A reminder in the Wall Street Journal this morning that the Mets -- playing solid enough baseball that talk of the wild card is not delusional -- have some hard decisions to make. And not just with Carlos Beltran and Jose Reyes. That’s because, as all Mets fans know, if Francisco Rodriguez finishes 55 games this year, his $17.5 million contract option for 2012 is triggered. And right now he’s on pace to finish 61.
On some level you have to think that Sandy Alderson was hoping that events would take care of themselves, and that either the Mets’ competitive situation would be such that there wouldn’t be as many save opportunities and/or meaningful games -- or that K-Rod wouldn’t be effective enough -- to where it would make baseball sense for him to finish 55. But that hasn’t been the case, and as of now there is no plausible reason to change his usage pattern.
So absent a serious July swoon, the Mets are kind of damned if they do, damned if they don’t. If they keep him, they’re on the hook for an intolerably large financial commitment to K-Rod next year (or a union grievance if they alter his usage pattern for purely financial reasons). If they shop him -- again, assuming they’re still playing good baseball -- they’re basically saying that 2011 doesn’t matter and will be accused by some of waving a white flag due to their serious lack of green.
I would still think the latter problem would be the better one to have. Haters (i.e. the talk radio and tabloid crowd) are gonna hate anyway. You gotta think long term and you can’t worry too much if someone gets some short term mileage off of some disingenuous white flag talk (disingenuous because the same ones who would offer it would go crazy if commitments to K-Rod prevent the Mets from making an offer to Reyes).
But that doesn’t make the short term any easier. And I’m kind of glad I’m not in Sandy Alderson’s shoes and don’t have to deal with the contractual mess that was left for him to clean up.