Do you really own that bridge, Mr. Randolph? Honest?

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

Vic Sage wrote: (to what end? who knows.)

You of all people have to ask which end? As if all threads don't conclude at the same person's fundament?

It's curious what you say about Wright, because of course if they would have had the brains to promote Wright two springs ago, as he plainly deserved, and then if they would have had the courage to explain why they were doing it, and if they would have had the foresight and the scouting not to sign Kaz Matsui a few months before (thus crowding up their infield for Wright's entrance) none of this would have had happened in the first place. We'd have had Wright at 3b, Reyes at ss (no throw-your-star-rookie-at-a-position-he'd- never -played -before- for- some -retread- geek) and Wiggy at 2B (where would have put up the same O and D numbers as Matsui only much cheaper) all along.

[Guest Rotblatt]

Well, if we're going all hypothetical, chain reaction stuff, we'd ALSO probably still have:

Huber platooning with Jake at 1B
Castro at C, with Jake/Huber backing him up
Kazmir rounding out a rotation of Petey, Glavine, Trachsel & Seo.
Petit & Gaby Hernandez competing for role of long man in our pen (consisting of Wagner, Heilman, Bell, Hamulak & some scrub--who am I forgetting?).

SS Reyes, B
CF Beltran, B
3B Wright, R
LF Floyd, L
RF Cameron, R
1B Jake/Huber, L/R
2B Wiggy, R
C Castro, Jake/Huber, R

That's a decent lineup. Losing Delgado hurts, but Jake/Huber is a pretty decent platoon. Castro's no worse than LoDuca offensively, and probably better defensively. Wiggy's probably at least a slight improvement over Matsui, and Cameron/Diaz is an improvement over Nady/Diaz.

IMO, the net loss on offense would be mostly offset through our pitching staff. Heilman would be relegated to setup man, but he'd be a damn good one--I'd guess better than Sanchez or Julio.

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

Yeah, this chain reaction stuff can get silly, I know, ("Now if we woulda moved Adam out of the garden of Eden entirely back in '00, and maybe put the serpent in instead, then maybe Eve would have....") but not quite as silly perhaps as saying "Couldn't have been helped, water under the bridge, what's past is past" over and over again when confronted with an inane series of counterproductive moves for a decade or so.

[Guest KC]

BS: >>>the scouting not to sign Kaz Matsu<<<

I'm not going to research anything to perpetuate this charade of interest
in objectively discussing the Mets, but wasn't Kaz like Baseball America's top
one or two Mets prospects (of course prospect is loosely used) for 2004?

He was up there, and they're pretty damn unbiased on this stuff.

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

And yet certain critics were opposed to signing a 28-year-old rookie shortstop to a high-priced contract with all sorts of no-trade provisions when we had a good, cheap, young shortstop at the time.

[Guest KC]

Yay, Bret.

[Guest Johnny Dickshot]

I'm sorry to see the fighting in this thread buried a rare appearance by Horace Osterdonk in almost no time.

As always, deceptively lucid and just the right shade of orange.

[Guest KC]

And this is typical on your part, btw. You cite lack of scouting, someone
points out that he wasn't scouted as all that bad, and then you change the
discussion about certain onlookers (you, course) who knew better.

Quit your day job, and go get a front office job ya freakin' genius.

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

Write me a letter of reference. Be sure to include the phrase "freaking genius," please.

[Guest KC]

BS: >>>Be sure to include the phrase "freaking genius"<<<

Why?

Oh, oh, oh - that's right - this is where you turn the tables that someone's picking
on you. Sorry.

Please change that to "baseball genius"

My bad.

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

And before this discussion goes totally nuclear, let me point out that the introduction of David Wright into this thread, and the scouting of Kaz Matsui, came from Vic's post, not mine. I just responded to the line of thinking that he introduced.

Or is another "When we introduce shit, Bret, stand there and take it. None of this defending your position stuff, please. Just dummy up and take the hits, damn it"?

[Guest KC]

Unbelievable.

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

And of course if you'd rather discuss the

KC wrote: charade of interest in objectively discussing the Mets

that I'm pretending to put on because of a deeply-flawed character, well, there's an appropriate place for that.

Chrissakes, would you stop shitting up threads about the Mets and baseball to discuss my character defects, please? We've got a whole forum for that.

[Guest KC]

Dude, you said most of the CPF is often incompetent and dishonest in this thread
and I can't say "freakin'" or gently question your motives in the thread that is on the
card right now? Yeah, that sounds fair.

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

KC wrote: Dude, you said most of the CPF is often incompetent and dishonest in this thread and I can't say "freakin'" or gently question your motives in the thread that is on the card right now? Yeah, that sounds fair.

Duuuude, I have no doubt that you see the unprinted words "I hate the CPF whose members are all corrupt and dishonest and I hate baseball and I hate life itself" under my user name in every post, but I never said anything of the kind in this thread. Take a breath.

You can say the word freakin' all you like. I just wanted that included in the letter of reference, dude.

As to questioning my motives--do you ever do anything else? We get it that you question my motives for posting, for breathing, for thinking. It's getting tiresome, you interjecting this shit into every thread. Why not put it in your sig line, or give me some useful CPF permanent marking (like having the words "stupid Met-hating asshole" under my username just above my post count, or something)? That would be less intrusive and certainly less repetitive.

