Godspeed, Johan!!!

Sorry, T, couldn’t bypass tweaking u a tad as I’ve yet to watch a game where there’s as much vacancy as some of the heads we encounter here.

“News conferences to introduce backup middle infielders are not the norm, but the Mets held such an event Wednesday at Citi Field. Of course, there was cultural significance, too.

Chin-lung Hu, who was acquired from the Los Angeles Dodgers on Dec. 27 for minor league left-hander Mike Antonini, is one of only six Taiwan-born players to have played in the major leagues. The others: Chin-Feng Chen, Hong-Chih Kuo, Fu-Te Ni, Chin-hui Tsao and Chien-Ming Wang.

Assuming he beats out Luis Hernandez for the backup middle infield role, which is the expectation, Hu will become the first player born in Taiwan to represent the Mets.”

sports.espn.go.com/new-york/mlb/news/story?id=6061802&campaign=rss&source=MLBHeadlines

Anyone counting on getting anything substantial from Johan this year is just courting disappointment.

Don’t expect anything because not pitching for 9 months is going to take a a month or so to get back in it and by that time it’s mid August at best.

And don’t forget that this in no way contradicts what we’ve already been told.

Pitchers and catchers report Feb 14. Spring Training starts two weeks later. Plenty of time for Santana to start throwing.

Don’t try and call someone dumb when it is your own reading comprehension that is failing.

“To my knowledge, he’s not throwing at this point,” Alderson said. “But again, that’s his own decision and based on how he feels. I think the [physical therapists] recommended that he continue to do certain exercises, and when he feels like he’s ready to toss, he will. He’s medically cleared, but to my knowledge, he hasn’t actually started throwing yet.”

So he hasn’t ACTUALLY thrown a ball………..

“With the hole that Santana’s absence leaves in the club’s 2011 rotation, it’s likely the Mets will be keeping a close eye on his return date, but Alderson wasn’t willing to speculate other than the club’s previous rough target of June to July.

“I wouldn’t try to kid you that any of us can accurately predict,” Alderson said. “And certainly adding or subtracting days from what is otherwise a pretty loose projection I think would be probably misleading on my part.”

In another shocking development – new regim not trying to give false hope and promises they can’t keep…….not sure I can get used to that, I’m so used to lies and fabrications.

a career .191 hitter w/2 HRs, 17 RBIs gets a press conference

People need to re-read the official Mets release.

“NEW YORK — Johan Santana visited Mets medical staff in New York this week and has been cleared to begin a rehab program “which will have him throwing before the start of Spring Training,” according to a team spokesman.”

He was cleared to begin a rehab program “which will have him throwing before the start of Spring Training,”.

Today Rubin who does an excellent job following the Mets followed up by re-stating the following.

“When the New York Mets announced Jan. 14 that Johan Santana was cleared to begin throwing, they left open a big range for when that activity would actually begin, only saying it was expected before spring training.”

He then posted this quote from Alderson on his understanding of the situation.

“To my knowledge, he’s not throwing at this point,” Alderson said. “But, again, that’s his own decision and based on how he feels. I think the [physical therapist] recommended that he continue to do certain exercises, and when he feels like he’s ready to toss, he will. He’s medically cleared, but to my knowledge he hasn’t actually started throwing yet.”

Santana still remains “medically cleared” to throw when he is ready. It was expected he would begin throwing by the end of January but if he instead starts throwing Feb 5th are people really going to have an issue with that?

Originally I thought Johan would be back in full form for the 2012 season. If he’s used in 2011, it will be for testing and baseball conditioning. I hope I’m wrong, but I haven’t seen anything yet that says so.