Edgy MD

One-Dog and Clark Bar are your correct answers. Each of you give yourselves a pat on the back. One guy was a teammate of both Pee-Wee Reese and Bud Harrelson. Name that guy.

Youse know this, folks. Neither of these two guys came directly from the Cards, or are even particularly known as Cardinals, but each started their career with St. Louis, joining the Mets a team or more later in the same offseason, and ultimately left in the same trade a year and a half later, while "I'll Be Missing You" by Puff Daddy and Faith Evans featuring 112 was topping the charts. [youtube:2maebs21]mM0-ZU8njdo[/youtube:2maebs21]

I guess it depends on who you want to put through waivers to make room for him, but he looks like a player to me.

McEwing indeed played with Ordóñez with the 2001 Mets, but he did not play with José Oquendo. He did, however, come of age on a Cardinal team that boasted a coaching staff that included Oquendo who, in fact, has no tilde over his N. Maybe he's the one who taught McEwing how to be scrappy. We're looking for two guys, a starting pitcher and an outfielder, both of whom played only a year and a half with the team, but in neither case was it an insignificant year and a half. Both stayed healthy, contributed, and left behind some memories. Both ended their Mets tenures as part of the same trade.

Papa says, ‘If you see it in The Kaplan Herald, it’s so.’

This is me totally falling for fake news, by the way. Ty is still a free agent. (Go get him, Mets!)

Berroa is our last BFA honoree! I think "Friend Award" has a really genial sound, considering the politically charged drama of crossing town mid-season. I think it should be a thing, and the Mets and Yanks should host Friend, Bragg, Berroa and Tanana at the next Subway Series, perhaps honoring one per game.

I think it's great to show up at the ballpark and see a guy in the starting lineup that had been added that day in a transaction you missed. Even moreso when it's not a guy that was on the 40 — perhaps a journeyman minor leaguer that got the happiest tap on his shoulder, or perhaps a surprising waiver claim. Obviously, this is far less likely in our media-saturated age, and sure, such a character in the lineup probably means lower odds of winning, but going to a Met game and meeting a new Met? That's value added. My big moments of being present for an unexpected launch were Craig Paquette and Shawn Hare. Both might have been double-switch specialists of little account, but as a guy who is descended from a line of Quebeçois carpenters named Paquette, I was thrilled. Come on, 2009 infielder. Who's our last Friend Award Winner?

Well, I'm uncertain about that standard, since the Y's there are serving as vowels, but on those terms, Ed Lynch ties Ty's score at 85.7.

Tanana is correct. And Greer's uninterrupted streak of Metly perfection continues on in it's 24th year. I wonder if the Mets got any Greer compensation when he signed with the Giants. The only other Friend Award winner I'm aware of is a 2009 infielder.

Ty Kelly, briefly a funny, skinny utility Met, has been claimed by the Blue Jays.

The Mets have a history stretching back to something like 1996 of seeing infielders blossom after giving up on them. Kent and Vizcaino and Vina and Wigginton and Keppinger and Turner. On one hand, it's a downside of shopping for bigger names, that there's no room for the guys you've been developing. On the other hand, it sometimes demonstrates a lack of faith in the scouting decisions that brought them into your fold in the first place. On the other hand, it speaks well of the scouting decisions in the first place. On the fourth hand, I don't know. But yeah, a guy costs a roster spot and an inflated salary that you believe he isn't worth, so while it certainly represents an error, I wouldn't call it unforced. This is why there are dozens and dozens of non-tenders every year at Thanksgiving. And as for versatility, virtually every reserve/platoon infielder boasts the same calling card. Almost every infielder comes up with the tag of versatility until he loses it by hitting enough to stick somewhere. You don't think Gavin Cecchini would play second, third, short, left, right, third-string catcher, and drive the Zamboni if he thought it would keep him in the bigs? The Mets had three reserve infielders around that time who were better hitters than defenders: Turner, Satin, and Campbell. They cycled one in when another failed. It's a strategy that works until guys run out of options. Turner ran out while another guy was ahead of him on the depth chart. Maybe (probably?) their failure was in not coaching him and conditioning him to his full potential, though he still looks fat to me.

