The Mets optioned Niese today to the minors and this was pretty expected at this point. Garcia has been struggling, and probably will be cut or optioned or something soon, hopefully far away from the Mets. It is hard to say good bye to Niese but I have a feeling he will be back. He is going to get stronger this season in the minors and unless Hernandez is lights out this season, he will be on that short leash. As soon as he has a couple of bad starts in a row, as long as that happens after April, I have a feeling Niese will come up, and probably bounce around between the rotation and the pen. He just needs a little more seasoning, and as soon as he gets it, he could be the next home grown arm in that rotation. I really do wonder what this means for Redding, I guess its something we will have to wait and see how it plays out for the Mets and their number 5 madness. On another note, I still have this gut feeling that the reason Hernandez has not been publicly named as the Mets fifth starter yet is I think Manuel wants to take a closer look at Figueroa, which he should.
On another note entirely, the Rangers announced they will not be using those two toned red and blue batting helmets, and thats great news for every baseball fan around, because those were some terrible, terrible helmets and now they are gone.
