UMDB's All-Time Top 20 lookups anaylsis

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

For no apparant reason I'm just feeling facinated by the fact that there isn't much movement in UMDB's Top 20 All Time rankings so I figured I'd guess why

-Keith Hernandez
Still visiable with the Mets and the NYC sports scene, course Keith did appear in a very popular Seinfeld episode and remains on the top of fan's list of who should be the next Met retired number (or manager as the case could be some day)

-Mike Piazza
No explanation needed. One of the true greats of the last 10 years and he spent a soild 8 years as a Met

-Dwight Gooden
One of the usual suspects when "What could have been..." stories come about. Still came away with a soild MLB career, but constant relapses keep his name in the news

-Tug McGraw
Hugely popular Met and Phillie, son and daughter-in-law and country music legends. Ya gotta believe Tug will always be remebered

-Tom Seaver
No explanation needed. Greatest. Met. Ever. Still the only Met player (Hodges doesn't count) with his number retired (and many feel other than Piazza, that should stay that way)

-Lee Mazzilli
I'm not quite sure if his heart throb status is more a myth propagated by the Met PR staff through the years (from what I hear MFY Bucky Dent was the real dark haired heart throb of the day) but his status as a Yankee coach and Oriole manager lead Maz to still be in the news

-Lenny Dykstra
The Man They Call Nails like Tug is still a popular Met/Phillie and his current career with TheStreet.com may keep his name in the news

-Darryl Strawberry
Like Gooden another "What could have been..." tale. Still is the greatest offensive player the Mets ever produced from their system

-Howard Johnson
Just an insanely popular Met from 10-15 years ago. Would say that he'd probably would rank as the most favorite player of most new Internet users who are Met fans when UMDB went on line back in the Rain Delay Theatre days (that would be college/HS students back in 98) Also current role with the Cyclones keep him in the spotlight

-Gary Carter
Another popular 86er that is still in the spotlight in one way or another

-Ron Darling
Another popular 86er that is still in the spotlight in one way or another

-Mookie Wilson
-Ed Kranepool
These two are linked more because they represent to non-Met fans or Met-haters as whom they think are the two most popular Mets of all-time. Wilson is still in the game, and Kranepool is still making apperances and such so that explains their popularity in lookups

-Dave Kingman
Other than Maz this is the only mid-70's-early 80's Met on this list. I guess he was that popular back in the day, I haven't heard much from the "Kingman For The Hall" groups since the steriod era began in earnest back in the late 80's-early 90's, but I guess Kong still has many supporters

-Rusty Staub
Through his charity works he is still a visiable ex-Met, and a very popular ex-Met, though its his later run as a PHer that gets him lumped with Wilson and Kranepool as "Who is your greatest player? Ed Kranepool?" type of comments from MFY fans

-Kevin Mitchell
This is an odd ball as he was pretty much done as a MLBer by the time UMDB went online. I guess stories of his run-ins with the law and various stories (such as the cat story in Gooden's auto-bio) lead him to be a popular lookup

-Bobby Valentine
Controversial Met manager when UMDB went online (I'm sure the Wharton-gate helped push him in the top 20 to stay), and still very much in the news today as a skipper in Japan.

-Willie Mays
No explanation needed. The greatest player to every wear a Met uniform, period. No doubt his legend will continue to shine, probably thanks to the steriod era people should look at him, Frank Robinson, Harmon Killebrew, Mike Schmidt, Hank Aaron and appreciate them even more

-Jerry Koosman
He, McGraw, Kranepool and Seaver are the only 69ners on the current Top 20. While true he is a Met legend, I'm not entirely sure why he in particular he is still on the top 20

-Wally Backman
Very popular back in the day, recent minor league managing success and troubles with the Diamondback job keeps him in the news

Wonder if any of the following would be in the next 20 or ever were in the top 20

-Joe Torre
Current Yankee manager turned pop-culture icon here in NYC for the last 10 years, plus "Safe At Home Foundation" should keep his name viable long after he decides he really had enough of General Steinbrenner

-Yogi Berra/Warren Spahn
Arguably 2, 3, 4 or even 5 on the "Greatest Player to Ever Play For The Mets Ever" list (Seaver, Mays and Piazza of course make up the rest of that top 5) and Berra has been an American Icon for many, many decades

