Rico Brogna, Good Fit - Mets in Retirement, 2009

[soupcan]

Darryl Strawberry will join the likes of Cyndi Lauper , Bret Michaels , Rod Blagojevich,Sharon Osbourne and Sinbad on Donald Trumps Celebrity Apprentice......[/quote:2ddcux65]


I got some inside dope on this....

They are currently filming it and Darryl is gone. Not fired Trump-style, but he quit. In the boardroom during taping he supposedly said that he didn't realize how much work was involved and just didn't want to do it.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Well, keeping up with Bret Michaels is never easy.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Shit and damn. Say a prayer for Victor Zambrano.

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20091109&content_id=7639474&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb

[Guest Edgy DC]

Less this go overlooked, Zambrano's mother has been kidnapped. By my count, I think that's five current or former big leaguers who have had a family member taken, and at least one (Henry Blanco) that has had a family member killed.

[Met Hunter]

And Gus Polidor was murdered in VZ protecting his family.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Venezuela is one place that I won't be vacationing in any time soon.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Harry ?s Gary!

http://www.news-journalonline.com/NewsJournalOnline/Sports/Headlines/sptBASE01111009.htm

[Guest Edgy DC]

Rico gets his first command:

http://www.oursportscentral.com/services/releases/?id=3927407

[Guest Number 6]

Less this go overlooked, Zambrano's mother has been kidnapped. By my count, I think that's five current or former big leaguers who have had a family member taken, and at least one (Henry Blanco) that has had a family member killed.[/quote:1wmobi0s]

Winning lines, as stolen from teh intarwebs:

1. Jim Duquette on the phone now trying to trade her for Scott Kazmir's mother.

2. Rick Peterson claims he can find her in 10 minutes.

[Guest Edgy DC]

AP Gives us some real winning lines. Se�ora Zambrano is home safe.

CARACAS, Venezuela � The mother of former major league pitcher Victor Zambrano was rescued after a three-day kidnapping ordeal, Venezuelan authorities said on Wednesday.

The 56-year-old Elizabeth Mendez Zambrano was rescued late Tuesday during a "commando-style operation" in the central state of Aragua, Federal Police Chief Wilmer Flores Trosel said.

Zambrano said having his mother alongside him again was a "great joy."

"I never thought we could be together again so soon," he said.

Trosel said Mendez Zambrano was held in a makeshift dwelling near a highway, where she was only once offered food.

Three men have been detained, including two brothers and one man wanted for homicide, Trosel said. He said a fourth suspect has been identified, a 24-year-old man wanted nationally for homicide and robbery.

Police said seven armed men burst into Mendez Zambrano's home at her son's farm near Maracay on Sunday morning and kidnapped her because they didn't find large amounts of cash and jewelry.

Zambrano's mother was abducted nine days after the former big league pitcher's cousin, Richard Mendez Zambrano, was kidnapped and later killed. Police have declined to comment on whether the two incidents were related.

Zambrano played for Tampa Bay, the New York Mets, Toronto and Baltimore over seven seasons. The right-hander had a career record of 45-44 with a 4.64 ERA.

He hasn't appeared in the majors since 2007, and plays in Venezuela's winter league.

Crime is rampant in Venezuela and the families of wealthy athletes are periodically targeted by criminals. Another former major league player, Jose Castillo, said he was robbed by armed men on motorcycles as he left his luxury hotel in a taxi on Tuesday on the way to Caracas stadium.

Castillo, who plays for the Caracas Lions, said the robbers took his gold chain and wedding ring.

In June, Colorado catcher Yorvit Torrealba's son and brother-in-law were kidnapped and released a day later.

[MFS62]

She is OK:
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=4644310

I guess the kidnappers gave up when they discovered she had a sore arm.

Later

[Guest Edgy DC]

Got it, Scoop.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Bob (G.) Miller, Hall of Famer


http://www.suburbanchicagonews.com/couriernews/lifestyles/1881126,3_1_EL13_MILLER_S1-091113.article

Mookie Wilson, reunited with Bobby V.


http://www.stamfordadvocate.com/ci_13774639

[MFS62]

You know who must really be pissed that the world will end on December 12, 2012?
Bobby Bonilla.
He will have collected only two of his $1 million annual payments by then.
IIRC, the payout starts in 2011.

