The most famous No. 1 in Mets’ history has some advice when it comes to the man who is quickly becoming the most infamous No. 1 on the Mets.

“Give the kid a chance,” Mookie Wilson said Friday when discussing Jordany Valdespin. “He is a very spirited kid, very young and has a lot to learn, no question about that. But some things are being blown out of proportion. I think we need to back up and not overanalyze everything.”

That’s what Mookie told Bill Price of the Daily News.

“I do know the kid personally,” said Wilson. “I’ve had the opportunity to work with him for a limited time. I think we need to give everyone an opportunity to explain themselves and what is really happening.”

“They are struggling right now and I think that’s expected when you have young players and players coming in from other organizations. This is similar to what the Mets went through in the early ‘80s. Winning was not a frequent thing, we didn’t see the results of our labor, but in 1983 we were starting to be in games. I see that with the Mets now.”

And the beat goes on…

UPDATE:

Matt Cerrone of MetsBlog writes moments ago:

However, no team can guarantee success, regardless of who they sign, trade for or develop. They can only guarantee that New York’s media will continue to push on a story until it bleeds, because they know it will sell and people will read and listen… which is exactly what we’ve seen this week with this Valdespin and Collins story.

Is he kidding me?

What is going on over there…

Now that I’ve had some time to cool off, I was wondering how the rest of the Mets blogosphere was reacting to Spin-Gate and was surprised to find little to nothing about it on MetsBlog or anywhere else for that matter. Could it be I’m just overreacting? It wouldn’t be the first time…

However I did learn the Mets are recalling reliever Greg Burke because the Mets bullpen is overworked. It’s only May 11th, and already the Mets have made eight different bullpen transactions. I haven’t check other teams, but that sounds like a lot of moves this early in the season. That’s never a good sign.

Meanwhile, the Mets beat writers and columnists are weighing in on the fractured Mets clubhouse.

David Lennon of Newsday writes:.

Jordany Valdespin acted just like everyone expected he would Saturday when Pirates reliever Bryan Morris drilled him on the right forearm with a retaliatory 94-mph fastball.

He carried the bat with him halfway down the first-base line, which always makes for some anxious moments, before flipping it, end over end, toward the Mets dugout. When the seventh inning was over, Valdespin walked down the stairs and angrily rifled his helmet at the rack, a startling display from the volatile utility man.

The Mets’ response afterward was just as predictable.

To say his own teammates and manager were happy about the Pirates using Valdespin as a piñata would be unfair. Instead, let’s put it this way: They certainly didn’t sound upset.

“I would have been bothered had it been somewhere up in the neck area,” manager Terry Collins said. “If nothing else, he grew by it, and that’s the most beneficial thing that could happen.”

It was nice to see such genuine concern from the Mets manager about one of his player’s well-being.

I believe that Terry Collins has lost control of this team and anarchy is quickly setting in. So much so that slumping first baseman Ike Davis also decided to let it all out today and blamed the Mets hitting philosophy for his woes at the plate.

John Harper of the Daily News reported about Davis’ frustration and said that he has openly questioned the Mets’ hitting philosophy of taking pitches and working counts. Davis said, “It’s time to start swinging at first pitch fastballs.”

As I’ve said before, a one size fits all philosophy doesn’t work. To effectively get the most out of your players, one needs to consider each player’s unique skill sets, weaknesses and strengths.

What might work for some, may not always work with others. Ike Davis is a perfect example of that. The former Mets first rounder was very successful long before Dave Hudgens showed up. Clearly, something is amiss.

Adam Rubin of ESPN New York caught up with David Wright and I was waiting all night to see what Wright had to say about this Valdespin situation. Wright was on the on-deck circle when his teammate got thrown at and stood there motionless with a blank stare. After Valdespin jogged to first, Wright struck out to end the inning and the look on his face was priceless as Valdespin rushed ahead of him and slammed his helmet in the dugout and headed down the tunnel to the clubhouse.

“He’s young. He has a lot of flair about him. That’s his personality. And he doesn’t need to change the person that he is. I think toning some of it down might be appropriate. But he gets excited. He hits a home run and it’s exciting. Sometimes your natural reaction is to be excited about that.”

“You have guys that care about Valdy and are always pulling him aside. And he will pull guys aside and ask questions and things. I think he gets somewhat of a bad rap, sometimes unfairly. He’s obviously made some mistakes in the past.”

I didn’t see a lot of guys that cared about him after he got hit, did you?

I had a beer during the game so my judgement could have been clouded. There could have been a lot of care that I simply missed because of my one-beer drunken stupor.

Valdespin, by the way, declined through a team spokesman to speak about today’s drama afterward.

I think Lennon made a good point when he said that as long as Valdespin remains on the 25-man roster and is wearing a Mets uniform, his teammates have to at least pretend to stick up for him. Making fun of Valdespin or ripping him constantly to the media is no way to try to build a winning foundation in Flushing, which is what is supposed to be going on there. Whether Valdespin was in the wrong or not, why should the Mets care how the Pirates feel?

Maybe Valdespin should have never flipped his bat as he did, but as I wrote in my recap, I didn’t believe he was showing up the Pirates at all. I guess I was the only one who saw it and reported it, but Valdespin was glaring into the Mets dugout when he did that. In fact this is what I wrote Friday night:

Funny thing… Almost as if in a moment of defiance, Valdespin looked straight into the Mets dugout, flipped his bat, and rounded the bases with a swagger that screamed – You keep benching me and I’ll keep making you look like the clown prince.

I thought the message was for Terry Collins and NOT the Pirates.

I think Collins knew that and that’s why he “Spinned” the tables on him. You may remember before the game I took issue with Collins ranting about the Pirates potentially throwing at David Wright. He raged on about being on the lookout for Valdespin being retaliated against by the Pirates before the game. And wouldn’t you know it… That’s exactly what happened.

It may be time to get rid of Jordany Valdespin. He’s not wanted here and that has been obvious from when I first started sharing my conspiracy theory about that back in February. I’m not going to get all Andy Martino on you and say any of this has to do with race. It doesn’t.

As I said at the time, the winners in the Mets Spring Training battles wouldn’t be based on performance, but mostly on the fact that Alderson would rather have his guys play than the residue of the last era. That’s his right and his call as the general manager.

Otherwise, how else can you explain the best performer of the spring camp being relegated to the bench?

Unfortunately, they won’t get much for Valdespin if anything at all because the Mets have completely destroyed and demolished any trade value the kid might of had.

If this exciting prospect ever does fulfil his potential, it won’t be with the Mets, and most likely the team won’t have anything to show for him if and when that happens.

“We’ll be back next Sunday because if it’s Sunday, it’s Meet the Press.”

Updating Adam Rubin’s report this past weekend, which you can read about below, Mets GM Sandy Alderson spoke to the Daily News and said the following:

“It’s no secret Jordany has had a slightly different approach to some things, there is a certain level of tolerance that we have. I hope he doesn’t exceed that level.”

As I’ve been alluding to for months now, my conspiracy theories and pursuit of this so-called “non-story” wages on.

Alderson is hoping that Valdespin continues to mature, but clearly he is as close to “persona non grata” as you can get despite his enormous potential and upside.

“I am hoping he will continue to mature,” Alderson said. “He has, I think, made progress. Hope he continues to do so on that front.”

I just call them the way I see them.

I’m not a conspiracy theorist, just someone who is very good at reading between the lines.

So let’s talk about this non-story some more, shall we?

Well actually, now it is a story… Which negates about three-quarters of the comments telling me I was barking up the wrong tree …

Insights > Willful Blindness

Wipon = Front Office = SNY = Wilpon

It’s the Circle of Life, baby…

Original Post May 4, 2013

Adam Rubin of ESPN New York reported that Jordany Valdespin was asked to attend early batting practice at Turner Field yesterday, but opted to not participate.

