Oh Bay-bee!

Jason Bay is reported to be on his way to cashing a paycheck signed by a Wilpon, just the "splash" that NY fans are said to demand during the winter. Is having a real left fielder going to fix what ails this team? Probably not. And no one seems that impressed. But this is the Makeshift Mets, and beggar-fans can't be chooser-fans. Plus, without Bay, who will stand behind David Wright as opponent's club Mets pitching, and watch the hits soar over their heads?


Fans reassess Mets' playoff chances in 2010

I will optimistically chose to see this acquisition as an opportunity to give a big Burnitz-Bonilla welcome back to a former son. In the future, I hope to see the Mets continue along in this vein, and reclaim other products of their productive farm system, such as Scott K*zmir, Lastings M*llidge, and Jose Reyes.

I Don't Gotta Believe

Christmas sucks for Mets fans and Jeff Franchise is here to prove it.

I am here to reminisce about that wonderful winter of 2001, when Jason Bay had yet to be traded from the Mets and when dreams took wing. Those were the days of $95 million payrolls, when Steve Phillips played rotisserie baseball before it was cool, the days when the Mets would back away from any player with a back problem, and that was our biggest problem.

Obligatory Steve Phillips' mistress photo.

The interwebs were just catching on in the sports world, and people still read the beat writers on the NY Post webpage. I remember clearly salivating over the prospect of Juan Gonzalez joining the Mets. Oh, what an offensive contribution he'd make. Plus, Juan's friends were saying things like:''Juan has never wanted anything more in his life than he wants" to be a Met.

The Mets thought it would be easy. After Juan Gonzalez said he wanted to join them, the Mets figured they would make the best offer, Gonzalez would take it, and their supersized lineup would have even more meat. Last night, the Mets learned, the story was too good to be true.

Of course, Juan Gone, probably high on the steroids at that very moment, bent Steve Phillips over and took Texas' offer instead. Phillips, who was probably fucking an intern at the time, didn't even really want Gonzalez. Stevo recovered nicely and put together the 2002 Mets, with Mo, Roberto, Jeromy, and Shawn Estes, who went 75-86, a record good for 5th place.

Flash forward to the waning days of the Omar Minaya regime. Minaya has done everything short of trading Tom Seaver to bury this franchise, and during this hot stove, most likely his last winter as a big league GM, he's taking the cautious route, with his cell phone thumb lodged securely in his ass. Of course, Omar's inactivity is arguably a good thing even though the Mets have more holes than a thing that has a lot of holes, since this market is dominated mostly by players that will be overpaid because of the weak competition, and since Omar not doing anything is a good thing. But I still feel some nostalgia for the time when the representatives of free agents would have their friends spread lies in the media about wanting to be a Met.

There's still plenty of time for things to get worse. There isn't a Metsfan alive who wants Benjie Molina's fat ass to don the Orange and Blue, and there are a few dead who don't want Omar to go to two years on the contract. Even if the Mets land Bay, widely seen as the suboptimal choice, they will probably end up bidding against themselves since all of the big players seem to have moved on.

But hey, Kelvim Escobar!!

So Happy Holidays!! Try not to think about the Mets!

The After-Met: Baseball 2009...From the Ridiculous to the Surreal

Continuing to pick up the pieces...


Just another golden shower for Victorino.

Front-runners and other participants at the Yankers parade expressed and exhibited their smug American-ness in all sorts of different ways (warning: link is suitable for work, or at least it was produced at work, but there is nudity). Scholar-bloggers expressed their disappointment/resignation as to what the latest Yankees business acquisition means for baseball in other ways.

Ridiculous:
To remember that the Mets 2009 Metastrophe even wiped out an entire level of their supposed future: Fmart and J-Niese going down in flames.

Stomach-turning:
The bald eagle.












Surreal:
Pay-Rod feeds the compliant media lines about how he wants to play for free. You know, as long as there is an opportunity to pose shirtless at some point.

Nine months later [after getting caught with steroid drugs], Rodriguez wore a black porkpie hat and swayed to Jay-Z’s “Empire State of Mind” at City Hall to celebrate a championship. While the parade was special, Rodriguez, like some of the cold and eager fans, was already aching for more baseball.

“I wish we could just continue to play,” Rodriguez said. “Just show up and play for no reason. We have such a good group of guys. You know. No umpires, no scores. Just show up and have fun, like a softball game.”

***

If you're looking for a diversion, Patrick Brown has a nice stock taking essay, "In play--runs," about baseball fandom and the internet. He is probably more accepting of the often shrill climate wrought by the new breed of "fexperts," those who have soured an originally insightful perspective on baseball, and with a certain attitude, are making discussions of baseball increasingly devolve into grating, know-it-all statistical pissing contests smugly performed by recently minted WAR fundamentalists, who don't let the fact that they couldn't pass a freshman statistics class hinder the delivery of jejune message board lectures based more on their uncritical acceptance of a particular statistical package and the performance of "gameday" software then on actually watching the game, but so be it. The new fan/expert has found their hammer and everything is a nail, and even better if they can hide their subjective preferences in a discourse licensed by their perceived membership in a club of people who actually understand what they're doing. Luckily, robot umpires are just as susceptible to having beer dumped on them, but one wonders if anyone will notice when, in the future, the MLB just broadcasts Gameday simulations of games in small markets when player salaries eclipse national GDPs and ticket prices become unattainable to all but the ultra-wealthy--'hey the sim-Pirates beat the virtual Royals last night without sacrifice bunting!" The old guard of crusty, data-averse sportswriter Luddites, who resist the statistics that increasingly replace their stories, have provided a convenient scapegoat in all this. There is no middle ground to be found in mom's basement, and at times, it can get as tiresome as listening to the double-breasted suited jock morons spout inanities and patent falsehoods. But I digress.

