Frayed Knot

I predict his mere presence and attitude will make them into a winning team ... oh wait!

Mex17 wrote: MFS62 wrote: Bigot? In what way? Do you have any sources you can provide? Later Pick up the book "Lords of the Realm". btw, If you read 'Lords of the Realm' you may remember the passage about how Doubleday locked himself into a 20-year deal with Cablevision despite the advice from MLB HQ that it would be much better to go with shorter deals that could be re-upped sooner at higher rates. "Go fuck yourselves" I think was Nelson's reply to that advice. The point being that it turned out to be a not very smart business decision and one that almost certainly held back the team financially while the Yanx were able to sign their landmark deal with MSG in 1989 at a huge increase (while they were definitively NOT the hotter NY property) and then go on to start YES when that deal was over all while the Mets were playing with the same early '80s contract that eventually outlasted the owner who insisted on it. By the time it was finally coming to an end it was so past its sell-by date that Wilpon felt it better to pay a big fee and buy themselves out of the last year - possibly costing a player or two - just in order to get SNY started rather than living with the outdated deal one more season.

The deal was that Wilpon, who was a minority owner (about 10% I think) when Doubleday first purchased the team, had a clause in his contract (or whatever you call an ownership agreement) that he could get the right of first refusal to become an equal partner in the team if/when the team was sold. So when it was sold from Doubleday the company to Doubleday the person Fred exercised that right and, as a result, increased his ownership (as in paid enough of the re-sale price) to a full 50%. That Doubleday was unaware of that clause, or that he didn't want to share, or that he decided he didn't like having a Jew partner, or that he just didn't like Wilpon for whatever reason is HIS problem not Fred's, and it certainly doesn't make it a "swindle".

Edgy DC wrote: Did Parnell warm up at all in the ninth? I'd be perfectly happy with the two of them as a lefty/righty closer tandem. He was warming in the 8th. The only Astro LHBs in the lineup batted in the 8th which is why Pedro was in when he was. So with nothing but RHBs in the 9th Parnell either wasn't considered or Jerry thought the LH-hitting bench players were more of a threat than the 9-1-2 guys coming up. No, I don't think the Mets have called anybody up. Their website still shows Rodriguez on the roster so perhaps he hasn't yet been added to the Physically Unable to Conform to the Rules of Decent Society List. Not officially on the DL yet either as far as I can tell. This season ending surgery thing isn't a done deal as of yet and I could see Frankie & agent wanting a 2nd opinion just to cover his ass about the NYM doctors making up or exaggerating the injury just to get him out of sight.

-- Matt Harvey, rhp, Mets (No.7): His $2.525 million bonus was $347,000 over slot and the largest paid by New York since it gave Mike Pelfrey a team-record $3.55 million (as part of a $5.25 million big league contract) in 2005. It is NOT - unlike Pelfrey & also Humber before him - a 'Major League' contract, something that would have put him immediately on the 40-man and shorten his timetable to the majors. Not sure what his workload in college was but, either way, I doubt we'll see anything of him this year until maybe the fall/winter leagues. Harper got an ML deal with Washington which is a bit risky for a guy who'd only be going into his Sr year of HS normally. The only other one I can remember who got a ML deal any younger was the absolutely idiotic deal the Yanx gave the then 16 y/o Wily Mo Pena. Several picks in the top half of the 1st round wound up NOT signing, including #6 Barret Loux to the DBacks who earlier in the week failed a physical also #9 Karsten Whitson, a HS pitcher who was rumored to be one of the Mets top choices. He chose college over San Diego's money. #14 Dylan Covey (Brewers) another HS pitcher who shockingly was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes recently. Will also head to college instead.

I was just about to mention the Astros winning a judgement against Chacon so maybe that gives the Mets some hope on this front. But the bottom line is that there's not a lot of precedence on this one way or the other so most of what we're going to hear about how this eventually turns out will be 99% guess-work at this point.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: Because having designated ninth-inning guys is a bad thing. Just because it's become standard, doesn't mean it's right. Jerry said in the paper today that the Mets will go with closer by committee, with the day's closer being determined by matchups. How isn't that good news? I hope it catches on! I'd put it more like having a designating a guy strictly as your ninth inning guy isn't the ideal thing, which is not necessarily the same thing as meaning that the presence of that guy on the roster is a bad thing. Now the contract and the behavior make it a different story but I wouldn't say that the Mets are a better team on the field now than they were last week on account of Frankie's busted thumb.

Mex17 wrote: Frayed Knot wrote: Which says more, in my mind, about the presence of Cashen than it does about the presence of Doubleday. And quite a bit more about the enhanced presence of Wilpon once he bought (swindled?) an additional 49% of the team from Doubleday after 1986 and injected himself moreso into the operation. Swindled? C'mon now. Do you want to actually have a discussion about this or are you just going to stick the black hat on Wilpon in any instance whether it fits or not?

Nelson got caught mumbling some anti-Jewish remarks at one point (or maybe more than one) although I forget the specific details.

There is/was a supposed sizable gap between the top 4 picks and the group after that - so if Tallion got "only" $5mil then Harvey might be pricing himself out if he holds out for $4.5 On the other hand, I don't think that price is all that high for a 7th pick. Yonder Alonso - a college 1B drafted 11 spots ahead of Ike in the same draft - got right about $4.5 as the 7th pick two years ago. Sometimes it depends on not just the money but how it all gets structured and how many years it's spread out over.

Not sure what the "slot" figure for the 7th pick is supposed to be so I don't know whether $4.5 is super-high or only kind of high. That Harvey - and most of the rest of the top 10 picks - were going to ask for above-slot money was pretty much a given.