Rubin said that Valdespin was told by a coach he did not have to participate in the batting practice session, so he simply didn’t show up which in turn annoyed the team and coaching staff.

“Valdespin is exciting,” Terry Collins said after last night’s game. “He plays with a lot of excitement, a lot of enthusiasm, especially when it’s crunch time. You know you’re going to get things that you don’t expect sometimes.”

Last night, Valdespin came in as a pinch-hitter and ignited the rally that would win the game and he scored the winning run.

Of course, we don’t know how many other players didn’t show up for the “voluntary” early batting practice, but this is Valdespin and for some reason any chance they get to make him look bad always finds its way out somehow.

Maybe they should try hitting him in the face with a sledgehammer next time instead of a pie. Maybe that will fix him.

The folks at MetsBlog assess the situation as follows:

I understand the team’s frustration with Valdespin’s quirks and behavior as well – in the end, this is a workplace for the players, not a summer camp, and he has created a perception of immaturity for himself which he has to work hard to shed. If Valdespin’s superiors request he attend a batting practice session to get some extra work in, he should take the hint and just go. In the end, this isn’t a huge deal so much as it’s another reminder of who Valdespin is. Perhaps if he conformed to the culture and practices of the team consistently, he would reap the rewards of his performances and talents and be respected a little more as well.

I have a problem with that. Valdespin shouldn’t have to conform to any cultural guidelines to gain his respect. His play alone is worthy of respect. In that regard he should be getting more respect than anyone else on the team with four of the team’s wins directly attributed to him.

If the Mets coaches wanted him at early batting practice, then they should have simply told him that. Running to the press and calling him out? Typical Mets under this current regime and ownership.

How about the Mets conform to the US Constitution and afford Valdespin his rights to live his life the way he sees fit as long as he’s not breaking any laws? Voluntary means just that, voluntary.

Voluntary visits to Walter Reed Hospital, voluntarily not reporting early enough to Spring Training, not participating in a voluntary batting practice… Honestly, who created those dramas, the players or the Mets?

The sad part here is that many fans draw their conclusions from the messages and vibes that the Wilpon owned SNY cable and blog network communicate.

It led to a comment like this from one prominent blogger who wrote last week:

Happy that the Mets had won, although it a homer was by my 25th favorite Met, I rolled over, hit off and drifted off to dreams of updating this post in the morning.

What kind of message is that?

Or how about this one from Mack (I’m not a Met fan) from Mack’s Mets:

I stopped following him (Jordany Valdespin) both on Twitter and Facebook a while back because I just got sick and tired of all the pictures of himself that he kept posting. This is one sick conceited dude…The dude is just a thug and a jerk. Dump him.

Needs to conform to culture? My 25th favorite Met? A thug? A jerk? A sick, conceited dude?

Who do you think is creating these misconceptions? The player, the team or their paid messengers?

Maybe it’s a combination of all three, but is this the kind of PR a team who needs an emergency image transplant needs right now?

They call me negative because I bitch whenever the team that I love loses, and yet you see comments like this flying under, over, and through the damn radar screen and nobody says a word.

I’m pretty certain that I’ll get called out for speaking my piece on this for sure… There goes Joe D. again – getting all negative and spouting truths… The nerve of that guy…

NYC Blackout Shuts Out Shea In 1977

It had been a sweltering hot summer in NY, so hot that my dad and I had taken to sitting out in the backyard to listen to the games.  It was July 13, 1977, and the Mets were playing the Cubs. They were losing 2-1 in the bottom of the sixth in spite of  an 11-strikeout effort by Jerry Koosman. We were eating watermelon and cheese. I remember spitting watermelon seeds out towards the tomato plants occasionally bouncing a seed off the big red tomatoes hanging from the vines.

Jerry Koosman, who had always been good, had never been Tom Seaver great. If we went to a game and Koosman was pitching it was like getting almost what you wanted for Christmas, like getting a pair of Pro-Keds instead of the Converse hightops you had your eye on … I was 12, what did I know? I’d been spoiled by one of the greatest ever to pitch off a mound and I was still reeling from having lost my all-time favorite NY Met. With Seaver gone, you’d think I would have grown to appreciate Koosman’s ability, but it was just the opposite. I grew to resent Koosman even more because he wasn’t Tom Seaver. Koosman became something like a bad imitation, an imitation that offered no consolation when the real thing ended up being taken away forever.

So we listened to the game and swatted mosquitoes and ate watermelon and sharp Greek cheeses. My mom and my sister weren’t home because my sister was in class over at Queens College and my mom had taken the car to go pick her up. Normally my sister would take the bus, but lately my mom had become so worried about this .44 caliber killer the tabloids had tabbed “Son of Sam,” that she’d taken to driving her out and picking her up every night.

My sister also happened to be a long-haired brunette which apparently was a favorite target of this particular psycho. Anyway, we’re listening with Lenny Randle at the plate and Ray Burris pitching and suddenly there’s a roar in the crowd and Lindsey Nelson starts going on about the lights going out in the stadium and just as I was explaining to my Dad that the lights had gone out (he had a hard time with any English vocabulary that wasn’t specific to his remarkably complete baseball lexicon – he even knew what a balk was) the radio went dead. It didn’t hit us at first because there weren’t any lights in the backyard, so we were just kind of staring at the radio wondering what happened. Then we heard the yelling and screaming from all around us and realized the lights had gone out, all the lights, everywhere.
It was becoming a long night as we sat in the hot kitchen lit only with a few old Easter candles while my dad paced back and forth chain-smoking. We were waiting for my mom and sister to get home. We had no idea where they were or how they’d get back in the dark. Eventually they did manage to get home without getting shot or looted, well past 11:00 PM. We were just happy to be together and safe.

My sister later explained that Mom had pretty much driven the entire way never exceeding 15 miles per hour with the windows up and never coming to a full stop. We ended up laughing a little as my parents fretted about spoiled cheese and melted butter at the store (my family owned a small deli on Roosevelt Ave.), and after a while we didn’t even mind the dark so much as we drifted off to bed. The noise of the increasingly more distant and sporadic yelling continued to waft through our open windows throughout the night with my dad keeping a quiet vigil at the front of the house, guarding from whatever chaos might happen by.

My friend Andy from across the street who was three years my elder was at the game that night with his cousins. He told me all about it the following day the same way he’d retell rated R movies scene for scene, word for word. I’ll never forget listening to him recite Jaws in all it’s gory and suspenseful detail, I swear it took longer for him to retell the movie than the movie itself. It took him a week to finish the Exorcist.

Anyway he explained how they didn’t realize it was a city-wide blackout until they were filing out and heard from people who’d been in the upper decks that the entire grid was black. He described the strange scene on the field as the players drove their cars onto the outfield grass with their headlights on and mimed infield practice to entertain the fans while the organist played Christmas music. Emergency generators lit up parts of the the stands but many of the halls and corridors were pitch black. Eventually they tired of waiting and slowly made their way out. They ended up walking the entire way back to 98th street, Corona.

Thinking back to that summer I can’t imagine a more fitting metaphor to losing the Franchise, Tom Seaver, than being left dumbfounded in the dark with a dead radio in the middle of a game. They’d turned the lights out on us and herded us into the pitch-black unknown. I’ll never forget the front page of the Daily News, “Seaver to Reds; Kingman to S.D.” We couldn’t make any sense of it. I read the paper to my dad and we concluded it was all about money, but I was way too young to understand anything about free agency or renegotiating contracts or personal pride.

