batmagadanleadoff

Bottom third.

Ceetar wrote: Don't act like nobody here knows the Wilpons are incompetent fools unable to make money selling the Mets to Mets fans. They're the worst, everyone knows that. I'm not. If I post a positive article about Jacob deGrom, am I assuming that nobody but me knows how good deGrom is? If it's a crappy post yes. If it's an interesting post talking about various aspects of his success, no. No. Idea. Whatsoever. Ceetar wrote: I honestly don't give a crap about the Wilpons. it's not about keeping track of off field/on field stuff at the same time, it's that I ONLY CARE about the on field stuff. I barely care about the minor league stuff. Good for you. I don't give a shit about the Dr. Who TV show, or that on-line scrabble game you guys play. And you couldn't pay me to listen to a Rush record. Figure out what this next sentence should be, if I was in the mood to write it.

That's some sick advertising!! People are always telling me that smoking causes low birth weight. Talk about a win-win-win! An easy labor, a slim baby... You've probably figured out that's fake, but just in case Worth1000 "is an image manipulation and contest website" according to Wikipedia. The best line in that ad is in the bottom corner: Winston when you're smoking for two

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: Don't act like nobody here knows the Wilpons are incompetent fools unable to make money selling the Mets to Mets fans. They're the worst, everyone knows that. I'm not. If I post a positive article about Jacob deGrom, am I assuming that nobody but me knows how good deGrom is?

I guess some people, their heads might explode if they hadda keep track of the on field and off field stuff all at the same time. The Mets are in first place in the middle of June? Good for them. Congratulate the players responsible for this, and everyone in the organization that made this happen. But this doesn't excuse ownership from running the team the way they've been running it for the last, I dunno, it'll be 10 years before you even realize it. There's no reason, no justification. The Mets should have a payroll in the top three, four or five of baseball. Always. Among other things. And first place doesn't get the owners off the hook.

batmagadanleadoff wrote: I'm logged in, yet I'm not permitted to edit the top post. So I'll assume that editing posts more than a week old is now forbidden?

Yes! I might actually win this thing.

Confession: I really like the early 1970s feather-on-sleeve uniform. I don't think that type of design, with the contrasting sleeves going all they way to the neck, has been used since. The basic Braves uniform today is a classic as well. Everything between the two was a disaster! Never saw this before. The Man From Topps photographs an Atlanta Brave wearing the feather uni cap with a dated jersey from the year before. For extra credit, play the Braves version of Who Am I? and you can win a custom Don Cardwell 1970 Topps style Braves card. Who's the Brave making a mixed fashion statement, below?

Reed came to the Mets from the Yankees in a multi-player trade for, among others, Rafael Santana. I remember this trade because my friend's little brother, a big Raffy fan, was heartbroken that his favorite Met would be playing for the crosstown hated rivals. I tried to comfort him by telling him that at least Santana would get to wear his old Mets uniform number with the Yankees. Yeah, this post is more of a Santana post than a Reed post. Give me some Mets stuff about Jack Aker.

The reality, as multiple members of the front office have explained to me, is a simple one: Alderson has no idea what he can spend, or even when he'll know. And their frantic efforts to supplement pitching with an improved offense is severely restricted as a result. That's a far more difficult problem than simply a frugal budget. Give someone $100, and it's hard to afford a car. Fail to tell him how much money he has, and it's impossible to buy a car. [emphasis, mine] This, I think, is the crux of the article. If true, Megdal broke a story that warrants major sports coverage.

