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Kirk Nieuwenhuis � CF Mike Baxter � LF David Wright � 3B Lucas Duda � RF Daniel Murphy � 2B Ike Davis � 1B Justin Turner � SS Mike Nickeas � C Johan Santana � LHP

O/U on how long it takes Klap to insist Rivera be starting pitcher for both teams?

Despite MFY tinge, Fan Fest at Javits in 2008 was A LOT of fun. Not just a lot, but A LOT. Strip away the pinstripes, embellish with orange and blue and 2013's version holds much promise.

ASG threads usually unleash a torrent of "I don't watch it" posts, but for those who watch it and get a kick out of it at least in concept if not for every waking minute of it, glad Citi Field will be The Place in 2013. Wish Shea Stadium could have been The Place one time after I was 18 months old, but what's done is done.

Nice si.com column by the always-entertaining Steve Rushin on NY sports landmarks that have all become chain drug stores and the like. His jumping off point is the site of the old Dodger offices, where Jackie Robinson signed his contract, and how it's now a TD Bank. It isn't true that every other business in New York has become a Duane Reade drugstore. But there was, last I checked, a Duane Reade drugstore at 51 West 51st Street in Manhattan, the former address of Toot Shor's famous saloon, where Joe DiMaggio and Jack Dempsey ate, where Shor literally drank Jackie Gleason under a table, and Yogi Berra allegedly said upon meeting the writer Ernest Hemingway: "What paper are you with, Ernie?" Seated one night at the circular bar, Frank Sinatra watched Dempsey, then Bing Crosby, then Babe Ruth walk through the front door. "When Babe Ruth walked in," Sinatra recalled in a film clip in the 2009 documentary Toots, "I damn near wet my pants." Today you can purchase Depends on the former site of Shor's, but have very little reason to wet your pants there, which is an irony evident in many of these ghostly shrines. Ruth himself used to sign his contracts at 1639 Third Avenue in Manhattan, in the offices of Yankee owner Jacob Ruppert, whose Ruppert Brewery sprawled over four blocks of the Upper East Side. That brewery's front door was near the corner of East 91st Street, where the portal to a kind of anti-brewery stands today: It's a health club -- a branch of the New York Sports Club -- so that this former shrine to Knickerbocker Beer and Ruthian excess is now a temple to physical fitness and self denial. This seems to be a theme connecting these ghost buildings of New York. Upon his arrival in the city, after signing with the Jets, Joe Namath was introduced to Toots Shor, who in turn introduced him to the New York press at a cocktail party-slash-press conference on January 23, 1965. Eventually, the pair had a falling out -- specifically a throwing out, when Toots tossed Namath after an argument -- and Broadway Joe opened his own swinging joint, Bachelors III. That place is still there, still a pickup spot, still full of fur coats and heavy breathers, but now 798 Lexington Avenue, on the corner of 62nd Street, is a pet shop, American Kennels, and the only pedigree the customers care about is the pooch's, not the building's. Decent book on the same subject: Babe Ruth Slept Here: The Baseball Landmarks of New York.

David didn't do the wrong thing (David Cares). Terry didn't do the wrong thing (Terry's Careful). If I'm to believe the wisdom passed down through generations of retired ballplayers turned color analysts who romanticize Gibson and Drysdale, Carrasco did the old school thing, which has been sold through the years as the right thing. It's just one of those things that became a Met thing in a blink. And Met things never look good in the postgame. The Mets are rarely the ones to fire the first high and tight pitch in any potential confrontation, which makes it an odd thing. Usually we're left reacting to somebody else's hothead and getting the ball taken out of our pitcher's hand before justice or vengeance can be served. Maybe Carrasco had heard of the legend of Oliver Perez and didn't want to be left in to soak up blowout innings while putting the scoreboard on tilt (which is where it seemed headed). My better angels wanted to see him hang in there for three frames and perhaps figure a few things out, regardless of the score. My more grounded angels have gone back to finding him hopeless and a waste of resources.

Star-hiding Mets hold tight to the 36-game season's second Wild Card, though as Batmags noted in IGT the Reds are coming in for a showdown -- plus the Marlins and Giants are closing in...and it isn't really a 36-game season. We just lost 8-0, Terry had a strange postgame presser and it's the middle of May, yet somehow I find myself thinking, "I wouldn't bet against us in a one-game playoff."

