New York Mets

As we approach the 2011 season, it seems as though several teams in the NL East have significantly improved this offseason.

The Phillies brought back Cliff Lee to set up one of the best pitching staffs, at least on paper, in recent history.

The Braves added Dan Uggla to solidify the middle of their order.

The Nationals signed Jayson Werth, Adam LaRoche, and Rick Ankiel in an attempt to improve their offense.

The Mets just signed Chris Capuano and Taylor Bucholz to add some more depth to the pitching rotation. Both of these are solid signings and may pay off in big ways.

Capuano is only a few years removed from an 18-win season, and Bucholz has shown he can be a valuable seventh, or even eighth inning reliever.

“Every year players come out of nowhere to become success stories. Look no further than R.A. Dickey. He signed a minor-league deal last January, became a fixture in the starting rotation in May, and finished the season with 11 victories and a 2.84 ERA. I believe some of our offseason acquisitions can be this year’s version of R.A.”

New York Mets General Manager Sandy Alderson stated this in an e-mail to fans earlier today, and he could very well be projecting the future.

Three of the Mets' best players from the 2010 season—R.A. Dickey, Mike Pelfrey and Angel Pagan—are eligible for arbitration, which began on Wednesday.

Players who have between three and six years of major league experience are eligible.

Dickey, Pelfrey and Pagan are all looking at significant pay raises from last season, and they all chose a great time to perform the way they did last season.

SATIRE— Take pity on Mets General Manager Sandy Alderson. He has to rebuild a team that is saddled with a core of high salary players who are low on talent and lower still on productivity.  

To make matters worse, the team’s fans have been promised much on-the-field greatness in recent years, but have received little in terms of success.   As a result, Mets followers are losing their patience and have begun turning to other activities, such as Yankee baseball and alternate side of the street parking.

Roberto Alomar was overpaid by the New York Mets for his year and a half of service towards the end of his career, but I was happy to see him get the recognition he deserved with a spot in the Hall of Fame.

His career will always be defined by a select few by the spitting incident, and for those of you who think that is enough to keep him out of Cooperstown, I feel sorry for you.

Some fans will never overlook this transgression, using it as the basis of every argument they ever make about his wrongful inclusion.

Heading into 2011, few Mets fans, myself included, are expecting much from the team.

With big strides made by division rivals Philadelphia Phillies, Atlanta Braves and Washington Nationals, the Mets haven't been able to keep up, at least not in terms of names.

Financial restrictions have kept the Mets' focus on low-risk/high-reward players, which have been able to find.

In a year where we saw ‘Prevention and Recovery,' hirings and firings, and even some crazy top 10 plays, our New York Mets couldn’t put together a winning ball club and now our eyes are set on the promising future.

With a new regime in place that stands for almost everything opposite from the last boss, we take one last look at 2010 with the knowledge that our team will improve in 2011 and years to come. 

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    Just when you think you've seen it all, almost every season a player on the New York Mets makes headlines for a surprising off-the-field issue.  The multitude of inappropriate actions and embarrassing behavior by the team feels more like a soap opera than a professional baseball organization.

    While the New York Yankees perennially grace the cover of local newspapers for winning championships, the Mets created news over the years with locker-room brawls, drug scandals and throwing fireworks into a crowd of fans.

Despite the gripes of New York Mets fans, Luis Castillo will at the very least be in spring training this season vying for the starting second base job that he once possessed.

He no longer has the range of his younger self and has also lost a step or two on the base paths.

But the one thing about Castillo to keep in mind is that he is owed a ton of money in the final year of his contract. Omar Minaya signed Castillo to a four-year deal after the 2007 season.