Met Fans Today

[Guest Johnny Dickshot]

]I do think that if you dressed up a bunch of rhesus monkeys in Mets uniforms, though, there would still be some CPFers who would cheer them on, and spiel the same "Anything can happen" stuff you're spieling to me, and you would look down on them as self-deluding fools.

Until that happens, I'll manage my expectations with the human beings wearing the jerseys today.

(BP says the Mets have a 17.5% chance to make the playoffs as of this morning).

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

Johnny Dickshot wrote: (BP says the Mets have a 17.5% chance to make the playoffs as of this morning).

That seems fair to me. I would have thought four months ago that the Mets would be much further out of the Wild Card than they are today. Notthat I expected them, with their talent base, to be playing much worse, but I am surprised that someone--Philly, Florida, Houston--hasn't played about ten games better than they are playing and put a few nails in their coffin.

Part of my position has to do with the Mets' resources. Some teams simply can't afford to put a better team on the field than they have--not so the Mets. The Mets didn't want to sign the Delgado, the Sexton, the other slugging 1B guy they so desperately (and now so obviously) need. Instead, they went for demographics--"Hmmm, we could draw more Japanese fans if we signed a great Japanese player--let's sign this bozo for a zillion bucks and hype him to death and hope we get real lucky" isn't a policy I approve of. Likewise the other Kaz, whom I suspect was another attempt to appeal to demographics rather than f'in baseball. Also the whole Latin marketing, which has worked out better on the field but which I still find disgusting.

First you get a good f'in baseball team, and THEN you market it, IMO. These guys have it ass-backwards. Scout well, spend smart (and spend plenty if you've got it), know your minor league players well enough to know who can play fill-in roles for you on the cheap (to make up for your superstar FA signings), play guys in proportion to their talent not their contracts or their hype, and you'll contend. The Mets have done very little to warrant being contenders, and they could have done a lot.

[Elster88]

I thought they made the same offer to Delgado that Florida did.

[Elster88]

]This I dont totally agree with. Asshole fans were a different type of asshole. It has changed.

This seems like a silly statement to me.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Elster88 wrote: I thought they made the same offer to Delgado that Florida did.

They pretty much did. It's not that the Mets didn't want to sign Delgado, it's that Delgado didn't seem to like the Mets. Something about Omar and Fred's approach rubbed Delgado the wrong way.

I do wish there was a better Plan B than Doug Mientkiewicz, but it's not at all fair to say that the Mets didn't want Delgado.

[seawolf17]

Bret Sabermetric wrote: Instead, they went for demographics--"Hmmm, we could draw more Japanese fans if we signed a great Japanese player--let's sign this bozo for a zillion bucks and hype him to death and hope we get real lucky" isn't a policy I approve of. Likewise the other Kaz, whom I suspect was another attempt to appeal to demographics rather than f'in baseball. Also the whole Latin marketing, which has worked out better on the field but which I still find disgusting.

This is blatantly racist and offensive.

First -- I'm not going to deny that Kaz Matsui was signed to sell tickets and jerseys. But whatever his shortcomings here as a Met, he had a career .309/.349/.486 line in Japan, which is pretty damn good for a middle infielder. Did they screw up? Yes, they did. I'm not going to say it was a brilliant move, but he was not a "bozo for a zillion bucks" who they "hoped to get lucky" with.

Second -- The "other Kaz" was acquired because this team wanted another left-handed arm in the rotation, and maybe because they wanted to get rid of a clubhouse malcontent who was part of a past regime. Did they ride him too long? Obviously, but NOT because of his race.

Third -- Guess what? There are Latinos in the New York area! (Gasp!) If you don't market to everyone, you're a freaking moron. It just happened that all three of the big-dollar free agents this year were Latino... and guess what? Our GM is Latino also. If you have a problem with that, get counseling... don't bring that crap around here. There's nothing wrong with creative marketing and knowing your demographics.

