Hit or Error? Baseball Digest's 2002 Rookie Edition Reexamined

Welcome to the 40th—and final—edition of Hit or Error, our weekly excavation of prospect pasts, where promise meets reality and the line between future All-Star and Triple-A footnote is as thin as the paper it’s printed on.

This entry isn’t just the end of a series—it marks the end of an era. March 2002 wasn’t only the last time Baseball Digest published its annual rookie preview; it was also the final year the venerable magazine appeared monthly. A tradition that once offered fans their first real glimpse at tomorrow’s stars quietly faded into history.

Inside that issue, the Mets were still clinging to the embers of a recent pennant—Mike Piazza still mashing, Al Leiter still grinding—but the Mo Vaughn experiment was underway, and so was the slow decline from contention. The rookie preview itself had reverted from the previous year’s organized position-by-position breakdown to a more old-school, team-by-team format. The Mets’ page? Just six pitchers, a few scouting nuggets, and the usual intoxicating optimism that comes with clean slates and radar guns.

Not quite Generation K. Not quite Generation Okay. But in hindsight, a fitting curtain call for both the magazine’s monthly run—and the kind of printed prospect preview that now belongs to baseball’s past

Of the six, Adam Walker never toed the rubber in the Major Leagues—so we’re chalking that up as an Error on Baseball Digest’s ledger. Pat Strange did make it to the show, but barely: 17 appearances, 0 wins, 0 losses, no saves, and a career ERA of 4.68. We’ll call that one a clock violation. Mark Corey logged just 14 innings in a Mets uniform before fading into the baseball ether.

That leaves us with the last three standing—Jae Seo, Tyler Walker, and Mike Bacsik—the remaining threads of hope from this particular crop. Let’s see if they earned a Hit… or something closer to a hit-by-pitch.

Jae Seo: Generation Not-OK’s Most Optimized Result

We begin this trio with a name that sounds like it belongs on a Google analytics dashboard: Jae Seo. (And if you just tried to type “Jae Seo stats” into a search bar and got bombarded with tips on boosting your website traffic, you’re not alone. In 2002, he was our original search engine optimization.)

Baseball Digest called him “an intense competitor with great control,” touting three big-league pitches he could throw in any count. He battled back from injury, climbed the organizational ladder from Port St. Lucie to Norfolk, and looked like the kind of under-the-radar arm who could turn into a dependable rotation piece. No hype, no neon lights. Just three pitches and a purpose.

And wouldn’t you know it — for a little while, they were kinda right.

Seo made his big-league debut in July 2002 with a tidy, scoreless inning of relief. By 2003, he was leading all National League rookies in innings pitched (188.1) and starts (31). Solid ERA, decent strikeout rate, and he gave the Mets something they desperately needed: a competent, unflashy innings-eater in a sea of five-inning flameouts.

But baseball giveth and baseball taketh away. The next year, he struggled — bouncing between Queens and Norfolk like Jerry, Elaine, Kramer, and George circling the mall parking garage for hours, desperately searching for their car and slowly losing their minds.The velocity that once crept into the mid-90s never quite returned post-Tommy John, and his stubbornness about tweaking his mechanics reportedly clashed with Mets pitching coach Rick Peterson (who probably tried to fix him in 10 minutes).

Still, give Seo credit: he kept battling. In 2005, he reinvented himself a bit, adding a slider and splitter to the mix and carving out a brilliant second act with a 2.59 ERA in 14 starts. It was his best stretch in a Mets uniform — and just like that, the front office flipped him to L.A. for Duaner Sánchez and Steve Schmoll. (One of those guys gave us an incredible half-season and an even more incredible cab story. The other was Steve Schmoll.)

From there, the SEO results got murkier. Stints with the Dodgers, Devil Rays, and a bloated 8.13 ERA in 2007 sent him packing back to Korea. But even then, Seo had one more gem in him: he starred for South Korea in the 2006 World Baseball Classic, spinning a 0.64 ERA and throwing six shutout innings against Japan in the semis.

All told, Jae Seo’s major league career:

28–40 record, 4.60 ERA, 606.1 innings, and one of the better statistical runs from any Mets pitcher in that early-2000s haze. No All-Star games. No bobbleheads. But for a guy who started out as a flier from Gwangju with a rebuilt elbow, he gave the Mets four years of serviceable starts and one unforgettable WBC performance.

Verdict: Hit — not a moonshot, but a clean single through the 5–6 hole. And if you squint hard enough, maybe a fielder's choice that turned into a web gem.

Bases Loaded, Nobody Out? Call Tyler Walker

The 1990 scouting report painted a gutsy picture: “Tyler worked his way back to get called up to Norfolk. Has great confidence in his ability and is a fierce competitor who wants the ball when the game is on the line.”

In other words, this was a guy who didn’t shy away from pressure. You could almost picture him kicking down the bullpen door and yelling, “Give me the ninth!”

And to his credit — sometimes, they did.

Walker’s major league career was a bit like one of those rollercoasters where the line is longer than the ride, but the thrill is real. Drafted out of Cal, he made his Mets debut in 2002, posting a 5.91 ERA in five games, which in Mets-speak is known as “not bad for the early 2000s.”

But the best chapter of the Tyler Walker story came not in Queens, but across the country in San Francisco. In 2005, Giants closer Armando Benítez went down, and Walker stepped into the 9th-inning cauldron. He converted 23 saves in 28 chances — not exactly Mariano Rivera, but certainly Mariano Rivera adjacent if you squinted real hard and had a forgiving imagination.

