Your Saturday morning dose of New York Mets and MLB playoffs news, notes, and links.
Meet the Mets
Jacob deGrom and Travis d'Arnaud both made Baseball America's 2014 All-Rookie team.
Could now ex-Yankees hitting coach Kevin Long be a solution for the Mets?
Matt Harvey's return is certainly an exciting part of 2015 but how will the Mets manage his innings coming off of Tommy John surgery?
At Fangraphs, Marc Hulet reviewed the Mets minor league season along with a couple of other NL East clubs.
Around the Playoffs
James Shields gave back a 5-1 lead and the Orioles tied things up at 5-5 but in extra innings, the Royals got a pair of home runs to Alex Gordon and Mike Moustakas, then held on in the bottom half of the inning to beat Baltimore 8-6 in game one of the ALCS.
Around the Majors
The Yankees signed GM Brian Cashman to an extension, then fired hitting coach Kevin Long and first base coach Mick Kelleher.
The Diamondbacks have narrowed their manager search to four names: Phil Nevin, Jim Tracy, Sandy Alomar Jr, and former Mets third base coach Chip Hale.
The Mariners had a deal in place with Nelson Cruz last offseason that ownership ultimately nixed. Seattle missed the playoffs by one game. Ouch.
Russell Martindeclined an extension from the Pirates earlier this season, making it likely he'll hit the free agent market.
Infielder Ed Lucas was claimed on waivers by the Rangers from the Marlins.
David Roth looked at the best of bad St. Louis Cardinals writing.
Yesterday At AA
We handed out the hardware for Mets best reliever in 2014.
If you read an article or find a link that you think would be a great addition to a future edition of Mets Morning News, please forward it to our tips email address tips@grission.com and we'll try to add it in.