Joe Janish does a good job in extending my own remarks. I agree with him that Putz probably should have been shut down when persistent pain surfaced in his elbow. I’m hesitant to comment in depth as I was not there to hear Putz’ own feedback of how he was feeling. There is no way of knowing what he was saying to the Mets staff as he was aware of his own contract situation.

Reagrding Putz further, a question should be asked at as to whether of not the Mariners were candid with the Mets about Putz’ health. That does not absolve the Mets, however, from doing their own physical exam like they did before signing Pedrom Martinez in 2004. Did they receive his medical records? If they recieved accurate ones, they should have been concerned as it would look much like Janish’s timeline. Putz was apparently hurting enough when he arrived in camp for it to be an issue during his spring training physical exam. Consideration via hindsight does not reflect well on the Mets. But the Mariners were indeed aware of Putz’ history and can be said to have knowingly traded damaged goods.

The rehabilitation for removal of foreign bodies from of the elbow is relatively short, and in hind sight a more prudent decision would have been for an arthroscopy when pain persisted. A noteworthy comparison is that a similarly injured Johan Santana is doing so well right now. I have no way of knowing why that decision was not made.

Dr. David Altcheck took over for Dr. James C. Parkes after the 1991 season. Altchek was a departure from the conservative Parkes in that he appeared to recommend surgery for players much quicker than would have Parkes. Whe Joe McIlvaine returned to the Mets as GM in 1993 he asked Altcheck why there appears to have been so many surguries. The Mets contracted their physician care out to a hospital that payed them a lot of money for a few years before they turned to Altcheck before the 2004 season.

In the cases of Carlos Beltran, Jose Reyes and Putz there seems to be a change in philosophy to opt for surgery. I doubt that that philosophy is driven by Altcheck. Last season the Mets also clearly displayed similar hesitancy in placing these same players on the disabled list. Observers are probably wondering outloud about how long Santana was hurting before it was decided to perform surgery on him.

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Jon Voight has agreed to play Day.

Bud Day’s home was only blocks from my own and I vividly remember the event the day all of our POW’s were released. One long time friend of Day sums it up:

“We don’t want a Sean Penn or some people like him — they’ve gotta be on the righteous side, on the best side of America,” Gates said.

Luckily it’ll be the patriot like Voight.

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Its been 15 days.

Brown today demanded to be seated while senate dems are jamming things through in the mean time.

Mitch McConnell protested the continued voting by Paul Kirk. It may come to a head if they attempt to get a vote an SEIU operative to the NLRB.

While reports today are saying that Brown will be seated tomorrow afternoon, something tells me that it will be delayed or that senate dems will attempt to hold a votes on some controversial nominees. Maybe both if dems remain true to form.

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Looks like Darryl talked to a number of members of the media yesterday. Although some writers appear to be taking his comments to be an indictment of Omar Minaya, I think that he tried to stay away from it. He mentioned that the acquisition of Jason Bay as a positive, but that it hurt to lose Carlos Beltran. That’s a win-lose wash. And Darryl said that the club needed more pitching. You can probably get members of the front office to say that publically.

More telling were his quotes regarding the Mets intensity. Fans will agree with that. Darryl’s characterization of the 86 Mets’ moxie is similar to my own. It’s not so easy though. Frank Cashen referred to it as “fire in the belly” on the day he fired Davey Johnson in 1990.

By that time, a different set of players were around. No Ray Knight. No Roger McDowell. No Lenny Dykstra. No Jesse Orosco. No Mookie Wilson. A far different chemistry existed in the Mets clubhouse. A different formula for success was in place that didn’t work as well. The club didn’t play as well as it had because it wasn’t as good. Cashen unfairly took that to mean that the team wasn’t playing as hard or cared as much. Bobby Ojeda took exception to Cashen’s statement and spoke to both him and Buddy Harrelson who shared similar views.
Harrelson was gone before the end of the next season. Cashen sceeded control to Al Harazin and Jerry Hundsicker a few days later.