-Duke Snider/Nolan Ryan/Gil Hodges
Three of the more popular MLB icons who played with the Mets at some point in their careers. Hodges I'd bet would be bubbling under the Top-20, especially come time for the veterans HOF comittee voting time

-Rogers Hornsby/Bob Gibson
Along with Willie Mays, Warren Spahn and Yogi Berra they would be "The Greatest Players Ever To Be Met Coaches" Hornsby quite simply is a Top 20, maybe a Top 10 if I started to think about it, all time player, and Gibson is a Top 10 hurlers ever. Not sure if Gibby's lack of involvement in baseball in recent years has something to do with his lack of ranking (this is of course if Yancy's ranking is "players only")

-Al Leiter/John Franco
Two of the biggest "clubhouse politicians" during the last 10 years, surely their controversial nature would lead to apperances in popular lookups

[Guest Yancy Street Gang]

For a long time, the top three were, in order, Piazza, Seaver, and Hernandez. It seems strange to me that Seaver would be in fifth place; he really deserves to be number one. He was passed by Tug McGraw when Tug died and by dying generated a huge number of hits. Every time Dwight Gooden gets arrested, he gets a surge. He's on a pace to pass Piazza within a couple of months.

Seaver's been gaining on Tug recently, so he may eventually regain fourth place, especially since he hasn't yet played his death card, and Tug has.

Kevin Mitchell is on the list because of a mention in July 2004 on ESPN.com of him beheading a cat. He had several months worth of hits in a single day, and it carried over to give him a record-setting week.

Wally Backman surged onto the Top Twenty during his DIamondback situation.

I can't remember who Mitchell and Backman displaced. I'm thinking it might be two of the following three: Nolan Ryan, Cleon Jones, and David Cone. There's a web site somewhere that holds archived web pages. (MBTN.net once had a link to it, so maybe Johnny knows where it is.) If you found that site, you could put together a partial history of the UMDB top twenty.

And no, non-players aren't eligible for the list, although I do track their hits. If they were eligible, Bob Murphy would be in 23rd place. He is, by far, the leading non-player. Of the non-players, the first eight are broadcasters. Of the uniformed guys, Art Howe leads, and he's in 9th place. Davey Johnson is in 12th and Casey Stengel is in 15th.

I have a page that's not yet ready for prime time that will show a history of daily leaders as well as monthly leaders. Stay tuned.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Kevn Mitchell and Howard Johnson probably get a handful of hits a month just by having common names. HoJo probably gets hits of people looking for HoJo's.

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

Edgy DC wrote: Kevn Mitchell and Howard Johnson probably get a handful of hits a month just by having common names. HoJo probably gets hits of people looking for HoJo's.

Right! Good point.

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

By the way, has Rusty Tillman ever had a day as a popular lookup? Speaking of Mets with the same name as someone in the news? Or Brian Giles, Kevin Brown and the "other" Pedro Martinez?

Reason for Tillman was that he shares the same name as New York's XFL franchise's coach. The same coach who was "harassed" on the sidelines by Jesse Ventura who was trying to make a WWF angle out of a "feud" between the two. Funny thing was, Tillman wanted nothing to do with it, but Ventura capitialized on it by saying Tillman was "afraid" of Ventura!

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

Never mind, I see Tillman never has been

but: Brian Giles
Brian Giles was the most popular Ultimate Mets Database daily lookup on April 8, 2003, April 9, 2003, December 3, 2004, and December 4, 2004.

Hmmm. Only 4 seems abit odd, and back-to-back days since the current Brian Giles has been a B-List star in baseball for quite some time

The other Pedro 11 times and Kevin Brown, none, but he does rank in the top 200 though,

Steve

[Valadius]

Found it. It's the Wayback Machine. Here's a link from May 25th, 2002:

http://web.archive.org/web/20020312220046/www.leaptoad.com/mets/roster.php

May 28th, 2003:

http://web.archive.org/web/20030503161433/www.leaptoad.com/mets/roster.php

And June 4th, 2004:

http://web.archive.org/web/20040705045644/www.leaptoad.com/mets/roster.php

[Valadius]

You know, I could probably find stuff that was wiped out on the old CPF. What's the URL of the old CPF?

