Former Met, Timo Perez, had a huge game last night as he hit for the cycle while his team, Licey, won 16-2. That was really the big news of the night, a Mets minor leaguer Mendez also had a good night, and the rest of the Mets didn't fare so well. Here are the stat lines with the team name first, followed by the player name, and the stats:
     Licey- Anderson Hernandez 1-5, 2B, R
     Licey- Timo Perez 4-5, 4 R, 2B, 3B, HR, RBI
     Gigantes- Mendez 2-4, R, 2B, RBI
     Lara- Alfonzo 0-5
     Caracas- Fmart 0-3, R
Timo Perez's performance actually landed him on Sports Center today as the number 2 play of the day, behind Tebow and the BCS Championship game. Fmart continued to struggle for a third straight day, but he did get a run, so thats nice. Here's hoping that he can shake this off soon because its hurting his team which has now fallen to 3-3 and is danger of not advancing to the next round of the playoffs. Another surprising string of stats is Hernandez has been struggling the last few games. This is the winter, this is when he is supposed to be the best ball player around.

Several players made it official today that they will be playing for their respective countries, including a current and former Met. Former Met, (or really former Met prospect), Matt Lindstrom, has accepted an invite to play for team USA. He will be joined by Roy Oswalt who recently agreed to comeback and by Curtis Granderson who also agreed today that he will play for team USA. If you are going to root for team USA this year, you have to happy because they are really putting a world class team out there. They have Wright, C. Jones, Granderson, Sizemore, Youkilis, and Pedoria already signed on. They would be even better if a pitcher today didn't turn down an invite. They tried to get Cliff Lee to join the squad today, but he declined the invite.

Another current Met made it official today that he will play for his team again and that would be Pedro Feliciano, who will play again for Puerto Rico. Last time he didn't allow a run in any of his appearences. I actually have a unique peice of his from the classic. A couple of months ago, I purchased for a very reasonable price of $25, Feliciano's Locker Room tag from the Classic. Its very odd that such an interesting piece of memorbilla would be that cheap, especially when compared to the prices of other objects that were beign auctioned off. In other Mets WBC news, Reyes, Santana and Krod still all want to play for their respective countries. I remember reading a piece not too long ago that said that said that the Mets brass is not to fond of the idea of Santana playing in the WBC so he can continue to heal from his offseason procedures.

The Market is whirling right now, so every day I am giving quick updates. Here are the quick notes before opinions and analysis:
      Hoffman Signs with Brewers (Beating out the Dodgers)
      Smoltz signs with Red Sox
      Baldelli close to signing with Red Sox
      Mets made an offer to Redding
Starting off with the Mets. What I have been hearing about referring to Redding, they have offered Redding and are making one to Wolf, both of these for the fifth spot, while Lowe and Perez are going for the final spot (which could be any number 2-4). The only thing I'm upset with is that the Mets have ranked Redding above Wolf, when I feel many Mets fans would rank them the opposite way. That is probably because Wolf would be able to demand more money than Redding.
The Red Sox started to make market noise, not in the way the fans probably wanted, but it would be nice to not have Smoltz in the division anymore. The downside to that is that the Braves will probably be pursuing Lowe harder now, and I really hope the Mets step up the plate to get him. I am a big fan of Baldelli, and I hope he does well in Boston (If he signs there, it still isn't clear at this moment in time).
All of a sudden this week, the market for Hoffman started to heat up. The Brewers were pursuing him, the Dodgers were, and the Dodgers were actually the leaders to about last night because it was thought that Hoffman wanted to stay on the coast. I guess the real loser here is the Padres. They are trying to rebuild, but couldn't trade Peavy and now with Hoffman signing with the Brewers, they real couldn't commit to rebuilding in the right way, which will make this season even tougher.

