You're Fired and you're Hired.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Also, it doesn't matter much, but Manny is the whitest guy I've seen with San Pedro de Marcoris, DR as a birthplace.

[Guest patona314]

Edgy DC wrote: Credit where it's due department: I've seen Mazzilli called a traitor a lot of times on this old internet. Yours may be the first time I've seen it with the word "traitor" correctly spelled.

worst of it is that he truly is a met. not a seaver or a kooz, but a staub like met.

and he ignores it. if he comes back as acta's replacement at 3B, i WILL buy tickets by the 3B bag and let him have it.

in a politically correct way that is (i.e. no italian cracks)

[Guest Edgy DC]

I feel similarly. But I also want to meet the first guy who turns down an offer from the Yankees out of loyalty to the Mets.

Two of our first hires --- Stengel and Weiss --- were out-of-work Yankee Hall-of-Famers.

[Guest cooby]

patona314 wrote: [ and he ignores it. if he comes back as acta's replacement at 3B, i WILL buy tickets by the 3B bag and let him have it.

Why? Because when he had a family to feed, he went and worked for the Yankees when they gave him an opportunity?
And because he was loyal to them while he was there?
What a loser.


What's he saying about them now? My guess is nothing, because Mazzilli always had class.

[MFS62]

Edgy DC wrote: Credit where it's due department: I've seen Mazzilli called a traitor a lot of times on this old internet. Yours may be the first time I've seen it with the word "traitor" correctly spelled.

(channeling Colonel Parker here)
"Meadow muffins!"

Later

[Guest patona314]

cooby wrote: ="patona314"][ and he ignores it. if he comes back as acta's replacement at 3B, i WILL buy tickets by the 3B bag and let him have it. Why? Because when he had a family to feed, he went and worked for the Yankees when they gave him an opportunity? And because he was loyal to them while he was there? What a loser. What's he saying about them now? My guess is nothing, because Mazzilli always had class.

family to feed? was he making 25K a a year? please

[Guest cooby]

Blown away once again by crystal clear logic.

[Guest cooby]

Who was paying him that?

[Guest Edgy DC]

Point being that virtually nobody turns down a big league job offer from one team and chooses to remain unemployed out of loyalty to another team.

[Guest patona314]

="Edgy DC"]I feel similarly. But I also want to meet the first guy who turns down an offer from the Yankees out of loyalty to the Mets. Two of our first hires --- Stengel and Weiss --- were out-of-work Yankee Hall-of-Famers.

my apologies to all i offend w/my convictions, but... like many generations behind me, i bleed blue and orange. national league baseball in nyc. i do not tolerate traitors..

google leo durocher.

[Guest Edgy DC]

I don't need to.

[Guest patona314]

cooby wrote: Who was paying him that?

the point was he has plenty of $$$ in his checking account

[Guest patona314]

="Edgy DC"]Point being that virtually nobody turns down a big league job offer from one team and chooses to remain unemployed out of loyalty to another team.

yeah, but why the yankees?

[Guest cooby]

patona314 wrote: ="cooby"]Who was paying him that? the point was he has plenty of $$$ in his checking account

And you know this how?

I like how people assume that those who make money don't have to spend any of it.


And if you think "why the Yankees" is a good argument to ostracize and verbally abuse Mazzilli, get over it.

[Frayed Knot]

Thinking that players & coaches are supposed to maintain a fan's version of silly, blind loyalties to a particular team to the point of turning down promotions and stunting their careers is blatantly absurd.

We may view the sports world as a set of black hat/white hat contrasts, but they (properly) see those teams, not as good or evil, but as potential EMPLOYERS.

[stevejrogers]

Word FK!

The biggest example fans use when they try to explain that "back in the old days the players were more loyal to the organization" is Jackie Robinson retiring rather than playing a single game for the Giants. FALSE, FALSE, FALSE!

Essentailly Jackie was set to retire after the 1956 season anyway, and even doing so in a magazine article. The trade was made because the Dodgers wanted to pull a fast one on the Giants. Jackie would have been seen as a Roger Clemens type (retiring and then un-retiring) if he played for the Giants, not a traitor.

[Guest iramets]

Isn't Belicheck doing what Frayed Knot is complaining about fans doing, in his snubbing and dissing of Mangini for accepting the Jets' job despite his (Belicheck's) desire to keep srcewing the Jets? Isn't Belicheck behaving more like a dopey fan than like a professional coach here?