What precipitated the split was the new Collective Bargaining Agreement that was signed on July 12, 1976. It was the beginning of free agency. Only four months earlier, the Mets had signed Seaver to a three-year, $675,000 contract, and he was, at that time, baseball’s highest paid pitcher.

Later that winter as the first batch of free agents cashed in with players signing million dollar contracts (even Nolan Ryan ended up making more than Seaver as Gene Autry offered him a 300,000 dollar base salary in lieu of Nolan’s impending free agency), Seaver wanted to renegotiate. But the bitter pill for fans came after the realization that there was actually a renegotiated contract in place that would have kept Seaver in Queens when a story by Dick Young appeared in the Daily News describing how Nancy Seaver was jealous of the Ryans.

That was it for Tom Terrific, he wanted out and he got his way.  None of the participants, not Seaver, not Grant, not Young, not even Nancy, ever stopped to consider that their actions would leave some kid out in Queens very much … in the dark … eating cheese, and spitting watermelon seeds.

Sandy Alderson and Jay Horwitz chat before start of today’s game. (Photo: Matt Balasis, MMO)

Updated by Joe D. on April 15 at 12:00 PM

The reaction to Matt’s interview with Mets GM Sandy Alderson has been stunning. Over 25,000 different visitors have read the post and as I was telling Shannon of Mets Media Relations, it’s been talked about on WFAN and posted or linked to on over two dozen mainstream sites including MLB Trade Rumors, ESPN, Fox Sports, Yahoo, USA Today, MetsBlog and the Daily News to name a few.

In all fairness, regarding the Giancarlo Stanton rumor which originated with Andy Martino of the Daily News, and was covered on MMO in a post that eclipsed 300 comments, Martino offered a reply to Alderson’s denial that there were any recent conversations and wanted to add his comments here:

Just updating our item from last Thursday on the Mets’ interest in Miami outfielder Giancarlo Stanton. Two pieces of news trickled out over the weekend that both confirmed the Mets’ end of the story and moved forward the Marlins’ end beyond what we wrote.

In the original column, I reported that Sandy Alderson and Marlins GM Larry Beinfest spoke at a minor league game in Jupiter, Fla. This was probably early March. One good Mets source told me that two discussed Stanton, and that “there was heat there.” He was not talking about the temperature in Florida, but his team’s strong interest in the young slugger.

But another Mets person, also reliable, said he wasn’t sure if Stanton came up in the conversation that day. Alderson did not return a phone call seeking clarification, so I wrote what I knew to be accurate: One source said they talked Stanton, one said they talked about something or other. Regardless, we know the Mets are eyeing Stanton in their search for a marquee outfielder.

This weekend in Minnesota, Matt Balasis of Mets Merized Online spoke to Alderson. The GM, in a backhanded way, acknowledged that the teams had talked during spring training (he also said there was nothing happening now. To be clear, I never reported, suggested or implied that the teams were talking now).

To be clear, Alderson said they haven’t talked since “early spring training”. So we are talking about well over a month ago. Also, as Matt tells it, the exchange as it took place told more than just the words alone:

I wish I had video footage of the interview. When I mentioned Stanton for Wheeler and D’Arnaud he scoffed and just said “No,” then there was an awkward pause.

I followed up and said, “So there’s nothing to the rumors?”

And that’s when he said they hadn’t spoken since early spring. He was very, very clear that there was nothing to the recent rumors.

Anyway, both Andy and Matt added more context to the story regarding the Stanton rumor. Though while it was incredibly fun to consider, it was never nothing more than a longshot at best and one that ran out of steam over a month ago.

Original Post by Matt Balasis on April 13 at 8:00 PM

I had a chance to chat with Mets General Manager Sandy Alderson today during batting practice before the game at Target Field. I thought he gave me some very interesting answers on a number of different Mets topics. My thoughts follow the interview. Enjoy…

MMO: On the Stanton rumors, they’ve been all over the news, are there any truth to them?

Sandy: No, no we haven’t had any conversations with them since early spring.

MMO: Will adding players and payroll at the break be based on how well the team is doing or whether revenue is up?

Sandy: You mean adding players? If we feel the team is doing well we will add players.

MMO: Adding payroll, will you base that decision more on revenue or performance or both?

Sandy: Performance, but if we are winning, revenue will be up.

MMO: How do you feel about organizational depth as a whole? This is an organization that’s had poor organizational depth for a long time.

Sandy: It’s getting better. We are starting to see some effects of improved depth and we should be seeing more in the near future.

Sandy Alderson watching his team take batting practice before today’s game. (Photo: Matt Balsis, MMO)

MMO: If Buck keeps hitting the way he has been, how will you handle it when D’Arnaud comes up? Will you keep playing Buck or will he take on more of a mentor’s role?

Sandy: We’ll find a way to play both of them.

MMO: Any chance you will trade Buck?

Sandy: No. We are not trading Buck.

MMO: How do you feel about the bullpen, this team has struggled with bullpen depth for the greater part of the past decade?

Sandy: The Bullpen seems to be doing well, we still have Fransicso rehabbing and Familia down there so we feel we have some good depth there.

MMO: How do you feel about the team’s performance as a whole?

Sandy: Well it’s only been 10 games.

Thoughts from Matt

I got the sense that there is nothing to the Stanton rumors at all. A lot of the press around me seem to agree as well. Totally unfounded …

Overall I get the impression from watching Sandy interact around his players that while he does appear to be a consummate professional and an exemplary administrator, this is not the uncaring hatchet man he’s been accused of being.

The players joked around a lot (especially Justin Turner) with Horwitz and Collins, but with the exception of a short exchange between Wright and Sandy, there was little fraternization between Alderson and the players.

Nevertheless, he was intent and focused on the players and I would venture to say passionate even, which came out more during the interview when it was obvious the guy cares about this team.

As fans it’s probably difficult for us to distinguish between the job’s specifics and the person. A good General Manager can’t get too attached to his players, a good GM will deal a player when it improves the team.

As much as many of us have lamented the loss of some of our favorite players, this young season has been a case in point for why big long contracts and players whose game is dependent on their legs are risky propositions.

We want to thank Sandy for being gracious enough to answer a few questions for us. It was a pleasure to hear him respond to so many of the questions on many Mets fans minds. We appreciated the time he took to answer them.

I’ll be back at Target Field again on Sunday, and hope to have more video, pictures and maybe a surprise interview or two.

After discussing my earlier post with me on Twitter, Mike Newman of FanGraphs conducted his own polling to one of the largest trafficked sports sites on the web. There are the results.

My conclusion?

Too many Mets fans are prospect drunk…

I would speculate that a similar poll on MMO would be somewhere in the middle with the majority of them pulling the trigger on such a deal without hesitation.

Original Post 9:00 AM

I am well aware of how every Mets’ site has their own readership of Mets fans, especially so when it comes to their commenting community, for those few sites like ours fortunate to have a steady commenting community. The differences are stark.

I was very surprised this morning when I saw the results on a poll Mets Blog took yesterday on if they would swap prospects d’Arnaud and Wheeler in exchange for Giancarlo Stanton. Actually, the word “surprised” might be a bit too mild, I think “stunned” would be a better choice.

Wow, almost two thirds would say NO to the younger and more established Stanton who is on a Hall of Fame trajectory.

“In a heartbeat,” said one Mets official, who is not in general manager Sandy Alderson’s inner-circle of decision makers but has a voice in discussions. “Nothing against those kids, but it’s Giancarlo.”

Stanton put up those gaudy numbers at ages 20-22. He just turned 23 and is still four years away from his prime 5-6 years of peak production.

I asked no less than – I don’t know – 10-12 different media types from Rosenthal to Callis to Heyman and not one said they wouldn’t pull the trigger. I asked three Mets players who requested to remain anonymous and one said, “Do you really have to ask?”

