Edgy MD

Nymr83 wrote: they were all pretty bad defensively, but he was bad offensively too and he did it over more innings (hurting them more.) That's absurd. 1) It's almost impossible to be on the extreme right side of the defensive spectrum and be a net negative defensively. Just by being there and allowing better hitters to play other positions you're a positive. 2) By what standard are you claiming he (and everyone else the Mets ran out there) performed defensively beneath a replacement level catcher, let alone a general replacement level player? That's just a shocking disaster to consider and I'd imagine we wouldn't have all missed it. i'd really like to argue more about 2B though... Of course you would.

Nymr83 wrote: 2. why the LoDuca-love? he had an 85 OPS+ and is not a good defensive catcher By what measure is he bad? CatcherGGSIPTCPOAEDPFP%RFZRPBSBCSCS%CERAPaul Lo Duca113112974.079775434950.9897.280.8892722223.40%4.12

That implies it's not worth anything and I know you don't believe that. Lo Duca was clearly the best catcher on the Mets this season by all defensive measures.

What's catching worth?

Both of you are a pretty good score in Scrabble.

Yancy Street Gang wrote: I know that some saves are more difficult than others, but many of them are not all that difficult. But, as you see, in general they've been more difficult than you categorize them. Yancy Street Gang wrote: And I don't believe that the ninth inning closer faces tougher hitters than any other pitchers. The opposing team can be at any point in their lineup when he comes into the game. They could be at 3-4-5 or at 7-8-9. And the available pinch hitters in the ninth inning may or may not be dangerous. This is stubborn. Of course, they're more dangerous. Ether a team trying to come back in a save situation in the ninth has their better hitters come up, or they empty their bench to get their worst hitters out. Some pinch-hitters are better than others. All pinch-hitters are up there because they're considered more of a threat than the guy they're replacing. When was the last time you saw a closer face a pitcher? I don't like, and don't agree with, the whole role of the modern day closer. I don't blame you. This is no reason to derogate the closer himself or his performance. Does Wagner contribute to wins? Sure he does. But not nearly as much as the guys who score or drive in runs or the guys who pitch six, seven, or eight innings. Or, in Damion Easley's case, the guy who was a dangerous pinch-hitter for a month. How many Mets had an eight-inning start in 2007? Who would argue that a spotless save is more valuable than that. I wouldn't. But a bunch of them might be. I certainly haven't placed any single performance by a closer above any quality start of even six innings. But a closer's performances come more frequently. Bullpens are important. If you add up the Schaefer points of Wagner, Heilman, Feliciano, Smith, Schoeneweis, Mota, Sele, and Sosa (excluding his starts) you'll get a total that shows how important the bullpen is. But the way things are today, I can't argue that any one individual should be that highly ranked. I'd argue that the featured guy in the pen throwing the highest leverage innings all year, almost flawlessly the first half of the year, being worth more than a guy who was the best pinch-hitter for a month is pretty compelling.

Which (1) in fairness, isn't always as simple as that*, (2) isn't easy to do perfectly fifty times a year, (3) is generally against better competition than any other pitcher is asked to face, (4) is a rhetorial trick, as virtually all success can be termed a "lack of failure," certainly all success by pitchers If it was so easy, why is it so perceived that all these Mets have failed at it? *Of Wagner's 77 career saves with the Mets (playoffs included), I count 30 (38.96%) that have been with him entering with merely a one-run lead, and one in which he entered the game with one out in the eighth and a two-run lead and Jimmy Rollins on first.

I can't understand how cloers are bemoaned for decades (at least in Sisk's case, and Franco and Benitez are working on it) when they screw up, and dismissed when they succeed. If their failures are so costly, how are their successes so negligible? I want to hear from m.e.t.b.o.t.

Sure, but in the heat of the moment, the closer tends to get screwed in PotG voting. It's something we've observed every year.

They are re-evaluated. Feel free to go the rankings forum and add your voice to any season in which Trachs is ranked. The new list is factored in by everybody having his rank (the top guy getting a rank of 30) squared, multiplied by 88 (Met wins), divided by 10 (to chop a zero off the end, every score is divided by 10). This year's top player, presumably Wright, gets (30^2)*88/10 points added to his all-time total. That's 7,920 points, about the difference between David Cone and John Milner.

