batmagadanleadoff

Edgy MD wrote: I think [the Mets did an Astros style tear-down] in their own fashion, and the Mets beat the Astros to the World Series by two years. If by they did it, you mean they didn't. Because when you're three or four years away from contention, the very last kind of player you sign up is an over the hill 30 year old in decline who's nevertheless gonna command a very high salary given his past MVP caliber level of play and solid citizen status. Like David Wright.

And they didn't get Giancarlo because they're saving up for a Tom Seaver statue.

The Wilpons care so much for their fans that in a city that's closing in on a population of nine million, they built a 40,000 seat stadium. But what am I talking About? The team's so chronically disappointing, no one bothers to go to their games.

Two first place finishes since 1988. As if anything else needs to be said.

batmagadanleadoff wrote: If you're in the fancy seats, the Wilpons made sure you get a urinal divider if you have to take a piss. The peasants could piss all over themselves and on each other for all the Wilpons care, because if you're not in the fancy sections, you ain't getting a urinal divider. That's probably how the Wilpons were able to sign Yoenis: from all the money they saved on urinal dividers.

If you're in the fancy seats, the Wilpons made sure you get a urinal divider if you have to take a piss. The peasants could piss all over themselves and on each other for all the Wilpons care, because if you're not in the fancy sections, you ain't getting a urinal divider.

I'm pretty sure the soulless stadium was at least a tag team eff n jeff production, if not more jeff than eff. Once you get past eff's Ebbetsian stylings, it might be all Jeff. Especially the moronic cavernous dimensions and that stupid Mexican border wall of an outfield fence.

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: I'm all fired up on this. It would seem as though Fred -- who been blessedly quiet since Sandy arrived -- feels as though his ability to exert influence on the club is compromised by an intelligent guy in charge he never wanted and that Omar (and Terry, whom he also loves) are there to be Fred's eyes and ears and potentially at least, the means by which Fred can accomplish that which Sandy would recommend against. That's why Sandy's team is unhappy. That's why after years of silence we suddenly heard shit about Fred's "irateness" last week. He's begun meddling again. This is the very same set-up Fred had used with Duquette, whom he also didn't want as GM, so he (and not Duke) hired two "white-haired baseball men" as advisors and those guys were ultimately influential in the huge Zambrano-Benson setback. This is what I've been saying forever. Only I see Jeff Wilpon's fingerprints on this one, too. Silent fingerprints. With each passing day, the Mets are becoming Jeff's team more than Eff's team, and danged if Jeff isn't eventually gonna have himself a pliable GM that he can wipe the floor with if he wants to, which he will want to, because that's who Jeff is and every baseball insider knows what a colossal douchebag the guy is. Great! A NYC team that can't outspend the Royals and with Jeff soon to take the reins. How old is his old man? Nothing lasts forever.

Does honkballer mean defender?

LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: Without even double - checking the numbers, I'm going to jump with both feet on a limb and say that Johnny Lags value as a honkballer is somewhere north of "sucks." I'd agree. I didn't say his defense sucks. I said it's not as good as it used to be.

I'll bet anything the Mets part ways with Lagares in what will essentially be a salary dump. Lagares sucks. He can't hit. His defense isn't as good as it was in 2014. He's not worth the roster spot for two or three innings a week of late inning defense replacement a week and an occasional spot start. And from the likely perspective of the cheap Mets, he's making too much goddamn money.

Nymr83 wrote: the one part i don't agree with is the Marlins part - the Marlins are far more embarrassing because 1) this is their 3rd fire sale in 20 years - they are a PERPETUAL joke I wouldn't go there. The Marlins have two WS titles in 20 years. The Mets have two first place finishes in 30 years. And last I looked, the Marlins don't play in NYC. In fact, they play in one of the shittiest baseball markets in all of baseball, in an era where markets matter because money matters and the market determines how much revenue a team can generate. The Marlins simply don't draw crowds, even with Stanton and Jose Fernandez and another half dozen or so exciting and promising young players and one of baseball's newest and most innovative stadiums in baseball. Two first place finishes in 30 years is really, all you need to know to understand what an unmitigated disaster the Wilpons are as baseball owners. It's the Cliffs Notes version of analysis, but it's good enough.

