Drafted in the fifth round of the amateur draft last season, third baseman Zach Lutz immediately became one of the most highly touted prospects in the Mets farm system. Quickly assigned to the Brooklyn Cyclones, the team’s Single-A affiliate, Lutz injured his foot in the team’s first game of the season and spent the rest of the year on the disabled list. Still rehabbing from the surgery that was required to repair the hairline fracture he suffered nearly a year ago, Lutz has put on some weight and now looks like a completely different ballplayer. Chatting over the phone from Florida, Lutz spoke to Dem Brooklyn Bums about his recovery and what to expect from him in the future.

Dem Brooklyn Bums: Because of your injury, you only had two at bats all season and spent the rest of the year on the disabled list. Considering how much was expected of you, how did you feel the rest of the season?

Zach Lutz: After I got hurt, I waited around for a week before I went and had surgery. I got two screws put in my foot and I knew I was going to be out for the rest of the season. It was a tough road back, but I think I’m in better shape than I was before the injury. As of right now, I’m still doing rehab down in Florida, but I’m going to be ready to play in a few weeks.

DBB: Has the organization told you where you were going to go? Is there anywhere that you would want to go?

Lutz: They haven’t told me anything yet. I have no idea, probably Brooklyn. I’d really like to make a full-season team but it all depends on where they think I’m going to be at that time and if I’m ready.

DBB: Considering how little you played in Brooklyn, do you feel you have something to prove to the fans there?

Lutz: It was unfortunate what happened there and I do feel like I have something to prove to them, but all I can really do is concentrate on my rehab. I’ve worked really hard down here and I’m anxious to get started. I’m just really looking forward to staying healthy this season on whatever team I play on.

DBB: The Cyclones had a solid season last year, did you follow them after you officially left the team.

Lutz: Yes. I became pretty close friends with J.R. Voyles during that time. We used to talk on the phone pretty much every day and he always let me know what was going on with the team. He did a great job stepping in for me and I was happy that they had a good season.

DBB: This offseason, you’ve put on some muscle and look much bigger around your shoulders and arms. As a matter of fact, some people probably wouldn’t even recognize you. What exactly did you do this offseason, besides eating plenty of steak and potatoes?

Lutz: I was doing upper-body work four times a week and I was using the arm bike to stay in shape. When I first got injured, that was pretty much the only cardio work that I could do. I also paid very close attention to what I was eating. I wanted to make sure that I could do everything in my power to be ready this year. Over the next few weeks, we’ll see how prepared I really am and hopefully I’ll be ready to go.

DBB: Before you played your first professional game, you compared your game to David Eckstein. Considering how much you’ve changed physically over the past year, do you think that assessment still holds up?

Lutz: I don’t know. I think maybe I may be a bit of a different player now, but I still think I go out and play the game the same way as him. We both work hard and give everything we have. I just hope with everything that has happened to my foot that I can still go out there and play with that same kind of intensity. I hope everything holds up. I’m used to running wherever I go. I’m not used to being lazy.

DBB: After you were drafted, you said that you were the type of guy that would go home and hit after a game. Without a doubt, baseball seems to be a true love in your life. Being injured for as long as you were, you couldn’t do that, how did you cope?

Lutz: I still did things when I was injured. It was weird though, because I was instructed to always keep my foot elevated. I had a cast on my right foot for five months; it was really tough at times, but I had to do something. I usually went outside and put my right foot on a bucket and I would throw the ball around with my mother or father. I tried to do anything to stay active. I would go down to my old college with my father and get on my knees and take softballs. I also took four classes at school. I’m still a semester away from getting my degree. That’s very important to me, but right now my main concern is coming back healthy this season.

DBB: Did the time off take an emotional toll on you as well?

Lutz: When all of this happened, it definitely made me think about baseball and my life differently. Sometimes you wake up in the morning and you question if you have the energy to go out and perform and sometimes you take it for granted. But then, something like what happened to me can happen and it puts everything into perspective. I worked so hard and then that happened, but I’m going to let it take anything away from me. I’m dedicated to getting back to where I should be and making the most of things. This offseason I hit the gym and worked as hard as I could. I wanted to make sure that I was ready this season.

DBB: Are you confident that you can come back this season and be the player that everyone expects you to be?