That is the majority sentiment on MMO as well. That poll up there just showed me the difference between MetsBlog regulars and Mets Merized Online regulars. The two couldn’t be more different.

Almost 75% of MetsBlog readers would rather keep the two unknown quantities rather than adding a proven 23-year old superstar even under the current Mets outfield situation… Wow!

To all of our MMO daily readers… All 16,000 of you… Well 17,000 if you just go by Monday… Have I ever told you how much I love you? :-)

I think it’s cool that when hot button issues come up like this one, that we have two megalithic sites for Mets fans that offer a nice contrast and together comprise the whole of the entire fan base.

Original Post 3/11

The Mets “retain an unfilled craving for a marquee outfielder,” writes Andy Martino of the Daily News.

Martino says that the team is monitoring star outfielders such as Giancarlo Stanton of the Marlins and Carlos Gonzalez of the Rockies.

One Mets person told Martino “there is heat there,” in regard to the team having a preliminary discussion with the Marlins about Stanton, suggesting serious interest.

There is no evidence that GMs Sandy Alderson and Larry Beinfest have discussed a Stanton deal, only speculation. But it does sound like there’s some serious interest on both sides.

This adds to what Ken Davidoff of the New York Post said in a different report yesterday, where he said Stanton, Gonzalez and Andre Ethier are among seven outfielders the Mets might consider acquiring this season or next winter. I didn’t much care for the other four outfielders on his list. Soriano? No thanks.

If the Mets are truly serious and this isn’t just them blowing some smoke up our behinds, they must know it would cost them likely two of their top prospects, namely starting pitcher Zack Wheeler and catcher Travis D’Arnaud.

Surprisingly, someone close to Alderson’s told Martino the the Mets GM does not have any particular attachment to either of those players, simply because he traded for them.

The Mets had already considered, but then declined on trading Wheeler to get Justin Upton or Wil Myers, during the Winter Meetings.

There’s nothing  close here so don’t get the wrong idea. But usually where there’s smoke there’s fire so let’s keep an eye on this.

That said, the Mets obviously need a marquee outfielder and they have to stop playing pretend with this current group of flawed outfielders, many of whom wouldn’t be starting on a lot of teams not named the Mets.

Travis d’Arnaud: Ready or Not?

Andy Martino of the Daily News, answers the question as to why Aaron Laffey will get the start on Sunday instead of some guy named Wheeler-something?

The strategy is this, according to team insiders: Bide their time and plug it up until Zack Wheeler arrives in town.

“That can be read as a good sign for Wheeler’s readiness”, says Martino. “The phenom needs to iron out minor command issues in Triple-A, and ideally wait out the mid-June Super Two cutoff, so he is less expensive during his prime years.”

He doesn’t get the sense that the Mets are absolutely married to keeping Wheeler from becoming a Super Two if an obvious need arises and he is ready.

Jonathan Mayo on MiLB.com had a great article on Super Two elgibility and spoke to a few GM’s about whether Super Two get in the way of bringing up a prospect who is obviously MLB ready and fills an immediate need for their teams.

He points out that prospects Aaron Hicks was in center field, batting leadoff for the Minnesota Twins on Opening Day. Red Sox outfielder Jackie Bradley Jr. was in the starting lineup against the Yankees. Jose Fernandez was a late addition to the Marlins’ Opening Day roster and the Mariners’ Brandon Maurer broke camp as the club’s No. 4 starter.

But on the flip side of the coin Rays outfielder Wil Myers, Mets catcher Travis d’Arnaud and pitching phenoms who many believe are ready; Wheeler and the Pirates’ Gerrit Cole, will all be waiting for the Triple-A season to get underway later tonight.

Were these roster decisions based on Major League readiness and that they don’t currently serve a need on the active roster? Doubtful.

Regarding d’Arnaud, Sandy Alderson recently said, “I know people talk about control and ‘Super Two’ and all of that. If John Buck gets hurt tomorrow, Travis d’Arnaud is the front-line catcher.”

Let’s hope Buck stays healthy for the entire season, but I doubt d’Arnaud would be on a jet to Flushing tonight if the veteran catcher had injured himself and was facing a DL stint. Nevermind what Sandy says, Super Two and retention play a significant part, especially with the Mets and it always will.

In a similar circumstance, Omar Minaya wasted no time when it became clear that Mike Jacobs was finished, and he quickly turned to Ike davis who responded with 19 home runs and 71 RBI in a shortened rookie season. The result of that decision led to Davis’ hefty raise in arbitration this Winter – one year earlier than it could have been.

“Everybody is going to speculate why he is being sent out — and they’re wrong,” Pirates GM Neal Huntington said when Cole was assigned to Minor League camp. “He’s being sent out because in our minds, he’s not ready to compete, to be successful at the Major League level, to be one of those top-of-the-rotation starters, which is our goal for him.”

In that case, Huntington admits that Cole is “not ready” and in the past they had no problems calling up previous top prospects who became Super Two eligible.

Mayo points out that the teams who had top prospects make the Opening Day roster (Bradley, Hicks, Maurer), made those decisions because they believed those players were the best men for the job.

“The guy has earned it,” Twins GM Terry Ryan said last week. “I find it almost humorous that guys are talking service time and starting the clock. The guy has earned it.”

Ryan can be my GM anytime, but this quote from Mariners GM Jack Zduriencik says it all for me:

“We’ve always gone into Spring Training, philosophically, if a guy deserves to be on the club, I don’t see how you can look a player in the eye and tell him he can’t be. We stay true to that.”

“We went in with our eyes wide open and it was hard to deny Maurer. He had such a great spring, it was the right thing to do. We never discussed anything else other than if he deserved to be on the club.”

Retention and Super Two played no role in their decisions. It was based on fielding a competitive team and rewarding the player for a job well done – basically doing the right thing for the organization, the player and ultimately the fans who pay high ticket prices believing they are seeing the best team the front office could put together.

There are two schools of thought on this, as more and more fans are becoming financially-minded which fits in perfectly with what the Wilpons want.

However, I’m always of the mind that you should field the best 25 players you have and play ball. That philosophy has served me well since I fell in love with the game as a kid.

Play your best players and play hard.

It may sound old-fashioned and a bit outdated to most of you, but I’m glad there are still a great deal of current GM’s who share that same sentiment.

Most of you read my initial thoughts on Wheeler-gate early this morning; I think it was overblown. I wanted to just say one last thing in lieu of Sandy Alderson’s comments regarding the situation while a guest on WFAN. Here is what he said:

“We didn’t want this to escalate into an issue,” Alderson said. “We have had extensive conversations with both players. We think it’s done. When an incident like that becomes known, we have to address it. That’s the big leagues in New York.” (MetsBlog)

Good. They nipped it in the bud as any good organization would have. Whatever happened, happened, and now it’s over.

One person who was right there in the thick of it, told me that it was much ado about nothing and it all started with something a third player said that he shouldn’t have, after the plunking, “Good. That a**hole deserved it.”

The important thing to take away is that almost immediately, the situation was handled appropriately by the coaching staff, and then the front office, and that all is now good in the neighborhood.

I think what was more appalling than the minor incident itself was how some used it as an opportunity to make the team look bad, create more divisiveness and garner some extra attention for a day. Sadly many of them were Mets bloggers. Anyway…

Have a great weekend and think happy thoughts for Opening Day.

We will be live blogging the event and will have nine writers from MMO on hand from the pressbox to the Pepsi Porch to field level and basically anywhere else you can think of.

We’ve got it all covered on MMO…

Original Post 6:00 AM

Zack Wheeler, one of the top pitching prospects in baseball, was reprimanded last weekend along with teammate Aderlin Rodriguez for an on-field incident that led to ethnic tensions in the Mets’ minor league clubhouse, according to the Daily News.

