Edgy MD

Coolest retro thing the hipsters haven't thought of.

Detroit Nobody Not so fast there, Bill Laxton-breath! Outfielder Ezequiel Carrera was signed out of Venezuela by the Mets in 2005 when he was 17 and made it as high as St. Lucie before he was packaged as part of the three-team blockbusterish deal that made J.J. Putz unfortunate...I mean a Met. Last night the Detroit Tiger reserve notched his first postseason PA, walking as a pinch-hitter in the ninth to load the bases before his Bengals bowed out, 12-3. As Ted Berg pointed out, three different players the Mets sent away in that December 2008 transaction played postseason ball yesterday: Carrera, Joe Smith and Jason Vargas. Hope you enjoyed those bagels, Omar. Man, good call. That trade just keeps giving.

Baltimore Darren O'Day (pitched last night, had been grabbed by the Mets in December 2008 in the Rule 5 draft, and lost on waivers the following April to Texas) Detroit [crossout]Nobody[/crossout] (Not so, see below!) Los Angeles (A) Bazooka Joe Smith (lost by the Mets as part of the disastrous three-team J.J. Putz trade) Collin Cowgill (traded by the Mets, to avoid wavers, in mid-2013 to the Angels, for fringy prospect Kyle Johnson, who spent 2014 outfielding for Binghamton) Kansas City Jason Vargas (also coughed up in the Putz deal) Oakland Scott Kazmir (never a Met, but a Met property --- anybody remember how we lost him?) Washington Scott Hairston (signed away by the Cubs following the 2012 season) St. Louis Null Los Angeles (N) Justin Turner (signed away by the Dodgers following the 2013 season after the Mets non-tendered him) San Francisco Yusmeiro Petit (a Mets minor league soldier Omar Minaya sent away way back in the Carlos Delgado deal) Pittsburgh Jon Holdzkom (a minor league flame throwing freak that the Mets couldn't do anything with or keep particularly healthy, released following the 2010 season, and finally surfacing with P-Burgh for nine games this season, and apparently making the one-game post-season roster) Chase d'Arnaud (never a Mets property, but some of his DNA is) Seems like not a lot, in the great scheme of things. If so, you can look at that two ways: that guys who've played for the Mets stink too much to make the roster of playoff teams, or that the Mets have grown wise and have kept the better guys while shedding the stooges. I get the idea that Washington has a lot of future Mets.

The Aoki Strategy: Run back and forth in confusion and then make a last-second stab. How long is that gonna work?

I don't know what the law says, but that indeed is inaccurate. 1988 is correct.

Frayed Knot wrote: Tigers have tried four or five different guys at SS and have had trouble there all year long. They should try Mickey Stanley.

Autumn Barwis, wife of the Mets' new S&C coach Mike Barwis, and member of the Barwis Methods Team: Autumn comes to us as autumn closes in.

Remember Jim Malone? Strength and conditioning coach Jim Malone? You know, like to go cruising with his wife? Yeah, well, that guy is out. The Mets' new organizational S&C guy is Mike Barwis. [fimg=450]http://images.askmen.com/1080x540/sports/bodybuilding/mike-barwis-interview-1096890-TwoByOne.jpg[/fimg] You may remember Mike from last winter, when the Mets packed a few of their guys --- Duda and Tejada and Flores, if I remember correctly --- off to his Midwestern camp for conditioning and shit. And yeah, he's a Michigan guy. Man's got a method, he's got an motivational attitude, and he's got a connection to Fred's alma mater. What else could you ask for? A reality show?

From the "Abreu" thread: Frayed Knot wrote: On the hitting coach front, Mets Blog (citing various sources) lists candidates under consideration to include Abreu, Edgardo Alfonzo, Savannah hitting coach Val Pascucci, LV hitting coach George Greer, and roving instructor Jack Voigt. Lamar Johnson is expected to be reassigned within the org.

Birdland is rocking tonight.

Already been nominated. According to Rubino, Alfonzo's one of the candidates. A single short season in the NY-Penn League, though, that's not a whole lot of experience either.

Twins hero Doug Mientkiewicz and Twins hero/Minnesota homeboy Paul Molitor up for the Twins job. We could have two Hall-of-Fame players as managers at once.

Ruby reporting that Lamar Johnson and Luis Natera are out as batting coaches, possibly bullpen coach Ricky Bones, too. Whispers in the beatwriters pool that Jeff disapproved of Natera's out-of-wedlock pregnancy.

Woulda considered doing it against the Yankees in Game Four of the 2000 World Series. Start Bobby Jones but just let him pitch to Jeter and Sojo, and then flop over to Glendon Rusch. Of course, that strategy would be at least somewhat dampened if Jeter still hits that leadoff homer. OE: I probably would've just started Rusch.

Frayed Knot wrote: You find it hard to believe that base coaches or 'defensive captains' will stall while waiting for a signal from the dugout via their man upstairs just like the manager now does? I find that hard to believe. No. That's exactly not what I wrote. I wrote about the manager crossing the field.