Centerfield wrote: batmagadanleadoff wrote: Who the hell even cares? I mean, what the hell is the point of all of this? The point of all this is that I’m seeing how much control the Wilpons have over the conversation. They started SNY and suddenly they have control over the message from the TV media. That station partners with the Daily News and suddenly that outlet is compromised. They bought Metsblog, gave the 7 Line a kiosk and a license, and now those previously outspoken critics all fall in line. That sucks. But that's nothing new. That's the way it is in every sports market. You think you're going to find harsh and sustained criticism of the Yankees on their Yankees channel? The GOP has state TV in Fox News and Sinclair. You ever try watching FOX? I do once in a while just to keep an open mind. I can't last more than seven minutes on that channel. It's non-stop science fiction. And that's a much more serious problem than whether the 7Line Guy is a Wilpon shill or not (he is).

Who the hell even cares? I mean, what the hell is the point of all of this? That the Wilpons are OK because the 7Line Guy sez so? Maybe we should ask Jeff Wilpon's mom what she thinks of the Wilpons, next. How even old is the 7Line Guy? Twenty? What? His shilling opinion counts more than yours because he sells Mets t-shirts? And this is some more high comedy nonsense: 41Forever wrote: But since 2011, the team has hosted an All-Star Game.... I'm so impressed. It only took them about 50 years to host one. Has any team gone longer? I mean, Mets fans were born and died without the chance to ever see their Mets host an ASG. If you were honest, and not trying to spin things, your post would say, "since 1964, the Mets hosted an ASG. 49 years after 1964".

To see people rationalizing the Wilpons by noting that you don't need to have the highest payroll to win, or that the Mets could win with this approach or that approach is infuriating because the Wilpons don't win no matter what they do. They always lose and the Mets are never in the playoffs, not nearly as much as they oughtta be. They may not have Yankee money but they likely have more money than any of their NL East opponents. Two first place finishes in about 30 years, playing in a five team division for the most part, where the Mets are one of the five teams -- meaning that the Mets have only four other division opponents to beat. You can pooh pooh the importance of payroll all you want, but the best Mets squads the Wilpons ever fielded was when they broke into their hermetically sealed piggy bank and splurged for free agents Beltran & Pedro, and paid Carlos Delgado free agent sized money.

I think we all agree that you can win with a lower payroll, if you happen to be fortunate enough to have a lot of young talent, but to be forced to try to win with a lower payroll imposes a constraint that makes it harder to do so. And that, apparently, is where the Mets are. Here's what I'd note about the Mets, the Wilpons and young talent: Ever since Fred became the de facto majority owner of the Mets, running things his way (very early 90s) the Mets have had, for the most part and with few exceptions, a dreadful, barren farm system. Which is what they have right now, by the way. There's a simple reason why the Mets, who play in NYC, have just two first place finishes in about 30 years. In addition to the oodles of money the Yankees spend, how the hell did they suddenly assemble all of that awesome young major league talent they currently have, being that they almost always finish a season with what is among the best records in baseball, and thus, pick later rather than earlier in the amateur drafts?

Gwreck wrote: My take is that Alderson does the best he can but nothing gets better without new ownership. I think this is obvious. Alderson is a great GM who enters every off-season with both hands tied behind his back, and having to take most of the considerable heat because he has to provide cover for the fucking incompetent Wilpons, while a good chunk of whatever revenue there is, not that we know how much there is, pays back the Madoff debt. Even Howie Megdal gave up.

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: The Wilpons ... don't how to talk to fans .... Their sin is not transparency or cheapness. It's incompetence! It's both. The Wilpons probably secretly loathe us, hold us in contempt. We're just peasants to them with some money for them to separate from us. Just dig out that video of Jeff in perpetual sourpuss face telling the media that it's none of their business because the Mets are a privately held company. Real smooth move there. Guanranteed to endear himself to us paupers. Centerfield wrote: Benjamin Grimm wrote: And six years later, that sentiment is as valid as ever. Not if your Darren Meenan. Today, he feels like this is an issue that should be decided by the voters of Alabama. Yeah, that 7Line statement was utter bullshit. If you know that the Mets are permitting him to use their logos and trademarks, and that the Mets could probably take back those rights on a whim, then you know he's not gonna bite the hand that feeds him. He's just threading the needle. 41Forever wrote: If I were advising them, I'd make Jeff available to a couple of the higher-profile writers.... Teach him to pivot [if] the questions go to places where you don't want to go. It's OK to say that they'll never spend like the Yankees because no one can spend like the Yankees. Spoken like a sleazy politician. Teach Jeff to pivot, i.e., to change the topic, to engage in conversationalist sleight of hand, to bullshit. Because the fans are as dumb as those goobers who're still waiting for their old $50/hr. factory jobs to come back. They'll believe anything. And why can't the Mets spend like the Yankees without incurring any blame for that shortcoming? What? Is Betsy Devos donating hundreds of millions of dollars to the Yankees, too? Not only do the Mets not spend like the Yankees, they're barely outspending the Mariners and the Royals. The Royals, ferchrissakes!

