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Mets Release Ken Takahashi

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The Mets released lefty reliever Ken Takahashi, according to Ben Shpigel of the New York Times (via Twitter).

Takahashi, 40, signed a minor league free agent contract with the Blue Jays in February.  The Mets scooped him up after the Jays released him in March.  Takahashi tossed 56.6 Triple A innings, including seven starts.  He had a reverse platoon split in his 27.3 big league innings, as lefties knocked him around to the tune of .302/.387/.472.

Odds & Ends: Saito, Jaramillo, Marlins

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More Monday linkage…

  • Troy E. Renck of the Denver Post says the Rockies want catcher Yorvit Torrealba back, but not at his $4MM option price.
  • WEEI's Alex Speier explains that outrighting Takashi Saito makes a Boston re-signing more feasible.
  • Rudy Jaramillo will likely reach an agreement soon with the Cubs for their hitting coach position, according to SI's Jon Heyman.  Heyman says Jaramillo will be near the top of the coach pay scale, at $800K a year for multiple years.  The Cubs are hoping Jaramillo can help Alfonso Soriano. Milton Bradley hit well in Texas, though he's a trade candidate.
  • MLB.com's Joe Frisaro talked to first baseman Nick Johnson, who is approaching free agency for the first time in his career.  Johnson seems unlikely to stay with the Marlins.  (Check out our discussion post on him here).  Frisaro says the Fish could further shake up the infield corners by trading Jorge Cantu.
  • Newsday's David Lennon reminds us the Mets chose Oliver Perez over Randy Wolf last winter.  Wolf supplied 214.3 innings of 3.23 ball for the Dodgers for $8MM.
  • MLB.com's Jordan Bastian talked to Blue Jays defensive whiz/impending free agent John McDonald about the future and his popularity in Toronto.
  • MLB.com's Bill Chastain feels the Rays will at least talk to free agent reliever Billy Wagner.  Nice fit, though VP Andrew Friedman found it unlikely they'd sign a closer when asked a few weeks ago.  It won't help if Wagner turns down an arbitration offer from the Red Sox, which would attach a draft pick cost.

Holliday Prefers New York?

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Ken Davidoff of Newsday has a source who has told him that Matt Holliday's top two choices in free agency are the Yankees and the Mets, in that order.

Davidoff doesn't see the Yankees wanting to make another commitment of that level after signing Mark Teixeira, C.C. Sabathia, and A.J. Burnett last winter. He also feels that winning the World Series would remove some of the pressure to sign the superstar left fielder.

Davidoff lists hitting at Citi Field as Holliday's main reservation about signing on with the Mets, but says that based on recent comments by Jeff Wilpon, the Mets could be willing to try anything and everything this offseason. "Anything and everything" will be expensive in Holliday's case, however. Remember that back in September, an agent told Jon Heyman that he estimated seven years and $147MM for Holliday, while Heyman himself ventured a guess of seven years, $120MM.

Holliday struggled (by his standards) in his brief American League tenure, posting a line of .286/.378/.454 with Oakland through 93 games this season. Since being traded to the Cardinals, however, Holliday exploded to post an incredible .353/.419/.604 line through 63 games.

It seems a bit early to begin making predictions, but since that's one of the fun parts about the offseason anyway, let's hear 'em. Does Holliday land with a New York club? Will he re-up in St. Louis? Or will we be surprised at what jersey he's wearing again, as we were when the A's acquired him last winter?

Odds & Ends: Mets, Yankees, Brewers

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A few links to browse while you recover from last night's 13-inning marathon in the Bronx….

  • The New York Post's Joel Sherman has a plan for the Mets' rotation: take advantage of spacious Citi Field by pursuing fly ball pitchers instead of the ground ball pitchers that everyone else will covet. Sherman's ideas include Jeremy Guthrie, Gil Meche, and Ervin Santana.
  • Adam Rubin at the New York Daily News hears that the Mets want to acquire a right-handed first baseman to complement Daniel Murphy in 2010. Rubin anticipates that the team's bigger move will be adding a power-hitting outfielder though.
  • Bill Madden of the New York Daily News expects the Yankees to re-sign either Johnny Damon and Hideki Matsui as the team's regular DH, letting the other player go. Brian Cashman could then use that money to sign a left fielder who wouldn't be a defensive liability.
  • After the Cincinnati Reds hired Bryan Price as their pitching coach, Tom Haudricourt of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel becomes more confident than ever that Rick Peterson is headed for the Brewers' open pitching coach position.