Dude.

[Guest KC]

And we "get" how you feel about us and the Mets.

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

No, I really don't think you do.

[Guest KC]

Incompetenet and dishonest, for starters.

Oh excuse me, "for the most part".

[Guest cleonjones11]

]"We are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right." --George Orwell Kinda like the idea that to sell someone you have to make them believe it was their idea in the first place. The Mets in my opinion are taking the wrong road towards winning aka the MFY school of buying enough mud and hoping some sticks on the wall. Seo for Duaner Sanchez Geez...what was Omar thinking..or drinking... Kaz Matsui 8 million dollars David Wright 350 thousand or something like that. odd..

[Guest cleonjones11]

I just sold a baseball card to Heath Bells' brother..Hooray...

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

KC wrote: Incompetenet and dishonest, for starters. Oh excuse me, "for the most part".

If you keep saying that I said CPFers are incompetent and dishonest, I'll certainly be willing to consider that YOU are totally incompetent and dishonest. Show me where I said that in this thread, please.

Do not repeat it again. You've already done that several times. I want you to cite the post where I said that CPFers are incompetent and dishonest. You should be able to do that easily, if you're competent and honest.

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

Bret Sabermetric wrote: Yes, I often get worked up over displays of total incompetence and dishonesty that most CPFers find trivial or even examples of Metly virtue.

What might have confused you was the above post, quoted in its entirety, where the "total incompetence and dishonesty" referred to is that of the Mets, not the CPF (as anyone who has a reading level above that of a nine-year-old will tell you), and in which I'm criticizing CPFers for being tolerant of the Mets' incompetence and dishonesty.

If you're still confused, have Edgy explain how complicated sentences work. He enjoys that and you'll get something out of it as well. Ask him to talk slowly.

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

And at the risk of redundancy, you are not the Mets. The Mets are a baseball team. You are some dweeb on the internet. When I criticize the Mets, I am criticizing a baseball team. If you choose to be offended and go off on some loopy jihad, and fire up your internet buddies ("Hey! This guy is making fun of US here, fellas! Are we going to take that sort of insult, and big words, and complex sentence structure? Hell, no, let's all turn this thread about baseball into a thread about how much Bret hates us, and mess up his chances of continuing to talk about the Mets! Yeah! Fuck, yeah! We don't have to take that kind of personal insult, fellas! Ji-HAAAD!"), well, I can't help you.

Actually I think you may be beyond anyone's help. I'm beginning to think you may just be a dysfunctional sick bastard. Get some professional help, please.

[nymr83]

]And at the risk of redundancy, you are not the Mets. The Mets are a baseball team. You are some dweeb on the internet.

I've never heard a Mets fan talk like that, actually theres only one variety of fan i've ever heard talk like that: front-running yankee fans. everyone else indetifies with their team and says "we."

[Guest cleonjones11]

You seem to be a touchy little Diva....

[Guest KC]

BS: Actually I think you may be beyond anyone's help. I'm beginning to think you may just be a dysfunctional sick bastard. Get some professional help, please.

Thanks for the advice and kind words. Have a nice day.

[Vic Sage]

can't we all jes' get along?

and Bret, your response to my post was to point out how stupid Mets brass was... which was not my point. I'm not debating about whether they were right or wrong [There's no way to really know just by looking at it one decision, in retrospect. As chaos theory suggests, if a dung beetle farts in Iberia, there are Tsunamis in Okanawa (or something)].

my point wasn't whether they were WRONG or not. My point was that you can't go from thinking they're wrong to adjuding them LIARS. Well, i mean YOU can, and you've done it again here (which was the point of my sarcasm), but i can't and won't make such an arbitrary and defamatory leap of logic.

Being wrong is bad enough. One doesn't need to find them to be evil as well.

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

Vic Sage wrote: Bret, your response to my post was to point out how stupid Mets brass was... which was not my point.

No, it was my point. I'm allowed to have points, aren't I?

] I'm not debating about whether they were right or wrong [There's no way to really know just by looking at it one decision, in retrospect. As chaos theory suggests, if a dung beetle farts in Iberia, there are Tsunamis in Okanawa (or something)].

There's no way to know anything, is there? By one decision or by a decade full of them. If you don't want to reach a conclusion, then you're free to insist that you need more information. As I'm free to insist that I have plenty of information, more than enough to characterize this team.

]my point wasn't whether they were WRONG or not. My point was that you can't go from thinking they're wrong to adjuding them LIARS.

Yeah, in fact, I can and do.

] Well, i mean YOU can,

That's better

] and you've done it again here (which was the point of my sarcasm), but i can't and won't make such an arbitrary and defamatory leap of logic.

That's nice for you. And for all you drinkers of Koolaid out there.

]Being wrong is bad enough. One doesn't need to find them to be evil as well.

One doesn't need to but one can. I think the time has long since passed when anyone would need to, but you'll come around whenever you come around. There's no need, or little possibility, of your reaching my conclusion any sooner than you feel like it. So why conclude that I need to reach your conclusion, and right now?