The Mets put pitchers Orlando Hernandez and Duaner Sanchez on the 15 day disabled list to begin the season.  That means Mike Pelfrey, who was shelled in his last three spring starts, and Joe Smith, who showed improvement, will begin the season with the big club. 

It makes sense to give Hernandez and Sanchez more time to get into game shape.  There is no reason to rush them back in April when they are not ready.  In particular, Sanchez can be a huge help to this team down the stretch, if he is fresh and healthy.  In fact, the later he comes back, the better.  This way, he can reduce the workload of fatigued members of the bullpen.

Hernandez, who went back to his old delivery on Friday, will also benefit from some extra time against some minor leaguers.  And since he never stays healthy for a full season anyway, maybe starting him late will mean he is around for the stretch run and playoffs, if they get that far.

So the roster is set, and the speculation is over.  All that's left is to play the games.

There are a lot of websites out there that offer fantasy baseball fans, and fans of the game in general, projected statistics for their favorite players.  They use some kind of Einsteinian formula to predict what every player is going to do in 2008 – how many home runs, RBI, uniform (ahem) adjustments, etc.  But it seems that all of these projections are just slight modifications to the player’s stats the previous year.  It makes me wonder just how accurate these projections are.

Well, here at Mets Fan in Texas, we’ve devised our own state-of-the-art formula for making projections.  We pull the numbers out of our ***.

We’re going to put our formula to the test against ESPN’s fantasy projections, and at the end of the year, we’ll see who got it closer.  Here’s a list of some key Mets, and their projected (ahem) stats for the upcoming season

David Wright

ESPN: .319 BA, 32 HR, 109 RBI, 28 SB

MFT: .316 BA, 34 HR, 114 RBI, 31 SB, 30,000 swooning thirteen year-old girls

Jose Reyes

ESPN: .285 BA, 13 HR, 63 RBI, 72 SB, 112 R.

MFT: .297 BA, 16 HR, 71RBI, 68 SB, 121 R, 451 sentences started with “I mean”

Johan Santana

ESPN: 22 W (!!), 269 K, 2.54 ERA

MFT: 18 W, 241 K, 2.95 ERA, 2 new yachts, 1 golden idol built in his honor by Willie Randolph

Carlos Beltran

ESPN: .274 BA, 33 HR (didn’t he have 33 HR last year?), 108 RBI, 21 SB

MFT: .281 BA, 36 HR, 118 RBI, 23 SB, 36 times he refers to his bat as his “little friend”

Pedro Martinez

ESPN: 10 W, 161 K, 3.10 ERA

MFT: 14 W, 186 K, 3.89 ERA, 100 major leaguers frustrated that they didn’t even come close to an 86 MPH fastball

John Maine

ESPN: 13 W, 156 K, 4.18 ERA

MFT: 17 W, 205 K, 3.46 ERA, 12 times he’s mistaken for the GOP presidential nominee

Carlos Delgado

ESPN: .267 BA, 29 HR, 98 RBI

MFT: .263 BA, 26 HR, 88 RBI, 1 time he refuses to stand for the “Curly Shuffle” between innings

Oliver Perez

ESPN: 12 W, 170 K, 4.40 ERA

MFT: 12 W, 170 K, 4.40 ERA (Eh, it sounded about right)

Moises Alou

ESPN: .328 BA, 14 HR, 51 RBI

MFT: .304 BA, 17 HR, 62 RBI, 1 AARP membership, 2 blown quads, and 1 balky, um, groin

Orlando

Hernandez

ESPN: 9 W, 130 K, 4.14 ERA

MFT: 178 mentions of the word “bunion,” 78 mile an hour fastballs, and about 5 trips to the DL.

Ryan Church

ESPN: .274 BA, 18 HR, 78 RBI

MFT: .282 BA, 23 HR, 76 RBI, 1 sign in his locker that reads, “Know your role, vet!”

Billy Wagner

ESPN: 36 SV, 2.41 ERA

MFT: 40 SV, 2.93 ERA, 2 appearances before he abandons his new changeup for the eighth straight year.

The two presumptive candidates for the Mets fifth starter job, Orlando Hernandez and Mike Pelfrey, threw a simulated game yesterday.  They each worked through the same lineup of minor leaguers and the two major league catchers, Ramon Castro and Brian Schneider.  Neither pitcher was perfect, but one clearly looked like a major league pitcher.  And it wasn't Hernandez.

El Duque, fighting a bunion on his right foot, has famously changed his windup to take pressure off it.  In doing so, he has lost his velocity and his command.  During one sequence yesterday, he walked three batters and hit one, forcing in a run.  One observer said he looked "bat shy," as if he were afraid to throw one in the strike zone.

Pelfrey threw darting fastballs that consistently reached the low nineties.  He gave up a home run and a double to Schneider on backdoor sliders - a pitch he learned to throw just last week.  Unlike Hernandez, he has started exhibition games this Spring, and he has been largely effective.

Hernandez has only thrown simulated games and bullpen sessions, and has looked like a slow-pitch softball pitcher riding a beer buzz every time out. 

It's time to give Pelfrey a full season in the major leagues as the Mets' fifth starter.  He may have been rushed to the majors last year, but clearly, he learned from his experience.  After starting the season 0-7 with a 6.10 ERA, he finished 3-1 with an ERA of 4.88.  He seems to have remembered the lessons he learned last year, with only one bad outing marring his statistics this Spring.

Orlando Hernandez was, at times, the Mets' best pitcher last year.  But he is a different pitcher this year.  At age 38 or 45 or 65, El Duque cannot learn a new windup and change his mechanics.  Even if he can do so, he is bound to hurt himself, ala Sandy Koufax, as a direct result of changing his motion.  It's time for him to get surgery on that bunion, and take the year off, or retire completely.  But he can't reinvent himself at this stage of his career.