[Guest Mark Healey]

="Edgy DC"]Point being that virtually nobody turns down a big league job offer from one team and chooses to remain unemployed out of loyalty to another team.

Nobody was offerrng a job to Maz once he retired...after bouncing around, the yankees not only offered Maz a job, they offered him a managing job, and he excelled...

The Mets don't exactly have such a great track record when it comes to taking care of their own...

Mookie "I'm rooting for my son because I'm noty eomplyed by the Mets" Wilson.

[Frayed Knot]

I honestly don't know what Belicheck's beef is with Mangini - I don't follow closely enough to care really - though it sounds like there are some personal issues buried somewhere.
If it is strictly based on him taking a job with "the enemy" then, yeah, he is being a childish dope, especially since most (if not all) of the NYJ ownership/mgmt has changed hands since back when B.B. had his split with them.

But, even as dopey as that would be, it's still a different situation than the one where the fans of the team that a player/coach once worked for want him to make career decisions based on what they think of the team where there's a job opening.

On a side note, it always cracks me up to hear old-timey fans lauding the likes of Mantle or DiMaggio for their "loyalty" in sticking with the one team for their whole careers -- as if the fact that they were legally (illegally, actually) bound for life to one team had nothing to do with it.

[metirish]

] The Mets don't exactly have such a great track record when it comes to taking care of their own...

Seems to me that every year there are ex Mets coaching in the system, and Mookie had a long run with the Mets coaching at various levels,and did anyone expect him to root for the Mets over his son?

[Guest KC]

That assertion seems a little absurd to me too. I don't know what the
average percentage of ex-homers each organization has working for
them but the Mets had a bunch at the beginning of 2006:

Randy Niemann
John Stearns
Al Jackson
Howard Johnson
Blaine Beatty
Tim Teufel
Mookie Wilson
Gary Carter
Keith Hernandez
Ron Darling

I'm prolly missing some, I just flipped quickly through the media guide.

[MFS62]

Blane Beatty's back in the organization?
I remember when he was a soft tossing lefty with great numbers as a Mets minor leaguer (The Blake McGinley of his day).
Then, IIRC he hurt his arm.

Its interesting that with most teams trying to load up (draft/ trade) with as many hard throwers as they can get these days(mostly righty), folks like Beatty and Jackson are counted on to teach them how to pitch.

Later

[Guest KC]

I don't know, and I just realized I was flipping through the 2005 media guide.
The point is, as metirish said, you always hear ex-Mets names thrown around
when talking about the organizational tree.

[Guest Johnny Dickshot]

Maz owed his Yankee job to his Met connections through the relationship with Torre he forged when they were both good guys, anyway.

I can see being mad at Maz for his actions during that blasted home-and-home doubleheader a few years back, but it sure helped his team. His record in Baltimore didn't speak particularly well for his abilities as a skipper anyhoo, tho he wasn't in a very good situation there.

[Frayed Knot]

I think there was a time when NYM mgmt didn't seem all that interested in fostering ties to their past. Recently they seem to be almost going overboard in making up for it. Half the '86-era team has been given some sort of job over the last few years.

Mazz, even though there was talk about him being a future manager while he was still playing, didn't jump into it immediately. He chose to play on his looks and popularity by doing the stage acting thing for a while plus some other stuff w/his info-tainment host wife (he still with that chick?). Nothing wrong with that of course; hell, it pays a lot more than some Single-A job.
He got back in - as Dickshot notes - when his early mgr/mentor/paisan Torre got the reins in Yanqui-land. Thinking that he should have turned that down based on the fact that the fans of the team he came up with wouldn't like it is silly (remember also that the team that nutured him also celebrates the day they traded him as one of it's top turn-around moments).

Want to turn him down for "screwing" the Mets by intimidating the ump into making that obstruction call? Fine with me; I don't really care one way or the other if he coaches here. Of course if he wasn't willing to make calls like that then it wouldn't make him a very good coach would he?

[stevejrogers]

Frayed Knot wrote: I think there was a time when NYM mgmt didn't seem all that interested in fostering ties to their past. Recently they seem to be almost going overboard in making up for it. Half the '86-era team has been given some sort of job over the last few years.