Team sources told Andy Martino that during a minor league intrasquad game last Saturday, Rodriguez, a 21-year-old infielder from the Dominican Republic, homered against Wheeler, 22, and “pimped it” around the bases, as one witness described it.

Rodriguez apologized to Wheeler, but the phenom still hit Rodriguez’s teammate with a pitch later in the game. That drew a long glare from Rodriguez, who shouted at Wheeler during a slow walk to first base. At one point, the home plate umpire stepped between the two prospects.

Later, ethnic tensions arose in the clubhouse, according to two people present at the time. “Some of the American guys and some of the Latin guys were circling and yelling at each other,” one source said. The same source added that Wheeler and Rodriguez “are both great kids, competitors, and this stuff just happens sometimes.”

Mets brass reprimanded both players, and the team considers the issue closed. Vice president of player development and scouting Paul DePodesta acknowledged the incident, and said, “We’ve talked to everybody involved, and I think at this point it’s done with.”

Asked if there was any concern about ethnic tensions arising from the incident, DePodesta said: “From our perspective, we treated it as any parent might treat a dispute between two of their kids. You don’t take sides. There is no such thing as sides. You just try to tell them what the right thing to do is, the responsible thing to do, and you go from there. There aren’t any sides taken (by the organization).”

While most of you all know about Wheeler, Rodriguez is considered one of the organizations top power hitter and led the system in home runs in 2012.

Thoughts from Joe D.

This sounds a little overblown to me and it doesn’t matter what the ethnicity is of the players involved. This is baseball and this happens all the time. It seems that the Daily News wanted to sensationalize this simply because of what the ethnicity of the players involved were, rather than the fact it was just two Mets prospects and that’s it.

1. Player A throws pitch down the middle of the plate.
2. Player B hits home run and showboats it.
3. Player A plunks the next batter.

You’ve seen this before. The only thing that’s different is that it was an intrasquad game and both players went into the same clubhouse after the game – both of them still a little hot.

This is no big deal.

Cecchini is from Louisiana, so the sites from Hurricane Sandy were all too familiar. He had already gone through it with Hurricanes Katrina and Rita a few years ago. He was only twelve at the time, but remembers Hurricane Rita devastating his town.

Cecchini went on further to say:

I was just watching the news and the pictures just hit me. I saw cars flooded and the homes. I saw a car blow up outside MCU Park. I’ve seen that before. I felt a connection. I was drafted by the Mets, this is my extended family now and I could do something to help… I knew I had been blessed with this talent and if I could use it to help my extended family, it’s what I wanted to do.

Cecchini is excited about one day being able to play his games at Citi Field, but it’s still going to be a few years before Cecchini is standing in front of the New York crowd. He should start the 2013 season with the Cyclones once again this year, and if he does, is worthy of his very first standing ovation from the Brooklyn crowd.

According to Miami owner Jeffrey Loria, is “absolutely not available.” But despite Loria’s insistence, we all know everyone is available. It just depends on the price. Or as one Marlin operative told me the other day:

“I understand Jeffrey’s getting killed in Miami over blowing up the team this winter and why he doesn’t want to trade Stanton. But how much more can we get killed? The fact is, this is the right time to trade Stanton. He’s never going to have more value than this. He’s already had some injury issues, and we’re never going to sign him to a long-term deal.”

We’ve discussed the scenarios about what it would take to acquire Stanton from Miami just last week on MMO.

The majority agreed it would take both of our top prospects to get him; Zack Wheeler and Travis d’Arnaud. But it was kind of split as to whether the Mets should do it or not.

Last week, Sports on Earth wrote that the Mets were one of only four teams in baseball that had the pieces to snatch the superstar away from Miami where he seems very unhappy since they blew the team up.

I would be very shocked if Stanton were still a Marlin after the trade deadline.

Andy Martino of the Daily News, asks a thought-provoking question in his column this morning:

Would you have rather traded Jonathon Niese, instead of R.A. Dickey, to Toronto for Travis d’Arnaud and Noah Syndergaard?

Turns out that the Mets had that choice according to  Martino.

While Niese faced Team Venezuela Wednesday in Port St. Lucie, two people with direct knowledge of last December’s deal told me that the Blue Jays were willing to send the same package to New York in exchange for Niese.

“Toronto has loved Niese for years,” one source said.  “They absolutely would have done that.”

The view from here has always been that the Mets should have retained Dickey, and found another way to stock the farm system, but we’ll give equal time to the other perspective. Niese is much younger, lefthanded, and working under a team-friendly contract.  At 26, he probably has more years remaining in baseball than the 38-year-old knuckleballer.

That’s kind of difficult to answer. On the one hand you have the reigning Cy Young winner who may be one of the top five pitchers in the game right now, while on the other hand you have a reliable number a solid mid-rotation pitcher who is much younger and has a team friendly contract with four more years remaining on it.

Of course the contract extension Dickey signed is also a huge value considering what other pitchers of his caliber earn.

There really is no wrong answer here, and either way it’s a great deal for the Mets.

But looking at the team now and the lack of a reliable ace it wouldn’t be far-fetched to have kept Dickey and the veteran leadership that comes along with him.

Ironically, if Johan Santana isn’t ready to pitch on Opening Day, it just may be Niece who gets the nod. Hopefully, things go better for Niese than they did for Mike Pelfrey when circumstances forced him into a similar situation.

What do you think?

Terry Collins told ESPN New York this afternoon that the oblique injury to top prospect Zack Wheeler is “not very bad.”

Adam Rubin also reports that “the hope is to get Wheeler back on a bullpen mound in five days.”

As MMO’s John Delcos pointed out this morning, Wheeler sounds like he’ll miss just one more start before he appears in another Grapefruit League game.

As they should, the Mets are handling this one with extra caution.

Original Post 2/27

Andy Martino of the Daily News is hearing that Zack Wheeler will be scratched from his start today because of an oblique injury that happened while hitting in cage….

Wheeler has confirmed the injury and the Mets are calling it a mild strain…

“It’s mostly precautionary at this point,” general manager Sandy Alderson said. “He tried to throw and didn’t experience any problem, but he was sore to the touch so we’re backing off.”

Darin Gorski will start in place of Wheeler in Wednesday’s game against the Cardinals.

While the Mets try to make do with an outfield made up of what would likely be utility outfielders on most other teams, John Harper of the Daily News sheds some new details on the Mets’ failed pursuits of Justin Upton and Michael Bourn.

Regarding Upton, the Mets were hoping he would just fall in their laps for either Daniel Murphy or Ruben Tejada plus two A-Ball pitching prospects, believing Arizona GM Kevin Towers was desperate for a third baseman or shortstop.

In addition to either Murphy or Tejada, the Mets would have included one or more of lower-level pitching prospects, presumably someone from the likes of Rafael Montero, Luis Mateo, Michael Fulmer, or even recently-acquired Noah Syndergaard.

But while Alderson actually thought he was in the game, a baseball executive from another club who knows Towers well says the D-Backs GM never got close to doing anything with the Mets before finally trading Upton to the Braves.

As for the Bourn situation, for one thing it’s now clear other teams complained about making an exception to the terms of the collective bargaining agreement just to appease the Mets and also let Scott Boras beat the system.

The Mets were going to have to win a grievance to keep the draft pick, and Alderson didn’t want to go through that process before having an agreement because he believed it would give Boras more leverage. It was that fear and tentativeness that blew any chance to sign Bourn, sources told Harper.

“Typical Mets.”

