The Mets announced to reporters yesterday that they’ve shut down infielder Wilmer Flores for the remainder of the season after he was diagnosed with early onset arthritis in both knees (links via Newsday’s Anthony Rieber and MLB.com’s Anthony DiComo). It’s a curious diagnosis for a player who has yet to celebrate his 28th birthday, though Flores suggested that he doesn’t believe the issue will have a significant impact on his immediate future. For the time being, he received an injection in each knee with the hope that it’ll curtail the symptoms he’s been feeling.
Asked about how the dual knee issues could impact Flores’ future with the team, manager Mickey Callaway was noncommittal. “I think that really depends on what the rest of our team looks like,” said Callaway. “He can definitely obviously fill in, and start, and swing the bat well and play good enough defense. … We’ll just have to see what the makeup of our team looks like next year.” Flores is arbitration-eligible for the final time this winter and hit .267/.319/.417 in 429 plate appearances.
More on the Mets…
- Dominic Smith’s future with the Mets is up in the air after a lost season, writes Mike Puma of the New York Post. The former first-rounder was recently viewed as the organization’s first baseman of the future, but that distinction could very belong to rising slugger Peter Alonso, who had a huge season between Double-A and Triple-A. The Mets have tried Smith in left field, though with Michael Conforto, Jay Bruce, Brandon Nimmo, Yoenis Cespedes (once he recovers from surgery on both heels) and others in the mix, his chances there could be slim as well. Smith chats with Puma about some of his 2018 struggles and his own cognizance of the crowded path between him and regular at-bats with the Mets, expressing confidence in his abilities and acknowledging that all he can do is force the team’s hand with a big showing next spring (if he’s not traded this offseason).
- The Mets formally shut Zack Wheeler down for the remainder of the season after a 101-inning increase in his workload from the 2017 season, Puma writes ina a separate column. The 28-year-old enjoyed an enormous rebound season after missing 2015-16 due to injury and pitching on a limited workload last season, as he rode a sensational second half to a 3.31 ERA with 8.8 K/9, 2.7 BB/9, 0.69 HR/9 and a 44.2 percent ground-ball rate on the season overall. Wheeler tossed a total of 182 1/3 innings, and it seems likely that he’ll pitch without any sort of innings limitation next season. Both manager Mickey Callaway and pitching coach Dave Eiland spoke with Puma about the strides Wheeler made in 2018, with Eiland in particular talking about how the dugout staff lobbied against trading the right-hander with the belief that the 2019 season could have a championship-caliber rotation. That’s been the hope in Queens for years, of course, but next year’s top four of Jacob deGrom, Noah Syndergaard, Wheeler and Steven Matz nonetheless looks quite promising if the quartet can finally stay healthy.
Let’s go Mets!
Tebow is your #1 prospect
Jeez! Shouldn’t you be outside putting rookie cards into your bicycle spokes?
You just love to see your name on this site….what an idiot!!!
I love clueless idiots that post here. Makes it more enjoyable.
Let’s celebrate a 27 year old needing injections in both knees. When questioned privately he said that he believe he caught some sort of infection from Cespedes’ foot problems.
A positive report about “Thor”, except how many innings and starts did Mr Superstar make?
Ridiculous of course.
Let’s also congratulate Wheeler on shutting down a successful season. That is unless he information with management thinking is not accurate—a hallmark of the Wilpon’s ownership where truth is far from reality.
That division was completely open for business this year. In my opinion the Braves are a really good team and deserve it this year, but if the Nats played to their expectations the Braves would be in second by far. Now is their chance to make the division theirs. They need to make a splash in free agency
It ain’t over yet!
Atlanta vs Philly 6 games left
They would have to win all the games remaining and then some. Good luck with that.
True but still possible
And it’s possible that you have a good perspective. Only problem is that your behavior here matches your dysfunctional name.
I mean who did you root for;
Mookie Wilson or Buckner in ‘86?
Piazza or Clemens in ‘00?
Time to come clean and get a legit identity.
MetsYankeesRedSox…….Even if the Phillies win nine of their remaining 10 games, they would need the Braves to finish no better than 2-7 just to force a tie.
BTW I am a Phillies fan and with their terrible defense and sporadic offence I don’t see that happening.