Baseball Blogs Weigh In: Twins, Mets, Rockies, Delgado, Nady, Butler

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On this date six years ago, Aaron Boone ended the ALCS with an 11th inning home run off of Tim Wakefield. Yesterday we learned that Boone is likely to retire, ending his 12-year career. With this season's LCS underway, 26 teams are already in the Hot Stove season. Let's take a look at what is being written in the Blogosphere…

Cork Gaines writes for RaysIndex.com. If you have a suggestion for this feature, Cork can be reached here, and followed on Twitter here.

Odds & Ends: Astros, Indians, Reds, O’s, Reyes

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Assorted rumblings from around the majors…

Mets Notes: Wilpon, Minaya, Jaramillo

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According to Peter Gammons, Mets COO Jeff Wilpon is the general manager of the Mets, not actual GM Omar Minaya.

Gammons went on to describe Minaya as "the one out there to take the heat” on Michael Kay's 1050 AM radio show Wednesday.

This has implications for how the Mets will proceed this winter, of course. The good news is that if Wilpon wants to spend money on a player, he doesn't need to run it by ownership, since he is, in fact, ownership. The bad news is, no one knows exactly how much baseball expertise Jeff Wilpon has.

The quote from former Mets' co-owner Nelson Doubleday in 2003 isn't encouraging:

“Mr. Jeff Wilpon has decided that he’s going to learn how to run a baseball team and take over at the end of the year… Run for the hills, boys.  I think probably all those baseball people will bail… Jeff sits there by himself like he’s King Tut waiting for his camel.”

This has ramifications for recently-jettisoned Texas Rangers hitting coach Rudy Jaramillo as well. After all, Jaramillo has been linked to the Mets before, and the well-respected coach once managed a young minor leaguer named Omar Minaya.

While a failure to bring in Jaramillo doesn't prove much, if the Mets do bring him in, it goes a long way toward showing that Minaya still has some power with the Mets.

Odds & Ends: Lansford, Rangers, Jaramillo

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A few more links, including big news out of L.A. and San Francisco…

  • According to the Los Angeles Times' official Twitter account, Dodgers owner Frank McCourt and his wife, CEO Jamie McCourt, have separated in "a move that could place the future ownership of the team in doubt."  Tim Brown of Yahoo! Sports notes that a similar situation in the Moores family resulted in the sale of the Padres last spring.
  • Andrew Baggarly of the San Jose Mercury News reports the Giants have fired Carney Lansford as hitting coach. Giants manager Bruce Bochy informed him of the news with a phone call Wednesday night.
  • According to Tim Cowlishaw of the Dallas Morning News, Rangers fans who bought playoff tickets this season were told they won't see a refund until November because it's "tied up with MLB."  Clearly the club is having serious financial issues and it'd be a surprise to see them chase any major free agents this offseason.
  • As Bart Hubbuch of the New York Post points out, highly touted hitting coach Rudy Jaramillo has been represented by agent Scott Boras in the past and Jaramillo is likely to use Boras again this winter.  The Cubs, Mets and Astros are thought to have interest in adding him to their coaching staff.

Yusei Kikuchi To Meet With Seven MLB Teams

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NPB Tracker's Patrick Newman has the latest on amateur lefty Yusei Kikuchi, based on reports from Nikkan Sports and Sanspo.  Kikuchi still hasn't decided whether to start his career in MLB or NPB, but he's meeting with teams starting Friday.  He'll first meet with a dozen NPB teams, followed by seven MLB clubs.

Nikkan's list of MLB suitors: the Giants, Mets, Dodgers, Yankees, Rangers, Mariners and Indians.  MLB.com's Anthony Castrovince confirms the Indians' interest.  Newman tells us all about Kikuchi in this post.

Odds & Ends: Tigers, Clark, Duncan, Beltran

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Wait, what do you mean "there are no baseball games tonight?!?"

  • James Schmehl of MLive.com says that during the Tigers' annual season-ending meeting, GM Dave Dombrowski acknowledged "that payroll limitations this offseason will prevent the Tigers from keeping every free agent." Detroit's double play combo of Placido Polanco and Adam Everett will be free agents, as will their setup man-closer tandem of Brandon Lyon and Fernando Rodney.
  • Mark Bowman of MLB.com reports that Braves scouting director Roy Clark "told the Braves on Tuesday that he's leaving the organization to become an assistant general manager with the Nationals." Clark will have a similar role with the Nats, overseeing player development and the scouting department. He had been Atlanta's scouting director since 2000, drafting such players as Brian McCann, Yunel Escobar, and Jason Heyward.
  • Cardinals' pitching coach Dave Duncan said he's going to wait and see what manager Tony La Russa does before making a decision about his future, according to FoxSports.com's Jon Paul Morosi.
  • In a mailbag at MLB.com, Marty Noble says the Mets are "boxed in" when it comes to Carlos Beltran because not many clubs can assume the $37MM he's owed the next two years, not to mention concerns about his physical condition.
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