According to Ken Rosenthal, the Mets have contacted Jerry Hairston (Jr., I hope), the only free agent who plays both center field and shortstop.

This is an excellent point.

Old man Hairston’s kid has capably fielded both positions in his career, according to both UZR and plus/minus. Those are both in pretty small samples, mind you, but given the fact that he’s also been a decent defensive second baseman, it’s safe to say he’d be a nice addition to the roster as a utility man to a team with defensive question marks in the middle infield and general lack of range in the outfield, Angel Pagan notably excepted.

Hairston made $2 million last year with the Reds and Yankees, a figure he more than earned with his defensive flexibility. I can’t imagine he’ll require much more this year, though I have no inside information.

The problem? Hairston can’t really hit. He has had random spurts of success in short bursts — most notably when he posted an .871 in 261 at-bats for the Reds in 2008. But other than that, he’s hit like the utility infielder that he is. He has a .701 OPS for his career.

And the Mets already have a 34-year-old, weak-hitting utility infielder under contract for $2 million. His name is Alex Cora, and though he can’t really hit or field as well as Hairston, nor play as many positions, he’s loaded up on intangibles.

So there’s that.

The Mets’ best route to recouping some of Beltran’s offensive production is by adding platoon bats to pair with Daniel Murphy and Jeff Francoeur. That likely won’t cost them money, but it will cost them roster spots and so they probably won’t be able to afford to carry multiple replacement infielders, even if one can handle the outfield.

Assuming 12 pitchers and two catchers, plus Murphy, Luis Castillo, Jose Reyes, David Wright, Cora, Jason Bay, Angel Pagan and Francoeur, the Mets have three roster spots to work with.

Hmm… I started this one way and now I’m changing my mind a little. Maybe, maybe, if the Mets could find a right-handed bat and a left-handed bat (Nick Evans and Chris Carter, perhaps? Ryan Garko?), Hairson could slot in as the 25th man and super sub. He’d sort of render Cora redundant, of course, but Alex Cora transcends redundancy, or something.

Twitter’s telling me I’m wrong though, so I’m open to changing my mind. Feel free to explain what I’m missing.

And that’s all fun and games anyway, since I’m sure there’ll be a handful more changes before the Mets even get to Spring Training.

Carlos Beltran released a statement tonight. It went like this, according to Matt at MetsBlog:

“I am totally surprised by the reaction to my recent knee surgery.  Any accusations that I ignored or defied the team’s wishes are simply false.  I also spoke to Omar Minaya about the surgery on Tuesday.  He did not ask me to wait, or to get another doctor’s opinion.  He just wished me well. No one from team raised any issue until Wednesday, after I was already in surgery.  I do not know what else I could have done. The most important thing here is that the surgery was a total success and I expect to be back on the field playing the game I love sooner rather than later.”

So Beltran called Omar on Tuesday, and Omar wished him well in surgery? Joel Sherman reports the same thing. Then why was John Ricco on the conference call today acting like the Mets had no idea he was going under the knife?

I’m done even trying to figure this one out. I’m guessing the root of the problem is a massive breakdown in communication once again.

OK, so the conference call is over. If you missed it, it featured a whole lot of Mets’ assistant GM John Ricco dancing around questions for legal reasons, but the most interesting tidbit of information gleaned was that, essentially, the high ranking members of the Mets’ front office didn’t know Carlos Beltran was having surgery until after he was having surgery.

Ricco stressed numerous times the Mets’ current issue with Beltran stemmed from the team’s desire to be “afforded the right” to seek a third opinion on his knee before he resorted to an operation that could jeopardize the start of his season.

But Beltran, presumably with the guidance of his agent Scott Boras, opted to undergo surgery without first consulting his team.

And that’s, well, it certainly falls under the general umbrella of “not cool.” They’re paying him a whole lot of money to play center field and hit home runs, and that probably buys them the right to understand how he is thinking and to know when he’s about to go under the knife.