Reading Brown's essay, I also have to wonder what happens when we collectively get tired of the "citizen journalists" who write "from the fan perspective" and all the experts are gone--both the charlatans undressed by the "fexperts," and the insightful commentators moved out to pasture by the general failure of the journalist business model--and "we" (fans) are the only ones to listen to about baseball, other than a few jocks? Mom's basement has become an ironic rallying cry among bloggers, but it gets damp down there and I'm not sure if I want the view from the basement to be the only one available. Accepting this norm, the baseball fan equivalent of happily busing our own tables at McDonald's so that the giant corporation doesn't have to pay anyone to do it, may yet turn out to be a wrong turn.

It's hotstove time...do you know where your GM is?


Above, an attendee of the Latin Grammy Awards exhibits strangely fake looking body parts. And, on the right, old Omar Minaya fave Sammy Sosa.

Yankers Finally Overcome the Curse of Piazza, Buy Latest Championship

New York's other team has finally put nearly a decade of futility behind them and collected the prize that is supposed to come with a $200 billion payroll: the "World" Series. The Mets were content to win the real "world"2009 competition, the competition over which club can send the most of their pricey players to the meaningless World Baseball Classic to become injured/ineffective. Look for them to do the same exact thing again the next chance they get.


















It was a shame Michael Jackson, pictured above enjoying someone else's children and some enormous fake breasts, couldn't have lived to see the Yankers 27th champtionship. But seriously folks, I always took Colbert as more of a "bottom" than a "top."


So... it's nice to have that all wrapped up. Still, questions remain:














Could the Yankees have pulled it together without Luis Castillo and his amazin' early season gift win?

Was Pedro a rogue agent (ala Gla*vine) sent by the Mets to destroy the Philmes hopes and dreams?

Will Jimmy Rollins ever shut the fuck up?

How are Derek Jeter's herpes doing? A little flair up the middle?

How much will the Mets sign Hideki Matsui for?

Why is Jorge Posada so ugly? I have to know.

Will Joe Girardi pull over one night, and pull the Mets franchise from a steaming wreck? (I think he learned that scam from Arod).

Aside from watching Fever Pitch on an endless loop, Clockwork Orange-style, is there anything more painful for a Mets fan than listening to Joe Buck announce a Yankees clinching victory over that disgusting Philadelphia team? Buck will spend the weekend picking Mariano Rivera's pubes out of his teeth, but I await the 2010 season to find out the answer to my question.

It's Tool Time Again: Steve Phillips Provides Some Levity as Mets fans Stare into the Abyss; Hundley Name Back in the News

Above, a gallery of people Steve Phillips has fucked.

Looking for a way to avoid thinking about the World Series that could transform the Mets' 2009 season into arguably the worst in club history? Mr. Steve Phillips, prize tool, reporting for duty.

As Met general manager and member of the ESPN idiocracy, Steve always liked tools in his players; even more so he likes being a tool, and uses his tool outside his marriage with gals who work for him every chance he gets. The only question remaining for historians to sort out was which institution he had done more damage to, the NY Metropolitans or marriage, particularly his own. While Mo Vaughn is undoubtedly still hitting buffets and strip clubs across the nation on the Mets' dime, it looks like the balance has finally shifted in favor of the latter.

The New York Post's fine, Pulitzer-level coverage of this new low, including letters from the mistress, statements from Phillips' son and wife, details how Phillips' affair with 22-year-old production assistant Todd, er, Brooke Hundley went quickly downhill and started to take a toll in terms of the Phillips families' social life, social internet networking, and landscaping. It sounds like Phillips' wife is getting the house and suing for divorce and one can only wish her well. We continue to scratch our heads that such an incompetent and useless bag of human shit could manage to become the GM of a major league baseball team and later, be paid for his commentary on our national past time. Do we really want the Wilpons to choose a new GM/manager?

Metsfans, Try Not to Use the Hot Stove To Burn Your Eyes Out

Gather round the The Mets Hotstove, times are tough!

Watching the Sawx meltdown in the 9th yesterday with their season on the line, although the incompetents at TBS couldn't get the in-screen score graphic right (the score at one point had it 7-7, then scrolled around until it finally rested at the correct score--TBS knows drama), was still educational.