“They can say this happened or that happened but the bottom line is they didn’t act decisively,” one major league executive said. “They should have gotten the draft pick decision settled — it wasn’t going to change Bourn’s market. To let the delay of the draft-pick decision get in the way of a deal was small-time thinking.”

The executive added that while neither Bourn or Upton was going to make the Mets winners in 2013, it now makes building a contender-worthy outfield in 2014 considerably more difficult, and that Alderson will be under the gun to finally deliver a winning season in his fourth and final year of his contract.

While the Mets embark upon a future that may not include all-star shortstop and fan favorite Jose Reyes, I can’t help but notice how oddly familiar this all seems.

The drama of potentially losing the face of the franchise and the intense media build-up leading up to his final moments, is something that many of us old-timers have seen before. I know that most of you reading this were not even born yet on June 15, 1977, but you may soon feel what it was like when another Mets general manager made the erroneous decision to plunge the Mets into a bleak uncertainty and to move on without their franchise player, Tom Seaver.

Those were dark days for the Mets, and like today, money had a lot to do with why it happened. In the days leading up to that fateful day the Mets found a PR person in Dick Young of the Daily News, to help chip away at that great Tom Seaver persona and try to tarnish his glistening image and even minimize some of his incredible achievements.

“Tom Seaver is after more money. He wants to break his contract with the Mets. “Renegotiate” is the pretty word he used for it in this time of pretty words.” – Dick Young, Daily News

The hope was that it would help facilitate Seaver’s departure by getting a small minority of the fans to sour on Tom Terrific. That never happened of course and M. Donald Grant became one of the most vilified and abhorred general managers in New York baseball history.

The NYC Morgue had more life than Shea Stadium in the years after that trade, and in fact many began referring to Shea as “Grant’s Tomb”. The mere mention of Grant’s name – even today – will draw a scowl from anyone old enough to remember him.

Are we seeing this played out in all it’s grandeur again today?

Like Seaver, Reyes has shattered well over a dozen franchise records since coming up from the Mets minor leagues and becoming one of the most exciting players in the game and the premier leadoff man in baseball.

Reyes has become the face of the Mets franchise and even today is considered by most to be an essential part of the Mets offense and their top core player.

Sandy Alderson is treading on some dangerous terrain right now. He must navigate through some choppy waters. Depending on how he handles these negotiations with Reyes, he could invoke the ire of an entire fanbase and plunge this franchise back into that same black abyss of the late seventies.

Even the great one, Tom Seaver himself, shared his thoughts on Reyes not to long ago. ”Unless you have a game plan to go in a different direction, you can’t get rid of him. He’s too good,” Seaver said.  ”Reyes is a player you build around. If the Mets don’t re-sign Reyes, what are you going to replace him with?”

Remember the saying “As Jose Reyes goes, so goes the Mets?” It was intended to remind everyone of just how valuable Reyes was to this line-up and to this team as a whole.

I’m curious to know, and please I’m speaking only to those who were actually around back then, doesn’t all of this seem vaguely familiar?

This Fan Shot was submitted by John Volpe. Have something you want to say about the Mets? Share your opinions with over eleven-thousand Mets fans who read this site daily. Send your Fan Shot to GetMetsmerized@aol.com.

1. Where do you rank the Mets Minor League System on a scale of 1-10 in the following areas:

A) Starting Pitching: 3. And that could possibly be generous. Frankly the only pitchers that I truly see as big league starting pitchers in the organization are Dillon Gee, Jenrry Mejia, and Matt Harvey. And there are even questions as to whether Mejia or Harvey will end up starters or back end relievers.

B) Power Hitters: 7. They have some guys that can really put the ball out of the park. Fernando Martinez when healthy along with Kirk Nieuwenhuis and Lucas Duda should provide plenty of power in AAA. In AA Reese Havens and Sean Ratliff have very good power, Ratliff is a sleeper for me. In A+ they have Wilmer Flores, Cory Vaughn and maybe Cesar Puello’s BP power translates to games. Then you have the best power bat in the system in Aderlin Rodriguez down in Savannah.

C) Potential Star Caliber Players: 6. I think they have a few potential stars in Mejia, Flores, Harvey, Puello and Aderlin Rodriguez. Problem is they do not have any Jason Heyward’s, or Mike Stanton’s etc. All their potential star caliber players could be flops or just solid major leaguers. They don’t have that one stand out prospect that you are certain will be a superstar.

D) Overall: 5. I’ll say 5 because despite what some may feel, I think they are a middle of the pack or so farm system. They have some good prospects that look like big leaguers, even if not stars. If they keep up spending in international free agency and really focus on draft spending and scouting this farm could jump quick. I trust Sandy Alderson and co. to be able to handle this.

2. At what position do the Mets have the most quality depth and why?

No doubt it’s in the outfield. I guess why is a hard question, they just struck luck with those group of guys. But they have guys like Duda, Nieuwenhuis, Martinez, Ratliff, Puello, Vaughn, Darrell Ceciliani, Javier Rodriguez. That is a good amount of solid outfielders that I could see them all ending up in the major leagues one day, some sooner than later. The outfielders really excite me.

3. Which Mets prospect took the biggest step forward in 2010?

Many I am sure will disagree, but for me it’s Sean Ratliff. Ratliff prior to 2010 to me was just a guy who could hit a few balls out of the park but would strike out way too much to put forth any form of a solid season. But man did he surprise me. The call to AA really sparked him. He OPS’ed .933 up in Binghamton, and I really am starting to think Ratliff could end up a big league regular in the outfield. He plays a solid center, but likely will have to be a corner as a pro.

4. Which Mets prospect took the biggest step backward?

I’ll go with Brad Holt on this one. He simply I don’t think could have been any worse. He was a top 5 prospect in the system for some people coming into 2010, and now there are many people who completely write him off as a big leaguer. I personally think he still has a shot as a middle reliever if he can get some control and stop throwing balls at the backstop. But the big bonus baby, and Brooklyn strike-out record holder took an enormous step back in the eyes of the public. He will really have to rebound this year in Binghamton to regain the trust of the organization and the fans. I personally would put him in the pen now and give up on the starting experiment that simply won’t work.

5. Lets have some fun. What will the 2013 Mets Opening Day Lineup look like?

C: Josh Thole 1B: Ike Davis 2B: Brad Emaus 3B: David Wright SS: Jose Reyes LF: Jason Bay CF: Kirk Nieuwenhuis RF: Wilmer Flores. Let’s order it Reyes-Nieuwenhuis-Wright-Davis-Bay-Flores-Emaus- Thole. I could imagine this being horribly wrong.

6. Boom or Bust?

A) Wilmer Flores: Boom. I have him in RF above, but I think he best translates in left at the big league level. His bat is exceptional, and as long as he stays healthy he’s going to have a long career as an above average offensive player.

B) Lucas Duda: Boom as a DH. I don’t think Duda really has a position, and I think he’s going to be much better suited in the AL. If he has a real good first half don’t be surprised if he’s dangled at the deadline to an AL team for pitching.

C) Fernando Martinez: Bust. Pains me to say it, I love Martinez. But I have all but given up hope that the kid will ever be healthy. Shame because his offensive upside is special, but he’ll never get to realize it.

D) Brad Holt: Bust. He may end up carving out a career in middle relief, but that’s not a $1M investment like the Mets made in him on draft day.

E) Reese Havens: Bust. I am going to put him in the Fernando territory where he simply will never be healthy. It’s a shame because him and Martinez both if they were healthy they have very good upside.

F) Kirk Nieuwenhuis: Boom. I was not too high on Kirk in 2010, even when he was performing well. But he’s grown on me. I think he’ll be able to play an acceptable center field, and has 20/20 type potential at the plate. He does need to work on plate discipline though, but he abuses the baseball on the line to gaps on a regular basis. He very well could be taking over after Beltran leaves.