It doesn’t matter the Dodgers will eat up either one of them in the playoffs. But it’s gonna be Atlanta
“Offense”… My God what has happened to this countries education…
Before someone tries to be funny, yes I spelled “countries” wrong on purpose… I’m well aware that’s not the correct spelling in this context, however, I’m not sure how many other people here know this…
bklynny67……I’m so sorry I offended you with my half-asleep post and used the preferred British/Canadian etc,, spelling instead of the American. I’ll try to be fully awake next time. Please, please don’t report me. /s
You do know it is spelled “offence” in Canada and other country’s, right?
You do realize the correct grammatical response is “My God what has happened to this country’s education”? You incorrectly made country plural into countries which would mean more then one country which is poor and inaccurate grammar, and it is also inarticulate and smug.
I don’t think they are a really good team, but they are good. I think this was more of the fall from grace of the Nats that opened the division for anyone.
You don’t win 85 games cause another team is not doing good. But if the Nats had a usual year they would have around 90-95 wins
Oops no idea how that happend! Anyway, whol bunch of issues with the Mets this year. Injuries, issues with players and trades. Maybe next year,.
Hey Goz-nothing will happen until there is new ownership. How many years can you play the injury card?
The Mets have a sort of Papal like dispensation from the MLB Commissioner so they are neither going to sell nor do they understand what it take to help the team win. The Wilpon’s make money but do not ever invest much money back into the team so that is a recipe for losing baseball.
And Rae—buying tickets as well as watching SNY support the Wilpon’s charade over NY baseball fans. If you support mutt and Jeff’s fantasy it’s time to pull the plug.
Where do you stand Rae?
Oops again! New personal rule, “never try to post a reply on a post that is not supposed to be on the board.” The original post gets sent to the Isle of misfit posts and mine stays and looks silly!
Hey Steve Adams… Who has to clean up all the posts? The author of the story?
Interested to see how Alonso does at the big league level. The power is special with 34 HR in AA & AAA and the average was good, although he struggled at AAA early. Hoping he pans out and does not end up the next Mike Jacobs/Ike Davis. Ifs and buts here, but with McNeil at 2nd, a healthy Conforto, and Rosario coming in to his own, if Alonso pans out, they need just a couple of better than average bats to be worth keeping an eye on. A Bruce rebound is highly unlikely at this point in my opinion, so probably need an OF. Can live with Frazier at 3B. Probably still middle of the road though….
Hopefully Alonso doesn’t freeze to death going from Las Vegas to Syracuse.
Further, it would be nice to see him have the success that Mike Jorgensen and Ed Kranepool had in their careers.
We also need a catcher as d’Arnaud and KP are unreliable… Frazier is a good stopgap for one more year but 3B needs to be addressed… The RPs have been atrocious and will need to upgraded as well, and I don’t trust Matz and Vargas at the back of that rotation. Dom Smith has minimal trade value right now so the best trade option to upgrade the bullpen would be Alonso, unfortunately.
Curious diagnosis for a 28 year old? Maybe that’s why it’s called early onset
BAM!
Josh Donaldson to Mets next year. Calling it.
No.
For a team as bad as the Mets are, you’d expect it to be easy to upgrade.
But, even assuming ownership was willing to sign onto a substantial payroll increase, what do you acquire? Other than catcher, every position has someone who is either an average major leaguer or a young guy you don’t want to block. (Maybe CF is open as well, depending how you line things up). And catcher isn’t the easiest position to substantially upgrade.
The bullpen is a hole, but relief pitchers are notoriously difficult to maintain performance year to year.
It would be nice to upgrade Vargas to a genuinely solid veteran #3 pitcher, but hard to make that a priority. There’s reason to hope Vargas will be a useful pitcher next year.
I guess the dream scenario is Machado for 3b, Frazier slides over to 1st for a year to give Alonso more time. But there is no realistic way the Mets are offering that kind of contract, and Machado supposedly doesn’t want to play 3b anyway.
Maybe flip Smith for a similarly failed prospect from another team, ideally a pitcher to give them some depth. Sign 2 of the better relievers who are available. Best catcher who can be had. Probably the most that can be expected.
I think Dom smith’s value is about zero. The failed pitching prospect would have to be someone like Henry Owens. I just don’t see any value there at all. I don’t now what’s the best move for the Mets with him. He has nowhere to play and clearly isn’t going to be a competent outfielder but you’re basically giving up on him in any trade scenario because nothing of value is coming back. Tough decision.