Bucky Harris totally pulled a deek move that is totally strategically legit but would be treated as dirty pool nowadays. He started Curly Ogden on the hill in order to ensure John J. McGraw would start his lefty batters, particularly Bill Terry, who hadn't been hitting lefties at all. Two batters into the game (one walk and one strikeout), up comes the left-handed Ross Youngs, and Harris heads to the mound to get Ogden and bring in his real pitcher of the day, southpaw George Mogridge. Terry himself goes 0-2, then with two runners on in the sixth, he gets lifted for pinch-hitter Irish Meusel. Harris brings in right-hander Firpo Marberry and Terry's bat is out of the game with (as it turns out) seven innings still to be played. Would any manager have the moxie to try that today? I like to think Valentine might've, but...

Newly discovered excellent-qualty footage shows the Senators' Game Seven 1924 Walkoff Victory. Just great stuff. Camera speed seems really high quality, making everything seem to be happening at a speed somewhat accurately reflecting real time. You get terrific dust-kicking slides, you get Bucky Harris' homer, you get Calvin Coolidge scandalously removing his hat in public, you get Walter Johnson bringing it sidearmed over the last four innings, you get the game-winning hit, and you get the glorious pandemonium of Washington's only world championship.

Sure a lot of actor get themselves locked into an action franchise and wax about how they're above it all, but the steady paycheck allows them to do Ibsen or something, but Chris Pine is taking a page out of Harrison Ford's book and turning that paradigm on its ear. Not content to merely be the linchpin of the red hot Star Trek franchise, he's now the fourth Jack Ryan, in the latest reboot of a series that has been trying to gain some traction for 24 years. Jack's a wounded Afghanistan War vet who gets recruited into the CIA by James Earl Jones, played by Kevin Costner, to go to Wall Street and look for financial irregularities that might indicate terrorist funding. That's it. He's an analyst. But when he stumbles over the big kahuna, the financial nexus of big-time terror action, he quickly gets... operationalized. Seriously operationalized. And it's a good thing he's got Keira Knightley along as his physical therapist/doctor/girlfriend/American-who-inexplciably-talks-British, because he goes from a seriously wounded guy barely able to walk to a guy who gets up and just wipes his nose after a lot of bad falls. Really bad falls! Kenneth Brannagh directs and villianizes. [fimg=450]http://static.squarespace.com/static/51b3dc8ee4b051b96ceb10de/t/52b86f63e4b0675cb7ea3994/1387818853426/tv-spot-for-jack-ryan-shadow-recruit.jpg[/fimg]

David Wright had a 9-plus-point week!

Is there something wrong with celebrating Eveland being the 30th best Mets of September of 2014? I'd be very proud! Bobby Abreu got 13 plate appearances, going .364/.462 /.364 // .825 but didn't figure in any run scoring.

Eveland finishes in the money. WHOO!

Frayed Knot wrote: Frayed Knot wrote: And then if you're not going to do it via manager challenges, then how? Base coaches, already on the scene, can approach the ump and ask for an appeal, following signals from the manager in the dugout, if necessary. If the defensive team wants to challenge, their designated defensive captain can make the appeal. Easy peazy. How does any of that do away with the stalling tactics? Whether it's the manager stalling while waiting for the guy on the phone, or the base coach/defensive captain stalling for a signal from the manager who's waiting for the go-ahead from the guys on the phone, I don't see how we're getting anywhere. I find that hard to believe. We don't waste time with the farce of a fat old guy climbing out of the dugout and crossing the field slowly while pretending like he's scuttling, which is the biggest stalling tactic of them all. Somebody on the field wants to ask for an appeal, he can, but his time is limited to a specific length and then he's cut dead. Easy. Peazy. You wire the head ump to call mission control without having to set up a com center behind home plate. Also easy.

Frayed Knot wrote: Some would argue that the waiting for the signal from the dugout time is simply replacing the dirt-kicking, hat-throwing, tantrum time that managers used to have instead, so, in effect, little time is lost or gained. People can argue whatever they want. I'd like to see them back that one up with data. Frayed Knot wrote: And then if you're not going to do it via manager challenges, then how? Base coaches, already on the scene, can approach the ump and ask for an appeal, following signals from the manager in the dugout, if necessary. If the defensive team wants to challenge, their designated defensive captain can make the appeal. Easy peazy.

Re-acquring Reyes wouldn't necessarily be the best win/$ move, but I think the pressure would be on them to swing it in the name of canceling debt with the fans --- the way Frank Cashen made it a point to bring back Kingman, Staub, and Seaver. Whether that would trigger a windfall of money from suddenly forgiving fans, I have no idea, but I think Sandy Alderson has worked too long without salary flexibility to blow it all on a PR play.

Pat Zachry. It's only the most obvious thing in the world. But that's what you get when you convene a bunch of managers with political capital but not the studied expertise on the particular issue. Managers, of course, HATE their pitchers throwing four extra inconsequential pitches. Personally, I think it buys warmup time for those pitchers' successors a lot more meaningfully than fake mound conferences do.