This should be an interesting season with new ownership moving into Los Angeles and old ownership possibly moving out of New York. There are new managers with new challenges in places like Boston, Miami and Chicago and I will try to encapsulate what each team will be going through this season.

I am a huge follower of advanced metrics and believe that new statistics lead to better understanding of teams, players and situations. I will be incorporating some stats in my columns. I love vigorous discussion so please comment at will and I will do my best to respond to even the most asinine of arguments. This week we focus on the National East. We will post a team a day until all 30 are spoken for. Starting with the New York Mets.

So far, this offseason, the most exciting news to come out of Mets camp has been that they won’t sign Ramon Castro. The Mets are a mess, but they’re on the right track, sort of. With the Madoff thing hanging over the organization’s head, they did what they had to do and cut ties with Carlos Beltran midseason and let Jose Reyes walk away in free agency. I think both moves were good on their part. Yes, Reyes won the batting title, but if you look at the contract he received, it made little financial sense for the Mets to give an aging shortstop that kind of commitment. Everything that came out of the front office in the offseason and even at the end of the season was that they were willing to give him four or five years and $100 million, but six years was ridiculous.

I couldn’t agree more. Sandy Alderson, Billy Beane’s mentor, is one of the more intelligent, prudent general manager’s in baseball. VP of player development, Paul Depodesta, Billy Beane’s protégé, is a numbers guru and notorious for getting value from the unlikeliest of places. They will draft well, like they did with Brandon Nimmo out of Wyoming and, with any luck, by 2014 they’ll have a team prime for contention. That’s two years away, though, and the biggest goal this team will have to face is to not lose 100 games. The management made a smart decision to move the fences in at Citi Field so they don’t have to watch another season of inside the park home runs and long triples.

1B

Ike Davis’ 2010 season was only surprising to those who hadn’t paid close enough attention to what he was doing in the minors. He excelled at every level and when it came time for his promotion to the big leagues he made the most of it with 19 home runs, a TAV of .286 and.791 OPS. Solid numbers for a rookie and granted he strikes out too much 138 times in 2010 and last year in an injury plagued season he struck out 31 times in 149 plate appearances. That’ll probably continue unless he develops a little better control. He walks a fair amount of the time, but certainly not enough. He says he’s healthy coming into this season and there’s no reason to believe he can’t return to form. Terry Collins could put him in the cleanup spot after David Wright and restore some of his confidence.

2B

It looks like Daniel Murphy will probably be the starting second baseman this season and with a BABIP of .345 in 423 plate appearances he deserves a shot. Don’t expect him to do that again, however. After his second MCL injury his range will be limited and owing to the fact that he has little to no power, he couldn’t be considered an able body replacement or backup for Ike Davis. On any other team he’d be a super utility player in the mold of Omar Infante or Marco Scutaro, but this isn’t a normal team, this is the Indians from Major League. Murphy could carve out a nice little existence as a subpar fielder, but decent hitter in this latest incarnation of Metropolitan futility.

SS

Alderson and perhaps, moreover, Wilpon let Reyes walk away and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Sure, he won the batting title last year, but his balky hamstring has to be a huge concern as he creeps towards his inevitable decline. Instead Ruben Tejada, a 22 year old rail, will be taking the reins. Nothing Tejada does is especially flashy or exciting, but he does possess a strong sense of fundamentals. He’ll hit singles, work the count, walk, but won’t steal bases as he’s not especially fast and won’t hit any homers because he lacks power. He equates to a David Eckstein type of player. Good with the glove, not great, solid with the bat with a .331 BABIP last season. His PECOTA projections suggest a regression as he’ll have a full season at shortstop and thus more opportunities to fail.

3B

After spending two months on the disabled list with a stress fracture in his back, David Wright hopes to make a comeback from what have been two out of three disastrous seasons. Wright is 29 and players are usually right around their peaks from 27-31. He should be right in the middle of the most productive period of his career. Instead, he’s been mired in back injuries and post-concussion syndrome. It’s evident the Mets would love for him to return to his pre 2009 self and reduce the errors at third (20 in 2010 – most of all third basemen) so he can become trade bait come July or even next offseason. There is a clause in his contract that states if he is traded during the season he can void next year’s team option and become a free agent, virtually assuring he will be a Met at least until November.

C

Has it really come down to Josh Thole as the primary catcher for this team? The same team that had the late Gary Carter (RIP)? That had Mike Piazza? He has no power, is a poor game caller and doesn’t have a particularly great arm as runners stole against him 79 percent of the time. He would be a second if not third string catcher on most teams, but he gets a shot on the Mets, because well they don’t want to sign a guy like Pudge Rodriguez and throw bad money at a guy that won’t help them win, since they obviously have no chance of coming in anything above fourth. Josh Thole is the kind of catcher that should be looking for a backup role year after year, accepting minor league contracts to get a shot in Spring Training. He is NOT starter material and the fact that the Mets run him out there to ruin what could be a promising young pitching staff is preposterous.

