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According to the New York Mets twitter post , the Mets have won their opening game in their last seven straight series. Teams beaten include: the Twins, the Tigers, the Yankees, the Orioles, the Indians, the Marlins, and the Padres (four of these seven were at home).

The Mets seem to be doing something right of late, as yet again they just need one more victory to win another series. The Mets’ win tonight tied their all-time inter-league wins number of 12. If they win tomorrow or Sunday, they get a new team all-time high.

David Wright hit a home run tonight, also driving in two. Mike Pelfrey threw six innings, allowing just two runs. Pedro Feliciano and Bobby Parnell each threw a perfect inning in relief. Francisco Rodriguez did his usual heart attack antics, but held down the fort to get a save. Pelfrey got the win, he is now 10-2 on the year. Kevin Slowey got the loss, he is now 7-5. K-Rod got the save, his 17th.

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In the offseason the Mets knew they needed to upgrade behind the plate, and they made Bengie Molina their target.

Unfortunately for them, Molina re-signed with the San Francisco Giants, and the Mets were forced to settle for Rod Barajas.

Early this season the Mets looked like they had struck gold. Barajas led the team in homers with 10 and had a decent .276 average to go with a very good .893 OPS. Combine all of that with a one-year, $400,000 contract, and he was a major contributor on the cheap.

He was doing so well that the Texas Rangers, who were in need of a catcher and were one of Barajas’ many former employers, contacted the Mets on his availability .

Unfortunately for the Mets, their offense was looking so weak that they were afraid of making such a move. Between that and the fact that they probably thought mid-May was too soon to start dealing, the Mets and the Rangers never really got into trade talks.

That has turned out to be a huge mistake for the Mets, and they should have seen it coming. Barajas is a 34-year-old journeyman who had never even managed a 100 OPS+.

If anybody in the organization thought that he could manage to continue that type of production, an .893 OPS, they were mistaken.

The story that the Rangers had contacted the Mets on Barajas’ availability was on May 22. Since the day before that, May 21, Barajas has been terrible.

In 21 games he has one home run and a .214 batting average with a .547 OPS. He has become an automatic out with almost no pop, not to mention very slow on the bases. He’s not even the best defensive catcher on the Mets; that would be Henry Blanco.

The Mets would not have been able to get any top-flight prospect for Barajas, but it is certainly possible they could have added a Chris Carter type like they did in the Billy Wagner deal. At the very least they could have added a piece they could turn around and include in a Roy Oswalt/Cliff Lee/Dan Haren deal.

Unfortunately, that is no longer possible. Barajas has shown the fallacy of small sample sizes. Any player can put up good numbers; it’s just a matter of how long they can sustain those numbers. In Barajas’ case, the answer is not very long.

Barajas is not an answer in the short term or the long term for the Mets. They should have gotten something for him when his value was at its highest.

Like this post? Want the latest Mets news and rumors? Subscribe to Flushing Baseball Daily via RSS Reader , by Email , Twitter , or Facebook . You can also follow this post’s author, Rob Abruzzese , on Twitter.

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The Mets have decided to return RHP Jenrry Mejia to a starting role and will initially send him to Double-A Binghamton to stretch him out. To replace Mejia they will recall RHP Bobby Parnell .

This is great news for Mets fans because Mejia, 20-years old, projects as a future starter and using him in the bullpen, in essentially a mop-up role, his development was being stunted.

Manager Jerry Manuel stated recently that he’d hoped that Mejia would have taken a firm grasp of the eighth inning role by now. Because he hadn’t, Manuel said that the team would reevaluate his role and it seems that’s exactly what they’ve done.

It’s not that Mejia has been awful, he’s been pretty good especially for a 20-year-old rookie (29 G, 0-2 record, 3.38 ERA, 26.2 IP, 15 BB, 16 SO, 122 ERA+, 1.650 WHIP).

Still, a young player with such a low strikeout ratio and high walk ratio needs to be in the minor leagues where he can continue his development. As a starter he’ll also be much more valuable to the Mets in the long run and maybe even this year too if they fail to trade for rotation help.

Replacing him is 25-year-old Bobby Parnell. Parnell pitched in parts of 2008 and 2009 with the Mets. His career numbers: 74 G, 8 GS, 4-8 record, 5.30 ERA, 93.1 IP, 104 H, 59 R, 55 ER, 8 HR, 48 BB, 77 SO, 78 ERA+, 1.629 WHIP.