Zvon wrote: I suppose thats something. But we are talking about all-time Mets. Clearly, that's why I quoted his all-time ranking As a Met he went 66-59. Hey, maybe as far as pitching goes that's top 50 material. What's top-50 material? Are there 20 more accomplished pitchers? Not in my book, but this isn't my book we go by. It's a book written on consensus. In the post season he started 2 games and lasted a total of 4.1 innings with a 14.54 ERA. That sucks. It's also a small sample. To me, this really effects his standings in relation to what he accomplished for my team. Nobody goes backwards. That doesn't make sense. It's a cumulative total.

He's started the twelfth most games of any Mets pitcher, eleventh until Glavine passed him this month.

The only way to move up is for us to reconsider a past year. But obviously, your legacy is in place when you're done playing. The best you can do is hope hold your place for a long time.

So, Norrin/Vic gives us: 30 - Wright 29 - Beltran 28 - Reyes 27 - Perez 26 - Maine 25 - Delgado 24 - Hernandez 23 - Wagner T21.5 - Glavine T21.5 - Alou 20 - Heilman 19 - Green 18 - LoDuca 17 - Feliciano 16 - Castillo 15 - Milledge 14 - Sosa 13 - Easley 12 - Castro 11 - Gotay 10 - Martinez 9 - Smith 8 - Anderson 7 - Pelfrey 6 - Chavez 5 - Gomez 4 - Schoeneweis 3 - Mota 2 - Velentin 1 - Burgos

Smith's batting average against seemed shockingly high. He was seemingly redeemed by a similarly high gb/fb ratio. Maybe the Mets should put five infielders out there when he's pitching.

I just stumbled upon deleted scene 143. Is this better than, worse than, or about the same as the movie's standard?

The Tony Scott big idea: Men are incomplete until they create and merge with their big dick-shaped machines and become sexy monsters. It's fucking up the world but it's irresistable. Women and chillums can try and melt their machinery hearts and get them to use their power responsibly, but as long as the women show off them big big titties, men will be smashing their machines into stuff in some kind of apocolyptic (but sexy!) metal global hump, set to awful corporate rock music.

Well, directors often are forced to make their films with the studios' guns to their heads, and don't have the juice to make the film that they want to until years later.

Of course. And Wonder Woman is still in the pipeline, presumably. Do you want to introduce her as part of the team, or in her own feature? Would it detract from her own feature or add to it? Can they stick a contemporary WW in the Justice League and World War II WW in her own serial and not confuse audiences too much. Does Batman as conceived in Batman Begins exist in a universe without superpowers and Superman? This is key shit.

Not such a good idea. The notion behind superhero team-ups in the comics wasn't to create a new great-selling title, but to use the better-selling characters --- Batman and Superman --- to draw readership toward the lesser-sellers. Teams conceived as teams --- the X-Men and the Fantastic Four --- always made more compelling reading than dream teams like the Avengers and the Justice League, where getting all those guys in one room under any but the most dire universe-threatening circumstances would be a monumental waste of resources.

One female perfomer... "When Emily Loved Me" from Toy Story II. The same-sex chicks will love it. There's several other female-vocal songs from the Sherry Bobbins episode of The Simpsons. The Lurleen Lumpkin episode has "I'm Basting a Turkey with My Tears" and "Don't Look Up My Dress Unless You Mean It," among others.

For some reason, "My World is Beginning Today" has been cut in recent years from Santa Claus is Coming to Town. You can take quite a bit from Yellow Submarine or Heavy Metal, though much of those are borrowed material. "Spider-Man Theme" from Spider-Man "Way-Out" from The Flinstones "Trogdor, the Burniator" from Homestar Runner "Inside Outside Upside Down" from Josie and the Pussycats "Do a Half-Assed Job" from The Simpsons "Sugar Sugar" or "Bang-Shang a-Lang" from the Archies "Laugh Laugh" by the Beau Brummelstones on the Flintstones

Will he be racing for artifacts against those insidious North Koreans?

I'll call the Sandlot less than excellent, and her role kinda odd, married to the visibly younger Denis Leary. At 56, why not let her chase Indy around? Better than sticking him with Julia Stiles or Thora Birch some shit.

Right, Outspan. Am I really out of the loop and supposed to know that the Frames suck?