David Wright has a “small fracture in the middle joint of his right pinky.” It sounds neither serious nor fun. Wright is heading to see a hand specialist today, Wednesday, and Terry Collins seems to hope that he will be back by Friday.

And if that doesn’t happen? The people want to know about contingencies.

Kevin writes:

If you had to call someone up to play 3B for the Mets tomorrow who would it be, Zach Lutz from Buffalo or Jefry Marte from Binghamton?  Marte is higher on your list and off to a good start, but a level below with shaky defense.

Jonathan C writes:

Personally, I would really like a look at Lutz in the bigs, the man can hit. He would have (or should have) been here, had it not been for the freakish injuries he has suffered.

Let’s discuss!

The first issue is determining the length of Wright’s absence. If he’ll be back in a few days, the Mets can just play Justin Turner or Ronny Cedeno at third until Wright returns. If it’s looking more like 10 days or so, the team would do well to place Wright on the DL, let him heal fully and make a move.

There are lots of options. Terry Collins has repeatedly said that he does not want to move Murphy from second temporarily. Lets assume, for the purposes of this discussion that even if Wright is placed on the disabled list, he will be back around the minimum (15 days). Even if he’s out a full three weeks, that falls into the temporary category. Under this scenario, Murphy stays at second, and the Mets need to fill third.  Here too they have choices: they could call someone up and install him at third, or two call someone up and have him help the combo of Cedeno and Turner as third basemen and depth pawns.

It’s not going to be Jefry Marte. He’s 20 years old, with 19 plate appearances above advanced-a and he’s not on the Mets 40-man roster. He’s always had some pop, and he made some nice strides in cutting down on his strikeouts and increasing his walks at the end of 2011 which seem to have carried over into 2012. However, he needs the development time in the minors.

Here are the choices: Josh Satin, Zach Lutz and Vinny Rottino.

The arguments for Lutz:

• He’s on the Mets 40-man roster
• Dude can hit. He’s hit a combined .296/.378/.500 in 72 games in parts of three seasons in AAA.
• He’s a better third baseman than Josh Satin. Satin, a natural second baseman, began playing a lot of third base in 2011. Lutz has a better range factor at third (2.13) than Satin (1.97)

The arguments against Lutz:

• He gets hurt a lot (but he’s healthy now).
• He’s not a really good 3B. His career .942 fielding percentage in the minors at third is a touch better than Satin.

The arguments for Satin:

• He’s on the Mets 40-man roster
• He hit a combined .323/.411/.495 between AA and AAA in 2011 as a 26-year old
• He’s versatile. He can play 1B, 2B, or 3B
• He’s got strong eyebrows

The arguments for Rottino:

• He’s hit .293/.360/.433 in almost 2,000 plate appearances over seven seasons in AAA since 2005.
• He can play first, the outfield corners and is a former catcher if the Mets want a little help or the flexibility to pinch-hit for a catcher more regularly.

The argument (s) against Rottino:

• The Mets would have to make space for him on the 40-man roster and potentially expose one of the other two guys to waivers.
• He’s not really a 3B. He has not played third in a minor league game since 2009 and looked a little shaky there in spring training.

And the Winner Is
Lutz. Lutz will be 26 in June while Satin’s already 27. For what it’s worth, I had Satin ranked #24 among Mets prospects coming into this year and Lutz #28. Lutz is closer to a third baseman than Satin, who’s played first exclusively for the Bisons this year.

If the Mets need to place David Wright on the disabled list, I’d sure like to see if Zach Lutz can hit in the big leagues.

At ESPN.com, Baseball Prospectus’ Kevin Goldstein wrote about the 10 biggest surprise assignments out of Spring Training and surprise! Matt Harvey made the cut.

His comment concludes:

“…the Mets have expedited things with Harvey, who was the opening day starter for Triple-A Buffalo on Thursday. Heading into the year, a September look was the most optimistic projection for Harvey — now it might be the baseline.”

I argued Harvey was ready for AAA during the off-season. Why was this assignment not a surprise? After getting hit hard in his first five starts, Harvey was actually pretty good over his final seven starts at AA in 2011. This table will help.

