Photo by Ed Delany
The New York Mets have released third base prospect Eudor Garcia. He was playing for the St. Lucie Mets and catcher Anthony Dimino was activated in the corresponding move.
Garcia, 23, missed the start of the season due to a personal issue. In five games this season for St. Lucie he was 5 for 14 with three RBI.
The former fourth round pick back in 2014 out of El Paso Community College also missed a large portion of the 2016 season due to an 80-game after testing positive for banned substances bumetanide and furosemide.
The once promising corner infield prospect finishes his Mets career with a .285/.337/.415 slash line in 222 games.
young man…really a shame..best of luck to him
Gotta be some sort of trouble under the surface here, especially with missed time due to a “personal issue.” Wish him all the best
Just guessing here, but it could be a weight issue. He weighs 240 now and thats up 25 pounds from last year. It shows on his face. He’s had only 4 chances in two games at 3rd base (lack of range?) and he’s made errors on two of them. Perhaps they gave him till the end of extended spring to get into shape and he just hasn’t done it.
It has to be something going on. Either he went back to drugs, or he punched someone out.
Yeah, it seemed weird to me at first, too. But I’m sticking with the weight problem theory. Just take a look at his picture (which wasn’t on 3 hours ago when we first posted): he looks like a slightly smaller version of Bartolo Colon. You can’t play 3B in that kind of shape.
I would say it’s a weight issue. He looks like the Michelin Man in that pic.
It seems like every year we have a player that we release because of personal reasons. Last year it was Christian Montgomery – and there have been others. Is this just a crap shoot or the Mets not properly assessing these kids before they draft them and not helping them once they are in the fold? These are young kids – many of which are right out of high school. We need to get better at this.
In an extremely small sample size he was hitting well this year. While weight appears to be an issue, there has to be something else for the Mets to release him.
Just par for the course. Happens to every team. Thye draft almost 40 players, international signees, and some domestic undrafted players each year. Two or three will play in the major leagues for more than a cup of coffee.
Some don’t make it for lack of talent, some dedication, some personality. With that many individuals there will be some of everything.
Like you said – extremely small sample size. A high batting average doesn’t mean he was hitting well. Was he driving the ball? Was he getting his hits off of legitimate prospects, or just beating up on scrubs and looking awful against the real pitchers?
I could point to his [also extremely small] fielding stats of just 4 chances in 4 games and having made errors on two of them. Too small to prove anything. But if the weight was affecting his range and fielding and he doesn’t have enough power to move to 1B, then weight would be the reason. If he was given an ultimatum back in February to lose the weight and could not do it in five months, then thats a reason.
Montgomery was a 12th rounder and Garcia a 4th rounder with as good a bat as one could ever hope to pull out of that round.
The bigger issue in my mind is that in Garcia we had once again shown emphasis on yet another slow footed first basemen as anyone could see he had less than a zero chance of playing 3B or anywhere else at the highest level.
That being said I would have gladly taken him even in the 2nd round as his bat is that good with Frozen ropes laced all over the OF including RF off LHP’s.
Tremendously talented hitter who will probably play out the year in Mexico and see what interest there is in his services in the off season.
I would bet anything he winds up in Houston’s farm system.
You were right: MLB issued him a 100-game suspension for drug of abuse. The suspension was officially announced on July 14th, about 2 weeks after the Mets released him. But I’d imagine the Mets knew he had failed the test when they released him.
He signed a deal with a Mexican League team on 7/9 that had him in their minor league/reserve list. And he was just signed by an American Association team, one of the two top Indy leagues. If he ever gets signed by an affiliated team/organization, he will have to serve the 100 games before playing in a real game.