I was about to say that in response to Kase!

I think the perception is more geared towards the bigger names in the organizations history, not the Kevin Morgans, Steve Phillips, Blaine Beattys, Randy Niemanns or even Tim Teufels of the world.

The fact that there was a frosty relationship more times than not with #41 while the MFY trotted out a virtual HOF gallery every year at OTG (never mind of course the start of said lineup always has all kinds from Jake Gibbs to Kevin Mass returning year after year) and the local media always looks back fondly on the Boys of Summer era Dodgers and Giants as both franchises actually have their NY roots celebrated and trot out old Brooklyn and NY players, lead many to wonder why the Mets don't do the same.

Or the argument is always, "Hey we have Joe D, Mick, Whitey and Yogi. The Mets have Ed Kranepool, Mookie Wilson, Jerry Koosman! History? What history?" and that might be part of why the Mets management has been hesitant to reach out as it would look, well, amatureish compared to the Bronx, or even the history the Knicks, and football Giants can provide (leaving the Jets, Rangers, Icelanders, Devils and Nets out of it for, either living on one shinning season, short era or too current (Sorry ABA fans) for a legacy to be built upon)

[stevejrogers]

patona314 wrote: talks like a Yankee.

Oh BTW, what does this even mean?

Willie Randolph spent the better part of his entire career in the Bronx and despite being managed by both Billy Martin and Lou Piniella comes off sounding Torre-esque, in a way "Yankee Like" as you'd put it.

Of course that doesn't make sense because Torre, last time I checked, started his soft spoken ways as manager of the Mets 30 years ago!

Don't pin this on the Derek Jeter/Joe DiMaggio Athlete-speak that MFY homers say is how a Yankee should be. Thats been going on in the "Athlete as World-Wide Superstar" culture as long as Michael Jordan (last time I checked, never played for the Yankees) started perfecting that way of being back in the 90's, and continues with the Dereks and Tiger Woods of the world.

Yes it harkens back to the cold and calculated way of the Joe McCarthy/Joe DiMaggio era (never mind that Lefty Gomez was on that squad and quite a comic) but more often than not that is not how a "Yankee Is"

Babe Ruth? Mickey Mantle? Thurman Munson? Reggie Jackson? Billy Martin? Mickey Rivers? Sparky Lyle? Rich Gossage? Yogi Berra? Whitey Ford? Joe Pepitone?

Not exactly softspoken, reserved "I'll give you ONLY what I want you to know, but with a little bit of class so you think I'm a press/fan-friendly guy" guys in that group and right down that pinstriped line. The Joe D's, Gehrigs, Mattinglys and Jeters of Yankeeville are actually few and far between.

So this "talks like a Yankee" bit is a bit BS.

[Guest KC]

SJR: >>>why the Mets don't do the same.<<<

I don't know who exactly wonders this, the short answer would be (to me)
is that because the Mets aren't the Yankees and I don't want the Mets to
be like, try to be like, or want their fans to want them to be like, the Yanks.

[metirish]

It seems to me that this thought that the Mets don't take care of their own stems form Gooden and Strawberry getting " taken care of" by Steinbrenner over the years,it's silly really,Straw is back with the Mets and I've read that Steinbrenner will probably reach out to Gooden again....I've no problem with that,just hope he can help himself this time.

[stevejrogers]

="KC"]SJR: >>>why the Mets don't do the same.<<< I don't know who exactly wonders this, the short answer would be (to me) is that because the Mets aren't the Yankees and I don't want the Mets to be like, try to be like, or want their fans to want them to be like, the Yanks.

I don't think the wonderment is about the Yankees per se, just a wonderment of why the Mets don't try to reach out the way other organizations (not just the Yanks) do to their past and thats where the perception that the Mets do not do a good job when it comes to ex-Mets comes from.

I'd be content if the Mets just had a muesem to hold the HOF busts (or maybe create plaques instead) along with the WS trophies and a truck load of old memoriabillia and interactive stuff (BTW, Mets should give Yance and JD calls for some research for this project) the way the Braves, Reds and Cardinals do at their parks (Actually the Mets should do an NL NY Baseball muesem and leave only the AL crap to stay in the Bronx!) and not feel the need to trot out players like they did in the Payson years or the Yanks do (I think they might be the only ones to do a yearly thing BTW)