Note that although his strikeout rate was constant, and his walk rate actually ticked up in his last seven starts, he gave up many fewer hits. You know, not giving up hits, is, at least partially, within a pitcher’s control. He had 22.2 lousy innings to start his AA career when he was giving up too many hits. Then he finished off 2011 with 37 strong innings.

Could he have started at AA? Sure. Is AAA a challenge? Similarly affirmative. Obviously, he impressed some important Mets folks this spring.

Goldstein concludes:

“…the Mets have expedited things with Harvey, who was the opening day starter for Triple-A Buffalo on Thursday. Heading into the year, a September look was the most optimistic projection for Harvey — now it might be the baseline.”

That really does seem about right.

Matt den Dekker has officially been invited back to big league camp. This is interesting in the sense that as a guy who was not on the Mets’ 40-man roster, he could have been borrowed from minor league camp anytime the Mets wanted to grab him as depth for the big league game. The Mets’ moment of center-field panic/chaos seems to have passed with both Andres Torres and Scott Hairston improving, and making noises about being ready for Opening Day.

Mike Baxter’s in centerfield Friday against the Braves, and Jordany Valdespin will see some time after looking awkward on a fly-ball Thursday. Den Dekker remains a very long shot to make the Mets’ Opening Day roster.

Which brings us to a question on Twitter.

League average #8 hitter is a funny concept, but I’ll bite, and the answer is: probably not yet.

According to Baseball Reference, National League #8 hitters hit .246/.315/.359 in 2011.

As I pointed out earlier this week, PECOTA, Baseball Prospectus’ forecasting system sees Matt den Dekker as capable of putting up a weighted mean: .229/.278/.352. It isn’t until den Dekker’s 80th percentile forecast, which PECOTA pegs at .257/.308/.394 that den Dekker exceeds the average rate stats compiled by NL #8 hitters in 2011.

So, it’s not impossible that the 24-year old den Dekker, who hit .235/.32/.426 in a half season of double-A in 2011, could outhit the NL average #8 hitter right now, but the odds are decidedly against it.

Also, Josh Satin was optioned to minor league camp, while Omar Quintanilla and Fernando Cabrera, who were not on the 40-man roster were simply sent down.

We’ll get back to baseball this afternoon, but I wanted to make a few points about the settlement between the Madoff trustee and the Mets ownership group this morning.

Both the defendants and the Trustee picked up concessions to settle.

The only way to understand the agreement is through the prism of the court’s rulings since March 1. First, on March 5, the court ruled that the Wilpon/Katz group was liable for $83 million in “fictitious profits” even before the trial. This $83 million number was calculated as the profits accumulated over the final two years of Bernie Madoff’s ponzi scheme.

The second ruling, on March 15, shifting the burden of proof to the defense, appeared to be a win for the Trustee.  The Trustee and the Wilpon/Katz group were prepared to go to trial over another $303 million in principal. The key issue in the trial was going to turn on whether the Wilpon/Katz group acted in “bad faith” in ignoring the ponzi scheme – that is whether they were “willfully blind.”  This would have been extraordinarily difficult for the Trustee to prove as it speaks to the state of mind of a set of individuals, not just their actions, but their intentions, and what they knew, when they knew it. Proving that they had acted in “good faith” would have been difficult, but not impossible.

So, what did the trustee get out of that leverage? Well, the headline is $79 million more than the Wilpon/Katz group was already liable for. However, the win for Picard is that he created a new standard for settlement. Instead of agreeing on fictitious profits over two years, the two sides settled on an agreement for fictitious profits over six years. This was the standard the trustee was after in the first place, back in the days when he was attempting to recover over $1 billion. Now the trustee will look for settlements with amounts driven by six-year “returns” with other investors.

In exchange for giving the Trustee his six year win, the Wilpons gained:

• The right to insist on their complete innocence. Fred Wilpon Monday:

              “We are not willfully blind. …We acted in good faith.”

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The Basics
Every year, every team in baseball has every player on their 40 man roster, including their prospects with no chance of breaking camp, with the big league team in spring training. Other guys get invited too. At some point, these guys are sent back to minor league camp. For the Mets, who sent 13 guys back to minor league camp, the first round of cuts was Thursday.

