Edgy MD

According to reports (for what that may be worth), The Mets have added veteran infielder Christian Arroyo on a minor-league contract. While Arroyo has not had a career that screams out about his first-round pedigree, he had a solid four-year run as a part time infielder with Boston before spending 2025 minor-leaguing it for the Phillies. Note: Virtually nothing in this deal has anything to do with Kyle Tucker, Framber Valdez, or Tarik Skubal. [FIMG=600]https://nesn.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2022/08/Christian_Arroyo.jpg[/FIMG]

No, he is absolutely known and proven to have been juicing. Beyond that, he launched a very Trump-like public campaign to personally attack and discredit the persons and lab behind the tests he failed.

The legacy sequel — returning to revisit (and perhaps do a soft reboot of) a property a generation or two after the prior film — is more than a sequel. It is a cry for help from an industry at sea without a paddle.

I mean, wouldn't we all be served better if the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (to use as a metaphor) spent a year, instead of elevating a previously disposable quickly rejected candidacy like Styx or Men at Work at their annual gathering, instead taking a look at why the art form they celebrate becomes more of a culturally inconsequential relic every year, and asking hard questions like, "Is Vampire Weekend really the best we can do?"? I have no problem with a thoughtful and scholarly review of the cases for Willie Randolph or Willie McGee or Willie Wilson on occasion. I have a big problem with elevating them because things have gotten dry of late and we need living candidates to help us pretend things are peachy over the course of HoF weekend.

So, the Hall of Fame was lying when they wrote this?

That is probably pretty close to accurate. The main caveats that would pushback against that would be that, while none of see upside in Clay Holmes,see upside in David Peterson, see bounce-back potential from Sean Manaea (it would be hard to get less), and bullish on getting a full season from Nolan McLean ... is unreasonable, banking on all of it is, so it is understandable that folks may hope for a stronger hedge against that. Unmentioned is that the fifth member of the rotation — Kodai Senga — is also looking for a bounce-back year. The hedges they otherwise would otherwise be counting on would largely be the emergence of the next generation of starting pitchers as the season progresses and the needs presumably present themselves.

Disagreeing with Anthony DiComo to a degree is Paul Blackburn. https://nypost.com/2026/01/03/sports/paul-blackburn-tells-the-post-why-2025-mets-clubhouse-didnt-mesh/

“We don’t believe in a playoff system because of the tradition and history of baseball.A playoff system would be in contradiction to these traditions. You can have teams finishing fourth or fifth percentage-wise and then playing the champion of the other league in the World Series. We do not believe the public will accept this. The World Series is the greatest event in sports, and it is dangerous to tamper with it.” — NL President Warren Giles, speaking to The Associated Press, 1968 Giles, of course, was mocked, but he was not wrong. Not from my perspective, anyhow. In what would have been a fun sort of chaos, there was a very real chance that the American League was going to switch to division play in 1969 while Giles and the NL stuck with one big homogenous, 12-team bunch. As with so many shortsighted rule changes, the Mets were held up as an object lesson, as AL President Joe Cronin came back with “You can’t sell a 12th-place club. Who wants a lot of second-division clubs?” Of course, that club destined for perpetual second-division status and presumably a regular 12th-place finisher won the world championship in the first year of division play.

I think he might if the team's internal conversations suggest it is the kind of risk to embrace. I don't think any GM is outright risk avoidant, but they all have different philosophies of risk management. There was a time when the richest teams could roll the dice on any and all of the very biggest names and consider risk the cost of doing business. But the luxury tax penalties (that have become a salary cap of a different name) has made that far less tenable. As written above, Valdez has had an unusually strong track record of staying on the field for a 21st-century starting pitcher, and while there is only so much guarantee that can offer, it may be a tipping point for Stearns. That said, I don't need a boot to drop.

I imagine not, but I tend to think inducting people just to get more wattage into the event is shortsighted. With just a little imagination, a Hall-of-Fame weekend with no inductions at all could be wonderful.

Just ... please don't. Please.

He was not the Mets' baserunning coach.