I hate to say this, Bret, because sometimes I agree with you, but screw off.

(edited to complete my thought on Matsui)

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

seawolf17 wrote: screw off.

Sorry--tight bottle-cap.

I'm not saying it was 100% race- or ethnicity-driven, nor that the Mets should never take advantage of the roster to appeal to fans. Just that the roster should be 100% baseball-driven, and THEN whatever roster you have, market that. I'm arguing that the roster was partly composed to appeal to a particular demographic, which is the part that I find disgusting, and that has blown up in the Mets' faces.

Since I wanted the Mets to sign another latin player, in addition to those they did sign, I don't think you can accuse me of racism here, at least not fairly.

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

Yancy Street Gang wrote: ="Elster88"]I thought they made the same offer to Delgado that Florida did. They pretty much did. It's not that the Mets didn't want to sign Delgado, it's that Delgado didn't seem to like the Mets. Something about Omar and Fred's approach rubbed Delgado the wrong way. I do wish there was a better Plan B than Doug Mientkiewicz, but it's not at all fair to say that the Mets didn't want Delgado.

You may bet your gluteus maximus that they would gladly pay him their final offer plus, say, another 20 Mil, if they could turn back time to the winter of '04-'05. They didn't want to pay over a certain amount to nail him down, and so they gambled, and they lost. I call that not wanting him badly enough.

Once having lost him, they could have decided to overpay Sexton and other available slugging 1B men, but they decided to balls it out and pretend that Mienkiewicz was a viable answer. He wasn't, and I think some of us knew that at the time.

[Elster88]

]Once having lost him, they could have decided to overpay Sexton and other available slugging 1B men,

Well, Sexson signed in December and Delgado in January, so that's one wrong. I don't like Minky either, and have been angrily typing since the winter to those who prefer Minky, but I think after Delgado signed there was no one left.

[Elster88]

How did this discussion come up? This thread was supposed to be about how more Met fans are racists then in the past.

[seawolf17]

Bret Sabermetric wrote: I'm arguing that the roster was partly composed to appeal to a particular demographic, which is the part that I find disgusting, and that has blown up in the Mets' faces.

I apologize for blasting off; it was too early in the morning. I enjoy your posts, Bret; I really do. Just sometimes -- aaaaaaaaaargh!

I would not say it's "blown up in their faces." This team is in the hunt for a wild-card spot, coming off a season in which they lost 91 games and finished 21 games out of the playoffs. I'd say that's pretty good. Could they be better? Certainly. But it's hard to go from 91 losses to 91 wins. They're at least going in the right direction now, I think.

[Elster88]

Bret Sabermetric wrote: I'm arguing that the roster was partly composed to appeal to a particular demographic, which is the part that I find disgusting, and that has blown up in the Mets' faces.

Or maybe, just maybe, it's because the best available hitter and pitcher in the off season were both of a certain demographic.

[MFS62]

Elster88 wrote: Or maybe, just maybe, it's because the best available hitter and pitcher in the off season were both of a certain demographic.

Actually, the top three were of the same heritage: (with a slight change)
Best pitcher; Pedro
Best Player: Beltran
Best Hitter: Delgado

Based on the past few years, many fans felt the priority was the best hitter and Omar should have signed Delgado, using some of the money spent on Beltran. The team really didn't need a centerfielder. Cameron was more adequate at that position than anyone the Mets had to play frist.

This has nothing to do with race. And Bret said so.

Later

[Guest rpackrat]

Getting back to the original topic of this thread: I think the assholishness of Mets fans reflects the coarsening of the broader culture. With the advent of 24/7 cable news and sports networks came the need to fill all that airtime, which led to screaming heads on both news and sports channels. Soon, this came to be an accepted means of discourse, and arguments were "won" by simply expressing opinions the loudest, no matter how objectively, demonstrably wrong those opinions might be. As basic respect and civility disappear from the common discourse, it disappears in other contexts as well. Not to say that sports fans couldn't be rude or obnoxious in the past, but I think it really has sunk to a new level in recent years.