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

Yancy Street Gang wrote: And no, non-players aren't eligible for the list, although I do track their hits. If they were eligible, Bob Murphy would be in 23rd place. He is, by far, the leading non-player. Of the non-players, the first eight are broadcasters. Of the uniformed guys, Art Howe leads, and he's in 9th place. Davey Johnson is in 12th and Casey Stengel is in 15th. I have a page that's not yet ready for prime time that will show a history of daily leaders as well as monthly leaders. Stay tuned.

Just a guess on the other 8 broadcasters:

Ralph
McCarver
Nelson
Gary Cohen
Ed Coleman
Fran Healy
Howie Rose
Ah, I'll say Ted Robinson at 8 due to his announcing gig for tennis

Art Howe's recent reign put him ahead of Davey and Casey? Wow!

Steve

[Guest Rockin' Doc]

The old CPF or what's left of it. Best of luck to ya.

[Frayed Knot]

Billy Wynne was briefly an unusually popular Met lookup.

[Valadius]

SUCCESS!!!

I have recovered a lot of what was once the old Crane Pool Forum. I'll start posting links in the Classic CPF thread.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Wow!

Anyway you can transfer it over to somewhere safe.

Yancy, any advice?

[Valadius]

The access to the various pages is intermittent, as they were at some points preserved at different dates in time. Also, getting at the material is almost like walking through a maze. But we SHOULD be able to preserve a very sizable chunk of what's left of it.

I feel proud... almost like I can pay my debts to you guys in creating this place by preserving the old CPF, which I was never a part of... thanks again, everybody.

[Valadius]

You know, on this same subject... what was the URL of the MOFo? Maybe that could be rescued as well.

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

Not 100% sure of this but I think the lineage of this site dates back to the very first Mets site EVER! The late MetsOnline.net which was heading by Bryan Hoch and that might be the MOFO that everyone talks about (MetsOnline was pretty much shut down when for some reason, despite years of unauthorized knowledge of the site's existence, the Mets sent a cease and desist letter. Stuff was cleared up, Bryan moved to a site I think was called NYFansOnly.com which eventually bought the publishing rights to Inside Pitch which Bryan is now editior of)

Steve

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

Actually it wasn't the Mets, it was MLB that shut it down in 2002:

http://web.archive.org/web/20020802224433/www.metsonline.net/metsonline-ceaseanddesist.html

