In keeping with an annual tradition that no one but me cares about. And this has come to be way more about my pet peeve with many amateur oddsmakers than actually predicting who will make the Mets’ Opening Day bullpen. But whatever.

For the purposes of this exercise, I’m assuming Frank Francisco, Jon Rauch, Ramon Ramirez and Manny Acosta are in. The first three represent most of the Mets’ offseason acquisitions. Acosta pitched well for the Mets after the Francisco Rodriguez trade last year, now has 200 2/3 strong Major League innings under his belt and, perhaps most importantly for his bullpen candidacy, is out of options.

Lefty specialist and expert videobomber Tim Byrdak would have counted among the certain ins if he didn’t have surgery on a torn meniscus last week. Sandy Alderson “guesstimated” Byrdak would miss six weeks, but Byrdak has said he thinks he can be ready for Opening Day, so he’s getting thrown in the mix. Whenever he returns he’ll join the big-league bullpen, replacing someone, rendering this list even more pointless.

Here we go.

Bobby Parnell (1:4): Parnell has options left on his contract, which preclude him from being a lock, but by all accounts he’s a favorite to earn a spot in the Opening Day bullpen. He throws really hard, he pitched very well in stretches last year, and he’s yet to allow a run in Grapefruit League play. Some worry about Parnell’s ability to succeed under pressure, but I suspect those issues have been at least partly due to heavy use, since his high-leverage opportunities have largely come in response to long stretches of frequent and effective pitching.

Miguel Batista (1:2): The 41-year-old Batista is nearly as interesting on the field as he is off of it. Batista’s peripheral stats generally look woeful: He doesn’t strike out many hitters and he walks too many. But Batista has finished 10 of the last 11 seasons with an park- and league-adjusted ERA+ that’s better than league average. The Mets seem to appreciate his versatility, and leaving him off the big-league club would mean paying him a $100 thousand roster bonus and giving him a June 1 opt-out clause.

Garrett Olson (19:11): If the odds seem strange there, they are to make the math work out and to reflect Olson’s slight leg up over Edgin in the race to replace Byrdak as the lefty in the Mets’ bullpen. Olson throws hard, has an excellent beard and has pitched well in Spring Training games.

Josh Edgin (2:1): Edgin, another lefty, was the first guy mentioned by both Sandy Alderson and Terry Collins when asked who might replace Byrdak in the bullpen. He hasn’t pitched above High A ball, but he has clearly worked his way onto the team’s radar this spring with mid-90s heat and a good breaking pitch.

Tim Byrdak (3:1): I’m saying there’s a 1 in 4 shot Byrdak recovers quickly and the Mets decide they’d rather let him rehab on the roster than figure out a way to get another lefty reliever onto the 40-man. Upon the news of Byrdak’s injury, Terry Collins mentioned that he once had Mitch Williams jumping around in his office two weeks after arthroscopic knee surgery, claiming himself ready to go. That sounds like something Byrdak might do, only he’d also be wearing a silly costume.

Danny Herrera (4:1): This site endorses Herrera, a diminutive lefty with awesome hair and a screwball. But Andy Martino reported in January that the Mets believed Herrera could lose effectiveness with too much work, then a couple weeks ago that Herrera is not a candidate for the lefty specialist role. Herrera has been much better against lefties than against righties in limited Major League work, though.

Chuck James (11:1): When the Mets signed James I figured he’d have an outside chance to crack the roster as a second lefty in the bullpen, but James has not pitched well this spring and seems like an afterthought in the southpaw competition. His odds are this high mostly due to his handedness.

Chris Schwinden (14:1): Presumably the Mets want Schwinden starting games in Triple-A and ready to get the first call if any of their starters go down, but I’m allowing the small possibility they want another long reliever on the roster early in the season to take pressure off Johan Santana and/or the rest of the bullpen if the other starters endure some April shakiness.

Fernando Cabrera (14:1): Not much has been written about Cabrera this spring, at least not that I can find. He pitched quite well in Triple-A bullpens the last two years, but since he’s right-handed, he’s likely ticketed for a return to that level until a need arises. For what it’s worth, he looks like he could be a soap-opera star.

D.J. Carrasco (19:1): Carrasco is hurt and hasn’t pitched since March 10. He’s owed guaranteed money, which could earn him a spot on the disabled list to start the season. But also seems like a candidate to be cut when the Mets need to add players to their 40-man roster.

Pedro Beato (19:1): Beato hurt his shoulder earlier this spring and didn’t appear likely to make the Opening Day roster even before that. He’s still got the live arm everyone raved about last Spring, but since the Mets can now send him to the Minors to iron out the kinks, they probably will.

The field (14:1): What have you got for us, Tabasco of the Mexican League?

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This required more than 140 characters in response so I figured I’d tackle it here. Then I realized I forgot to post an over-under poll this morning so I lumped them together.

If whatever happened to Bay when he joined the Mets was some sort of light-switch thing and he can flip it back on and again hit like he did for most of his career before he joined the Mets, I have to imagine Sandy Alderson and the SABRos would be thrilled to be able to part ways with Bay’s contract even if the outfielder is playing well. I’m not sure how long he’d have to hit, how long he’d have to do it or how much of Bay’s contract the Mets would be willing to eat, but since it doesn’t appear likely that Bay will contribute to the Mets’ next contender, it seems safe to say they’d love to clear some of his salary to (hopefully) invest elsewhere.

