I agree that this team can definetly win without bily wagner. we have been doing it for a month now. stokes, knight, ayala, smith, rincon, schoenweiss, sanchez, and heilman can carry the load this year. knight, smith, stokes, ambiorix burgos, eddie kunz, ruddy lugo, and a few others we just called up are all under 25 and are great young arms who can contrinute in the seasons to come. i say that after this season, we cut ties with heilman, schoenweiss, wagner, and pedro martinez. we should resign oliver perez (he doesn't have to be great as a number 4 pitcher) and make a move on some 5th starting pitcher. then we should try to sign some cheap closer like jason isringhausen (always thought he was underrated) and be finished with billy. i'm not willing to pay a 38 year old pitcher 10 million dollars to sit on his ass until september at the earliest. he is getting older and older, and who's to say after such a devastating injury he will be the same pitcher he was this year? and he wasn't even that good this year...he made the all star games but sucked in the second half and led the MLB in Blown Saves. we can do just as well with our young guys (ive kunz a chance) and i am confident with knight, stokes, smith, figueroa, feliciano, sanchez, rincon, lugo, wise, burgos, and any dime-a-dozen veteran releiver we can find in our pen. in the offseason, in addition to a SP, we should look into getting a good corner OF bat. i wouldn't mind signing Barry Bonds, but since that's not likely, there are lots of potential suitors. if we really wanted to make a move and make our lineup ridiculously stacked and had the ability to break out the checkbook, matt holliday is on the trading block over in colarado. reyes, church, wright, holliday, delgado, beltran is a pretty crazy top 6 of the lineup! i'm only fantasizing, but it would definetively give us the best lineup in the game, and that combined with our excellent SP staff (johan, pelfrey, and perez are all pitching excellently and maine is good when he comes back) could be a devastating combination. any other thoughts on what we should do this offseason?

you want to give up Billy Wagner simply because he's injured and gonna miss time? no offense but you obviously weren't paying attention the first half of the season. you fail to take into account how incredibly difficult it is to play for a bad team (and the Mets stunk in the first half). couple that with the fact that you're playing at the biggest stage in the world if the hardest city in the world and you should have a recipe for disaster. through the first few months, our starters were inconsistent, our offense could never put more than one hit together at a time, and our bullpen was horrendous. the lone star in all of this was Billy Wagner, he was the only player who seemed to be doing his job at this point. he didn't pitch good the first half of the season, he pitched lights out. of course you have to expect him to falter at one point, you can't blame him for having a few bad games on a bad team after being so dominant for half a season. people criticize his 7 blown saves and fail to realize that there's a 100 other games in which he's been phenomenal. if you take those 7 games out of the picture, here are his stats for most of the season:

41-IP 16-H 1-ER 1-HR 5-BB 45-SO .130-OBA 0.21-ERA

moving on, we should most definitely NOT look at Barry Bonds. you hate old, injured players and Barry Bonds is the epitome of old guys who won't contribute.
and, according to you:

"we should resign oliver perez (he doesn't have to be great as a number 4 pitcher) and make a move on some 5th starting pitcher."

and a bit later

"that combined with our excellent SP staff (johan, pelfrey, and perez are all pitching excellently and maine is good when he comes back) could be a devastating combination."

From ESPN:

> Smoltz open to offers outside Atlanta if rehab works out
ESPN.com news services

John Smoltz would be willing to pitch somewhere other than Atlanta if his recovery from shoulder surgery is a success and a return to the Braves doesn't work out, according to Atlanta Magazine.

...

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If we go into '09 knowing we don't have Wagner, we could do a lot worse than throwing Smoltz a boatload of money to close for a year. I have NO INTEREST in seeing Schoeneweis or Heilman as a closer for a whole year. Ayala I don't know well enough, but I don't think he's got a year of closing for a contender in him.

I can't even begin thinking about off season moves or replacements for Billy Wagner in 2009. My mental focus is 100% on this team winning with the talent we have right now.