Mets and former Mets had a lot of action in the Winter Leagues last night, and two came up with big performances. Stoner clinched a spot in the next round of the PR playoffs for Mayaquez last night with his amazing starting pitching and Rincon closed out a game for Lara last night. Without further ado, here are the stat lines (Team name first):
     Mayaguez- Stoner (2-1), W, 6.0 IP, 2 H, 3 BB, 3 K, 1.50 ERA (over 5 games)
     Caguas- Casanova 0-4
     Lara- Alfonzo 1-3, R, BB
     Lara- Rincon 1.0 IP, K, Save (2)
     Caracas- Fmart 0-5
     La Guaira- Chavez 1-2, R, 3 BB
     Gigantes- Mendez 1-4, R
How good was Stoner? When we first looked at him last season, it was unclear if he was a prospect, but this winter between Arizona, and now PR, he is really turning it around. I am very curious to see how he does in minors at the start of the season because when the Mets need spot starters, Stoner could be gearing himself up to be that person. Rincon has also started to make himself look more line a bullpen pitcher. Him and Padilla could be dark horses to be sitting in that pen during April of next year.

In the 2008 Baseball Draft, the Mets selected Reese Havens, a shortstop/infielder out of the University of South Carolina. Despite his struggles this past season with Brooklyn, mainly due to injuries, he is receiving praise and hype. Baseball America named him number 8 on the Mets top 2009 Prospect List. He only played in 23 games this season, and in 85 AB he had 13 R, 21 H, 6 2B, 2 3B, 3 HR, 11 RBI, 3 SB, .247 BA, .340 OBP. His extra base hit to hit ratio here is pretty nice, especially for a shortened first minor league season. Out of his 21 hits, he has 11 extra base hits, including a nice distrubution over doubles, triples, and homers. The Baseball Cube gives him the following scouting report:
     Power 82
     Speed 14
     Contact 57
     Patience 87
(The Scores are Based out of 100)

Before playing professional, he played in 2006 and in 2007 between college and in the Cape Cod League. In 2006 he batted .259, and 2007, he batted .274. Then he went to the Cape Cod league where he batted .315 over the 2007 summer and he really turned it up in 2008 batting .360. So there is a positive progression. He also has had a huge increase of walks going 30 in 06, 21 in 07 and 58 in 08. The Power numbers have jumped as well going 4 homeruns, to 5, and this past season he knocked in 18. His RBI's have increased over time as well, but not as dramatically, 40, 43 and then last year 57. He played for the University of South Carolina.

When he was in high school, he was a highly touted prospect hitting .530 with 48 RBI's his senior year. In 2005 he was drafted by the Rockies in the 29th round (867 overall). MLB.com says that this was mostly due to his "strong commitment" to South Carolina, which he fulfilled. He was going to play in the Hawaiian Winter League, but due to his injuries during the season, the Mets brass thought it would be better if he continued rehabing and staying on their program. The real test of abilities of Havens will be when he plays a full minor league season without injuries.

Over the last several days I have been watching the MLBN and I must say, it is great for Baseball fans. This is the time of the year that Sportscenter is annoying because they don't show baseball or anything about baseball except for that short 30 teams in 30 days segment. The great thing about the MLBN is the origninal programing is entertaining. While I might not always agree with what is said on the Hot Stove News Show, they do provide Baseball news, even the small news, and they do break it down. Originally, I didn't think I was going to like Prime 9, their countdown show of the 9 best whatever the topic is, in the modern history of baseball (post 1901), but it is actually a good show. (This past Monday they counted down the top 9 Cernterfielders and top 9 homers).

The other shows are entertaining as well. In Cathedrals of Baseball, not only do they go to the current stadium and show all of the archetecture, the lights, and the food, they also go around the town and show all of the former baseball spots in the city and show what is there now. The episode I caught was about Seattle and they showed where the last AAA team to play there is now a Lowes, but there is a spot outside where they still mark where homeplate is.

Overall, its great to have a channel to get that Baseball fix, and to start gettting pumped for the upcoming season.