TransMonk wrote: Ceetar wrote: err, I think the injuries to Wright, Murphy and d'Arnaud are the main culprits in making this team 'offensively starved' I don't believe the 2014 offense was a Michael Cuddyer away from being a reliable offense on the whole...no matter how elite Wright is. I think they would still be below league average as a team in most stats this season even if all these guys were mostly healthy. It's debatable whether Cuddyer is even an asset. The jury's still out on that one. And it's been a while now since David Wright was an elite player. I'm waiting patiently for the reveal that the owners forced Alderson to re-sign Wright in 2012, against Sandy's better instincts. Those Mets were so rotted out, that they probably wouldn't have won half their games even if Wright won the MVP in the first year of his newest contract. Frayed Knot wrote: He starts off by citing, in quotes no less, Kernan's line from a column last week about the team targeting 2016 as the real year for contention, something Kernan never backed up or indicated where it came from, or qualified whether it was an assumption, an opinion, a flat-out statement, or something voiced (even anonymously) from within. But Medgel goes ahead and runs with it as if now a universally agreed upon fact then adds that "Sandy Alderson has been turned down many times when asking for funds to go get a player". Really? When did that happen (and apparently happen again, and again, and again ... )? You'd think THAT would make news if and when it occurred or when it became public knowledge but, even though I don't claim to read every press released, I never heard anything resembling that to the point where I've more often heard exactly the opposite even if I dismiss such stuff as more akin to public relations that stated policy. I think Megdal's main point here is that Alderson is running the team essentially blindfolded. If true, you wouldn't read that in the press unless some insider leaked that info. It's obvious that Megdal has developed contacts within the organization who are privvy to top-level information. This was apparent at least since the days after the Madoff scandal broke, when the Mets were shopping shares of the team to interested investors. And in an organization as dysfunctional as the Mets, struggling with enormous economic pressures, it's not so far-fetched that there would be disgruntled employees, working under difficult conditions, perhaps unfairly pressured or blamed for the Mets failing, who would want to leak that info. Granted, you have to take a leap of faith to credit an article based entirely on off the record sources, but the thing is plausible. And consistent with what you can see with your own two eyes. This sports story has been underreported, especially in proportion to its magnitude and its locale. And especially given the strong similarites with baseball's ouster of McCourt. I'm still amazed at how first Selig, and now Manfred, can sweep this under the rug with nothing more than the dog ate my homework juvenille logic, while escaping the scrutiny of the media.

