So John Maine had a crappy outing Grapefruit League outing yesterday, providing everybody everywhere with reason to remember John Maine.

Maine, I think, often gets lost among Ollie Perez and Mike Pelfrey in discussions of the questions in the Mets’ rotation. We talk about the Good Ollie and the Bad Ollie and whether or not Pelfrey is crazy or just the victim of the horrible defense behind him, and Maine’s sort of forgotten, with the assumption that he’ll be pretty good if he’s fully healthy, and that he may never really be fully healthy.

I was a guest on The Happy Recap Radio yesterday and we discussed Maine a bit. The knock on Maine has always seemed to be his stamina, and so I speculated that if it didn’t appear to be working out for him as a starter, he could thrive in a bullpen role. He’s got a good fastball that’s a very effective offering for him in the past, and I figure if he could dial it up a notch in shorter bursts, he could be a pretty great setup man.

It’s funny, then, that it turns out Maine chalked up his rough outing yesterday to entering the game as a reliever. To his credit, it’s not something he’s had a whole lot of practice doing — Maine has made 216 starts in college and professional ball and only seven relief appearances. (And despite that, Maine has gone on record with his choice of closer music, one of the best reasons to like John Maine.)

Anyway, the THR guys and I also discussed Maine’s injury issues the last couple of years. I wondered on the show if Maine flourished under Rick Peterson, reputed as an expert in keeping pitchers healthy through sound mechanics.

I did a little investigating this morning to see if there have been any marked differences in Maine under Dan Warthen. I used June 17, 2008 as an end date, which I realize is a bit arbitrary since obviously it’s not like Maine completely shifted to all of Warthen’s philosophies the day Warthen took over.

Anyway, here are Maine’s lines with the Mets before and after the Tuscan tile replaced the hardwood floor.

Under Peterson: 362.3 IP, 154 ER, 321 K, 142 BB, 46 HR, 3.83 ERA, 4.25 FIP

Under Warthen: 140 IP, 70 ER, 107 K, 71 BB, 16 HR, 4.50 ERA, 4.68 FIP

What does that mean? Hard to tell. The biggest difference is that Maine was a lot better at staying on the mound under Peterson, but I’m unwilling to chalk that all up to the change in pitching coaches.

Pitchers get hurt, after all, and Maine could have been well along the path to injury by the time Warthen replaced Peterson. Since the differences in FIP aren’t massive, it’s likely the Maine’s uptick in ERA is more the product of some bad luck and terrible defense, not to mention the shoulder injury.

Of course, the Warthen/Jerry Manuel team, while paired with the Mets’ front office, hasn’t done a lot to inspire confidence that it can successfully coach players back from injury.

The grand conclusion? I’ve got none, other than that Maine was good enough in 2007 and when healthy in 2008 — and heck, in his final few starts after returning from injury in 2009 — that he’s certainly earned the benefit of the doubt for 2010. One Spring Training outing shouldn’t ever change anything.

I have a couple of posts I was hoping to get done this weekend but it doesn’t look like either will be finished today, so instead, read Brian Costa’s profile of Jenrry Mejia. It’s fascinating:

“I didn’t like baseball,” Mejia said. “I just wanted to make money.”

Only after Mejia turned 15 did he begin playing baseball, a decision fueled not by some newfound love of the game but by the same ruthless pragmatism that caused him to eschew it in the first place.

When Pedro Martinez signed a four-year, $53 million contract with the Mets in late 2004, Mejia realized what so many other teenagers in the Dominican Republic already knew: For the talented and lucky few, baseball is a way out.

Whoa. A lot to process here. First, and I recognize that this isn’t exactly breaking news, what does it say about the conditions in the Dominican Republic if Jenrry Mejia developed Major League dreams because they were relatively practical? I abandoned my Major League dreams because they were so impractical. (Also because I sucked.)

And it’s actually kind of refreshing to hear Mejia say that straight up, I suppose, and to read a feel-good story baseball story that doesn’t involve any treacle about some kid’s unyielding love for the game.

But the most interesting thing about the piece, I think, is the implication that Mejia only even took up baseball because the Mets signed Pedro to that big contract. I know we’ve heard a whole lot about how that deal improved the Mets’ standing with Latin American prospects, but here’s some concrete evidence of it.

Really takes the sting off Pedro’s final two injury-prone seasons with the Mets, doesn’t it? Jeez. If Mejia turns out half as good as people seem to think he will (and the Mets don’t screw it up somehow), Pedro’s contract becomes a steal in some bizarre way, like a gift that keeps on giving.

So that’s cool. I’m a big fan of the man, as you may know, and so here’s hoping Mejia can help Mets fans remember him in a more positive light.

Adam Rubin reports that Jerry Manuel “appears to prefer” going with 20-year-old Ruben Tejada over Alex Cora in Jose Reyes’ stead.

Though Rubin’s usually on top of these things, it’s just a report and so I don’t want to overreact. And I’m bored of killing Omar Minaya for signing Alex Cora to the deal he did when he did.

But if that’s true, that means that this offseason, coming off a season in which their starting shortstop got hurt, the Mets signed a backup shortstop that their own manager was not comfortable starting if their starting shortstop got hurt.

One more time: If that’s true, that means that this offseason, coming off a season in which their starting shortstop got hurt, the Mets signed a backup shortstop that their own manager was not comfortable starting if their starting shortstop got hurt.

I suppose that’s slightly overstating the case. For all I know, Manuel’s perfectly comfortable starting Cora and just happens to think Tejada’s great.

That’s a stretch, though, considering Tejada didn’t exactly light the world on first at Double-A last year, and he’s 20, and…

You know what? Screw it. No more on the Great Alex Cora Debate until the season starts, I promise. I’m certain you’ve already made up your mind on the matter anyway.