Ooooh wait, that wasn't just DEREK JETER hitting into a game-losing GiDP with the tying run on 2nd and the bases loaded was it?!?!?

Hisanori with ... A Perfect Save !!!! Meanwhile, teams with supposed real closers are blowing up shit all over the place. Dodgers cough up 4 in the 9th and lose to the Braves. And now Valverde of Detroit is doing his best to blow a 3-0 9th inning lead in da Bronx. (and, yes, the Yanqui game which started an hour earlier than ours with the same number of runs scored is still going).

Which says more, in my mind, about the presence of Cashen than it does about the presence of Doubleday.

Hey lookie here, another opponent run after two-out/nobody on.

I fail to understand the Met fan (mostly belated) love for Nelson Doubleday. He was (IMO) the typical rich guy to whom the team was an expensive toy and who CLEARLY became disinterested in owning the team after a while. Not that any of that makes him a bad guy necessarily (although at times was both a drunk and a bigot according to various sources) just hardly my idea of the ideal owner.

If Fred already has stepped back and Jeff is doing more (and I think that's probably true although not quite the same as Harper "disinterested" line) then I don't see where it matters if titles have changed place or not. And if Fred still is running things just not as publicly as before then it really doesn't matter that titles haven't changed place.

I don't think this has any effect on the contract situation. Maybe it allows them to get out of part of this year's bill (approx 1/4 of 1 year) but the real test comes if and when the legal process gives them an opportunity to explore an out in the remainder of the deal. I doubt it ever will, but even if it does that won't be for a while yet and the injury really has no effect there. attgig wrote: so, the question rears its head again... who's our closer? If they're smart, the answer is, whoever is most rested/available for that night and/or matches up with the upcoming hitters best. What they most likely WILL do is designate a specific someone and 'save' him for closer spots unless and until he botches one or two at which point they'll designate a different guy and start the whole process over again.

What Seaver has said recently, mostly in response to questions about how closely he follows the game, is that since he's working farmer's hours 3,000 miles from CitiField he's pretty much come full circle and follows the game the way he originally followed it, and that's through boxscores.

Remember that Tampa had TEN years of not only bad baseball but of consecutive sub-70 win teams and the high draft picks associated with each before they started turning things around. It's one thing to tear stuff down and start again from scratch, it's another to assume that that route is a guaranteed path to success.

1) The part about Fred "clearly" not having any interest in the team he owns is quite a statement for Harper to throw out there and then not explain other than connecting it to some stupid throw-away line about Minaya last week that was designed to do nothing more than change the subject. 2) Don't get too hung up on specific titles as if the duties associated with each are exactly the same in different companies or in different eras 3) the GM as COO (or whatever label you want to hand him) is a remnant of the past at this point. As Gary Cohen explained during the NYM HoF day a few weeks back, Cashen was in large part responsible for hiring him (Cohen) whereas today's GMs would have neither the power nor interest in deciding who the radio guy was today. It's much more an on-field only personnel job these days.

I've heard Kurkjian talk about this in the past and it was mostly just habit that kept him doing it this long. Obviously he began the practice long before these things were available via the internet and certainly before the internet was available everywhere. It was more a home reference for him (I doubt he lugged the book around with him) as well as a way to make sure he saw each of the boxscores especially for games which he didn't see or see hi-lights from. After all, just because boxscores are available every day doesn't mean everyone reads them but if you're - literally - cutting and pasting them, you do.

"I think that his balls out commitment to the absurdity of his characters works well in a tv sketch ... but is ultimately grating and unsustainable for 2 hours of storytelling. He is best in small doses, as an added flavor, rather than the main ingredient." You could just about wash, rinse & repeat that for most SNL alumni. I was kind of disappointed in Ricky Bobby - such an easy target to parody and only the occasional hit. I found the ice-skating send-up much better even with the absurd premise and maybe more over-the-top jokes. Never got around to 'Anchorman' even though that tends to get better lip service than most, and you'd have to beat me repeatedly before I'd even attempt to sit through 'Step-Brothers'

Gwreck wrote: Frayed Knot wrote: - and just under 1/3 of the total save opps (66, or 32.5%) were 'Perfect' saves. Or, looked at another way, of games that are saved, just under 40% are perfect. I'm betting that a majority of fans would guess that number to be much higher - like well over half. It think it depends on the situation. A "perfect save" when it's a 1 run lead is an accomplishment. Giving up a baserunner (or even two) when it's a 3-run lead is far less consequential. I'm sure there could be a metric for this, something like [(Hits + HBP + Unintentional Walks / "1 run save situations") * x] and we could call is "close save efficiency." Yeah, differentiating the data between 1, 2, & 3 run saves might have been more informative - although with the way closers are used in modern baseball the managers rarely make a distinction when choosing to go to their closer unless the lead gets to 4 runs or more. Plus, I was more trying to get a gauge on the usual complaint about how often your team's closer "makes you nervous", or "can't ever make it easy" etc. I suspect most fans think that closers have 1-2-3 innings a lot more than they actually do, so when their closer gives up a 9th inning baserunner under any circumstances the whole stadium/home audience lapses into a kind of 'here we go again' mode no matter what the score. That proposed metric sounds like something the geeks at 'Baseball Prospectus' would come up with (along with some god-awful accompanying acronym) - and they probably do have one although I doubt they have it broken out to the specific 'closer situations' that I'm using here.

NYM 2010 Runs Allowed: 0 outs = 19.57 % 1 outs = 38.06 % 2 outs = 42.37 % NL 2010 Runs Allowed: 0 outs = 23.13 % 1 outs = 38.82 % 2 outs = 38.05 % So that's somewhat skewed against our staff's "clutchness", although not nearly as lopsided as what I remember from the time I did this a couple seasons back.