Mets, in first, look again to next year By Howard Megdal 2:19 p.m. | Jun. 10, 2015 The New York Mets are in their seventh season since they last finished with a winning record. The New York Mets are also in their seventh season since ownership could rely on Bernie Madoff for uncommonly consistent returns and a slush fund for spending. These two facts are not coincidental. Accordingly, no one should be surprised by the revelation in Kevin Kernan's Sunday column that an offense-starved team is "targeting 2016 as their real target date to make a splash." But let there be no question about why this is. It has nothing to do with the pace of the rebuilding effort, necessitated by ownership's inability to afford a major league payroll in the top two-thirds of the league, despite a cash cow of a TV network, the largest market in the league and an influx of national television revenue. As previously reported, general manager Sandy Alderson has been turned down many times when asking for funds to go get a player. And the inability to add even marginal depth this offseason has left this Mets team particularly bereft in case of an injury. Nor does it reflect the team's current standing. The Mets, even after getting no-hit by the Giants Tuesday night, are in first place in the National League East more than a third of the way through the season. The reality, as multiple members of the front office have explained to me, is a simple one: Alderson has no idea what he can spend, or even when he'll know. And their frantic efforts to supplement pitching with an improved offense is severely restricted as a result. That's a far more difficult problem than simply a frugal budget. Give someone $100, and it's hard to afford a car. Fail to tell him how much money he has, and it's impossible to buy a car. The remarkable reality of a first-place team pushing back its own timeline for financial reasons would seem to fly in the face of the MLB commissioner Rob Manfred's own vote of confidence for Mets ownership this spring. Manfred said, back in March: "I think adding players comes at the point in time that you've built your farm system up and you have a really good core of players on the field. And then it's effective to spend. I think the Mets have made great progress in terms of the young talent they have. And I know, at the point in time that they think it's appropriate, they will spend to supplement players." That statement works as long as the "they" isn't baseball operations, but rather an ownership group who continues to put its own financial survival, which requires financing massive debt against team, TV network and stadium, ahead of any investment in the team itself. The same line has been used throughout Sandy Alderson's tenure, regardless of where the team is on the field. Back in 2010, when Alderson took the job, he said this: "I wasn't hired to apply a Moneyball approach to the New York Mets. I would not have accepted the position were I required to run the Mets on a shoestring budget. ... But we do have to get through a somewhat difficult period from a standpoint of our payroll because we already have most of it committed." Mets payroll at the time topped $140 million. Here in 2015, despite massive increases in revenue around the league, and a national television infusion of cash, the Mets find themselves with a payroll of around $100 million, bottom third of the league. And as we now know from Steve Kettmann's book, which included more than 100 interviews with Alderson, that Alderson believed this by February 2011: "Immediately after the Madoff litigation was made public, I realized that was going to have some impact on what we were going to be able to do." And so it has been ever since. In 2012. In 2013. In 2014. In 2015. But as the Alderson rebuild has produced more players, there's been a separation between on-field expectations and off-field realities. Mets fans could see the team wasn't close to winning, and thus each summer would begin hot-stove dreaming a bit early. Each winter, the team did very little, relying on internal, already-paid-for players. Some of these have worked out (Lucas Duda), some of these haven't (Ruben Tejada), but Alderson made no secret of it: he didn't view either one as a "core player" back in 2013. That both are still here is more a consequence of the enormous barrier to making deals during his tenure than any change in his beliefs, though Duda has certainly proven himself since. So the target date for relevance has continued moving back, even with the improved on-field performance that was supposed to trigger spending to move the Mets from talented group of homegrown talent into a team maximizing their window. As Alderson said in the summer of 2013, "Was 2014 always a target year? Yeah. It should be an important year for us." As Alderson said, famously, in spring of 2014, about his call for the Mets to try and win 90 games, "This team is now about being successful. Being successful is not some nebulous concept about winning or being competitive or playing meaningful games some month later in the calendar. This is about concrete expectations about what we need to do. The 90 wins is about challenge. It's about changing the conversation." And after the Mets did little to add to a 2014 team that won 79, not 90, adding Michael Cuddyer and little else this past winter, the spring produced this leaked moment from Fred Wilpon's closed-door meeting with manager Terry Collins that, according to Collins, Wilpon "expects a much better team." Not that anyone heard this from Wilpon himself, who hasn't made himself available to reporters since the spring of 2013, a press conference in which he claimed, falsely, that he and the team were debt-free. Indeed, even the talking point from the organization about Wilpon has shifted from "of course he can afford to run a large-market team" to how much he cares about winning, as if that matters even slightly if he lacks the means to make it happen. And yet, here are the 2015 Mets, their best pitchers excelling and critically in their cheap, pre-arbitration years. Offensive help is on the way from the farm with outfielder Michael Conforto and shortstop Amed Rosario impressing, but how quickly they can arrive in New York and hit major league pitching, no one can say. And without ownership able to lock down these pitchers as they get more expensive, the Mets could find themselves with enough hitting just as it's time to, say, trade Matt Harvey. So as Alderson and his lieutenants cast about for more hitting, all too aware that targets with big contracts are likely off-limits (though one never knows; the money for Bartolo Colon magically showed up about 48 hours before the Mets signed him), the team continues to hold the top spot in a division the Nationals have underachieved enough to make competitive. But the analog Mets fans need to be hoping for here is 1973, when it took only 82 games to win the N.L. East. And that requires the Nationals to keep on playing well below capacity all season, an unlikely outcome. Otherwise, it looks like whatever improvements the Mets can muster to an offense among the worst in the National League, especially since May 1, will have to come from within. Hope that Travis d'Arnaud, activated Wednesday, can stay healthy and productive. Hope Daniel Murphy's quad heals quickly. Hope Juan Lagares remembers how to hit as he did even last year. Pray nothing happens to Lucas Duda, by far the team's best offensive player. It's a strange position for a first place team with good young players in the biggest market in the league. But thanks to MLB continuing to allow Fred Wilpon and his partners to divert that revenue toward financing their company's debt, that's reality for the 2015 Mets, and any Mets team, contending or otherwise. http://www.capitalnewyork.com/article/media/2015/06/8569873/mets-first-look-again-next-year

Mike Fyhrie me. How do you even pronounce that? Fyhrie rhymes with "theory". It's tougher to spell than to say, I'd say. I got video of this guy. Try and find a picture of Fyhrie in a Mets uniform. I dare you. I don't know if it's a relatively new feature, or if I just noticed it (I caught it a few months ago), but baseball-reference has pronunciation info for every player's last name. Joe Grzenda: Solved.

It's been Leigh Castergine Week here at the Wild Card Standings all month long! [fimg=229]http://content.sportslogos.net/logos/54/54/full/88mss9g9tj4ko0oya9lf.gif[/fimg][fimg=266]http://content.sportslogos.net/logos/54/74/full/2296.gif[/fimg]

I'm logged in, yet I'm not permitted to edit the top post. I wanted to add Dick Selma, whom I'd omitted. What gives?

[fimg=383]http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ggM1q6uhQMQ/VXpIftMXWoI/AAAAAAAAZwo/4ktxxU9YaAg/s640/2015mfcGM--NO-NO-HESTON-z15.bmp[/fimg] Braves game in progress, tied in the 8th.

