MET NOTES
Mets 16 Orioles 4
PORT ST. LUCIE – One-by-one, they didn’t want to be summoned by GM Steve Phillips. With the roster at 36 to start yesterday morning, big-league Survivor took place and nobody wanted to be voted out of the clubhouse.
At the end of the day, only 28 guys remained and one of them was Jorge Toca. Batting .429, Toca deserved to survive. Toca again looked excellent yesterday, smacking two more hits in four at-bats, driving in two runs and scoring two others.
“He’s swinging the bat better and better,” manager Bobby Valentine said after the Mets’ 16-4 pounding of the Orioles in the last home exhibition game of the spring.
In a 10-run fourth, Toca smashed an RBI single to center. Even when he made outs, the balls were hit hard. In the second, Cal Ripken Jr. looked like an old third baseman – Brooks Robinson – when Toca lined a shot down the line and Ripken left his feet to stab the ball out of the air. In the third, Toca knocked a flyout to the wall.
Despite his hot hittting, however, Toca will likely be the 26th man on a 25-man roster.
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Rich Rodriguez was released yesterday. He will still collect his $900,000 salary for this season. Phillips, who signed Rodriguez to a two-year $1.5 million contract before last season, said he couldn’t find anybody to take him in a trade . . . The others who were voted out of the clubhouse were reliever Tom Martin, pinch-hitters Matt Franco and Mark Johnson, and infielder Jorge Velandia. Bobby Jones (rotator cuff tendinitis), Rick Croushore (rotator cuff tendinitis) and Eric Cammack (bone spur in his elbow) were all placed on the DL. The Mets like the lefty Martin and the 30-year-old was just a victim of having options. He had a 1.64 ERA in 11 innings. . . . Besides Toca, the next guys who are likely to get cut or traded are the newly acquired Brian Rose and Rule V pitcher Julio Santana. Rose is out of options and Santana must stay with the Mets the entire year, so the Mets will either offer him back or try to deal with his former team, the Giants. This will bring the roster to 25 . . . Timo Perez (groin) and Jay Payton (oblique) both are staying in Florida instead of traveling with the Mets to Pittsburgh. Perez and Payton batted in a minor-league game yesterday.