Box. Wright 2.5 Ramirez 2.0 Baxter 1.5

David in the postgame, on his animated conversation with Terry, reminded of the Sopranos custom of telling somebody "all due respect" when in fact you were offering information of a disrespectful nature. "Terry's the manager, and I've got all the respect in the world for Terry. I try to go to battle for Terry every day. He's got to make the move that he thinks is best for the team, and he obviously did that. Whether I agree with it or disagree with it, I respect him. I've loved playing for him the short amount of time that we've had together. And I've got all the respect in the world for Terry specifically." Interestingly, no media asked Wright, "So David, do you respect Terry?"

METS ALL-TIME HIT LEADERS Through Games of 5/15/2012 1. Ed Kranepool 1,418 2. Jose Reyes 1,300 3. DAVID WRIGHT 1,297 Maybe David was mad at Terry for costing him a chance to overtake Jose one or two at-bats sooner. As is, he has a pretty good chance to become the second Met in less than eight months to get his 1,300th hit against the Reds.

Around the beginning of the season.

Torres-CF Nieuwenhuis-LF Wright-3B Duda-RF Murphy-2B Davis-1B Cedeno-SS Nickeas-C Gee-RHP And it's raining.

Official announcement of long-expected news coming at City Hall (not Citi Field) tomorrow, 5/16, per Ken Davidoff in the Pest.

This one's so big that even the New York Times noticed...Mets Yearbook: 1962, Thursday night at 8:00 and again at 10:00. Not a year in review, but the preview that was filmed during the very first Spring Training. WOW! one assumes (since Snigh his less likely to cutting to ribbons earlier films than the later versions). To Mets fans who bleed Orange and Blue, the video, which will be broadcast for the first time on SNY Thursday at 8 p.m., is a precious time capsule. Filmed before the Mets had played an exhibition game, the Mets were still undefeated and fans could dream that George Weiss, the team�s stuffy president, had a plan to produce a contender. To sports fans, the show, which is called �1962 Yearbook,� is a wonderful example of how sports was covered a half-century ago, complete with fawning announcers, eager players and a lack of whiz-bang technology that predominates on sports networks these days. Same night at 7 PM and 9 PM, SNY airs thir 50 Greatest Mets show.

Box and won. Batista 4.5 Murphy 2.5 Wright 1.0 Cedeno 1.0 Duda 0.5 Francisco 0.5

The suicide-squeezing Mets maintain their grip on Wild Card No. 2 through the 35-game season.

METS ALL-TIME HIT LEADERS Through Games of 5/14/2012 1. Ed Kranepool 1,418 2. Jose Reyes 1,300 3. DAVID WRIGHT 1,295

Steve Rushin: Current SI writer.

They made a middling deal of David passing Straw for the RBI record, so I assume they'll acknowledge it and then some, unless they're overly conscious of the cheap comparisons the Greek chorus in the media will make to the last guy in New York to set a franchise most-hits record. Hopefully they'll really blow it out when he reaches 2,000 and, perhaps, 2,500 in a Mets uniform.

The walked-off Mets nevertheless slink out of Miami with the second Wild Card at the end of the 34-game National League season.

Turner 2.5 Niese 2.0 Murphy 1.5 Wright 1.0 Nieuwenhuis 1.0 Valdespin 0.5 Rauch 0.5

Savannah not a Cam Maron kind of place: .214/.309/.298 after 20 Sally League games.

METS ALL-TIME HIT LEADERS Through Games of 5/13/2012 1. Ed Kranepool 1,418 2. Jose Reyes 1,300 3. DAVID WRIGHT 1,294 Mr. .400 is one Rennie Stennett day from passing Jose.

Ceetar wrote: found it. You only credited him with 1 hit in your update from through 4/20 in your next update through 4/25 he actually had a hit on 4/24 and 4/25. Thanks for checking (and again to batmags for confirming something I kept meaning to look into because I had the feeling I wasn't on the nose). I went back and corrected his progress from then to now out of a combination of concern for the historical record and my own disgust for letting this slide. Can't blame the umps for this one.

I understand pinch-hitting to go for it when Niese's turn came up (reluctantly) but a flu-riddled Davis seemed like an addled choice.