Essentially it has little to do with caring or intensity. Chemistry in a positive sense spawns from winning combination of players. To be sure negative influences can cause harm . See Gregg Jefferies, Eddie Murray, and Tony Bernazard.

I’m hopeful that a subtle change can occur in these Mets’ clubhouse. With the departure of a subdued Carlos Delgado, a new hierchy will emerge among everyday players. The example of intensity will come from David Wright, Jeff Francouer and Jason Bay. A healthy Jose Reyes, the lovable foil.

And if the pitchers can get enough outs we just might see some of that “fire in the belly”.

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Not as quick as Leach wants though. As there are questions lingering over Leach’s actions, he was left out of the running for for any coaching openings that occured. Last week it was reported that Craig James threatened to sue the university if it did not investigate Leach’ treatment of his son.

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Joe Janish does a great job today of sifting through the story and asks all the right questions.

At any rate, my surprise begins with the news that the Mets never made any inquiries about Putz health prior to the trade and that the club trivialized his injury. Significant assets were committed to get Putz and now he is gone without anything resembling compensation.

A Mets statement somewhat contradicts Putz:

We were aware that [Putz] had a bone spur before the trade,” the statement said.

“He had the same condition in 2008 and was able to pitch with it. J.J. underwent an exam during spring training and an additional exam and MRI before he was cleared to play in last year’s WBC [World Baseball Classic]. Unfortunately, the spur did flare up again in May and he missed the rest of the season.”

Putz seems to be overatating his problems with the Mets as the Mets did an MRI on Putz before they let him go the the WBC. Putz said nothoing of this is his interview. To say the Mets mishandled or mistreated him is false. They took a chance on Putz elbow would be a non factor and probably relied on much of what they Mariners were telling them.

Pitchers frequently pitch with spurs or chips present within the elbow’s hinge joint. Unless problems begin – meaning pain – they are allowed to pitch. But when a pitcher begins hurting, it’s shut down time. As in Putz case and from the timeline that Janish provided, it appears that the bone spur that Putz developed is something we see quite frequently. To make a comparison, the development is similar to that of heal spurs after years of plantar fasciitis on the bottom of a foot. We often inject painful heal spurs with some success.

Unlike a shoulder where a bursa sack can be injected, the elbow does not provide such an effective target for costisone. Putz received and injection last year in May last year likely intended to decrease the spur.

The easiest path has been to jump in another public Mets beat down and I would have if the medical staff hadn’t done an MRI prior to Putz going off to the WBC. A larger issue that provides much more interesting dynamics comes up when one notes the large number of Mets whom participated in the WBC suffered season ending injuries last season. The list include Putz, Carlos Beltran, Jose Reyes, Carlos Delgado, Johan Santana, and Oliver Perez. All of these injuries can be categorized as being of the over use variety.

The Mets don’t seemed to have publically advanced this theory as it could cause them considerable political problems within the industry. Having said this, it will intersting to see how the Mets handle the issue in the run up to the next one in 2013.

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Flores is considered to be one of the crown jewells of the Mets organization. According to this scouting service, his game has lots of holes. Could it be that Flores’ reputation came from the over hyping of latin prospects that came during the Tony Bernazard regime?

Met’s minor league prospect guru, Mack Ade, rates Flores at number three. Toby Hyde lists him 2nd.

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…….the Milwaukee Brewers assistant GM Gord Ash. One I like involves drafting high school players in a format similar to what the NFL does:

“Baseball needs to adopt the NHL rule where if you’re drafting underage players (high schoolers) you retain the rights,” Ash said. “If you’re forced into signing them and overpaying because you’re trying to buy out colleges you could say, `Look, go to college. We’ll keep our eye on you and we’ll sign you later.’ That has to go hand-in-hand with asking colleges to convert back to wood bats even if MLB has to subsidize it to some degree. It’s a much different game with aluminum bats.”

Ashe supports placing international players in the draft as well. I wonder what that would do to baseball’s current establishment of academies in latin countries. Including some sort of mandatory education component has been one of my ideas. Perhaps there could be some way to incorporate the vast number of junior college programs.

h/t: ballbug

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