]MetsOnline.net Ordered To Cease & Desist MetsOnline.net site administrator Bryan Hoch -- a 20-year-old college student at the State University of New York at Rockland -- received a cease-and-desist order via electronic mail from Major League Baseball Properties dated July 25, 2002. The e-mail ordered Hoch to deactivate MetsOnline.net and transfer its domain name, as well as all information regarding its operations, to MLBP effective 5 p.m. July 30. The order also threatened Hoch with further legal action to recover �appropriate compensation� for �use of the Mets� marks.� Note: When Hoch placed a call to a Mets official, he was told that not only that the Mets were unaware of MLBP's actions, but that: "We really appreciate our fan sites, because they promote the game and our product. We hope you'll be able to keep on doing what you've been doing, and that's creating a great resource for Mets fans." * The grounds of the order from MLBP are as follows: "Your registration of www.metsonline.net violates the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act ("ACPA") (15 U.S.C. � 1125(d)), a federal statute which provides a cause of action to eliminate the practice of those who, with a bad faith intent to profit, register and use the marks of others as domain names. Given that (1) you have no trademark right in the Mets' Marks; (2) your intent in registering www.metsonline.net was to divert consumers from the online location of the Mets to your own; (3) you have intentionally failed to maintain accurate contact information for www.metsonline.net; and (4) the famous nature of the Mets' Marks, it is clear that you have registered and used www.metsonline.net with a bad faith intent to profit. Therefore, your registration and use of www.metsonline.net establishes a violation of the ACPA and other federal and state laws." The truth of the matter, however, is far different. MetsOnline.net does not profit in any way from the service we provide to over 100,000 New York Mets fans who visit the site each week. In fact, any revenue received from advertising goes directly to CIHost.com, our web provider, who charges us a substantial fee for Web hosting and excessive traffic. While we respect the rights of both Major League Baseball and the Mets as trademark owners and profit centers, we do not view MetsOnline.net as a competitor to Mets.com. Rather, we fancy ourselves as a complement. MetsOnline.net offers original editorial content and fan-friendly multimedia extras, the vast majority of which have been submitted by passionate fans interested in advancing popular interest in the Mets. Furthermore, MetsOnline.net has provided links to official MLB Web sites as an additional service to its users (and a potential stream of profits for MLB). It�s also curious why Major League Baseball would find such fault with MetsOnline.net when it has been indirectly supporting the site for several years. Hoch, in fact, was afforded a job opportunity with the Mets during the 2000 season as a direct result of his efforts with MetsOnline.net. He spent that summer working as an unpaid volunteer to help upgrade and maintain Mets.com (prior to MLB's takeover of all 30 Major League sites before the 2001 season) � all the while openly administering the �competing� MetsOnline.net. Additionally, he has since received numerous press credentials to represent MetsOnline.net at New York Mets home games and other events, signifying not only the Mets' acceptance of the site as a legitimate media outlet but also their support for it. A main sticking point of the order is the since-discontinued line of products (including t-shirts, sweatshirts, etc.) that were offered for a brief period on this site, produced by CafePress.com and featuring the MetsOnline.net name but not the logo or writings of the New York Mets or Major League Baseball. While we recognize that this legal claim may have some independent legal merit, it is notable that revenues from such merchandise sales totaled just $16.00 (four orders), $12.00 of which was to Hoch's girlfriend. At the end of the calendar year, Hoch intends to use all remaining proceeds from the site (if any are available) to the Twin Towers Fund (www.twintowersfund.org). Unfortunately, such previous intent would be impossible to prove in a court of law, as it was not stated in print on the site. * MLB Properties' demands are as follows: 1. "Cease and desist from all use of the domain name www.metsonline.net and transfer that domain name to MLBP." * 2. "Cease and desist from all unlawful use of the Mets' Marks and any other indicia that creates the impression that there is an association between your company and the Mets and/or MLBP and confirm to MLBP, in a writing signed by an officer of your company, that it has done so." * 3. "Cease and desist from the sale of unauthorized merchandise featuring the Mets' Marks and fully disclose in writing the extent of your company's sales of this infringing merchandise, including the number of goods sold and the prices at which they were sold, the remaining inventory of the infringing merchandise, as well as the names, addresses and telephone numbers of the supplier(s) of such merchandise." * We intend to collect appropriate compensation for your company's unauthorized use of the Mets' Marks. The exact amount of our demand will depend on the information you provide to us, information we gather from other sources and the extent of your cooperation. Put simply, we believe that Major League Baseball�s insistence that MetsOnline.net violates ACPA simply holds no water � simply because we have never, in six years of operation, held an intent to profit (much less a bad intent to profit!). With the state of the game's affairs as they currently stand, Hoch (and hundreds of fans who have voiced their opinion to him via e-mail) feel that it is unfortunate that Major League Baseball feels that it must go after fan sites that provide nothing more than promotion and love for the game of baseball. MetsOnline.net is prepared to make whatever legal adjustments may be necessary to continue our service and mission statement of providing baseball fans with timely and entertaining reports concerning the New York Mets National League baseball club. This site has never been about making a profit -- it is with the intention of providing a service to fans of the Mets that would only increase their interest and enjoyment of the team. # About MetsOnline.net: Since 1996, MetsOnline.net has provided New York Mets fans with a constant stream of original editorial and multimedia content devoted to their favorite baseball team. The site � which appeared on the Internet before the Mets� official Web site � was founded by then-14-year-old Bryan Hoch, a native of Sloatsburg, New York. Hoch continues to administer the site to this day, but a team of unpaid writers who cover every angle of the Mets organization (including many that are not covered on mets.com) has since joined him. The site averages 10,000-15,000 visits per day and has been featured/cited in the Wall Street Journal, Newsday, MSNBC television, ESPN.com and the New York Daily News, among other media outlets and sources. The site has organized public events including two "Field Trip" outings to Shea Stadium in 2001 and 2002, and a well-attended "MetsOnline Night" at Mets manager Bobby Valentine's Queens-based restaurant earlier in July. # Further info regarding Bryan Hoch: Hoch, 20, is a resident of Sloatsburg, New York, where he resides with his parents and brother, Shawn, 16. He is currently a full-time college student at SUNY Rockland, majoring in liberal arts, and is also employed as a free-lance journalist, appearing regularly as a baseball columnist in the Rockaway Wave of Long Island (www.rockawave.com) and as a periodic contributor to New York Mets Inside Pitch, the club's official newspaper. His past experience includes work as a writer and site maintainer for Mets.com. He can be contacted via e-mail at bryanhoch@metsonline.net.

