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Mets Cut Ties With Piazza

Valadius Dec 07 2005 10:14 PM

DALLAS (AP) -- Mike Piazza's days with the New York Mets are over. The Mets declined Wednesday to offer salary arbitration to their longtime catcher, cutting ties with one of the best hitters in franchise history. The move was no surprise, and now the 12-time All-Star is likely to join an American League team that can use him as a designated hitter. The Los Angeles Angels, Minnesota Twins and Toronto Blue Jays are among the clubs that could be interested. "One of the greatest offensive forces that the Mets have ever had," general manager Omar Minaya said at baseball's winter meetings. "He's just been a special player that will probably go down in history as, without a doubt, one of the greatest hitting catchers in baseball." New York refused to offer arbitration to any of its former players who became free agents, including former closer Braden Looper. The team has offered a contract to 41-year-old reliever Roberto Hernandez and was waiting to hear back from his agents. But if Hernandez and the Mets didn't agree to a deal by the midnight EST deadline Wednesday, he also will not return. Players who became free agents and weren't offered arbitration cannot re-sign with their former clubs until May 1. Those offered arbitration have until Dec. 19 to accept and can re-sign through Jan. 8. With the 37-year-old Piazza slowed by injuries the past three years, his production at the plate has declined dramatically. Plus, he has long had trouble throwing. He became a free agent after last season, when he hit .251 with 19 homers and 62 RBIs in 113 games. It was his lowest batting average since he hit .232 in 69 at-bats with the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1992, his first season in the big leagues. Piazza was acquired in a trade with Florida in May 1998, eight days after he was shipped from the Dodgers to the Marlins in a blockbuster deal that also included Gary Sheffield, Bobby Bonilla, Charles Johnson and Todd Zeile. Piazza led the Mets to the 2000 World Series, which they lost to the crosstown rival Yankees, and became the career home run leader for catchers. "Mike Piazza's been a great player, a great teammate, a great citizen," Minaya said. "At the time when we got him, I was an assistant general manager. I've been very fortunate to watch Mike Piazza, and we're going to miss Mike Piazza being a New York Met." The Mets have been one of the busiest teams in baseball this offseason, adding first baseman Carlos Delgado, All-Star closer Billy Wagner, catcher Paul Lo Duca and utilityman Xavier Nady. Looper spent two seasons as the Mets' closer, going 4-7 with a 3.94 ERA and 28 saves in 36 chances this year. Hernandez did a nice job as a setup man last season, when he was 8-6 with a 2.58 ERA and four saves in 67 games.

Frayed Knot Dec 07 2005 10:23 PM

Piazza certainly isn't a surprise. For the team it doesn't work because it locks them into at least a $10mil deal for next year (no more than 20% cut). For Piazza it would make him a 3rd catcher/PH (even if a rich one) when he probably feels he can get a 2-yr deal somewhere else and play at least semi-regularly. I was thinking they might offer to Looper, but again, maybe they're afraid he might accept. Not sure what the thinking is on Roberto. Elsewhere in the meantime; - Houston is cutting ties w/Asshead. He won't be offered arb so those 2 parties can't talk until May 1. Now it's possible that Rajah - who claims he's still debating whether he even wants to play - could join the team a month into next season to avoid wearing down like he seemed to this past September, but Houston might not have enough money for him then. - And the Yanx are facing a midnight deadline with Bernie Williams. He's also gone unless offered arb by the team which, like Piazza, would lock them into having an expensive bench player.

cooby Dec 07 2005 10:25 PM

Sad news. But this I like New York refused to offer arbitration to any of its former players who became free agents, including former closer Braden Looper

Valadius Dec 07 2005 10:27 PM

You know what this also means? No more Cairo!!!

Yancy Street Gang Dec 08 2005 09:08 AM

Is Mientkiewicz on that list of players to whom the Mets declined to offer arbitration? Or is his status different? Does anybody even remember Doug Mientkiewicz? The only offseason interest I've heard about regarding him is that the Red Sox want to sue him.

Elster88 Dec 08 2005 09:09 AM

That name does not ring a bell.

MFS62 Dec 08 2005 09:16 AM

I wonder what Sal's thinking right about now. Later

Yancy Street Gang Dec 08 2005 09:18 AM

That they should have cut ties with Piazza four years ago.

Edgy DC Dec 08 2005 09:49 AM

I like the way this is phrased. Like Wilpon ripped his shirt and spit at Piazza's feet.

Yancy Street Gang Dec 08 2005 10:24 AM

I found this on NorthJersey.com. The main body of the article mentioned Piazza, Looper, and Hernandez. ]METS BRIEFS: The additional Mets players who were not offered arbitration were Miguel Cairo, Mike DeFelice, Danny Graves, Felix Heredia, Doug Mientkiewicz, Jose Offerman, Shingo Takatsu and Gerald Williams.

