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Wrong thread. Jay Bruce keeps clogging rosters, apparently.

T.J. Rivera joins Ty Kelly, Sean Gilmartin and L.J. Mazzilli on Wally Backman's Long Island Ducks.

Hal Breeden, Cub, Expo, law enforcement officer and all-time Richmond Brave, 76. https://richmond.com/sports/professional/there-will-never-be-another-hal-breeden-and-his-37-hrs-116-rbi-for-1970/article_ae8619bf-eaa8-5b4a-9e2d-ce6e62dc3cf2.htmlhttps://richmond.com/sports/professional/there-will-never-be-another-hal-breeden-and-his-37-hrs-116-rbi-for-1970/article_ae8619bf-eaa8-5b4a-9e2d-ce6e62dc3cf2.html

The Buccos have DFA'd Todd Frazier.

Donnie Stevenson seems as recent as Mettle the Mule, but Ken Rosenthal offers an addendum to dazzling if brief career of the hitting approach coach who was not so long ago the talk of the town. Donnie Stevenson was Pete Alonso. Multiple sources confirm it was the Mets' first baseman who fired up his fellow hitters on May 1 before they faced their former teammate, Phillies right-hander Zack Wheeler. The Mets won 5-4 on a go-ahead homer by Michael Conforto in the top of the ninth inning – the first victory of a 7-2 run that has vaulted them to the top of the NL East. “Donnie's been great helping the team,” Alonso said afterward, describing “Stevenson” as a “nice new hire,” “great hitting/approach coach” and all-around savior. “Donnie really helped us today.” Alonso, in assuming his alter ego, wore a hat and sunglasses to the hitters' meeting, then delivered the most basic of messages, according to some in attendance: Let's stop over-thinking things. Let's just go out there, stick to our strengths and let it rip. The meeting, according to one attendee, lasted about four minutes. The players did not even talk about Wheeler, laughing, clapping and hooting instead. The results of Alonso's attempt to loosen up a tight club were impressive – the Mets scored four runs in seven innings against Wheeler, matching the most he has allowed this season. Two days later, after a 6-5 loss in St. Louis, the team fired hitting coach Chili Davis and assistant hitting coach Tom Slater. But the emergence of “Donnie” had nothing to do with those moves. As Joel Sherman reported in the New York Post, team president Sandy Alderson and general manager Zack Scott had decided to make a change even before Alonso transformed himself into “Donnie.” Alonso, in fact, was among the Mets most upset by the firings, and admitted to crying at his locker after hearing the news. He also was emotional in two subsequent conversations with Scott, sources said. https://theathletic.com/2577809/2021/05/10/rosenthal-pete-alonso-behind-a-mets-mystery-the-red-soxs-unsung-hero-nick-madrigal-the-anti-2021-hitter/https://theathletic.com/2577809/2021/05/10/rosenthal-pete-alonso-behind-a-mets-mystery-the-red-soxs-unsung-hero-nick-madrigal-the-anti-2021-hitter/

Podcast host Jay Horwitz recently got together with Orlando Cepeda, Ed Kranepool and Mays's personal scribe John Shea (with whom he published 24) to celebrate Willie. Jay grew up a Giants fan in Jersey and didn't switch to the Mets until they paid him to. https://youtu.be/N8rN3_12amghttps://youtu.be/N8rN3_12amg

Dilson Herrera signs with the Blue Jays. https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2021/05/blue-jays-sign-dilson-herrera.htmlhttps://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2021/05/blue-jays-sign-dilson-herrera.html

Willie Mays taking a 90th birthday lap in 2021 is the chronological equivalent of Babe Ruth hypothetically doing the same in 1985, Christy Mathewson in 1970, Walter Johnson in 1977, Lou Gehrig in 1993, Hank Greenberg in 2001, Mel Ott in 1999, Ty Cobb in 1976, Jackie Robinson in 2009, Gil Hodges in 2014, Roberto Clemente in 2024 (and Jacob deGrom in 2078). The longevity that allows younger generations a glimpse of a living, breathing all-time great is an incredible gift to baseball. Willie looks pretty good, too.

I'm surprised Jake didn't sweep all four.

Hildenberger down, Drew Smith activated from IL.

Truly, this is a lineup that can't be posted enough.

McNeil 2B Lindor SS Conforto RF Alonso 1B D. Smith LF Pillar CF Villar 3B McCann C deGrom RHP

“Dad, can I drive the backhoe?” which inevitably lands as “Dad, can I try tobacco?”

Nice going, McCann.

Your correspondent's http://www.faithandfearinflushing.com/2021/05/08/not-a-night-to-say-rats/several cents.

Zack speaks. The second half is the perfect answer, had it been delivered last night.

Reid-Foley was sent down this week. Can't come back yet.

Looks like we got ourselves an opener. McNeil 2B Lindor SS Conforto RF Alonso 1B D. Smith LF Pillar CF Villar 3B McCann C Hunter RHP

Johnny Lunchbucket wrote: For all we know Lindor banged McNeil's wife and he only just found out. You know who'd do that? A rat.

Bobby Bo added he was only calling the press box to check on Jay Horwitz's cold. https://www.nytimes.com/1992/06/27/sports/baseball-hold-the-phone-mets-try-to-explain.htmlhttps://www.nytimes.com/1992/06/27/sports/baseball-hold-the-phone-mets-try-to-explain.html

What a great, goofy win. Now everybody line up in the tunnel and clobber McNeil.

This is a smashing story, by überpromising journalist James Schapiro, about the veritable kid who kind of owns Mets Twitter, partly (but by no means solely) from getting owned by Noah Syndergaard. For a professional baseball player with 1.2 million Twitter followers, most of Noah Syndergaard's Twitter timeline is pretty ordinary stuff. He makes jokes about beat reporters and fellow ballplayers; there's the occasional tweet advertising a product; he tweets about the book club he started this spring. But among those typical ballplayer Tweets, Syndergaard is also participating in a strange Twitter narrative that probably leaves most Mets fans mystified. He's relentlessly roasting an account named Richard Staff. “If this is SAFE, then Rich's wife might actually come back,” Syndergaard tweeted on April 11th, accompanied by a video of Alec Bohm of the Phillies scoring a controversial go-ahead run in that night's Phillies/Braves game. “And my parents naming me Dick Staff,” Syndergaard tweeted, after Staff shared a picture of his vaccination card with the caption “The only things that can hurt me now are Noah Syndergaard's tweets and the Mets.” “I see everything, Richard,” Syndergaard tweeted on February 21st. “Including your future, minus your wife.” It's a confusing scene: why exactly is Noah Syndergaard on Twitter relentlessly bullying a Mets fan whose profile picture is Keith Hernandez, who appears to be a middle-aged divorced man? Well, he isn't. But the true story is, if possible, even stranger. It's the story of a young Twitter comedian, a confluence of viral forces, and a baseball player with lots of time on his hands. https://sheabridge.substack.com/p/the-jester-king-of-mets-twitterhttps://sheabridge.substack.com/p/the-jester-king-of-mets-twitter