There wasn't much winter league action yesterday, but for the teams that did play, I searched the box scores to find a few highlights. Both the PR and the DR Leagues both had no games yesterday, and there are very few Mets in the Mexican League, so the League to find stats in yesterday was restricted to the Venezuela League. Here are a few stats:
     Caracas- Fmart 0-3
     La Guaira- Chavez 1-4, 2R, BB
     Lara- Alfonzo 1-4
Like I said, not much was going on. But there are few stories to update on. For example, there are three Mexican teams that are about to move up to the next level of playoff play. Licey beat Caracas which means they are starting to close the playoff picture in Venezuela as well. On stat note of things that actually happened, Fmart started to cool off, which is alright you can't be on fire every day. Chavez is continuing his great winter, and it still amazes me that Alfonzo is still playing.

There was already one article dedicated to how busy this week has been, and looking back on it, not only were there a few omissions, but a lot more has gone on as this week gets more hectic while unsigned agents try to find find a team quickly before spring training starts. The big piece of news, that really isn't news, that was left out of the first entry today was that Tex was introduced as the newest Yankee today. It feels like he signed a long time ago, and it was easy to forget that he was never introduced. In case there was any question, he will be wearing number 25.

In other news, Jerry Harriston Jr signed with the Reds, the Orioles signed Koji Uehara, the Yankees signed Angel Berroa, and Giambi's deal is for 4.5 million over one year with a 5 million buyout for 2010 with a 1 million buyout. Know what you are doing through 2018, well Mike Scioscia does. He signed a contract through 2018. Now he has a great resume in LA. He signed in 2000, won the World Series 2002, and has won 4 of the last 5 AL West Division championships. I feel that usually its a bad idea to sign management for more than 3 or 4 years at a time. He is going to be a staple in Anaheim, if he isn't already.

The only signing updated I want to spend a little extra time is Koji Uehara for the Orioles. He is an 8 time All Star in Japan (34 years of age) and the first player from Japan to put on the Orioles uniform. Pitching has been a huge problem with the Orioles over the last few seasons, and really, they have the offense to be competiteve, but lack the rotation and the pen to back it up. So far this offseason, their solution has been Mark Hendrickson, which is really a solution at all. Uehara doesn't seem like the ideal solution as many have projected him to struggle in the AL (but have slight success in the NL) and will need help to keep his ERA at 4.00. Luckilly for the Orioles, he eats a lot of innings, which will help their pen, which is also terrible.

This has already been a busy baseball week, and it is only Tuesday. Yesterday, two Outfielders fell off of the market as Pat Burrell and Milton Bradley were both signed. Today, that trend continued as not only were there signings, there was a ton of baseball news. On the side of the signings, Giambi is close to signing a contract that will send him back to Oakland and the Indians are close to a deal with Pavano. We also learned today that Pettitte is at slight odds with the Yankees, Shelly Duncan got designated for assignment, Codero is going to throw this week (before schedule), and the Brewers are interested in Hoffman.

So there is a lot going on here. Starting with Cordero. I have been for the Mets signing Cordero since the start of the offseason, and the Mets with a few other teams are interested. Now that the Mets have a setup man and a closer, Cordero doesn't have to have a big role in the pen, so it would be low pressure, and he could start to get stronger, and really eventually give the Mets a three headed monster at the top of pen (which seems to be the theme in football with the Giants and Ravens with their running backs). With the Athletics, its interesting the moves they have been making this offseason. They brought in a big back with Holliday and now they have protection for him with Giambi. They shouldn't be expecting vintage Giambi, and I don't think they are, but this is a good move to give their offense something. Besides the Angels, the Athletics can make a move above the Mariners and the Rangers with protecting their offense. The Indians continue their strange offseason with the signing of Pavano. They got DeRosa to help their bats, and now they will be giving two former pitchers shots at stardom again with closer Kerry Wood, and now with Pavano. It would be fantastic if he re-starts his carear there if, for nothing else, the story line of the Yankees wasting money.