Parnell has been pitching in Triple-A Buffalo all season as a reliever. In 23 games he’s pitched 40.1 innings with a 4.24 ERA. He’s also K’d 41 and walked 17.

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According to Adam Rubin of ESPN New York , the Mets have acquired outfielder Jorge Padilla from the Toronto Blue Jays and sent him to Triple-A Buffalo.

No word yet on whom the Mets are sending to Toronto to complete this trade.

This seems like a move purely for minor league depth as Padilla, 30, is a minor league lifer. In 2010 he’s played 51 games with a .328 batting average and a .860 OPS. His career in the minor leagues has not been as successful. In 1,216 career games he has a .290 batting average and a .773 OPS.

His numbers this year and last have been relatively impressive so it is possible that the Mets are hoping that they can catch lightning in a bottle with this guy. However, for right now he’s going to have to prove himself in Buffalo before he gets a shot in Flushing.

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A rotation with Johan Santana, Mike Pelfrey, and Lee would be pretty impressive, but Lee is going to be a free agent at the end of the season and the word is that the Mets are going to make a play for him.

If they’re willing to do that including Niese in a deal seems a little short sighted. The Mets would certainly compete with Santana, Pelfrey, and Lee at the top of their rotation, but it wouldn’t make them World Series favorites. Having that rotation with Niese included next season would be a lot more impressive.

It might be possible that the Mets could get Lee without giving up Niese. Cerrone reported that the Mariners like the Mets prospects and if that is the case and they become more motivated to deal Lee the closer it gets to the trade deadline they could back away from their demands to include Niese in a deal.

If the Mets could somehow include Bobby Parnell in the deal instead of Niese they would probably more seriously consider the deal. If they could maybe get a window to extend Lee’s contract that, might be worth it too. That would be a good way to keep him away from the Yankees, Angels, or Red Sox, three teams that could go after Lee this offseason.

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Mike Puma of the NY Post is reporting that “a player friendly with Roy Oswalt ” said the Astros 32-year-old pitcher would approve a deal to the Mets.

The Astros have been in the bottom of the league all season and Oswalt, who has a no-trade clause, told the front office that he would rather be traded than go through a rebuilding process with the team. Because of the no-trade-caluse he has some say in where he lands, and has asked the team to only deal him to a contender.

The Mets have been in need of a veteran pitcher all season long, but until now it was unclear whether or not Oswalt would accept a deal to the Mets because they seem both on the verge of contending and irrelevancy this season. If this is true that he would accept a deal to Flushing, it is unclear whether the Mets will pursue him heavily.

He’s still quite an effective pitcher; he’s got a 3.16 ERA and his losing record has more to do with his team’s weak offense than anything he’s done. The problem is the amount of money he is owed is quite substantial. He is in the fourth year of a five-year deal, and is owed $16 million next season plus a $2 million buyout if the Mets decided against picking up his 2012 option that is worth $16 million (it is almost impossible to imagine them picking up that option).

So unless the Mets decide to add quite a lot of money to their payroll they aren’t likely to make a deal. Houston could eat some of his salary, but it is more likely that they would prefer to keep him rather than do that. If this turned into a deal breaker for the Mets they might be able to convince the Astros to pay some of that salary if they sent some strong prospects to Houston.

This is good news for the Mets, but it remains unclear that they will actually pursue a deal. Still, it’s nice to know that if they want to they can.

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If you haven’t looked out the window recently. then you might not know that tonight’s Mets game has been canceled due to rain.

Here are some notes:

MLB has conducted its review of Oliver Perez to the DL and they have decided it’s legit.

John Maine is expecting to throw a rehab start next week and will take Hisanori Takahashi ’s spot in the rotation most likely. The reason is because Jerry Manuel likes Takahashi better in the bullpen.

Ruben Tejada is the Mets second baseman now, but as soon as Luis Castillo returns he’s going to lose his job no matter how well he does.

I don’t like the idea of Maine going back into the rotation without earning it, but Takahashi does sound like the better option out of the pen. It’s also great to hear that the Mets fooled the league with Perez’s phantom injury.

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With the seventh overall selection in the 2010 baseball draft the New York Mets select… Matt Harvey.