[Guest ScarletKnight41]

I seem to remember more drunken brawls at Shea in the early 80s than what I see today.

[Guest silverdsl]

rpackrat wrote: As basic respect and civility disappear from the common discourse, it disappears in other contexts as well. Not to say that sports fans couldn't be rude or obnoxious in the past, but I think it really has sunk to a new level in recent years.

I completely agree and it's not just a problem at sporting events. It seems like there's a general increase in the level of rudeness and lack of consideration for other people. Sometimes it's really disheartening. But in terms of sporting events specifically I've seen asshats of the kind we're referring to in this thread at every game or race I've been to so it's definitely not just a Mets fan thing. I'm astonished by some of the things that fans do and say, what they expect and how they think they're entitled to act because they bought a ticket. I just don't understand the mindset that some fans are in which they think that taunting players with the kind of personal insults that were directed at those Mets players is okay.

[Elster88]

I see where you all are going. Exhibit A would be the Pistons-Pacers fiasco last December. Someone did throw that beer, regardless of whether Artest was also being an asshole/asshat.

[Diamond Dad]

Not sure that we can blame borish fans on the cable news channels. To some extent, it has become more acceptable to boo the home town team, and to shout slurs from the stands. Time was when a nearby fan would shut you up (perhaps accounting for more fights in the stands??). I've seen the same in other cities. Some people are just less inhibited about shouting out at the players (home and visitor). Of course, they wouldn't say those things to their face in a bar, but from the safety of the stands, anything goes. I don't think most of these dickheads are really true fans, but even diehards sometimes have to let off some steam.

I remember booing lustily when Doug Sisk walked in from the Shea bullpen. So, in every era, there are guys that you just want to see leave the team. This year, it's Kaz Matsui. He can't win.

[nymr83]

] It seems like there's a general increase in the level of rudeness and lack of consideration for other people

blame the internet.

[Guest Rockin' Doc]

I agree with rpackrat. The increase in uncivil and disrespectful behavior by fans at sporting events is merely a reflection of our society as a whole. An increasing number of people seem to be concerned only with their own desires and rights. Fewer people seem to care about common courtesy and respect for those around them.

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

Was doing some thinking about my "Blame it on the media sucking up to the MFY since the start of the Torre era" theory and it dawned on me that, in the same era you don't have the same situation with other teams in the NYC area. All other fan bases seem to exist on there own and the media doesn't churn out articles or radio show topics about how the gulf between the teams has widen to the point where one team is rendered irrelavant.

I mean the Jets were 1-15 for a season within the last ten years and no one opened their radio show saying "The Jets are a dot on the NYC landscape, no one cares. The Jets are so insignifcant that they'll never topple the Giants" the way Don LaGreca did with the Mets last year.

Net, Devil and Islander fans have never called WFAN or 1050 telling the host that they have a "Knick/Ranger Eye for the Net/Devil/Islander Guy" like I heard a "Met" fan tell Michael Kay once (Yankee Eye for the Met Guy) Granted right now the Devils and Nets are doing better than the Garden duo but the Garden duo is still the more popular teams in their respective sports no matter what in this town

Basically it does seem that the Mets as an organization and by extension the fans, or at least the "fans" who call up radio shows and/or write letters to the sports page editors keep listening to what the media keeps feeding them about how the current Yankee dynasty might be the best ever, how the Mets never really could compete with them, even though they share the same revenue streams (again forgetting that Steinbrenner forged historic deals with Addias and MSG which is how they got alot of their revenue streams) and how the Mets doing what they been doing for the last 40 some years will continue to be the "Fredo Corleones" of baseball or fall behind the Metrostars and Liberty in terms of insignificance in this town

Steve

[Guest Edgy DC]

I think it's hard to argue that deviancy hasn't been defined down. The creeps who get on the radio have added the distinction of professionalism to being a creep.