The following guys were re-assigned: Matt Harvey, Valentino Pascucci, and Matt den Dekker. These three were not on the Mets’ 40-man roster.

The following guys were optioned: RHP Jeurys Familia, LHP Robert Carson, RHP Jenrry Mejia, 3B Wilmer Flores, OF Juan Lagares, OF Kirk Nieuwenhuis, 2B Reese Havens, RHP Josh Stinson, RHP Armando Rodriguez and 3B/1B Zach Lutz.

The Analysis
These assignments were predictable.

Matt Cerrone was “surprised” that Robert Carson was shipped back to minor league camp in light of Tim Byrdak’s surgery and the Mets’ subsequent search for a left-handed bullpen option. I am not. There’s nothing about Carson’s performance last year over a full-season starting in double-A that indicated he was big-league ready. When he was diagnosed with an intercostal muscle strain during the first week of March, I wrote, “Essentially, this kills any tiny chance he had of making the Mets out of spring training.” He had so much to prove (like he had the command for the big leagues) and just not enough time to do it.

The real surprise to me is the guy who’s still in big league camp: Josh Edgin. This is no joke. He was just added to big league camp this week, so it was unlikely the Mets would give him his walking papers to the other side of the complex just a few days later.  I still think he’s a very long shot to make the roster given that he topped out in advanced-a last year, but clearly, the Mets want to see more of Edgin.

Even an assignment to triple-A out of spring training would be very aggressive.  Chris Sale, the White Sox first round pick in 2010, skipped double-A, but who else has done it recently?

I learned something
The three players who are not on the 40-man, Matt Harvey, Valentino Pascucci and Matt den Dekker, can still be used in spring training games. The others, who were optioned, cannot.

Why Now?
Minor league spring training games begin on Saturday, so 1. the Mets will need to start fielding four teams of minor leaguers on a nearly daily basis and 2. there will be more competitive at-bats and innings available for the guys sent back to minor league camp than there would have been on the MLB side where the attention is on getting players who will be part of the Opening Day roster ready to go.

Josh Edgin will not make the Mets out of Spring Training. Yes, he throws hard, and was up to 94 yesterday. Yes, his slider looks like it can be a useful weapon. Yes, I liked him enough as a pitcher to rank him as my #19 prospect in the Mets system.

All the same, he’s never thrown a pitch above advanced-A St. Lucie. That’s three levels away from the big leagues. He still must improve his command. His change-up is fairly rudimentary, and he freely admits that he has room to improve the offering. He’s never seen the world’s most patient, disciplined powerful hitters. Nor has he seen the roughly next most 900 patient, disciplined hitters in double-A and triple-A.

(To answer an issue raised in the comments: Edgin will survive in the big leagues, if he gets there, on his fastball/slider. His third pitch is … Well a tertiary concern.)

He’s pitching for his spring assignment. Entering Spring Training 2012, he was surely headed to AA-Binghamton. Now, Wally Backman wants him at AAA. Of course he does. Edgin has a nice arm. All the same, there’s no reason to skip him over AA. Let him enjoy the sights and sounds of NYSEG Stadium in April. If he’s great for a month or two, swell. Move him up to Buffalo. He still needs he can retire advanced hitters.

The fact that Edgin has recorded a few outs in spring training games (and Monday gave up a game-tying double) does not mean much. He’s pitched mostly against minor leaguers (not prospects) and well below average major league hitters. In fact, he’s faced 12 hitters in Major League Spring Training games this spring and has not seen a single MLB average hitter yet.

The best hitter he saw, Andy Dirks, doubled against him. Dirks owns a career OPS+, accumulated during 2011, of 90. Of the 12 hitters he’s faced, five have seen MLB time. Their median career OPS+, where 100 is league average, is 72 (Eric Patterson). The five hitters he’s faced with MLB time are a murder’s row of in chronological order: Eugenio Velez, Andy Dirks, Omir Santos, Argenis Diaz and Eric Patterson. Three of the 12 guys he’s seen have never played as high as double-A.

Again, Edgin is a nice story with a good arm. He’s not going to make the Mets Opening Day Roster.

The full list of batters Edgin has seen in Spring Training follows after the jump.

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