7. Who is the best Mets prospect most Mets fans never heard of?

He has recently gotten a little love as a sleeper, but I would have to say Akeel Morris. The Mets drafted Morris in the 2010 draft, and he’s armed with a mid 90s fastball and an above average breaking ball. We’ll see about developing a quality third pitch, but I had one scout compare Morris to Frankie Rodriguez. With the herky jerky motion and all.

8. The Mets will have the #13 pick in the 2011 June Draft. I know it’s early, but are there any solid players that will be there for the Mets? Who do you like?

It depends on signability and whatnot of course. But I am all over the college pitching right now at 13. They could get guys like UCONN’s Matt Barnes, Virginia’s Danny Hultzen, UCLA’s Trevor Bauer (fav of mine), Texas’s Taylor Jungmann and Georgia Tech’s Jed Bradley. College pitching is definitely the strength of the draft. As far as high schoolers, I am big on RHP Archie Bradley, LHP Daniel Norris and RHP Dylan Bundy. Regardless I can’t see any logic and going anything other than pitching at 13.

9. On Sunday, their was a Daily News piece on how the Mets have revamped their approach to scouting. Did you get a chance to read it and what were your thoughts?

I like it a lot. This organization now has a plan. It’s fun to know intelligent people are running the team, and are prepared to send them in the right direction. They will have scouts monitoring specific organizations so the team could have very in depth scouting reports on everyone so when it comes time to trade they will know exactly who they like and why. In the past regime, you almost feel like they were picking at straws. Could this plan falter because you can’t possibly see enough of everyone? Sure, but I’ll take a legitimate plan that fails over guessing and hoping.

10. Which pitching prospect will have the better major league career, Jenrry Mejia or Matt Harvey?

I am actually going to vote Harvey. Harvey has the natural pitcher’s build, a little mechanical flaw, but certainly fixable. He has a fastball that cranks up to 98, as well as 3 average or better secondaries in his curve, slider and change. Mejia right now to me is a 1 pitch pitcher that needs a lot of work on his curve and change. Mejia to me has a better shot to end up in the bullpen than Harvey does, and I always give the edge to a starter over a reliever.

11. More of a Mets question, but how would you grade the Mets offseason, and how many games do you think they will win in 2011?

Considering the financial restraints put on Sandy Alderson, I think he did a strong job. I would give him a B simply based on what he had, not in relation to general moves or in comparison to what other teams did. He filled every hole that the Mets had with at least an able body. Unlike Omar Minaya, Alderson didn’t leave holes to be stronger in another area. He made sure he filled everything, and gave the team depth nearly everywhere too. The job he did this offseason I think is being severely underrated. I am going to give the team 85 wins if healthy.

12. Tell us about your very unique Mets blog, St. Lucie to Flushing and how you became interested in covering the Mets minor leagues as well as the MLB Draft?

Well I have contributed many places, including Mike Silva’s NY Baseball Digest, which I still read on a daily basis. I love to write about the Mets, and I love to cover the minors specifically. There aren’t too many Mets blogs out there that have a hard focus on the minors, and not just recapping games, but really focusing on the small details. We try to do that over at PSL2F, it launched rather quick last year, but in 2011 I expect real big things from the blog. I want to have video of prospects playing live this summer. I intend to attend games for all levels other than GCL, Kingsport and St Lucie. I will have plenty of exclusive interviews with prospects as well. I just simply enjoy this, this is all fun for me. There is nothing like having multiple tabs open following the Gameday’s of every minor league affiliate while watching the big club on my TV. I am excited for the future of St Lucie to Flushing, and I hope everyone goes and checks it out this summer, as the content will be unique and informational for all fans. We want fans to know more than just the top prospects. Our goal is to have everyone to know everyone from the top to the bottom. That’s the goal.

Thanks for your time Joe. Check out St. Lucie To Flushing and add them to your favorites. If you go there now you will find their latest post with features player projections for Wally Backman’s Binghamton Mets. You can also follow Joe on Twitter at PSLToFlushing.

As for Manuel, I took a shot at him the other day for comparing Jenrry Mejia to Mariano Rivera because they have similar cutters. But Mejia said yesterday he doesn’t even throw a cutter, rather his heater has so much movement it looks like a cutter. Good to hear Manuel is on top of things.

Poor Jerry, it’s only March 1st and already he’s fumbling his words…

Okay, here goes…

1. What are the two biggest keys for the Mets this season, and do you think they have a shot at unseating the Phillies and winning the division?

The first key is Pelfrey, Maine and Perez all staying healthy and all getting their acts together. There’s no room for error. The other key is David Wright rediscovering his power stroke. If he’s not a threat, the lineup is mediocre at best. As for having a shot at the Phils, yes, but it’s a longshot, everything must break right to have a chance.

2. As you wrote in your blog post last Friday, Jerry Manuel wants to bat Joey Kings, as you call him, third rather than leadoff. Good or bad idea?

It’s not a horrible idea, but I don’t like the fact that he will likely go back to leadoff when Beltran returns. Why mess around with him for two months? It doesn’t make much sense.

3. Who do you think will eventually have a bigger impact on the Mets between Ike Davis, Josh Thole and Jenrry Mejia?

Mejia. I’ll take a young pitcher any day of the week.

4. I think all of us can agree that the Mets could have had a better offseason. What one player that got away, would you have wanted to see on the Mets in 2010?

I think Lackey is the guy they should’ve went after. He would’ve taken so much pressure off Pelf, Maine and Ollie and our bullpen. True, it may have cost us Bay, but there were plenty of outfielders out there, but clearly not many big-time pitchers.

5. The Mets promised that they would correct the obvious communication gap last season between the medical team, the players, and everyone in the front office. Have they? And could it create more problems down the road? Do you think that kind of stuff really affects a players decision to sign with a team?

I can’t be sure if the problem is fixed, but the Beltran fiasco certainly makes it appear as if is hasn’t. As for players’ decision to sign with a team, unless the doctors are signing the checks, they are a non-factor.

How many homeruns will Jason Bay hit in 2010?  26

Will Omar Minaya still be the GM on July 15th?  Yes

Which TV Drama will best describe the 2010 Mets? 1. Heroes 2. Breaking Bad 3. Greys Anatomy.  No TV show comes close, but how about Hurt Locker? (Whew, I’m just glad you didn’t say Titanic.)

Besides Johan Santana, will any Mets starter win 15 or more games?  No

Have you ever lobby Jeff Wilpon for a front office position?  Does Mr. Met count as a front-office position?  (He most certainly does count as a front office position!)

Sweet Caroline for Mets sing-along: Good or Totally Sucks?  Awful. Can the Mets come up with anything original? Can we just bring back the Curly Shuffle for goodness sakes?

Whose uniform number should the Mets retire next?  They should retire No. 17 next, but Piazza will likely be the next guy. If not, it will likely be No. 5 in about 20 years.

What Star Wars character best describes Jeff Francoeur?  I’d have to say Chewbacca. He’s big, kind of goofy and doesn’t seem to care what anyone thinks of him. I wonder if he can make that noise.  (I see him more like Luke, sweeping in to destroy the Death Saber Star and save the Mets universe.)

Is Johan Santana better than Roy Halladay?  Roy who?

If you were stranded on deserted island and could have a lifetime supply of one of the following gastronomical delights, which one do you go for? (1. Nathans Hot dogs 2. Shack Burgers 3. Blue Smoke Pulled Pork Sandwiches)  I would have to pick the flat Harry M. Stevens beer with the plastic lids and nice cold Shea Stadium pretzel.  (Ahh, manna from heaven…)

You rock dude!