Centerfield Dec 08 2005 12:28 PM

I hat baseball.

KC Dec 08 2005 01:18 PM

I really thought they could have brought him back for another year or two with a diminished role. I was quietly hoping so. He was easily one of the best damn predominantly heterosexual Mets ever.

jerseyshore Dec 08 2005 01:39 PM

KC wrote: I really thought they could have brought him back for another year or two with a diminished role. I was quietly hoping so. He was easily one of the best damn predominantly heterosexual Mets ever. He's a bigger queen than Wes Westrum

Edgy DC Dec 08 2005 01:41 PM

That one is scooting by me.

jerseyshore Dec 08 2005 01:45 PM

Edgy DC wrote: That one is scooting by me. on one of these MET forums Wes Westrum was once described, jokingly, as a big queen. For some reason the concept of WW as a "queen" has always made me laugh.

KC Dec 08 2005 01:47 PM

>>>He's a bigger queen than Wes Westrum<<< Joisey comes out from under the boardwalk. (Bush won, btw)

Edgy DC Dec 08 2005 01:51 PM

Wes Regina

Zvon Dec 08 2005 07:32 PM

yep,..the chapter on Piazza is officially over. I will miss him,...he did us good. Like you KC, I was quietly hoping for him to hang around and PH and catch everyonce in awhile. It would be unfair tho, I suppose, if an AL team is willing to use him for DH. Bye Mike, thanks for the MetMemories. :)

Rockin' Doc Dec 09 2005 07:52 AM

Best of luck to Piazza. I wish him well in the twilight of his career. Thanks for the memories. He represented the Mets organization with class.

86-Dreamer Dec 09 2005 08:43 AM

ALL HAIL THE SACRED TOM SEAVER POST!! I cant think of a better way to use my Seaver post than to say: All Hail Mike Piazza! Thank you for so many great memories, none better than your HR on 9/21/01. Good luck in the AL.

ScarletKnight41 Dec 09 2005 08:52 AM

Hail!

Elster88 Dec 09 2005 09:00 AM

HAIL

GYC Dec 09 2005 09:04 AM

Johnny Dickshot Dec 09 2005 09:23 AM

Excellent hail

OlerudOwned Dec 09 2005 09:52 AM

sayvanderlay Dec 10 2005 08:49 PM Edited 1 time(s), most recently on Dec 10 2005 09:11 PM

As much as I like the guy, things should be kept in perspective - he had four superb seasons '99 through '02. Four, just four.

Edgy DC Dec 10 2005 09:00 PM

Well, my first response is "Welcome aboard." Thanks for joining the discussion. My second is, "Well, that's four more than Paul Lo Duca has had --- no disrespect, Paul --- and four more than Lo Duca is likely to have. And, to niggle, those are four he's had with the Mets. Not that it's that pertinent, but, in total, he had about ten superb seasons.

metirish Dec 10 2005 09:02 PM

Four seasons in which he helped put the team back on track, while we shouldn't overstate what he did for the team we certainly shouldn't understate it either. There were many nights when Piazza carried those teams with his offence, seven year deals rarely are great for all the years but I bet Wilpon would say he was worth every penny.

sayvanderlay Dec 10 2005 09:10 PM

Part of what made Piazza larger than life (in a sense) was that he is also a man of character. That helped him carry himself as much as his #'s. Seriously, (and maybe this is obvious), if he was a schmuck, no one would miss him.

Edgy DC Dec 10 2005 09:43 PM

You're not making a case against his retention. Yup, I'll miss his bat and him to boot.

sayvanderlay Dec 10 2005 09:45 PM

Edgy DC wrote: You're not making a case against his retention. . I wasn't trying to.

ScarletKnight41 Dec 10 2005 10:47 PM

Welcome newbie :)

Nymr83 Dec 10 2005 11:22 PM

with the book now closed on Piazza as a Met i must ask some serious questions: 1. was he the greatest Met of all time? 2. was he the greatest Met hitter of all time? 3. was he the greatest Met catcher of all time? 4. does he go into the HOF a Met? 5. should his number be retired at Shea Stadium? i'll refrain from answering until a few other people do.

Edgy DC Dec 10 2005 11:31 PM

1. was he the greatest Met of all time? No. 2. was he the greatest Met hitter of all time? Possibly. 3. was he the greatest Met catcher of all time? Most assuredly. 4. does he go into the HOF a Met? He'll go in as himself. 5. should his number be retired at Shea Stadium? Yes.