His finest hour? June 17, 2005. Bases loaded. Nobody out. He comes in and strikes out the side — becoming the first pitcher in modern save-rule history to pull that off. I’ve seen people win bar bets with that trivia nugget.

Over eight seasons, Walker pitched in 286 major league games, notching 23 wins, 34 saves, and a career ERA of 4.23. He wore five uniforms — Mets, Giants (twice), Rays, Phillies, and Nationals — which is a nice way of saying “he knew where the best clubhouse spreads were.”

He even had a solid bounce-back season in 2009 with the Phillies (3.06 ERA), and in 2010 with the Nats (3.57 ERA in long relief), proving that if you’re willing to reinvent yourself, baseball will keep calling… at least until your elbow files for divorce.

Walker’s baseball ride came to a close in 2011 with the Long Island Ducks, fittingly bringing him back to New York — the baseball world’s version of finishing a novel where you started the first chapter.

A rollercoaster arm with flashes of brilliance and resilience, Walker’s career was a mix of solid middle relief, closer moments, and enough reinvention to keep him in the majors. Not quite an All-Star, but definitely a guy who earned his innings. Verdict: Hit — more of a gritty double than a home run, but a valuable contributor nonetheless.

But baseball isn't everything. Just this month, the Walker name surfaced in heartbreaking headlines. Tyler’s brother, Mark Walker, his wife Sara, and their son Johnny were among those missing in the catastrophic floods that ravaged Texas. Their daughter, Ellie, was rescued, and the entire community has rallied with prayers and hope. A vigil was held on a local baseball field where Johnny played and Mark coached — a reminder that baseball families run deep, and real courage shows up far from the pitcher’s mound.

We can hope and pray for a miracle — because Tyler Walker’s story, like so many in this game, is about resilience, survival, and sometimes, grace under unimaginable pressure.

Mr. 756 (No, Not That One)

When the Mets picked up lefty Mike Bacsik in the December 2001 Roberto Alomar trade with Cleveland, there was reason to think they might’ve snuck in a bonus prize. Bacsik had just been named the Indians’ Minor League Pitcher of the Year after a stellar 13–6 season with a sparkling 3.00 ERA. He even had three major league games under his belt. In other words, he looked like a guy who could slide into the back of the rotation, throw strikes, and maybe even save a bullpen or two.

Well, it didn’t quite go that way.

In his two years with the Mets, Bacsik did get a few starts—including his first major league win on July 5, 2002—but his ERA across those seasons resembled the final score of a bad beer league game (4.37 in 2002, 10.19 in 2003). Let’s just say it wasn’t quite Tom Seaver redux. By the end of 2003, he was a free agent and back on the market.

But don’t think for a second that Mike Bacsik is just another forgotten name in a long line of Mets pitchers who made us yell at the TV. No, sir. Bacsik carved himself a place in baseball immortality on August 7, 2007, when, while pitching for the Washington Nationals, he served up the record-breaking 756th home run to Barry Bonds. That blast officially put Bonds past Hank Aaron on the all-time homer list. Mike tipped his cap to Bonds, later visited the Giants’ clubhouse to personally congratulate him, and received an autographed bat that said, “To Mike, God Bless. Barry Bonds.”

You can’t make that up. It’s like giving up the winning shot to Michael Jordan and getting a signed pair of Air Jordans afterward.

And get this: Bacsik’s father—also named Mike—once faced Hank Aaron himself. It was 1976, and Aaron was sitting on 755 home runs. Had the elder Bacsik just grooved one, we might be talking about two generations of Bacsiks giving up the same number—one to Aaron, one to Bonds. Baseball, man. It's wild.

After hanging up his spikes, Bacsik made a second career out of his voice, working in radio, television, and even spin class instruction (yes, really).

Unfortunately, the feel-good vibes didn’t last. In his post-playing days, Bacsik’s fastball control wasn’t nearly as wild as his mouth. While working in Dallas radio, he made some profoundly offensive comments on Twitter about the San Antonio Spurs and the Latino community—comments that got him fired and rightfully so. Then, a few years later, while coaching a youth baseball team, he got into a physical altercation with an opposing coach and ended up with an assault charge. Because, apparently, nothing says “teaching the game the right way” like shoving another dad into foul territory. Don’t expect him to be on my short list if AJ Carter and I write a sequel to Glove Story: Fathers, Sons and the American Pastime.

A middling Mets arm whose claim to fame is famously giving up a historic home run — not exactly the legacy a pitcher hopes for. His post-baseball antics unfortunately only add to the “error” side of the ledger. Verdict: Error — a rough outing on and off the mound, more walk than strikeout.

So there you have it—the strange (not Pat), winding journeys of three pitchers who once carried the Mets’ hopes in 2002. Jae Seo gave them steadiness and just enough success to make you wonder what could’ve been. Tyler Walker flashed fire in high-leverage spots and left with trivia immortality. And Mike Bacsik? He wound up as a historical footnote with a microphone and a knack for finding trouble. Not exactly the rotation of the future, but in true Mets fashion, it sure wasn’t boring. In this game, prospect projections are guesses, development is chaos, and the margin between “Hit” and “Error” is sometimes one meatball pitch away from history.