Relief is on the Way

In what is undoubtedly the biggest news to come out of the major league baseball winter meetings so far, the New York Mets have signed free agent relief pitcher Francisco Rodriguez to a three year contract. Rodriguez, or K-Rod, as he is known to the baseball world, set a new major league record for saves this past year, with 62 for the Angels.

While there are certainly other holes to fill on the Mets, Omar Minaya in one fell swoop has solved one of the biggest problems facing the Mets this past year. The team was humming along in first place, chugging their way to a division title, when closer Billy Wagner went down with a season-ending injury. The Mets were never the same again, and of course, collapsed down the stretch for the second year in a row. Who knows what would have happened if K-Rod had joined the Mets last August?

Nevertheless, he will be with the team in April when they christen their new stadium, Citi Field, and try one more time to win their division with their talented nucleus of David Wright, Jose Reyes, Carlos Beltran, Carlos Delgado, and Johann Santana. Adding K-Rod doesn't automatically make them better than their biggest division rivals, the World Champion Phillies, but it certainly gets them closer. And for every Met fan dreaming of another championship (and anxious to permanently erase the image of Carlos Beltran striking out looking without the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth of game seven of the '06 NLCS), that's a good thing.