Papelbon blew it right out his ass. Right there in Fenway, in front of plenty of pink-faced partisans. There are quite a few Mets fans that wish the Mets were run more like the Red Sox. I think I could be put in that category. But even the best organizations loose sometimes. Which makes the mountain the Mets have to climb in the next few years/decades seem that much more imposing. Cause they are terrible, Oakland Raiders terrible. Short sentences; the only way back into the Metsblogosphere.


Red Sawx WAR pie


Mets WAR pie


In case you haven't heard, the Mets had a disastrous off-season last year. Since the brass won't admit to doing anything wrong during the injury plagued season, let's all agree that management's first boner of the 2009 season occurred before the first ticket gauged fanny was in the seats at Tax Payer's Park. The franchise's mistakes in something of a rank order, are probably the following:

1. Retaining Omar Minaya as GM
2. Not firing Jerry Manuel
3. Signing Oliver Perez
4. Signing "K-Rod"
5. Trading for J.J. Putz
6. Accepting the status quo in terms of their medical organization

Note that 5 of the 6 are still in full effect. So with that in mind, we poor Mets fans can be forgiven if we hesitate to get excited about this year's hot stove, seeing as the idiots are still running the asylum.

I now wade into the coming debacle that will be known to historians as "Hotstove 2010." To be clear, I am not relying upon pure baseball logic to make my "decisions" about what this sad bunch of clowns should or should not do. In many ways, until regime change comes, we are beyond sound baseball decisions, so to pretend that this sort of logic will enter in to the picture is delusional. So come with me, and adjust your reality in order to weigh the attractiveness of potential Mets' for next season based on your gut, like Willie would. The time to seriously revamp this team was after the last two catastrophes. Now, we are stuck waiting to see which of the commodities under the Mets control can still play after recovery from surgery. In addition, we are stuck with the knowledge, the near certainty that this management team has no idea what they are doing. If I'm going to hold my nose and root for this bunch of losers, well, I am going to make some demands. In the meantime, lets get the hate-train started. I do not want:

Matt Holliday DoNotWant
Is it fair to rate Holliday based on his Metsian blunder in the pivotal game against the Dodgers? No, not really. But postseason exploits SEEM to have an influence on off season contract negotiations (see Beltran, Carlos)--they weigh heavy in check-signers' memories. But I don't want Holiday for reasons that extend beyond his defensive prowess. He is a radical religious nutcase. Sure, everyone points to the sky to give god his rightful glory over a rbi single these days. (Jesus didn't come to judge, Matt, but even he is pissed you couldn't catch a routine flyball.) You can pick a reason to be queasy about signing Holliday to any length of contract: he's old, his stats are an artifact of spending the majority of his career in Coors' mile high environment (the splits seem to support this), the outrageous muscles he packed on raising roid rumors, etc. I just don't like him. I worry about the impact he'd have on the smile of the Mets' gritty franchise player, Jeff Francouer.

Dan Uggla DNW

The Mets want to try to avoid acquiring players that would make a significant contribution to their on-field humiliation. Over time, if the Mets some getting guys that tend to be boneheads (Pagan), suck out loud (Heilman), etc. the theory goes, perhaps their play will improve. Now that's probably not true either, but I hate all ex-Marlins. Pass on this clown.



actual closeup of Uggla's hands

To be continued...


The Sky is Falling










What else could go wrong? SNY may have to pay Keith Hernandez a whole lot more cash to associate himself with these losers. SNY by letting him get away will be making a big mistake, since this would severely erode the only decent programing they can offer.

Mex doesn't need baseball:
"I didn't watch baseball for five years, didn't watch until the Sosa-McGwire thing," he said. "Then I started watching a little bit. Not an All-Star Game, a World Series, nothing. And I did not miss it. And I honestly feel when I retire doing this, whenever that is, I will not watch a baseball game again."

Top Ten Unqualified Sucesses of the Mets' 2009 Season

Mets beloved owner Fred Wilpon ponders his next move.

Are you discouraged by your team's abject, dismal failure on almost every operational front, compounded by the mind-bending decision by the owners to make no management changes going forward? Take a look at the bright side! Here are the top ten Met accomplishments we can be proud of:

10. Mets medical staff continues to protect players from Mud Wrestlers Rash, Mary Hart Epilepsy, and feline diabetes.
9. Mets able to spoil Florida Marlins' shot at club attendance record (a visit from the Mets depressed attendance numbers just enough so Marlins couldn't break 13,000 for the year)
8. Mets planning to add to ridiculous Citi outfield wall design with baseball's first in-park MRI machine housed in unmoving centerfield HR apple
7. Fernando Tatis can now add sun porch to his church in the Dominican Republic.
6. Delta Airlines, in honor of their affiliation with the Mets, now charging for each working hamstring as well as first and second checked bags
5. Pat Misch gets enough starts to cement his status as 2010 Mets #2 starter
4. Cody Ross sidelined by a wrist injury courtesy of a pitch from Mets' John Maine (along with Ross' habit of "rodeo-style" masturbation)
3. Fred Wilpon's team wins the NL West for the second year in a row
2. Due to drop in SNY viewership, visits to Jeter's Ford Challenge.com drop precipitously
1. Josh Thole is still alive and walking without help.