Early Fireworks

Francisco Rodriguez is a great closer, there's no question about that, but there are already a ton of miles on his shoulder, and some teams may be shying away from the guy because of that. At the minimum they would like to drop his value a tad before signing.

So the "drop in velocity" rumors have started making the rounds, so much so that his agent has had to come out and defend the guy, in arguably his greatest season yet.

The Mets are of course the heavy favorite for Rodriguez's services, and their was even a story from a Venezuelan newspaper yesterday, that Francisco Rodriguez wass on his way to New York for a physical exam, in advance of signing a contract with the Mets. But a person within the Mets organization tonight said "it's not true."

Give it a week or two. He will be a Met.

New York Times Blog The Book on Oliver Perez, by Scott Boras

Chapter Three is titled: “Perez Is One of Baseball’s Top 5 Left-Handed Starting Pitchers.” It puts Perez in a grouping with C.C. Sabathia, Cole Hamels, Ted Lilly and Johan Santana, who was Perez’s teammate on the Mets in 2007. Two charts are included to show that in each of the past two seasons on the Mets, Perez was the youngest left-handed pitcher in the majors to have an earned run average of less than 4.25 while accumulating at least 170 strikeouts and 10 victories.