Mike Pelfrey isn't perfect, but he has great stuff, and he can be coached at this young stage of his career.  It's time for the Mets to get younger.  They must abandon El Duque, at least for this season, and commit to Pelfrey.

No team in the history of Major League Baseball had ever blown a seven game lead in their division with seventeen games left in the regular season - until the 2007 New York Mets.

Tired of hearing that?  So is every other Mets fan.  The good news is, so are the Mets.

David Wright has said the Mets have a swagger this year that they lacked last year.  I disagree.  The Mets have shed the sense of entitlement that plagued them last year.  It was a given they were going to make the playoffs.  It was a given they were going to go a step further than they did in 2006.  The only question was who they would face in the World Series. 

The Mets were a complacent, aging team in 2007, and they broke down as a team in September.  Their primary failures were:

• The starting pitchers rarely lasted beyond the sixth inning. 
• The only starter who threw 200 innings, Tom Glavine, showed his age down the stretch, feeding batters a steady diet of spicy meatballs en route to a 6.10 ERA in September.  He also drove the final nail into the Mets' coffin, surrendering seven runs in 1/3 of an inning on the final day of the season.
• The bullpen played the role of firemen, not in the traditional sense, but more like the book-burners in Ray Bradbury's Farenheit 451.  Those close to the team say it was a result of burnout.
• Jose Reyes stopped hitting.  After having an offseason to think about it, this was probably more a result of crashing head-first into second and third base over a hundred times than being badly influenced by Rickey Henderson.  Though Henderson's absence this year does make you wonder.
• They relied on too many players in their late thirties and early forties during the stretch run.

In light of these failures, The Mets had to do two things this offseason:

• Get younger
• Get a top-line starting pitcher

They accomplished both.  They got younger at catcher, in the starting rotation, and on the bench.  While at 31, Brian Schneider is no kid, he is younger than the suddenly injury-prone Paul Lo Duca.  Angel Pagan, Ruben Gotay, Ramon Castro, and Endy Chavez should all be big contributers this year off the bench.  And of course, Johan Santana is thirteen years younger than Tom Glavine.  And he's the best left handed starter in the game today.

The Mets picked up Santana for a package of good prospects, but players they could live without.  They managed to keep Mike Pelfrey and Fernando Martinez, who have both looked very promising this spring.  Santana will give the Mets innings, he'll give them wins, and he'll give the bullpen a break.

Jose Reyes will rebound from his personal collapse.  If he reduces his stolen base attempts to pre-2007 levels, that should keep him fresh all year.  There is no question about his talent.  As Reyes goes, so go the Mets.

The question remaining for the Mets is one of injuries.  They are getting their starting lineup back, slowly but surely, and all but Moises Alou should be ready by Opening Day.  If Duaner Sanchez can return to full strength, the Mets' bullpen will have three (Sanchez, Heilman, and Feliciano) legitimate setup men for Billy Wagner.  That is a formidable weapon.  If Carlos Delgado can return to form, following his offseason surgery, the lineup will be as formidable.

In all, the 2008 Mets look better on paper than the 2007 team did last April.  In a couple of weeks, it will be time to show it on the field.

If the regular season were to start today, the Mets lineup would be as follows, by position:

Ramon Castro C
Olmedo Saenz 1B
Anderson Hernandez 2B
Jose Reyes SS
David Wright 3B
Brady Clark LF
Angel Pagan CF
Fernando Martinez RF

Certainly strikes fear in the heart of your opponents, eh? 

The injuries to this point had been nagging, recovery from surgery, nothing to shed but a drop of sweat over.  Now, Moises Alou is out four to six weeks for hernia surgery.  And, as we all know, he needs to do certain excercises to keep strength in his quads, or else they have a nasty habit of bleeding internally.  Bottom line - don't count on Alou this year.  Which is a shame.  He's one of the only Mets left who shows any emotion, he can still hit like the dickens, and he's a leader on the field. 

Of course, the Mets knew of Alou's history of injuries before they acquired him last year.  But that's OK, they have Endy Chavez.  Oh, wait, he's hurt too.  Well, that's why the picked up Angel Pagan.  Oh, wait, he has to play center field because Carlos Beltran is recovering from surgery.  We could always use Damion Easley or Jose Valentin.  Oh, that's right, they're recovering from surgery, too, and the good Lord (Casey Stengel?) only knows when they're coming back.  We could always rush Fernando Martinez up to the majors.  Oh, right, he's playing right field because Ryan Church has a concussion.  Well, we can count on Marlon Anderson, of course.  Nope, you guessed it.  He's in the trainer's room as well.

OK, so the lineup is a mess.  They can survive on pitching, right?  Maybe - if Johan Santana can figure out a way to pitch every day.  I see that Orlando Hernandez has adopted a new windup to take pressure off his bunions.  That's nice.  When are they going to put this guy out to pasture?  I mean, he has bunions, for the love of Casey! Here's a thought.  Maybe they can treat him like an old racehorse and have him stud a bunch of young pitchers.  This could be a brand new way of doing business in baseball.  Instead of drafting players out of high school and college, and paying out big bonuses, just raise them from birth.  Think of the money you'd save!

At least the rest of the pitching staff looks pretty good, IF Pedro can stay healthy all year, and IF Billy Wagner isn't over the hill, and IF Maine and Perez can somehow repeat their fifteen-win season, and IF Heilman, Feliciano, and Sanchez can provide effective setup relief all year, and IF Mike Pelfrey can pitch well enough to run El Duque out of town, or at least into the bullpen.

Wasn't I feeling good about this team last week?