LF

Jason Bay has two years left on his contract. That may be the nicest thing anyone says about him all season. If this were the AL he could be converted into a designated hitter, but instead he’ll be doing a poor imitation of Manny Ramirez on a good day in left. In 2009, his last year in Boston, he hit 36 homers. In 2010, his first with the Mets, he hit six, then last year he hit 12. Injuries and age have ruined what many thought was going to be a nice compliment to David Wright. If he performs at even an average level, with the fences moved in, he could become something of a trade chip to an American League squad if the Mets are willing to eat the majority of his contract. Otherwise, Met fans, you’re going to be stuck with him for a little while longer.

CF

Give Alderson credit for getting rid of Angel Pagan for Andres Torres. If Torres returns to his 2010 numbers the Mets will have scored a nice little coup here. Though, he was beset with leg issues, there is hope he’ll regain form and hit double digit home runs and steal 20 plus bases again. Hitting in the leadoff spot for this team will mean getting on base and trying to make runs happen. There is no doubt that the Mets will give him tons of leeway to run as he pleases, assuming he’s healthy. His defense is at times frustrating, but he did have a decent RF (Range Factor) last year of 2.34 in center field and there’s hope his leg issues will allow for his 2.66 RF of 2010 to be the norm and not the outlier, in an otherwise up and down career.

RF

Lucas Duda might be the worst defensive right fielder in the game, but boy can mash. He hit 20 home runs between the AAA affiliate in Buffalo and the big club last season. One caveat is that that was mostly against right handed pitching. He can’t hit lefties to save his life. He is a poor man’s Adam Dunn, you know, before Dunn decided to take a nosedive. Is it possible he hits 20-30 homers this season? Sure, but how patient the Mets will be with him depends on how many runs he gives up galloping in the outfield like a wounded giraffe. A platoon situation with Scott Hairston may be the norm until he learns to hit left handed pitching, but once he does look out.

Bench

The bench of the Metropolitans is a mix of guys like Justin Turner, who will be backing up Ike Davis at first, having played there once in his career. Ronny Cedeno who is, let’s face it, bad at baseball. Mike Nickeas, will be Josh Thole’s backup which is like the deaf leading the blind over a cliff. And the aforementioned Scott Hairston, a fourth outfielder who may get playing time if Andres Torres is out for any length of time.

Starting Pitching

If the Mets can get 100-125 innings out of Johan Santana they will be happy, but after hearing him speak to reporters in Port St. Lucie, Florida there’s little doubt that this isn’t the same dominant pitcher he once was. He’s been plagued by injuries since he signed that mega contract and missed all of last season with a shoulder injury. Make no mistake about it, if he returns to form the Mets will look to get something for him. This is clearly a team in rebuild mode and they are looking for future pieces not fillers. The farm system is beaming with young talent like Zack Wheeler, Jeurys Familia and Matt Harvey. These guys are the future and while I don’t expect them to come up this season and contribute much, there is a chance they will see some big league time.

These aren’t Omar Minaya’s Mets, though. The cautionary tales of Jenrry Mejia and Fernando Martinez should provide a more calculating attitude with Alderson and Depodesta. The rest of the pitching staff shakes out with a cast of clowns, has-beens and never wills. Jon Niese got a nose job for admittedly cosmetic purposes. Dillon Gee survived with a decent record, despite less than decent stuff. R.A. Dickey is a better writer than a pitcher and may be the lone knuckleballer left in baseball. Mike Pelfrey is like a child star that everyone thought was a good actor, then once he reached the big time people realized it was all hype.

Bullpen

Jon Rauch, Frank Francisco, Tim Byrdak, Ramon Ramirez and Bobby Parnell aren’t the worst bullpen in baseball, but they do qualify for the guys-past-their-primes-All-Star team. With the exception of Bobby Parnell, none of these guys is particularly worth talking about. Parnell has such unrealized potential, like so many of these young players, that it almost hurts. He has such a wicked slider, that if he ever learned how to control his pitches he’d be the closer. It’s a testament to how little the Mets truly value him that they went out and got Ramirez, Francisco and Rauch. He’s the one pitcher that could turn it around this season.

Final Analysis

The Mets are going to come in last place. It’s almost a factual statement before the season starts. They are not a good team. The thought that they could lose 100 games terrifies Met fans to their core, but I don’t think that’ll happen. It’s possible, but difficult. The Astros did it last year and they may do it again this year, but I think the Mets are going in the right direction. Their future pitching prospects look promising and getting Wheeler out the Giants for three months of Carlos Beltran was a shrewd move by Alderson who knows that Sabean is a horrible GM. In this division the Mets are going to struggle and with so many injury concerns heading into the season, fielding a competent major league roster may be the most difficult thing. That being said, somewhere in the region of 95 losses seems to me about what will happen.

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