metirish

="TheOldMole"]] Darling comes across as an ace in this interview, Barra as an asshole. Wallop. Great to have experienced people here to explain things.

Straight to Pittsburgh surely.

Great stuff, ] I always figured it's not Coltrane's fault that I don't get it right away, it's just my lack of sophistication. It all depends on where you are. Something that doesn't make sense today might make perfect sense 10 years from now." I think that's a great quote and could be true for a lot of music,certainly there is music I get now that I didn't when I was younger. Al Di Meola is the extent of my Jazz knowledge and in truth I only listened because a friend raved that he could play guitar faster than Eddie Van Halen,I didn't get it back then though.

Reyes - 2 Alou - 1 LoDuca - 1 Pelfrey - 0.5 Humber - 0.5

Maine - 3 Sosa - 1 Wagner - 0.5 Green - 2 Reyes - 0.5 Anderson - 1 Milledge - 1 Beltran - 1

Edgy DC wrote: Let's face it. Nobody knows shit about what makes John Maine effective. I'm shocked he's won 14 games.

Valadius wrote: Interesting tidbit from last night - I think it was Dusty Baker who said that when he throws down in the strike zone, he's "nasty", but when his pitches get up, he becomes hittable. Which is contrary to what others say about Maine,he pitches up in the strike zone and that's what makes him effective.

Yes indeed and some talk about Maine being the one to go to the pen if he's not in the post-season rotation because he can be trusted more than say Perez who might be deemed too erratic for the pen,Miane has the stuff and head for the pen duty according to some in the meadia.

Tom Glavine betrays hardly any emotion on the mound,perhaps Maine is like him in that respect ,Clemens meanwhile shows emotion with the stare and grimace and that works for him,really I think Orel is reading into the eyes too much.

Pretty cool stat,last night during the game Gary mentioned a stat that shows the Mets have the best record in the NL when they get a quality start..I forget the number of wins but I think it was 59,anyone else hear this.Darling went onto credit the pen with keeping the quality start in tact. This jumped out at me while reading the link Willets provided. ] # The Mets� performance is truly impressive. Not only do they have 7 wins with 5 or fewer hits (tied for 2nd-best), but they have only 7 losses (best). # Compare that to Arizona, who has a similar number of such wins (5) but many more such losses (25.)

Valadius wrote: Dusty Baker, who knows something about baseball, is saying very nice things about Maine. On edit: I'm Todd Pratt. Watch me hit a series-winning home run. Baker says nice things about anyone in baseball,I would agree that Maine seems to lose focus at times and I think as Peterson would say that's the mental side that he needs to work on.Maine certainly had the "eye of the tiger" last post-season. When he puts it all together he is capable of winning twenty games.

Valadius wrote: I'm heading to Rosh Hashanah services. I'll be praying for the Mets, and hopefully I'll be back to watch part of the game on ESPN. Brilliant.

Found this interesting,next year the N.L. picks... ] AL's top team to pick first-round format By Bob Nightengale, USA TODAY The Los Angeles Angels, Boston Red Sox and Cleveland Indians may all have comfortable division leads, but for the first time there's an added incentive to finish with the league's best record. The American League team with the best record will have its choice of playoff formats in the first-round best-of-five Division Series. The AL's top team will be given one hour after its final regular-season game to decide whether it wants to open the playoffs Oct. 3 � playing potential back-to-back games only once in eight days � or Oct. 4, with five games in seven days. The National League is unaffected; its two Division Series will start Oct. 3. "It's an attempt to give the team with the best record at least some perk," said Bob DuPuy, MLB president and COO. All playoff series "had been always been assigned, but after thinking about it, we decided why not give them a choice? Why not give the team with the best record the advantage over the wild-card team? "It'll be interesting, I think some of it will depend on the pitching matchups." If the AL team with the best record believes it'll be an advantage to use four starters on regular rest, it may choose the series that begins Oct. 3. If the team wants to use three starters and have its ace available in Games 1 and 4 on regular rest, it likely would choose the Oct. 4 series. "We're just trying to get into the playoffs," said Cleveland general manager Mark Shapiro, who could use Cy Young candidates C.C. Sabathia and Fausto Carmona in four of the five games. "There are different ways to look at it. You could decide that you're better off going with three starters, or decide that it would be too awkward with all of the off-days to consistently play well." This also is the first time there will be a travel day before a potential Game 5 in each first-round series. There also is an extra off-day in the best-of-seven Championship Series in both leagues, with off-days scheduled between Games 2 and 3 and Games 4 and 5. The World Series, which will open on Wednesday, Oct. 24, will keep the traditional format of two off days. The playoff matchups remain the same. The team with the best record in each league will play the wild-card winner, unless the wild-card team is from the same division. If the season ended today, Boston would play Cleveland, and the Angels would play the Yankees. The Mets would face San Diego in the NL with Arizona playing the Cubs or Milwaukee.

Yeah I would think he'll be having knee surgery whenever the Mets season ends.

Yancy Street Gang wrote: When, and how, are they going to stop doing the NYPD and FDNY caps? You know they're not going to be doing it in 2075, so at some point it's going to stop. I guess they'll do it when they sense that few people will care. As we can tell by the outcry about Channel 7 originally deciding not to televise the reading of the names, that year hasn't arrived yet. It's a touchy subject to say the least,I suppose they will wear the hats for the 10 year anniversary ,then the 15 year and 20,25 is important and so is 30....it might never end and really wearing the hats on the 11th is fine by me.

Sounds silly but trying to pick the AL outfield was not easy,it's just not that good IMO.....or many of them are having crap seasons.