Bragg is our outfielder. Picked up by the Yankees when the Mets waived him, and immediately confessed his lifelong Yankee fandom. Darren allegedly wore 56 to honor Lawrence Taylor, and was the recipient of this wise advice from Mets by the Numbers: "It's easier to DFA a guy wearing 56 than a guy wearing 11. Think of your career, man! Man, Ms. Met loved her some Darren Bragg, and was spitting mad to see him cross town.

You assure him personally. Or better yet, you just do it. Sign deGrom (and maybe Syndergaard) to an extension and tell him if he signs right now he can share the podium at the press conference, shaking hands with a favorite son. I think announcing an intent to spend money is a losing play. For one, it gives agents the upper hand. "I got the same offer from Seattle, Sandy, and I KNOW you've got more money because your owner has been talking out of school." For two, money talks and bullshit walks.

Matt Lawton was on both teams, but several years apart. To review, were looking for guys who were: [*:h2mgy4w8]Both a Yankee and a Met,[/*:m:h2mgy4w8] [*:h2mgy4w8]in the same season,[/*:m:h2mgy4w8] [*:h2mgy4w8]but never played for either team in any other season.[/*:m:h2mgy4w8][/list:o:h2mgy4w8]

Not Sabes. Never a Yankee, and he was a multi-year Met.

I take it back. Watson doesn't qualify for the Friend award. Sorry, Allen. Please send that plaque back at your earliest convenience.

Indeed he was. Two others that come to mind include a 2001 outfielder and a 1993 starting pitcher.

Rich Rodriguez was originally signed by the Mets after they drafted him in the ninth round of the 1984 draft, but after four and half years toiling in the Mets system, was dealt off off to the Padres in an all-minor league deal for Brad Pounders and Bill Stevenson, neither of whom would so much as cut a fart in a major league dugout, and indeed would total over 7 plate appearances between themselves in the minors before collectively packing it in. Rodriguez would go on to a 12-year big-league career, including terms as a teammate of José Oquendo on the 1994 and 1995 Cardinals and Rey Ordóñez on the 2000 Mets, a hapless tenure many a grumpy Met fan attributed to Rich's cozy days as a Met minor leaguer, rooming with a certain future GM named Steve Phillips. MoFo poster McGarrett threatened to have Rich Rodriguez arrested for impersonating a major league pitcher, but following his spring 2001 release, the indegatigable RichRod continued on to throw 59 1/3 innings over the next two seasons for three different teams. Two more dudes.

Not Mister Cook, Señor Reynoso, or Herr Herr. The second of the two pitchers and the outfielder were involved in the same deal.

I hate to pin a film on associations one personality, but we've had bad experiences with Zoe Kazan features in the past and didn't stick this one out past the eight-minute mark. Should we have?

I'm kind of a sucker for the idea of continuing the weird Mets tradition of getting coverboy Asian pitchers after their initial phenom period, but while they are still nonetheless grinding it out and surprisingly continuing to be a winning asset: Hideo Nomo, Daisuke Matsuzaka, Chan-Ho Park ... . Darvish is wine that is not yet past it's time.

Centerfield wrote: I disagree. The premise has been set in an article by his colleague. If you want to challenge his source that is one thing, but Vaccaro is not assuming a premise. Sure he is. Puma's claim is that Fred was angry at the Yankees, but not that Fred (or his son or brother-in-law) hated owning the Mets. That's Vaccaro's own notion there. If it were true, then sure, encourage him to let go of his misery. But Vacarro's asking us to jump from "Fred got angry when the Yankees grabbed a big contract" to "Fred hates owning the Mets."

I'm not comfortable with the article being built on a premise (the Wilpons hate owning the Mets) that the author feels no obligation to establish, instead relying on "let him come out and show me it's not true." It kind of stinks of President-Obama-was-born-in-Kenya logic.

I gave it three, but I switched to two. I'm kind of tired of being generous. YOU be generous, Disney, and stop disguising dumping a whole bunch of everything into the film as story.