Yesterday it came out that Johan Santana would miss his next start and go see a doctor for his ailing pitching elbow. Another day and another Met injury no longer surprises me anymore with this Mickey Mouse organization but what does surprise me is that the Mets knew about this and did NOTHING! Johan Santana is one of the best pitchers in the game, he’s the ace of the embarrassing starting rotation for the Mets and the Mets did nothing to protect him. Omar Minaya is a horrible GM and I’m starting to believe a horrible person who looks for scapegoats to protect his job, be it a manager, blaming a reporter for doing his job and I’m sure after this season is over he will blame the plethora of injuries, including Santana’s for the Mets failures.
What also bothers me is back in Spring Training there was a lot of concern and unsurprisingly a lot of miss communication over Santana having an injury with his pitching elbow. The Mets decided in their great and infinite wisdom not to have him visit a doctor nor get an MRI. As April and May came and went it seemed like the injury was nothing to worry about but then June came and went and Santana’s velocity was down and he was having a hard time getting through games. I wonder what an MRI and perhaps a visit to a doctor in April would have detected? I think the MRI would have shown that something was wrong with the elbow, notice he only had 2 really good months followed by another 2 months of decent but not Santanaesque performances.
As Joe D said last night in his post about Santana’s injury the Mets have known that Santana has suffered from elbow pain since June. That is 2 months ago and did not send him for an MRI, didn’t make him miss a start to see if there would be any improvement of this injury. He has not pitched any bullpen sessions since then and had to beg to miss out on his next start because the pain was too much to bear for him.
Sadly this isn’t the first time in the last 2 years that this has happened. Last year the Mets let Ryan Church fly across the country to Denver even though he had suffered a concussion not just in Spring Training but days before that trip. They let him hit in those games before finally shut him down. Fast forward to this year and it’s more of the same. Carlos Delgado injures his hip but the Mets do nothing and let him play though he is in constant pain for almost a month before he is shut down and allowed to have surgery on that injured hip. The Mets seeing that A-Rod had hip surgery earlier in the year and saw that he was back to the Yankees in about a month decided to lie to us yet again and tell us that this injury and surgery Delgado was getting was what A-Rod went through and they told us to expect Delgado back for this season. As of today, August 25, 2009 Delgado is nowhere near coming back, though the Mets would have you believe it’s because of an oblique injury he suffered while rehabbing. Jose Reyes suffers a calf injury and is just told to sit on the dugout and relax the injury. He was rushed back before his calf was healed and injured it more. Then he was rushed into rehab games and injured his hamstring with a “slight” tear. As of today there is no timetable on Reyes’ return to the Mets and he has not been scheduled for surgery nor is he rehabbing. Carlos Beltran suffers a bone bruise and is forced to play through the pain, making the bruise even bigger, shutting him down most likely for the rest of the season and possibly forcing him to have surgery that could end his playing career.
This organization if you can call it that is simply a joke. As usual the Mets don’t do anything right and now Santana is done for this season and with an elbow injury like this it sounds like Tommy John Surgery is in his future and next season is in jeopardy. Jerry Manuel the gangsta said he didn’t know how bad the injury is. He is the manager, he should be on top of this, how in the hell does this guy not know his best pitcher is in agony? The manager’s job is to look out for his players especially with ownership and the inept GM that is Omar Minaya at the helm. Speaking of looking out for Santana where exactly is Dan Warthen, the pitching coach in this? Shouldn’t he be looking out for the wellfare of his best pitcher?
The Mets put a muzzle on their doctors and trainers over this situation with Santana but it has come out anyways. I’m sure when Omar holds a press conference and is asked he will blame a reporter, perhaps Adam Rubin or maybe this time he’ll blame another beat writer just to spice it up a little and get himself on the backpages because whether the press is positive or negative he likes to see himself on TV and the papers.
This past weekend Dodger fan Mets owner Fred Wilpon said that Omar will be brought back and that Jerry was “his guy” so none of this foolishness will be corrected and we can expect more of this in 2010. I guess we shouldn’t be surprised that this guy cannot run the team after all he let Bernie Madoff scam him out of 700 million and his real estate business has been in the dumps for the last few years as well.
I hope the players union investigates the way the Mets have ignored injuries this season and fines them heavily. Take as much money as you can away from the Wilpons because we all know that is how you get their attention. They have not protected players, they have lied and scam their fans this season and it’s time for them to pay the piper. I for one am tired of defending this joke of an organization and want some justice for the players as well as the fans!
