The Knuckleball is a huge adjustment to both Managers and Catchers. Dickie is a very unusuall :trick Pitch” guy because he seems to have less control issues than some other Knuckleballers. Still…. trading for Dickie is a major leap for an organization….he’s less Marketable than a Fastball, Curve, Change up starter.

The revenue was always coming in but they made the mistake of taking on so much debt and expecting even more revenue by building a smaller ballpark and charging much more for people to enter it. They never considered the backlash of the fan base. Even in a bad economy, each day there must be 30,000 fans (like we do) who have the money but won’t spend that amount for something like going to a baseball game.

The thought that corporations would also purchase luxury suites no matter how high an expense didn’t help either. Even in the bad economy, there are more than enough businesses that could afford to buy those suites if they wanted to and if the asking price wasn’t perceived as being too much and just not in the corporate interest. For example, last season we were given opening day tickets for the Champions Club (which was only half occupied BTW) and the face value was $189 (for season ticket holders, individual seats went for $215). Even without the costs the Mets add on to the face value, that comes out to $15,300 per individual or $61,200 for four. Not enough firms felt that was worth the investment (same with the Yankees – one can’t miss the empty seats between first and third).

Mind you, those are not the luxury suites which go for much more. 1,500 of those seats would generate about $23 million alone.

If one wants to blame Omar for the bad decisions that’s fine, but to blame him for putting together a team in turn caused fans to stay away is ridiculous. Win or lose, Met fans have a fun time at the ballpark – but they won’t pay through the nose for it.

R.A. Dickey stays because he is likely to make 30 plus starts, fits within the limited budget, and has the right attitude for a team searching for a new identity. I wasn’t worried that R.A. would get hurt climbing the mountain but instead that he would hide up there for the season.

If the starting pitcher situation got any worse…we’d be resurrecting Tracy Stallard and Fat Jack Fisher. Seriously folks…..there are two chances for us to compete for a playoff spot this season….SLIM and NONE.

HERE IS THE REALITY…… If things go well then Wright and Bay come back and hit like they have in the past. Luca Duda and a healthy Ike Davis supply some power and the rest of the staring nine play fairly good defense. If so we will score some runs, hide the few weak gloves, and hopefully get enough pitching to win 75 games. That’s being optimistic!

It is more likely to be a season where we lose 100 games because we will not get any quality starting pitching other than Dickey, a slow starter who needs warmer weather to excel.

Keeping with the plan…trading David Wright is a real possibility if Sandy can get a stud pitcher or a couple of stud pitching prospects. The same goes for Jason Bay except that the Mets would probably have to swallow salary to trade him.

As fans, why not just understand what has happened and why things are happening now and give up lamenting about the past. Oliver P…Luis C….are gone!

and here is some advice for “the ghost of Omar”……Sandy Alderson’s job was clear from day one. His job was to save a sinking ship for ownership who were broke and in trouble. It was his job to slice payroll as best as possible and to help an organization that had no direction towards the future. His hiring was an admission of guilt for Fred and Jeff or else why would they have given total control of the operation. He was given the truth about the financial mess and asked to plug the leaks. It is too bad that you think he was hired to make you feel good as a Mets fan. Did you expect him to come out and say that the team is going to suck and that you shouldn’t bother to go to a game or watch on TV? Was he ever in the game to resign Jose Reyes? No and there was no other response that he could give under the circumstances of his job working for the Wilpon’s.

GET REAL DUDE!

Can you spell clueless? I’d say not, since you can’t spell the simple 5 letter word ‘B-R-O-K-E’.

Your obvious anger is misdirected, as usual.

Sandy might indeed spend that $10 million more wisely than Omar but having just $10 million to work with is almost like working with nothing. But if $10 million is all Sandy is willing to spend, then look for this cold winter to continue over all four seasons.

Since you’re too busy being insulted to understand what I wrote, I’ll translate it for you: I said you were feeling sorry for yourself as a Met fan. In no way is that equivalent to calling people names–as you did.

Take your own advice: Be a man…

BTW very classy response. Resorting to name-calling, since you can’t defend your statements. If you’re going to blog, maybe you should try being less thin-skinned.

Suck it up, princess.

He might very well be a good general manager given the tools to work with – after all, it was under his direction that those pre-money ball championship teams in Oakland were built. But again, seeing he is capable of bringing down a team and lie to the public with a straight face gives me second thoughts about him being more like M. Donald Grant than Nelson Doubleday or Mrs. Payson. After all, he seems to fit in quite comfortably with what the Wilpons want of him. If that was not the direction the Wilpons wanted to take, they would have fired him long ago.

Sorry if you are so arrogant to dismiss anyone who believes that Sandy possibly didn’t do his best last season to keep the team he inherited in contention. Judging by his actions, and the actions of those like him – who like to dismantle decent teams that just may need a little help but instead they forego to concede and trade chips away – that maybe that’s exactly how Sandy felt when he inherited the Mets last year. He may have felt that they had no chance so why bother – of course won’t say that but his actions told a different story. Like this year – and like giving up so easily on Reyes too.

So ‘any’ you’re just a plain old clown who does nothing but follow like the rest of them. You and srt – the 2 3-lettered book-keepers are just as blind and arrogant as anyone else, just very subdued about it.