Well, it had a good run though, but sometimes one door closes, another opens...

Steve

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

Well, it WAS on EZBoard, oh the irony...

And 1) can't locate its remains on ezboard (which reminds me, hey Yance, the old board is still linked on your site) and 2) when you plug in what the actual URL was it looks like it was moved to MetsOnline.net months after the shutdown!

[Frayed Knot]

"The late MetsOnline.net which was heading by Bryan Hoch and that might be the MOFO that everyone talks about"

Yes it was. MOFO was simply a nickname for the forum part of the site: Mets Online FOrum
The forum existed in numerous forms and software sites over several years so there wouldn't be just one url for old relics.



"Stuff was cleared up, Bryan moved to a site I think was called NYFansOnly.com"

Bryan pretty much just abandoned his site after the legal hassles. The forum part was taken over by someone else who has now named it 'New York Sports Day' which is the closest linear successor to the old MoFo.
NYFO is a different site.

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

Heh, Now I think I recall that forum. I may have used my regular username there SteveJRogers (or some variation) instead of mlbaseballtalk which is used to keep my baseball related subscriptions under the same email. I'm sure I was there for some time, probably not much of an impression though...

Steve

[Valadius]

Maybe this is a variation of the MOFo, circa July 2002:

http://web.archive.org/web/20020724210832/http://blackhole.upinhere.com/~metsonline/metsonlinefanforum/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=3

Look, there's ABG.

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

By the way, I'm trudging through the last recorded page of the old MOFO fourm and can only get the pages of topics except for a handfull on the front page

[Valadius]

I'm finding the same problem.

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

Yeah, its like the first 6 years of Mets talk on the Internet is gone forever!

sniff...

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

How about this for a flashback

The original home for Ultimate Mets Database when Yancy was sharing a site dedicated to Christy Mathewson called Rain Delay Central!

http://web.archive.org/web/19990427081122/http://www.leaptoad.com/raindelay/mets/index.shtml

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

Hey even in the formitive stages Yancy's site was deemed worthy of John Skilton's praise:

The Ultimate Mets Database was named "Link of the Week" by John Skilton's Baseball Links for the week beginning October 25, 1999.

[Guest mlbaseballtalk]

Man, I remeber surfing at some of these sites back in 96-97, God I'm feeling old, and I'll be having my 10th year HS reunion coming up Friday night!

[Guest Rockin' Doc]

Valadius - "Maybe this is a variation of the MOFo, circa July 2002:"

That is a later version of the MOFO. The Crane Pool was up and running by that time and was approaching it's first anniversary. Most of us were still posting on the MOFO, albeit less frequently than in the past. Bryan was still running the MOFO, but had by this time relinquished most of the moderating duties to a few of the members. The cease and desist letter from MLB arrived around this time. It seemed to finish Bryan's transition away from the site he had started and run for so long.

[Guest SI Metman]

Yeah, I tried recovering the MOFO from the Metsonline era, but it was limited to about 10 threads. What's left of it is on various disks held by current and former cpf'ers (and what was posted on the old cpf)

[Guest SI Metman]

also, your MOFO era's.

I think at the time of the close it was VBBulletin. It was EZboard for about a year and a half maybe mid-2000 to late 2001.

The current MOFO briefly switched away from VBBulletin in 2003, but we've been strong on that format since June '03 which is a record considering all of the forum changes when Bryan ran the site.