Thank you for taking some time out of your hectic day for us. We look forward to following the Mets via your blog The Bitter Bill at the Daily News. And for even more of Bill’s keen insights I urge you to follow him on Twitter.

But after a car accident in 1991 in which Dykstra was driving drunk and nearly killed himself and teammate Darren Daulton is when things started to unravel, or at least when consequences started following Lenny’s actions.  Years later, the consequences are growing more serious, as Dykstra has recently been portrayed as a lying, cheating, backstabbing, sorry excuse for a human being–yes, really, all of those things.  After facing a lawsuit in 2005 from a business partner, Dykstra became known in the business world as an expert stock picker and was even interviewed on CNBC.

But sadly, 2009 has been the year when the world has struck back at Dykstra, and it’s been striking back with a vengeance.  His wife, Terri, filed for divorce in April, shortly after an article ran in GQ that detailed one person’s experience of having Dykstra as an employer.  That horrific story led to more investigating, and ESPN reported in April that Dykstra was indeed the subject of more than 20 lawsuits since 2007.  Last week the Daily News ran a story about how Dykstra was dodging creditors, and how he was stealing pieces of his own property to sell in order to raise income.

To which all of this has to make us wonder, how much are we not reading?  And how unbelievable this is that one person can be such a wrecking crew to the lives and wallets of those around him—the same way he used to be a one-man wrecking crew to opposing teams and outfield fences.  It’s probably safe to say the guy is beyond hope, but we should probably all hope he winds up in prison to stop the proverbial bleeding, and to keep Dykstra from continuing to mess up anyone else’s life, or his own.

Yesterday Omar Minaya after what I am sure was an exhausting investigation into the Tony Bernazard situation finally announced that the Mets fired Tony Bernazard.  In his press conference yesterday afternoon Omar claimed that the Mets human resources department was already looking into Tony Bernazard’s behavior and an investigation was already being conducted quietly within the organization. Omar then said that Daily News beat writer Adam Rubin, the reporter who last week broke the story about Bernazard taking his shirt off and threatening 17 and 18 year old kids in the minors to a fight had been lobbying for the last few years for a job in player development.  Rubin was shocked and rightly so.

Omar Minaya is a liar, pure and simple.  Last week when Omar Minaya held his news conference to tell reporters that the Mets were “investigating” Tony Bernazard he gave no indication once so ever that the organization was conducting any sort of investigation into Tony Bernazard before then.  Let’s face it, there is no way that the Mets did not know what Tony Bernazard did in Binghamton.  Omar and the Mets were trying to sweep this situation under the rug until Adam Rubin dug it up and reported it in the Daily News.  Omar knew full well that a few weeks ago Tony Bernazard cursed out an employee at Citi Field in front of people and children because he wanted a seat behind homeplate that was being occupied by a scout for the Arizona Diamondbacks.  The public did not know of these unprofessional acts by Bernazard until Adam Rubin broke the story last week.  Later in the week the Post reported that Bernazard was in a verbal argument with K-Rod, which in my mind should have been the final nail in his coffin.

Omar said in his press conference yesterday afternoon that he stumbled a little bit when he read Adam Rubin’s column on what happened in Binghamton because Rubin over the years has lobbied for a job in Player Development with the Mets.  Rubin denied these charges, saying that he has asked team officials from different teams over the years how to break into that part of the business, Jeff Wilpon according to Rubin even offered more than once to sit down with him and talk to him about breaking into the business as well as a job with SNY but Rubin turned him down everytime.

Yesterday’s press conference should have been a slam dunk, Omar should have told the press that the Mets have decided to part ways with Tony Bernazard, field some questions and wish everyone a good afternoon.  This was the perfect chance to wash our hands of this, build on some momentum from the weekend and go out and play baseball in perhaps the most important series so far this season.  Unfortunately Omar as usual could not complete an easy task.  Much like last year when he fired Willie Randolph at 3AM EST on the road this firing turned into another circus.  Attacking Adam Rubin who admittedly has written some tough pieces on Omar and his job performance is like what Adam said “despicable.”  It seems to be nothing more than an attempt at getting some payback.  Payback for what you ask?  It’s no secret that Omar and Tony Bernazard are friends outside of baseball.  Bernazard was hired in December of 2004, 3 months after Omar was named the General Manager of the Mets.  Had Rubin never reported in what happened in Binghamton, Tony Bernerzard would still be employed by the Mets, taking his shirt off, threatening to beat up kids who are away from the families and in a different part of the world for the 1st time in their lives.

Omar decided to try and ruin Adam Rubin’s credibility, pure and simple by putting this out in the universe.  Last week Omar used the word investigate about 100 times during his news conference, I wonder if Omar was investigating Adam Rubin’s past?  Did Omar call around the major’s asking for any dirt on Adam Rubin?  I think what Omar set out to do was to try and get Rubin off the Mets beat.  2Omar was not being professional, he was being personal.  You cannot attack a beat writer because he wrote an article that forced you to fire your best friend.

I think it’s no secret that I have been calling for Omar’s head for months now.  I have not agreed with most of his free agent signings the last couple of years, the lack of trades and the horrible way he has built up the farm system.  That dislike was against Omar Minaya the General Manager of the New York Mets, the public figure, not Omar the person.  I’ve never met Omar Minaya, I don’t know anybody who knows him personally so I had no reason to dislike Omar Minaya the person until yesterday afternoon.  Omar showed his true colors yesterday afternoon by attacking Adam Rubin without producing any shred of evidence to support his claims.  If Adam Rubin has been lobbying for a job the last few years produce emails of inquiry, text messages or a resume from Rubin to the New York Mets. While Omar has not yet shown any evidence that backup his claims, Omar has showed that as a “man” he’s petty and in my opinion despicable.  There is no other word to describe him after yesterday.  I wanted Omar fired because I felt he wasn’t doing a good job, it was nothing personal until now.  I will smile and maybe even dance a little much like Tony Bernazard did in Anaheim when the Mets fired Willie Randolph.

The attack on Adam Rubin shows that with this organization if you say and/or write something negative about the Mets they will fire you and/or try to discredit you.  Anybody think it was a coincidence that Matt Yaloff and Lee Mazzilli were very critical last year of the Mets on SNY and are no longer with the channel?  It came out during this whole mess with Bernazard that he would threaten the younger kids, telling them that if they didn’t do what he liked he would get them.   Adam Rubin said that he has received letter from parents of minor leaguers confirming this and I hope after yesterday and the permission of the parents he will publish those letter in his column.  Fear and bullying seems to be something Omar approves of to run this organization.

You have to admire Adam Rubin.  He’s not a columnists, he’s a beat writer, he has to be with the team day in and day out.  To write a column like he did 2 weeks ago in the Daily News knowing that he would have to see Omar and the rest of the organization on a daily basis he still went ahead and wrote what he felt was wrong with the Mets and Omar.

Last night Omar held yet another press conference, this time with Jeff Wilpon by his side.  Omar did not really apologize, he just said basically that he shouldn’t have made the comments he made about Adam in a public forum.  In fact Omar seemed angrier than he was in the afternoon.  Jeff Wilpon by the way stood next to Omar, basically nodding, sipping a bottle of water.  He did say that he gets a lot of phone calls on a weekly basis seeking career advice. The Mets and Omar had a chance to clear the air, to apologize but instead looked worse than before.

Omar Minaya I don’t like you as a GM and now I like you even less as a person and I cannot wait to see you on the unemployment line!  Omar showed that he has no class, while Adam Rubin showed a lot of class yesterday, he could have said a lot of things about Omar but decided to not too stoop to that level.  I wouldn’t mind having someone like that in the organization working with our younger guys compared to “men” like Tony Bernazard and Omar Minaya.  Mets fans it’s obvious that Omar Must Go!