Later

[Guest Edgy DC]

Ed Kranepool, spokesdude: http://www.pr.com/press-release/193095

Lou Klimchock, honoring Ike Davis: http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/story/147199

[Guest Edgy DC]

And your new Lynchburg Hillcats pitching coach? Rigo Beltran.

http://www.oursportscentral.com/services/releases/?id=3929599

[Guest themetfairy]

Good for Rigo - he's a nice guy.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Davey Johnson, senior advisor.

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20091118&content_id=7683400&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb

[Met Hunter]

.

[Guest Edgy DC]

A Steve Bieser sighting is always a good thing.

http://www.commercial-news.com/sports/local_story_325015246.html?keyword=topstory

[G-Fafif]

Al Harazin, with Jim Baumbach in Newsday. He seems more likable now that he's not generating the party line.

On the wall of Al Harazin's home office in his Amherst, Mass., home, the former Mets general manager says there are two framed newspaper covers. One newspaper cover lauds Harazin for his off-season acquisitions of Bobby Bonilla, Eddie Murray and Bret Saberhagen before the 1992 season. The other page, however, shows Harazin with a doctored dunce cap on his head, in the wake of his trade of David Cone. As Omar Minaya's approval rating among Mets fans plummets with each transaction-less day, there are few people out there who understand the pressure he's under better than Harazin. Because those two framed newspapers serve as a daily reminder of just how quickly a general manager here can go from hero to zero in this baseball-frenzied town. "I put them side by side," Harazin said by telephone Thursday, "because I thought they represented pretty well the nature of the beast." As the winter meetings wind down Thursday in Indianapolis, Harazin couldn't be further from the baseball world. The 67-year-old instead had his own busy week. He's an adjunct professor of political science and American history at Holyoke Community College, and finals are about to begin. It's a far cry from where he was some 18 years ago, when he was in a similar spot to Minaya. With the Mets coming off their first losing season in a while, Harazin set out to make a big splash, retooling the Mets by signing Bonilla and Murray and trading for Saberhagen. The trades were well received by an impatient Mets fan base eager to return to winning, but in reality things couldn't have turned out worse. The Mets went 72-90 in 1992 and then 59-103 in 1993, with Harazin resigning midway through that downtrodden season. It's not hard to make the connection to the decisions Minaya has facing him this off-season and the moves Harazin made leading up to the 1992 season. Throw in the temptation to please an impatient fan base and you have the potential of an off-season that could make or break an organization for years to come. "It is very difficult to preach patience, and being in the same town as the Yankees makes it even more so," Harazin said. "But the role of the general manager is to balance the short-term and the long-term, for better and for worse. You can't mortgage your future to make people happy in the short term. You have to keep weighing what's good for the organization immediately without selling your soul for your future." Even though Harazin hasn't had ties to the Mets since resigning midway through the 1993 season, he said he keeps tabs on them. He did work there for 13 years, after all. And he has a World Series ring from 1986, though he admits he didn't always wear it when he moved to Massachusetts in 2002, for obvious reasons. "At the start of the year it looked like the Mets were going to have a really strong year and then people started getting hurt," he said. "Boy, I went through it. I understand completely how these things happen. It's amazing how all your wonderful plans can turn to sand very quickly by events out of your control." Some of his students know his background, he said, but most don't. He doesn't seem to mind. "I'm ancient history," he said, laughing. But as this off-season continues and the pressure on Minaya to make a big move grows more intense by the day, it seems fitting to think back to Harazin's off-season spending-spree and how it seemed so good at the time. Only it obviously didn't turn out that way. Sometimes, maybe, it pays to do nothing. "You're in a human being business," Harazin said. "You're betting on human beings. You're betting on fate to a certain extent. You're betting on the good health of people. There's so much that's unknowable. You just try to get yourself the best opportunity to be successful but it doesn't guarantee a darn thing."

[Guest Edgy DC]

Tom Glavine, hockey coach:

[G-Fafif]

Robin Ventura tells the Snooze that he is out of the loop.