For the most part, last night was a slow night for current Mets, former Mets and future Mets in the Winter Leagues last night, but that doesn't stop us from reporting scores. (First word is team name, then player and stat line):
     Caracas- Fmart, 0-1, 2 BB
     Licey- A Hernandez, 1-4, 2BB
     Aguilas- Victor Diaz, 0-4
     Caguas- Casanova, 0-3, BB
     Ponce- Cancel. 2-4, R
     Ponce- P Feliciano, 1.1 IP, H, BB, 2K
Before getting to the important players on this list, I couldn't resist putting Diaz up. Do you remember him? It feels like such a long time since I've heard his name. Anyway, the big name here is obiviosly Feliciano, who could be on the chopping block as many of his fellow pen mates have already been traded alway, he has to defend his spot. So far in the PR post season he has a 1.69 ERA and last night, his stats were very good. That is the type of performance we expect out of Feliciano, of course, we don't always get it. Even on a bad night, Fmart still impresses. He doesn't get a hit, but he gets on base twice, he is a monster. After that great performance by Casnaova a few days ago, he has seemed to calmed down with two straight 0 for something days. Cancel, second straight good performance.

According to MLB Trade Rumors, Burrell is close to signing a two year, 16 million dollar deal with the Rays. This is not only a great deal for the Rays, but a great deal for the Mets. Burrell has done the Mets in many times in his carear, including many times this season, now they don't have to worry about it. The Mets don't have to worry about Burrell treating Citi like he did Shea and its just one less player to worry about with the Phillies. It has been clear for a while that Burrell wasn't going to resign with the Phillies, but this make its certain that Burrell is out of the NL and the NL East.

Now on the side for the Rays. This is a good move for them. Burrell doesn't have to play in the field, he can take the DH spot. I am a big fan of Floyd, but he is declining, and this is a good bat to pick up and make that tough lineup even tougher. He also fulfills another function that Floyd brought to the team in Veteran leadership. It is also interesting to have him on the team because he won a World Series ring against the Rays (he probably knows a lot of the downfalls of the Rays as a team).

The only downside of this signing for the Rays is that it still doesn't fullfill the Rays biggest need. Depending on where the place Price and how Percival heals, the Rays will need a closer, and there are a few still left on the market, like Hoffman. If the Rays get a closer to hold down that pen, then the team will be set (they also have internal options for closer, like Balfor, who is as good as anyone when he is on, and he plays with a lot of passion).

Keeping up with the last few days, I went through the box scores of yesterday's game and pulled out a few Mets and former Mets that played yesterday. Someone commented on the Mets Merized Online version of this post yesterday that they wish these games were on the MLB network. That would be a great idea. I remember last year once the actual Carribean Series started, Comcast Sportsnet started to show the games. The games being played right now are to get into the Carribean Series. Here are yesterdays lines (First word is team name, then player, then stats):
     Lara- Edgardo Alfonzo, 2-4, 2B, RBI, BB
     Lara- Juan Rincon, 1.0 IP, H, 2K
     La Guaira- Endy Chavez, 0-4
     Ponce- Cancel 1-5, RBI
     Ponce- Padilla, W, 1.0 IP, K
     Caguas- Casanova, 0-3
Good day yesteday for Mets bullpen players from last year. Rincon got the save and had a good solid inning while Padilla picked up his second late inning win in a row. I talked about how Padilla has always seemed 4A to me, but the Mets will need more arms in the pen to back up Putz and Krod, and if he can keep this going, through Spring, and through parts of the MLB/MiLB season, then he can find himself in New York for the latter half of the season.

Now that the Jones deal has been re-worked, the question is now where will Jones land. The more and more I read, it seems that Jones/Castillo is completely overblown. Olney seems to think so as he says that the Mets will most likely not be interested. This really does make sense because as much as we want to move Castillo, what are we going to do with Jones. I have been over hyper on this in the past week, cause I have been looking too far down the road, trading Castillo means signing Hudson, which means awesome lineup. However, then we have Jones not fitting in with the teams picture.

