Your Sunday morning dose of New York Mets and Major League Baseball news, notes, and links.
Meet the Mets
Curtis Granderson's contract will not include a no-trade clause. The outfielder is just one double away from joining an exclusive club, says Ed Leyro of Studious Metsimus.
With Granderson in tow, Marc Carig says that the Mets have $13 million available to spend along with some trade bait as they head to the winter meetings tomorrow.
Adam Rubin counts the team's payroll at about $75 million with the Granderson contract. We'll find out soon whether the Mets move Ike Davis and maybe Daniel Murphy to create more payroll space.
Mike Puma ran down the five biggest issues confronting the Mets.
Over at Minor League Ball, they have a great rundown of the top Rule 5 draft targets in the Mets organization.
Around the Majors
Think the Mets are a dysfunctional organization? Well, it looks like the Mariners might top it, as former manager Eric Wedge spilled the beans on Jack Zduriencik and the entire #6org operation in a great piece in the Seattle Times. I enjoyed learning that Jack Z still uses wins and RBIs to evaluate players.
The Rakuten Golden Eagles may not postMasahiro Tanaka now that the posting fee is going to be topped at $20 million, per the new league rules.
Robinson Cano is gone and apparently he did not want to play for Joe Girardi, according to a friend of his. Cano also did not like batting second in the Yankees lineup and wanted to hit in the middle.
Grant Brisbee wrote about the Mariners' short-term future with Cano on board.
With the acquisitions of Scott Feldman and Dexter Fowler, the Astros have started the long climb upwards.
Yesterday At AA
Brian Wright recounts R.A. Dickey's one-hitter against the Rays among his top 10 Mets pitching performances.
Chris Strohmaier reviewed Ike Davis' ghastly 2013 season.
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.