RHP Matt Harvey, a North Carolina product was selected by the Mets yesterday, marking the first time since the drafting of Mike Pelfrey in 2004 that they have drafted someone in which they think they can make a star out of.

The 21-year old Harvey is almost an exact replica of Mike Pelfrey the way he plays the game, 6-4, 225 pounds, and a hard fastball that top’s out at 98 MPH, Harvey will need to develop more off speed stuff to become a prominent big leaguer.

Heres how I see it, it took Pelfrey a few years to develop his breaking stuff just after being drafted and struggled in the big leagues his first few seasons called up, expect the same with Harvey. He’s not a guy who will come up and change the entire demeanor of the clubhouse like whats going on in Washington with Stephen Strasburg and Bryce Harper, but he if he works hard enough on developing his off speed stuff that could get him by in the major leagues, his fastball can carry him the rest of the way and he could be someone very similar to (the possible all-star?) Pelfrey, but were gonna have to give him a few years.

Harvey wasn’t projected to go in the top 10, but Mets scouts really had a liking for the guy and took him early. Over his three year career at UNC, Harvey had a 2.70 ERA in 2008, a 5.70 ERA in 2009 and this season had a 3.09 ERA this season at UNC.

One thing that really caught my eye was this kids longevity into games. He threw 157 pitches through 8.2 innings this year, having a guy like that going deep into his starts for the Mets would be great, keep in mind though it will be a few years before he gets called up, so there will probably be a new look bullpen (fingers crossed Feliciano retires a Met!).

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With the amateur draft starting today, the Mets have the 7th overall pick in the draft , which is a pretty good opportunity to sign a high-caliber player. After that, they miss out on the 2nd round of the draft because they signed Type-A free agent Jason Bay during the offseason. Their next pick is 89th overall in the third round.

To get a good idea of where the current Mets came from in the draft, I wanted to take a look at where they were each taken in the draft.

1st Round

Mike Pelfrey (9th overall), Ike Davis (18th), R.A. Dickey (18th), Jeff Francoeur (23rd), David Wright (38th)

3rd Round

Alex Cora

4th Round

Angel Pagan

6th Round

John Maine

7th Round

Jon Niese

12th Round

Sean Green

16th Round

Tobi Stoner

17th Round

Chris Carter

22nd Round

Jason Bay

31st Round

Pedro Feliciano

38th Round

Mike Jacobs

International Free Agents

Johan Santana, Jose Reyes, Luis Castillo, Henry Blanco, Fernando Tatis, Ruben Tejada, Oliver Perez, Francisco Rodriguez, Hisanori Takahashi, Fernando Nieve, Jenrry Mejia, Raul Valdes, Manny Acosta, Ryota Igarashi, Elmer Dessens

Amateur Free Agents

Rod Barajas

That’s six players the Mets drafted in the first three rounds, nine players drafted in the remaining rounds, and 16 players signed as amateur free agents. That means that July 2nd, the day when international free agents are signed, is as important to the Mets as this draft will be. The first three rounds are also almost as likely to yield a major leaguer than the rest of the draft combined.

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  The Mets twice tried to send pitcher Oliver Perez to the minor leagues, but he twice refused so instead of asking him a third time the team simply put him on the DL. Now it appears that the MLB is looking into whether or not Perez is legitimately hurt.

“This could be 100 percent legitimate,” the official said. “When there are questions, we look into it.”

This could potentially be a big deal and end up costing the Mets a bit of money through a fine. The reason why Perez was able to reject a minor league assignment is because the MLB Players Association fought for that provision to be included in the last CBA. If a team sends a player to the DL with a fake injury they are effectively getting around that rule that I am sure the MLBPA would like to see strictly enforced.

Perez did have an MRI taken this week and despite the fact that the words ‘phantom injury’ have been thrown around a lot there could be something going on. Perez has always been a rather inconsistent pitcher, but this season he has been consistently bad. His velocity is down and his location is all over the place.

The only thing is that if there really was a problem, why didn’t the Mets just put him on the DL in the first place? Why all the fighting about voluntary demotions?

I’m sure these are questions the MLB has as well. I’ll continue to follow this story as it develops.

Like this post? Want the latest Mets news and rumors? Subscribe to Flushing Baseball Daily via RSS Reader , by Email , Twitter , or Facebook . You can also follow this post’s author, Rob Abruzzese , on Twitter.

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