Lutz: Definitely. I put on some size this offseason and my power right now is unbelievable. I’ve worked really hard on defense with the fielding instructors as well, taking grounders and working on my hand-eye coordination and all the little things I need to be sharp with. I actually feel better now than I did before the injury. I’ve put everything from last year behind me and I’m ready to see what the future holds.

Photos by Patrick Hickey Jr. and Jim Dolan

Nothing against Matt Bouchard, the Cyclones All-Star shortstop from last season, but former Cyclone Luis Rivera will always rank near the top of my list as far as well-rounded middle infielders who have played in Brooklyn go. Last year the Cyclones offense was solid throughout the season, as guys like Jason Jacobs, J.R. Voyles, Jake Eigsti, Lucas Duda and Brandon Kawal all seemed to come up big when the team needed them to.

In 2006 however, Luis Rivera and Dustin Martin were the only Brooklyn starters to hit over .270. Simply put, they were a team that relied on great pitching and solid defense. If they got a few runs, they usually came out on top. While Rivera had only 14 RBI in 69 games that year, his seven stolen bases and 61 hits were second on the team to Martin, making him one of the only dependable players the team could count on.

However, despite his solid offensive ability in Brooklyn, the guy saved runs every night by playing tremendous defense. Combined with Jonathan Schemmel, who was also a solid hitter for most of the season until a leg injury cost him his season, Rivera formed a pretty solid double play combination. While I remember cringing occasionally at how unpolished the Brooklyn bats were in 2006 [the free-swinging Sanchez immediately comes to mind], watching these guys turn double plays and watching Rivera especially make plays that most shortstops wouldn’t even dare attempt, my first season in Brooklyn featured many more smiles than frowns.

While his play on the field was one reason to be a fan of Rivera, his laid-back and honest nature was a reason to like him even more. I still remember the first time I interviewed him and how honest he was about how he came to the Mets organization and why he played the way he did. For some reason, the Chicago Cubs gave up on him in 2005 and for a short while, the youngster was left without a team, despite hitting over .300 with 21 RBI, 12 SB and 53 hits after two stops in the organization.

Most minor leaguers wouldn’t have too much confidence at that time, but Rivera was unshakably content with himself and left everything he had on the field. Far from being cocky, Rivera knew he had to work hard every night. That’s exactly what he did.

“Last year, I did well with them,” said Rivera, who left Florida International University after his junior year and is still working on his Bachelor’s degree in Recreational Therapy. “This year, I started off there [in the Cubs Single-A Affiliate, Peoria] and I wasn’t playing everyday, I hit 2 for 25 and they released me. Then the Mets gave me an opportunity. I knew I was going to find another team because I work hard and play hard every game.”

Now that I look back at it, maybe I could see where the Cubs were coming from. Rivera still has yet to hit a homer in the pros, despite hitting a combined .271 in the minors. Simply put, Rivera would have been a star in the majors 20 years ago but with guys like Michael Young, Jimmy Rollins and Jose Reyes, shortstops like Phil Rizzuto just can’t cut it anymore. However, if this was 1980, Rivera would definitely be guy that every team would want just because he played great defense and could hold his own at the plate. He kind of reminds of former Met Lance Johnson at the plate, simply because he’s a singles machine and finds ways of getting to second via the stolen base and smart base running. That to me is stuff you can’t teach.

On defense, he reminds me a bit of Rey Sanchez. Not very big or armed with a laser of an arm, he’s very quick and has great range, which easily make up for his lack of pop at the plate. Did I also mention that Rivera can plat second base as well? Why any team would not want a player like that on their team, who is as comfortable hitting in the eighth spot as he is being a table setter and plays the kind of defense that keeps you in games is beyond crazy to me.

Nonetheless, one man’s loss is another man’s gain and in the end, the Mets definitely got a good player in Rivera. Playing a part of last season in Binghamton, where he hit .348 in 18 games with 18 hits and a steal, Rivera may find himself back there at sometime this season, depending on how well he plays at St. Lucie, where he is right now.

Not bad for a guy that was looking for a job a few years ago, eh?

Photos by Conroy Walker

I promise a nice update this weekend or Monday guys, but for the time being I thought it would be cool to check this out. The guys at Maple Street Press were nice enough to send me a free copy of this, so I figured I’d review it.

With the plethora of information available online about Major League Baseball nowadays, the old school baseball annuals that flooded the newsstands and stadiums have little or barely any use to the average fan anymore. However, every once in a while, a guide comes out that, despite having plenty of commonplace information in it, manages to set it self apart from the crowd.