That being said it has been suggested that the other teams that might be interested are the Reds and the Braves. Well with the Reds, they just got Tavaras, and they won't need another OF. So that means that the Braves are really the next big option. What a turn of events if Jones lands back in Atlanta. Of course, the other side of the story is if the Dodgers lose out in the Manny sweepstakes, which is unlikely, then Jones might have to stay. In that case they just cleared room in their payroll for other assessts later on. On the flip side, the Dodgers might release Jones, I don't think that will happen do the amount of money Jones is still owned, but something might have to give. The last option of course is the "mystery team". Here a mystery team is one of the smaller market teams that might be interested in giving Jones a spot in a low stress location. I really can't think of any teams off the top of my head that would be interested in Jones for a stiuation like that.

The Mexico League, Venezuela League, PR League and the DR League all have playoffs going on right now which mean there are plenty of Mets, former Mets and minor League Mets that remain in action and several Mets had big nights last night. The first one is Fmart, who had an excellent Regular Winter Season this year in the DR continued to hit his stride with the Venenzuela League (for Caracas). Last night he went 2-4, scored 3 runs, hit a double, a home run, and an RBI. I can't wait to see what he does with the rest of the Winter Season.

Padilla picked up a win last night for Ponce in the PR league pitching an inning, 2 hits, one run, no earned runs and a strike out. I never know how to view Padilla. He has always seemed to be a "4A" player to me, but if a Met has a good performance it is worthy of note. Also in the PR league, Casanova had a huge night for Caguas. Casanova spent a lot of time in the system last year as an aging catcher, but he had a good spring and he came up to the majors for a bit when it seemed that every catcher on the Mets roster couldn't stay healthy to save their lives. Last night he went 2-3 with 2 R, 2 HR, 2 RBI, and 2 BB. Thats about as good of a night as one can have. Casanova right now is currently a Free Agent.

While here in the states we are gearing up for the NFL playoffs which start later today, the Winter League Playoffs are under way and the Venezuela League started their playoffs yesterday. The four teams are facing off with La Guaira against Caracas and Aragua against Lara. La Guaira won 4-3 in a close game and Aragua won out 8-4.

There are only a few batting and pitching lines that would mean something to Mets fans, but the most important is Krod. He pitching an inning, picked up a save, allowed no runs, no hits, walked one and struck out one. I always get worried when players play in the winter, but it is always a good feeling when they do well, especially in the start of January, where that depression of not having baseball starts to settle in, and that anxiety for the next season starts to build. Other lines of note are both former Mets in Endy Chavez, who went 3-5 and scored a run, and one of my favorite players to ever put on a Mets uniform, Edgardo Alfonzo, when went 0-4 with an RBI.

If you want to read about all of the playoff games, visit here.

The MLBPA has approved a contract deferment for the Dodgers and Jones, which could lead to a slew of moves by the Dodgers. What the agreement basically does is instead of Jones being paid these large sums of money for the next two years, he will get paid smaller sums of money for several more years and then make interest. In other words, both sides win here. Jones gets more money when the contract is over, and the Dodgers can make more room on their season to season payroll, which means they can offer Manny more money and prevent him from going to the rival Giants.

This means that Jones will more than likely be traded as well, if he is traded, there is still the possibility of him being traded to the Mets for Castillo, who now money wise, this deal would work out better. There are still a lot of problems in making this happen. First, the Dodgers have to have a use for Castillo. Second, the Mets have to have use for Jones. The Mets OF right now looks like:
    LF: Murphy/Tatis
    CF: Beltran
    RF: Church
Where is the room for Jones? As of now, he would be riding the bench as a fifth OF, unless he has an amazing Spring. Jones would open the door for Hudson, which is the big goal here. I would expect that if this deal some how happens, then the Mets will either move Jones after getting him or move Church in an attempt to get more bullpen pitching (possibly trading prospects as well). The advantage of trading Church is his price is the highest it has been in his carear, and the Mets can get a lot in a trade.

