I hate being right all the time…

In a must-read article by Andy McCullough of The Star-Ledger, R.A. Dickey spoke out on his current contract and his upcoming contract status.

Dickey made clear he wants “compensation commensurate with his production” these past three seasons. He also feels that he and third baseman David Wright are something of a “package deal.”

He struggles to envision himself inking a multi-year extension if the club doesn’t make “an aggressive attempt” to re-sign Wright.

“If I don’t see them pursuing David hard,” Dickey said, “I think it would be a message to everybody that they’re content to spend the next five or six years rebuilding this organization. Rather than trying to be competitive, and trying to rebuild it at the same time.”

McCullough said the Mets were going to sit with Dickey and try to work out an extension through 2014 before the season began, but decided against it and wanted to see how this season went. Big mistake and again the Mets get burned and paid the price for waiting. It’s becoming a habit with this group.

Interestingly enough, McCullough speculates that Dickey’s average salary for a pitcher of his caliber to be at $15.5 million. That’s just a half million more than what I’ve been speculating. Last week, in a post I wrote about this I saw some readers predicting extensions in the range of three years and $25 million for Dickey and I had to contain myself to keep from laughing. Then you have those who say Dickey is like Wright, they don’t care about things like money. Ummm… Yeah…. Okay…

Dickey turns 38 next month, but opposing executives believe his knuckleball could sustain him for years to come and I certainly agree. In knuckleballer years, Dickey is probably just 29.

So to summarize, now both Wright AND Dickey want to know what the plan is, and now it seems that at least one of them won’t sign unless the other does because he considers themselves a “package deal”. Oh yeah… And they both want and expect market value. Hmmm… Where did we hear that before?

It’s going to be a drama-filled offseason and it all starts on October 4th. Buckle yourselves in.