“Meet the Mets 2008: An Annual Guide to New York Mets Baseball,” published by the Maple Street Press, is one of them. From cover to cover, this annual has stories Mets fans will love to read that are far more than just a simple precursor to the 2008 season. Most books of this type can easily get away with slapping a few mediocre articles together with some decent pictures and calling it a day. While this book isn’t exactly “The most in-depth coverage of you can get on the Mets,” (there should have been some more coverage on the minor league teams, especially the Brooklyn Cyclones, who are almost completely absent from the book), as it claims to be, it does do a great job in its coverage of the team. By the end, it really shows.

Looking at the Mets historic collapse last season as well as their complete history and even a look into 2009 and the birth of CitiField, this annual is something that fans of this team have been in dire need of for quite some time. As a matter of fact, some of the stories [The interview with Ralph Kiner featured in the book immediately comes to mind] are so interesting that you may even find yourself reading them a few times over.

While the stories themselves are all good reads, written by some of the most prolific and prominent Mets bloggers and a few fresh faces, the layout is filled with great pictures that bring the stories alive. A few of them, mainly the ones chronicling the Mets and Brooklyn Dodgers, haven’t been seen in quite some time and absolutely light up the pages they’re on. For those stories and pictures alone, this book is a must own for any hardcore Mets fan.

However, despite the easily read stories and lush layout, there are a few hiccups in the annual that dim its star a tad. For instance, there are a few typos in the book and any accomplished reader will feel at times that the book could have been edited a bit better. However, unless you’re a serious student of the English language, these small problems won’t ruin your reading experience.

Aside from that however, “Meet the Mets 2008: An Annual Guide to New York Mets Baseball” is a fun read that offers the complete smorgasbord of hardcore Mets goodness.

I was catching up on the Mets yesterday and I read a story about Joe Smith bet Duaner Sanchez a steak dinner that he wouldn’t make the team.

After that, I figured I’d share my thoughts on what I saw of him in Brooklyn.

I still remember talking to him his rookie season in pro-ball. He was a down to earth kid that was having a monster season and moved through the system like a freight train. A third round pick that season, Smith was the highest drafted player on the team and everyone expected big things from him. Boy, did he live up to his potential. After a month in the NY-Penn League, I think was obvious to everyone playing against him and watching him that he was destined for a career in the bigs. His first game however, didn’t go exactly as planned and in addition to giving up an earned run, his control was far from perfect. He didn’t look like a third round pick at all at that moment and the media was quick to jump to conclusions about how good he actually was.

After that one sloppy performance though, Smith turned it up and was stellar the rest of his time in Brooklyn, ending up with a 0.45 ERA and 28 strikeouts in 20 innings. Despite seeing guys like Jake Ruckle, Eric Brown and Tobi Stoner pitch great that season, Smith, who was eventually called up to Double-A, was the most dominant. He was throwing pitches by everyone he faced and had a slider that was just vicious. Add in the submarine delivery and you had a recipe for disaster as far as trying to hit the guy. Simply put, he was and still is the most dominant pitcher I’ve seen in my two years covering the Clones.

Nonetheless, his success never really got to his head, well at least what I saw in Brooklyn [I was told by a writer covering his progress that his teammates in Double-A thought he had some growing up to do, but that’s neither here nor there] and he was always a fun guy to talk to. Cyclones manager George Greer loved using him as well and gave us a plethora of great quotes over the course of the season. However, the best thing Greer ever said about him was that he had a “Stone Cold Stare” while on the mound. For those of you who never got a chance to see him pitch in Brooklyn, Greer’s words were too kind.

If looks could kill a puppy, Smith was definitely up for animal cruelty charges. He was so imposing and there was always this feeling that you were watching something special every time he was out there. That kind of mental makeup isn’t easy to find in a relief pitcher and it turned out that Smith had been honing his for quite some time.

“My head coach at Wright State, Rob Cooper worked really hard at the mental aspect of the game,” said Smith, way back now in July of 2006. “I can’t tell you how much he taught me about the mental game. I made a choice to listen to him and I can’t tell you how much it’s helped me.”

For a while, the Cyclones were so bad [during the beginning of that season] that Smith was one of the only reasons to come watch them. After he left, it kind of felt like that team had lost something they could never replace. As a matter of fact, that was exactly what happened. When I think of special players that played in Brooklyn, Smith is without a doubt one of the first that come to mind.

Photo by Conroy Walker