My AL East team. C -Varitek 1B - Carlos Pena 2B - B.J. Upton 3B - Rodriguez SS - Miguel Tejada OF - Nick Markakis OF - Alexis Rios OF - Manny Ramirez DH - David Ortiz SP - Beckett SP - Roy Halladay SP - James Shields SP - Chien-Ming Wang SP -Erik Bedard

I think the NL Central matches up good against the NL East. I should say my NL Central team...

I'll try the NL Central. C - Johnny Estrada 1B -Prince Fielder 2B - Brandon Phillips 3B - Aramis Ramirez SS - J.J. Hardy OF - Ken Griffey OF - Jason Bay OF - Carlos Lee SP -Carlos Zambrano SP - Roy Oswalt SP - Ted Lilly SP - Tom Gorzelanny SP - Aaron Harang

Coming to a book store near you. ] Feinstein, Moose & Glav John Feinstein, the wonderful author of the unforgettable 1987 best-seller "A Season on the Brink," about coach Bobby Knight and the champion University of Indiana Hoosiers, has been on the Glavine-Mike Mussina trail for nearly a year now, picking the pitchers' brains for a book about them to be released before the 2008 season. The following is my interview with Feinstein about this project and these two intriguing figures. When did you come up with this book? Actually, the concept came to me in 1999. I wanted to write a book about pitching, using someone who was not only great at doing it but who was also really smart, who could describe what he does and how he got to be so great. My original choice was David Cone. I thought he'd be perfect. But, unfortunately for me, I ultimately learned that he already had a commitment to do a book with (the famous "New Yorker" writer) Roger Angell. I then revisited the concept this winter and boiled it down to four pitchers: Glavine, Mussina, John Smoltz and Jamie Moyer. I eventually decided on Tom and Mike. I knew them both very well and I liked the idea of one Met and one Yankee, one lefty and one righty, both fairly deep into their careers, and who made huge changes by signing with New York teams � and, for a time, struggled, Tom more on the mound, Mike more in the clubhouse. Were they immediately receptive to doing it? Tom was much easier to sell. Mike had a lot of questions, such as: "How much time will this involve?" and "How often will you need to see me?" Mike is very careful. I needed to talk to him three, four times until he agreed. But once he committed to it, he was terrific. What have you learned about them? Well, they both have sneaky senses of humor. Tom is very dry, while Mike is razor sharp. Mike has a T-shirt that sums him up totally; on top, it reads, "National Sarcasm Society," but underneath reads the line: "Like we really need your support." Tom is more easy-going; I can talk to him before one of his starts and he doesn't mind at all. But if you try that with Mike, he might bark at you. Both have really good memories, although Mike is more precise, knows his career down to the exact numbers. Their approaches are different, though. Like Tom has never had trouble working with a catcher. In fact, Lo Duca told me that Tom is the easiest pitcher he's ever worked with, that Tom has shaken him off just one time in two years. On the other hand, Mike will shake off his catcher around 50 percent of the time. Who's the smarter one? Funny you should ask that. I joked with Tom one day that I thought Mike was smarter than he is, and Tom, in typical fashion, laughed and agreed. But the truth is, there is no smarter pitcher than Glavine in the game and if the Mets young pitchers have any smarts they will follow him around and learn from him, everything from how to throw a proper bullpen to how to throw the perfect breaking ball. In fact, Jamie Moyer told me that for years he carried a videotape around of Glavine's Game 6 clincher in the 1995 World Series (a one-hitter over eight innings), that he considered it the definitive game of a lefty who doesn't throw hard but was as close to perfect as anyone can be. Are you interviewing only Glavine and Mussina for this book? Not at all. Paul Lo Duca (who will go through Tom's 300th win pitch by pitch), Rick Peterson, Jorge Posada, Joe Torre, Ron Guidry and Willie Randolph, among others, will play roles in the book. I talked to all the important people in these pitchers' lives. There's a lot of back story, which is what I've always done in my books.

I'm assuming that Glavine means coming back as a Mets player,I think anyway. Just to add to what Edgy posted.....Glavine can decline the players option if it becomes guaranteed,which of course it did once 160 innings were reached.

Here's the article,I vote for him back as a Mets player. ] NEW YORK -- New York Mets left-hander Tom Glavine is still having fun playing baseball and wants to return for a 22nd major league season in 2008, the New York Post reported. Tom Glavine Glavine "I'm having as much fun as I've had in a long time, and that's a big factor for me,'' Glavine, 41, told the Post. "It's a fun team to come to the ballpark with every day. All the factors are there [to come back].'' Glavine, who won his 300th game on Aug. 5, says he has two criteria for returning next season -- how well he's pitching and how he's feeling physically. "That's the question I have to wait and see, but as far as going out there and having fun and doing the things I have to do to be successful, there's been nothing there that makes me think I am going to walk away," he told the Post. And as much as Glavine wants to spend more time with his family, he says his wife and their four children, aged 6 to 13, support another season. "Surprisingly, my kids are more on the side of me playing next year than not. I think that is in large part because they understand what I am doing," Glavine said, according to the Post. "They enjoy coming to the ballpark and being around the guys. They like the game of baseball. I think they are really starting to figure out that, 'Dad's a Major League Baseball player and it's pretty fun going to the games.'" Glavine is 13-6 with a 3.95 ERA this season and has 303 career wins, currently 21st all-time. Only three other left-handers have more wins than Glavine: Warren Spahn (363), Steve Carlton (329) and Eddie Plank (326).

Perez - 4 Wright - 2 Reyes - 1 Beltran - 1 Heilman - 1 Wagner - 1

seawolf17 wrote: Pretty catch by Carlos Beltran to end it. Looks like they fixed Willie Collazo's name on his uni. Was just going to post that...great game.

Rockin' Doc wrote: Six consecutive ground outs to second base for the Mets. Hey guys, you don't have to hit it to Prado. Seven now,amazin.