Still, it’s impossible to entirely fault Beltran, given the way things went for the Mets in 2009.

Ricco urged reporters to view the team’s injuries on “a case-by-case basis,” but since the problems were epidemic last season, one can understand Beltran’s impatience. Especially since he was already in Colorado with the knee specialist, and especially since the third opinion and the internal discussions and all the red tape that went along with that would probably mean tacking on another month before he could play again.

Ken Davidoff asked the best question of the call, in my opinion, wondering why the Mets would opt to make their grievance with Beltran public. Ricco ably answered that the team wanted to be honest, and that they were disappointed in their player and at how the process broke down.

In truth, it seems as though the Mets were a bit blindsided. That’s bad in isolation, but it’s downright terrible if they’ve fostered some sort of environment wherein players do not trust the intentions of or yield to the expectations of their team’s front office.

Of course, I don’t know that’s the case. Maybe Beltran is just one player gone rogue, and the Mets are only reacting accordingly. But maybe he only grew frustrated with a bureaucracy that seems to have failed him and his teammates again and again, and took matters into his own hands because he felt it was the swiftest way to get himself healthy and back on the field to help his team.

I have no idea what happened with Carlos Beltran’s knee surgery other than that something sketchy is afoot. That much is almost certain.

I’ll resist weighing in until we have more details, but it strikes me as entertaining that the situation has given people all over the Internet more fodder to argue the same points they’ve always argued about Beltran.

Those that like Beltran point out that opting for surgery was a smart move; he understands his body and was making the decision that was in his best interest to get himself back on the field at full-strength so he could help his team win, and that clearly he’s right, and anyway, who would trust the Mets’ medical staff at this point?

Those that don’t like Beltran say it’s another example of a me-first whiner who only cares about his paycheck and his stats turning his back on the team, and besides, he struck out looking that one time.

I guess we’ll find out more on the 2 p.m. conference call with John Ricco.

Hat tip to SNY’s Sam Pepper and The Big Lead for pointing me to this bit of fantastic strangeness:

So Carlos Beltran had surgery and will likely miss the start of the season. The team press release says he can return to “baseball activities” in 12 weeks, so throwing in some rehab on top of that, plus a couple of weeks of general nonsense time, I’d guess, conservatively, we won’t see Beltran back until sometime in May or early June.

That’s a bit of a gut punch given the way things went for the Mets last year. And it certainly doesn’t seem like a good omen for 2010. And it’s bad for fans of awesome baseball players in general.

As for the Mets, though, what now?

The first thing — and the most important thing — for Omar Minaya and everyone else, is not to panic. The Mets’ front office has done an impressive job so far this offseason not doing any major damage to the team’s farm system, and it would be a huge shame if it reacted to news that hurts the 2010 season by hurting the several that follow. The Mets have been known to cater to perception, and this one is going to sting, but there’s still plenty of time to figure out what to do before Spring Training.

Next step? Take Angel Pagan off the table in any potential deals, if that was actually being discussed. Pagan’s no Beltran, but he played like a capable starting Major League center fielder last season and, provided health, is likely as good an option to start the season in center field as anyone readily available.

A nice additional move might be signing Endy Chavez. Endy’s recovering from knee surgery of his own after a devastating injury last season and likely won’t be ready until May either, but the Mets are going to need someone to give Beltran’s knees a rest and defensive help in the outfield and Endy, when he’s right, provides that in droves. Since he’s reportedly willing to sign for only a Minor League deal, he’s certainly worth the flyer.

That doesn’t help the team out of the gate, though, and there’s not a ton on the free-agent market that does. Reed Johnson is probably the best bet to sign to be a fourth outfielder.

The truth is, the way I initially heard this news, several hours ago, it sounded way worse. Losing Beltran for a month or two is terrible, but if all the things that need to go right for the Mets to win in 2010 go right, they can weather that storm.  And there are a lot of little variables there, mind you, and Beltran will be another when he returns.