At the end of April last year, the division looked all Diamondbacks. Their pitching was amazing, the hitting was on a tear and nothing could stop them...except a gigantic slide thru the rest of the season which allowed the Dodgers to get a renaissance and get to the playoffs as the NL West champs. The Dodgers only made it there because of the hitter they acquired in the middle of the season, Manny. As the offseason has dragged on, it has seemed more and more likely that the Dodgers will get Manny again, and probably become favorites in their division because of Manny. It has also seemed that Manny will not be getting a 4 year deal, and maybe not as much money he originally wanted.

Then the Giants woke up and realized that not only do they have a good pitcher, maybe they can drop some money and make their position in a mediocre division much, much better. They already signed Randy Johnson and Edgar Renteria, which means they need to win now, otherwise those signings will be a waste. They are starting make a play at Manny and make a play at Crede. That would mean that their batting lineup will look completely different because it would be headlined by Renteria, Crede, Rowand and Manny. Their rotation has Lincecum, a veteran Randy Johnson, and Matt Cain with Lowry, who I feel both will start to come into his own soon.

I am not making the arguement though that these signings will make them into Division champions, because that is only a handful of players, and all of the batting players named were siginings by the team and didn't come up through the ranks of the Giants organization. Its a good thing for West Coast Baseball though for this competition because this offseason has been all about the East Coast getting the big names.

Well it finally happened. The event that MLB.com has been advertising endlessly for the past few weeks. At 6:00 Eastern tonight the MLB Network officially launched making history as the largest cable network launch going to over 50 million households. They have been hailing this really a big deal. Now, not taking anything away from this network launch, because it is pretty amazing, I did feel a little silly watching Selig's address at 6:00. For some reason, I felt like I was one of maybe handful of people actually watching the launch of the network. That being said, when the program started, Hot Stove, it wasn't bad. It felt like a different version of Baseball Tonight. Reynolds is on the set (thus why it feels like Baseball Tonight) and he joined by a few others including Al Leiter,

They started talking about Manny, who Reynolds feels is still a very big option for the Mets and would push them over in the division, to with Leiter argued that Manny adds pop to the lineup but can be devestating to the locker room. That was all I really watched because they then announded that they would have Jimmy Rollins in the studio, so I went back to watching the Rose Bowl. I also caught the beginning of their headlining piece tonight, Larson's perfect game, which they did start with an introduction interview with Yogi and Don. If you still want to see this game you are in luck because they will be repeating about 10 times till tommorrow as they show more of their programs as the days go by. I feel that this station will really start to pick up as Spring Training starts (and it doesn't take rocket science to predict that).

Wrigley Field, one of the most iconic images of baseball, was the home today of the NHL Winter Classic, when hockey leaves and goes outside to play the game. This has been done for a  few years now and it has been very successful. Last year they filled up Buffalo for the game, which was why I was initially surprised when I heard it was being played in Wrigley, where there are not nearly as many seats as most baseball stadiums and for that matter, most football stadiums where it makes sense to play this game at. Anyway, I though I would be upset watching Hockey being played on the Wrigely infield and shallow outfield, but I actually wasn't. Now, I didn't really watch the game, I watch the introduction and a few minutes of the first period, which is about as much as Hockey as I can usually stand in one sitting (although going to a game is a different experience). But here is a description of what the field looked like:

The players came out of the dugouts and walked basically around the wall to the backstop behind home plate, at that point they walked on two separate paths to their seats next to the rink. The walkways were very close at the start, being separated by the length of home plate, which was left exposed. A bit farther up from the plate, the paths split to lead the different boxes, with the pitching mound in the middle of the paths. The Rink basically started with a line from first base straight to third base and then outward. In the Outfield they had giant logos for each team (Detroit and Chicago) and space for giant flags for America and Canada.

I guess the reason that I was not upset, and actually intrigued, by Hockey being played on Wrigley is because they did not try to hide the fact that it was a baseball field, that there was a baseball mound, that there was a very famous home plate. All of that stuff was still there which meant that it was like a compromise, they recognized that they were visitors of hollowed ground in Baseball. And then of course I realized how ready I am for Spring Training and the regular season to start.