Johnny Dickshot Dec 10 2005 11:47 PM

The only thing that would keep Piazza from being the greatest Met hitter ever would be his longevity & compiling relative to Strawberry, Alfonzo and maybe a few others, but as a pure force in his best moments I don't think anyone was ever better, even Strawberry. He had real ultimate power. He beats Grote & Carter as best Met catcher rather easily. Obviously Seaver remains the GME, overall. I hope his HOF bust shows his helmet backwards like a catcher, leaviing everyone wondering and satisfied. The real question will be which facial hair design to they immortalize.

metirish Dec 11 2005 12:10 AM

] I hope his HOF bust shows his helmet backwards like a catcher, leaviing everyone wondering and satisfied. The real question will be which facial hair design to they immortalize. I love that, have to go with the porn-burns look .

Nymr83 Dec 11 2005 01:21 AM

the backwards hat would be funny, but lets be honest, there is way too much money to be made off it for them to allow that :-\ i think Strawberry was the better hitter as a Met, though Piazza had a better career. i do not think his number should be retired. i think 7 1/2 years, especially with no world series rings, is just not enough. if you retire him you've got to retire some other guys first. if you're going to keep retired numbers truly special i don't think he was here long enough.

Edgy DC Dec 11 2005 08:08 AM

I think Piazza's mullet has been retired enough years to be eligible for Hall of Fame this season.

Frayed Knot Dec 11 2005 10:15 PM

"the backwards hat would be funny, but lets be honest, there is way too much money to be made off it for them to allow that" I don't see how the HoF makes money off having a particular (or any) insignia on a hat on a plaque.

Bret Sabermetric Dec 12 2005 07:48 AM

Nymr83 wrote: i do not think his number should be retired. i think 7 1/2 years, especially with no world series rings, is just not enough. Funny thing is, of the three retired Mets, only Seaver has exceeded 7 1/2 seasons, and not by all that much. Between Gil, Casey and Seaver, they put in an average of under 7 1/2 seasons in a Mets uniform, with a pair of WS rings between the three men, so it's not as if there's some unreachable star for a retired number candidate to grasp.

Bret Sabermetric Dec 12 2005 09:00 AM

Through 1998, Piazza had earned 185 Win Shares, his rate of annual WS being about 28 or so at that point. In signing him, the Mets could have projected a total of about 130 Win Shares over a 7-year period as a reasonable if rosy estimate. (I'm using a version of Bill James' Favorite Toy, his tool for projecting future performance on to current stats, but you can use what tool you prefer. If you're projecting much more than 130 Win Shares, though, I've got to say that that may be the problem right there.) That means that if he keeps up his performance at the near-MVP level (30 WS is MVP level) for a while, like 3 years, then his projected performance over the remainder of the contract isn't so rosy. Piazza had earned 33 WS in 1998 for three teams. (He had broken the 30 mark thrice before, his high being 39 in 1997.) In 1999, his first year under the contract he earned 21 WS, then 28 in 2000 and 21 in 2001, making for about 70 WS over the first three years of his contract. The Mets had gotten good value from him and he was right on track to accumulate 130 WS in the remaining four years of the contract. Instead of dealing him, and getting a fair return on this still-valuable player, the Mets (and most Met fans) insisted on retaining him. Sure enough, they witnessed this decline: 19 WS in 2002 11 WS in 2003 12 WS in 2004 and I don't have 2005 yet but it brings us up to about mid-50s total for the last four years. Piazza never again got the near MVP total he'd earned in 2000, he never as a Met broke the 30 WS mark, yet he gave the Mets just about exactly the 130 WS they could have reasonably expected when they signed him in 1998.

Frayed Knot Dec 12 2005 09:56 AM

"only Seaver has exceeded 7 1/2 seasons, and not by all that much." 11-1/2 actually, so if by "not all that much" you mean 'over 50% more', then you're more or less accurate.

Bret Sabermetric Dec 12 2005 10:05 AM

That's my goal, FK. "More or less accurate." My point here is that basing Mets' retired numbers on longevity with the team is like basing actresses' Oscar chances on their bra sizes. With some exceptions, the relationship is an inverse one, historically, and even the exceptions haven't been strongly exceptional.

Frayed Knot Dec 12 2005 10:17 AM

When it comes to players, longevity should be one of the major attributes to consider and - seeing as how the retired player-numbers (as opposed to old guy manager ones) consists of a sample size of 1 - it's tough to argue that service time should be thrown out the window on account of some sort of weak criteria that's been established. If it were up to me I probably wouldn't retire #31, although I suspect they will and it's not something I'm going to get all bent out of shape about.