If the switch stays off and Bay plays the way he did in 2010 and 2011, it’s hard to see why he’d keep his starting job in the Mets’ outfield if the team’s outfield prospects in the high Minors succeed. There’s the personnel aspect to it, of course, and the arbitration-clock factor. But if come June both Bay and Kirk Nieuwenhuis are hitting like they did in 2011 at their respective levels and the Mets want to win as many ballgames as possible, it’d be difficult to justify keeping Bay in the starting lineup — especially if Lucas Duda is struggling defensively in right and would benefit from a move across the outfield.

But that’s all pure speculation and based on no actual inside information whatsoever. Also, if I’m considering those possibilities, I need also consider that Bay turns the dimmer switch just a bit back toward brightness and hits well enough to keep the Minor Leaguers at bay (npi) but not well enough to fetch interest in a trade. Or Nieuwenhuis gets hurt again, Juan Lagares returns to his underwhelming 2010 form, Matt den Dekker doesn’t hit and there are no young players ready in waiting if and when Bay struggles. Or Duda or Ike Davis gets hurt, prompting a defensive shuffle that brings a prospect to the big leagues but doesn’t replace Bay.

Essentially, there are many feasible scenarios wherein Bay is not the Mets’ starting left fielder by the end of 2012 and many in which he is. So all that meant nothing.

Bay started 92 games for the Mets in his concussion-shortened 2010 season and 121 games in 2011.

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Santana’s changeup appeared in prime form all afternoon. He twice struck out Freese on the pitch. Both times Freese’s bat went flying into foul territory down the third-base line.

– Adam Rubin, ESPN.com.

So that’s nice to see.

Last night, Lucas Duda took a 97 mph Stephen Strasburg fastball over the left-field fence in Digital Domain Park, an opposite-field home run. It looked like this.

Busy morning, Twitter Q&A.

The Mets themselves, or Mets fans?

I’m obviously not in the players’ heads, but if I had to guess I’d say the off-field stuff surrounding the franchise weighs on them less than it weighs on us on a day to day basis.

They’re conscious of it, I’m sure, because they’re asked about it with some frequency and they’re not morons. But playing baseball professionally requires a ton of focus and it is always in every player’s best interest to perform as well as he possibly can. And I can’t imagine it behooves any outfielder chasing down a fly ball to be thinking, “What does this settlement mean for the future of the franchise? Did the Wilpons act in good faith?  Why is it so difficult to find informed coverage of this stuff that doesn’t seem like it has some agenda attached?” Most likely, he should be and is thinking, “There’s the baseball! Go get the baseball!”Or something along those lines.

Which is to say that it probably doesn’t affect the Mets’ actual focus on baseball, since they’re baseball players and focusing on baseball is just what they do. I hope that makes sense.

As for Mets fans, I’d guess the focus shifts more toward baseball once the baseball gets a little better. No one wants to believe it, but winning heals wounds and ends boycotts and shortens memories and everything else.

I saw a comment at Amazin’ Avenue earlier this offseason and I can’t find it now, but the commenter perfectly outlined what I’m hoping for from this season. He or she said he hoped that by the end of the year, we could squint and see what the Mets’ next good team looks like, and so by then we spend more time talking about that then talking about everything else. And that would be sweet.

A bunch of reasons.

First off, what’s wrong with Tejada? He has been banged up this last week, sure, but assuming he’s healthy by Opening Day, he’s a 22-year-old shortstop who managed a .360 on-base percentage in the Majors last year. He doesn’t look like he’ll ever hit for much power, but decent-fielding young shortstops who get on base aren’t exactly growing from the mangroves.

Valdespin is two years older than Tejada, hasn’t yet had offensive success above Double-A and has been hampered by discipline problems on and off the field. In Spring Training alone he has twice been called for batter interference. In 2010 he was caught stealing more than he walked. Last year he made 32 errors in 98 games at shortstop.

Valdespin appears to have a ton of natural talent but he’s just nowhere near as polished a player as Tejada right now. Valdespin’s exciting because he’s hitting well in the Grapefruit League and he’s an unknown, but if I had to bet on one of the two enjoying long-term Major League success, I’d take Tejada and it’s not even close.

Also, for what it’s worth, the Mets seem to be working Valdespin at second base more than shortstop this spring. He has played 52 1/3 innings at the keystone and only nine at short in Grapefruit League action.

I suppose, but I don’t think it’s likely. Everything I heard in Port St. Lucie suggested Parnell is going to make the team. Plenty can change between now and Opening Day obviously, but unless something does before I get around to doing my annual bullpen odds report, I’m going to have Parnell as a better-than-even-money favorite for one of the open spots at the back end of the staff.

But yeah, I guess there are various currently hypothetical scenarios wherein Parnell winds up starting the year in Buffalo in the name of roster flexibility — maybe they want to carry two lefties, say, or Chris Schwinden looks dominant in camp and they want to keep two long men to have ample options for giving Johan Santana rest. Again, neither seems likely right now, but since Parnell has options he’s probably the first to go if anything happens.

It sounds like the Mets want to keep Miguel Batista around — they’ll have to pay him a bonus and give him a June 1 opt-out clause to send him to Triple-A — and they’re probably going to add at least one left-handed bat for the bench, so there are roster machinations yet to be undertaken.