans, Mike Carp and Dan Murphy are hitting well in the Eastern League, but none of them have a major-league ready bat or glove.

The Mets have played a lot of bad baseball this season, and Carlos Delgado has contributed more than his share of it. But they can’t do better than him inside the organization, and they can’t do better than him by going outside the organization. So suck it up, Mets fans, and start looking to other spots on the diamond as you continue hollering for changes.

 

Read more from Jack Flynn at his blog, Productive Outs and Crackerjack.