Edgy MD wrote: Hey, Keith: I hate that "You don't bunt during a no-hitter" logic. Me too. Who makes up these stupid customs? Baseball at its highest and most ruthless level of competition, and the batter's supposed to compromise his chances to succeed. Yeah right.

A historic uniform, they were specifically designed in anticipation of Aaron's record-breaking HR. Remember this one (below), not represented in this card thread? That's the uniform the Braves wore with nicknames instead of last names on the back. Messersmith was "Channel". Jimmy Wynn

"You want me to go do down to the Minors? I gotta think about this. They got a nice big screen TV in the locker room"? [fimg=444]https://thenypost.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/ollie-300x3001.jpg[/fimg]

You can learn a lot from The Man from Topps. Bob Miller's last major league gig may have been with the 1974 Mets, but apparently, Miller didn't think he was through at the end of that season. Below is a The Man from Topps photo of Miller in a Padres road uniform, taken in 1975. The road uni Miller's wearing was a one year only style, so it had to have been 1975. Also, Miller never wore #50 in either of previous two stints with the Pads. So it appears that Miller gave it at least one more chance with San Diego in the Spring of '75. OE: Miller pitched 25 innings for the Padres AAA team in 1975, the last professional innings Miller would pitch.

[fimg=280]https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8871/18620035032_ceb602539a_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8851/17953067333_49f64f03ab_o.png[/fimg][fimg=260]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/513/17953067343_67fbe2d25b_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/445/17953067363_26ec6e30aa_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8868/17953067373_5a5c0acf84_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/389/17953067423_ba7c9da21d_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/484/18740375455_342e1f4db5_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/533/17953292613_3ba9b77371_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=245]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/260/17953292593_a9b01d431a_o.png[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8847/17953292523_2e4b955a41_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/334/18386246170_f5ef597a57_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/464/17951137494_753c46c597_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/551/17951137484_c58e08c330_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/405/17951137454_0a5612e9e0_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/386/18387631360_d658f6208c_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/310/17951137414_63cfb166af_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/484/17951137384_7b68c27ab4_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/556/18386246150_3d1e5c490d_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=235]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/307/17951137574_87ef94799a_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=235]https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8858/18386246100_3b3e8bb3e5_o.png[/fimg][fimg=230]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/305/18386246130_42d7bd1a19_o.gif[/fimg][fimg=265]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/350/18386246140_8d28205ddc_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/436/18735663942_a8ce4f1571_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=255]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/257/18387631340_dd638d18d9_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=355]https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8845/18576060635_8b690643a0_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=345]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/369/18576060705_1cacea3824_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=345]https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/473/18576060725_de41e2419e_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=355]https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8893/18576060765_bfdc39586c_o.jpg[/fimg][fimg=355]https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8846/18576060735_6bd81a551d_o.jpg[/fimg] [fimg=235]https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8895/17953292623_febf4c6d59_o.jpg[/fimg]

Rockin' Doc wrote: batmagadanleadoff - "Your link's bad. Try this video. The fun begins at the 40 second mark." That's the video I was trying to post, but my limited computer skills aparently foiled me. Thanks for the assist. A situation like that in the video is I'm sure what led to the "Venditte Rule" which requires him to declare which had he intends to pitch with to a given batter. It was made clear from that game incident, if no one had anicipated it beforehand, that some kind of rule was needed. Otherwise, the batter and pitcher could switch sides/hands indefinitely without an actual pitch ever being thrown.

Rockin' Doc wrote: I think the rule is straight forward and definitely needed to avoid chaos (as Frayed Knot) describes and as happened in the minor. The article and image below demonstrates the need for the rule. https://youtu.be/yDyCRTlKllkwww.athleticsnation.com/2015/6/5/8735407/the-pat-venditte-rule-what-happens-when-a-switch-pitcher-faces-a Your link's bad. Try this video. The fun begins at the 40 second mark. yDyCRTlKllk By the way, obligating the pitcher to declare his pitching hand at the beginning of each pitch would eliminate the chaotic situation shown in that video of a Yankees-Cyclones game.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: I think the rule is fine as it is. It's simple and clear. I'm coming around just a little to this idea. The existing rule is easier to enforce. Otherwise, you'd have to give the batter extra time to decide what side he wants to bat from on each pitch., and that' another complication. I don't like the present rule, but it does have its strengths.