Centerfield wrote: I think it's worse than being incompetent or cheap. I think they are crooks. They are taking Mets revenue to payoff Madoff debt. It's a practice that was deemed to be not in the best interest of the game when it was Frank McCourt and led him to be stripped of his team.... I totally agree with this double standard. The only real reason the Wilpons were allowed to keep their team, but not McCourt, is because the Wilpons relationship with Selig was cozier than McCourt's. Any other explanation is utter bullshit. And the Wilpons probably are crooks. The Madoff trustee presented powerful evidence that the Mets owners had to have known that Madoff's funds were Ponzi schemes. At the least, they were willfully ignorant. FWIW, I personally believe that the Mets owners knew they were invested in a total scam. I mean, they're probably crooks even before Madoff. How the hell do you build a billion dollar empire from nothing in the dirty, cutthroat world of New York real estate without any corruption? The whole goddamn world of masters of universe is one big crooked den of thieves.

I think you guys are really over-complicating things with this what does Forbes know and do the Mets take in this much or that much from parking revenues multiplied by the square root of pi divided by their market size. The Mets play in the greatest city in the world. It's the same exact city that the Yankees play in. The Mets enjoy the same exact gargantuan competitive advantages that any team should derive from playing in this city. Just like the Yankees. So a little Occam's Razor here. The Mets should have one of the top two, three, four or five payrolls every single season. They don't. It's because the ownership is cheap, inept and ineffective.

metirish wrote: Fuck the Wilpon's and all belonging to them Yeah. That, too.

In hindsight, there was no optimal time to trade Harvey. Grimm's post is spot-on. Sometimes, things just don't work out and there's nobody or nothing that deserves any blame. It's a shame, really. Harvey emerged as baseball's best pitcher for a few months, and it's all been mostly a terrible and sad downhill ride ever since, with another peak mixed in there in 2015. You can hope for Harvey to still have somewhat of a high ceiling, and maybe that'll come to pass. But it's probably likelier that Harvey's glory days are over.

Centerfield wrote: We can talk about these albatross contracts like ARod and AGon and try to comfort ourselves that way. But the fact of the matter is the guys guilty of these terrible deals were in the LCS and WS. That's precisely the point! The point isn't necessarily that those contracts go bad in their final years. That's a calculated understood risk that the wealthy teams can afford to absorb. The point is that the Yankees are in the post-season virtually every single season. And so pointing out that some of those contracts went bad misses the point, entirely. The Mets play in the same exact fucking city that the Yankees do. And while the Yankees are in the post-season virtually every single season, the Mets miss the post-season virtually every single season.

Centerfield wrote: The “payroll doesn’t matter” bullshit is hardly limited to this forum. It’s rampant throughout the media and among pseudo intellectual half fans who think they are being cutting edge by saying “People don’t get it’s not about how much you spend. I’ve said it all along...it’s about spending wisely!” Because if anyone's gonna figure out how to assemble a team that's twice as good as the Nats are, for a fraction of what the Nats spend on payroll, it's gonna be that baseball savant ........... Jeff Wilpon.

Seriously dude, there is one "Howie" and his last name is "Rose" and I thought that he was retiring or Mets management canned him for some stupid reason. Given that Howie Kendrick's last name is almost the same as a Temptation (the ballplayer is a singular Kendrick), perhaps the title could have been "Are We Tempted By Kendrick?". If you want an Eddie Kendricks themed thread title, I'll suggest Keep on Fucking (with us): They get Stanton and we're talking Howie Kendrick here.