Transactions, 12/30/2026 [table][tr][th]Direction[/th][td90]GOING[/td90][/tr] [tr][th]Transaction [/th][td90]Signed away by ATL to Minor-League Contract, Invited to Spring Training[/td90][/tr] [tr][th]Position Group [/th][th] Outfielders[/th][/tr] [tr][th][/th][td90][fimg=90]https://img.mlbstatic.com/mlb-photos/image/upload/d_people:generic:headshot:67:current.png/w_213,q_auto:best/v1/people/640492/headshot/67/current[/fimg][/td90][/tr] [tr][th]Name [/th][td90]José Azocar [fimg=50]https://metsrostercentral.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/venezuelan-flag-small.jpg[/fimg][/td90][/tr] [tr][th]DoB[/th][td90]1996-05-11[/td90][/tr] [tr][th]B/T[/th][td90]R/R[/td90][/tr] [tr][th]High Level[/th][td90]MLB (2025)[/td90][/tr][/table] Jose Azocar, 2025 Met, is in the middle of something of a tug o' war, having gone from the Mets to the Braves to the Mets last season and now heading back to the Braves again, despite the Mets' apparent shortfall of outfielders. We are not saying he won't finish the season without leaving the Braves organization (and perhaps returning) again, but you would be a fool to bet on it. Transactions, 1/2/2026 [table][tr][th]Direction[/th][td90]GOING[/td90][/tr] [tr][th]Transaction [/th][td90]Hired away by WAS as Director of Base Running, Game Play, and Defense[/td90][/tr] [tr][th]Position Group [/th][th]Co-Hitting Coach[/th][/tr] [tr][th][/th][td90][fimg=90]https://img.mlbstatic.com/mlb-photos/image/upload/d_people:generic:headshot:83:current.png/ar_1:1,c_pad,b_auto:border/r_max/w_180,q_auto:best/v1/people/571465/headshot/83/coach/current[/fimg][/td90][/tr] [tr][th]Name [/th][td90]Jeremy Barnes [fimg=50]https://metsrostercentral.files.wordpress.com/2023/12/usa_m.png[/fimg][/td90][/tr] [tr][th]DoB[/th][td90]1987-04-13[/td90][/tr] [tr][th]B/T[/th][td90]R/R[/td90][/tr] [tr][th]High Level[/th][td90]MLB (2025)[/td90][/tr][/table] The Mets' 2025 "co-hitting coach" joins the division rivals in what appears to be a non-dugout role with a big portfolio that includes a whole lot of everything, but many Internet-using Met fans will be quick to tell you does not include hitting. It is, in fact, very reminiscent of him initially being hired hired from Houston by the Mets back in 2021 and having role of "director of player development initiatives" seemingly carved for him out of whole cloth. Indeed, before he became "co-hitting coach," he initially joined the manager's staff as Also referred to as "assistant coach" and "data coach." This strikes me as a guy who impresses organizations with his big baseball mind, but comes up short in working with actual baseball players. Teams want him, but his energy says "uniform guy" and his brain says "front office guy," so they create these hybrid gigs for him while trying to figure out the fit. Maybe if he shaved and got a new tailor, he'd be a GM by now. Maybe if he developed a nasty tobacco habit and a foul mouth, he'd be a manager. Some of us just gotta pick our lane.

I stand in steadfast if quixotic defense of two 16s — or, ideally, one 32.

And to continue, it seems to me that, when a number retirement is such an afterthought of a gesture that you have to remove it from somebody else's back in order to retire it, it is more of a performative pantomime of an honor than a solemn one. It would be more convincing if any official number retirement was preceded by a period of unofficial retirement. But back to 26,

In one of the more curious head-scratchers among the long history of head-scratching moves that the Mets have long made when trying to define their identity, they announced on September 24, 2019, of all days, with the team trying to mount a late-season run that would prove to be too late to overcome a long mid-season slump (with locker-room melodrama!), that they would be retiring #36 in honor of Jerry Koosman, 40 years after the enigmatic lefthander had last played for the team. The expected and unexpected repercussions of this move would be many, but perhaps the first was that manager Mickey Callaway was forced to shed his digits and spend the last week of the season — and what would prove to be the last week of his Mets managerial career — with a new numerical identifier. He chose #26 for his rebrand — and while that may only technically qualify him for this poll — he went 5-1 while donning his shiny new integers, both opening and closing the run with walkoff victories (the latter being the remarkable back-from-the-dead Dominic Smith moment). Hey maybe he does deserve a vote or two. Maybe Mickey 36 was Mickey-of-the-Darkness, while Mickey 26 was Mickey-of-the-Light.

Mongo no go to New York City. Mongo lack funds. Stupid Mets no hire Mongo.

The only way to square it to sign the right players on the right terms and walk away from those whose terms are not worth it. Be nimble, trust that you bring something to the table too, and realize that there are always other otters in the stream. It is a lot like love, actually.

Does Jay have chapter about the butt-dialing?

A three-year deal with two opt-outs is something of a double trap, though. The worse he does, the longer you keep him. The better he does, the shorter you keep him. During the Alonso negotiations from last year, David Stearns declared himself to be leery of the lack of reciprocity in such deals.

According to the wonderful and still active Mets by the Numbers, Bruce's initial late season 1974 tenure, from September 11 to October 3, was as a 26. He returned to the minors in 1975 before re-emerging in 1976 as a glorious 4 — the Mets apparently being in some sort of rush to put the Rusty Staub legacy behind them. So if you are blessed to meet Bruce Boisclair, perhaps the most illuminating question you can ask would be: was he by nature a 4, forced to take 26 in 1974 due to the far more juicy presence of Staub? Or was he, alternatively, a 26 by nature and sensibility, but forced to go with 4 from 1976 onward, due to the far more juicy presence of Kingman? A doorway in Mets history hangs on the squeaky hinge of his answer.

One of the least-credible candidacies may have been the first — Eddie Alvarez, the already-hard-to-remember utility infielder from 2024 who, to his credit, somehow managed to post a positive bWAR despite going 0-for-9 with a walk at the plate. This statistical oddity may or may not be due to him entering as a pinch-runner in his first game as a Met, scoring the go ahead — and what would ultimately prove to be the winning — run on a passed ball. Sadly, baseball-reference gives him no measurable positive bWAR for his single inning of one-hit shutout ball on the mound. Anyhow, with King Kong in the lead as the new year passes, here is wishing a happy 20Kingman to all. May The Year of David Arthur be blessed one.

Mazzilli is disco. Kingman is, like, Foghat.

A Kingman endorsement speaks for itself!

Please don't take a dubious position, just to distinguish yourself. You're all about Ralph Milliard and always have been? Please be prepared to back that up! We need hard data here!