Edgy MD

Yeah, I was bracing for a tight play, but I'm guessing he didn't come up with it clean.

Interesting that they stuck with Baty in left this time.

Jared Young can do stuff.

Run, Taylor, run!

This isn't right. I went out to walk the dogs with a 2-0 lead and come back to a 3-2 deficit. Who was in charge while I was gone?

Tom Ñieto, the former Met coach who won a World Series as a player with the Twins while catching Frank Viola during his Cy Young prime, has recently passed at the too-young age of 65, reportedly due to a sudden heart attack. Ñieto joined the Mets as catching instructor on Willie Randolph's staff for the 2005 team, doubling as Guy Conti's second bullpen catcher, when the Mets got double-barrel action going. In 2007, his portfolio expanded, with him becoming the team's first-base coach, only to go down alongside Willie in the great West Coast whacking of 2008. While it was known that Willie and pitching coach Rick Peterson were on thin ice, it wasn't clear what the Mets had against Tom. But Willie brought Ñieto with him over from the Yankees, so maybe it was guilt by association. Ñieto received some note by being a rare guy to wear a tilde over an initial capital N in his name. Never having seen it on Tom's back during his playing career, and with the Yankees (his previous coaching assignment) forswearing names on the back of jerseys, the Mets deserve some meaningful credit in this great leap forward in diacritical accuracy. Ñieto also played for the Cards and the Expos, and well, the presence of Expos among us is finite and declining, so may God keep the Expos.

Tim Leiper puts up the stop sign, and the fates had other ideas.

Pirates it is. August 7-9. Looking forward to it.

After scoring, Lindor goes over to feed info to Vientos. That's always good stuff.

Man, it breaks my heart to see a ball clank off of Arenado.

The Diamondbacks have replaced their sand-colored outlines with turquoise ... and ugh.

FATE: Imma fuck up Soto's leg. METS: OhmyGOD! Badly? FATE: Possibly. You won't really know. METS: Well, we're going to put him on the injured list until we're ABSOLUTELY sure he's 100%. Then we'll keep him out of games for two weeks after that. FATE: Imma also fuck up Polanco's leg. METS: You know? Let's just keep running him out there and see what happens.

Let's go! Irish can give us a preview of the Athletics, and (if she re-offers) cooby can give us a preview of the Dodgers. More in line with the IGT here, how about Baty starting in right and bumping Benge to left! That's some faith in Baty's arm, right there!

My plan was to have the players on each team elect one fitting teammate to wear it on Jackie Robinson Day every year. The compel-everyone-to wear-it plan is falling flat. Rachel Robinson, by the way, is 103, going on 104 in July. A hunnert and three! Maybe she should have a plaque in The Baseball Hall of Fame.

Anybody who wants to pick up the KTE mantle is implored to do so. We can turn it into front-page content here. Four switchies in the Diamondback lineup. # ARIZONA POS. # NEW YORK POS. 1 Ketel Marte (S) 2b 1 Francisco Lindor (S) ss 2 Cobin Carroll (L) rf 2 Bo Bichette (R) 3b 3 Geraldo Perdomo (S) ss 3 Jorge Polanco (S) dh 4 Gabriel Moreno (R) c 4 Luis Robert, Jr. (R) cf 5 Adrian Del Castillo (L) dh 5 Brett Baty (L) rf 6 Nolan Arenado (R) 3b 6 Mark Vientos (R) 1b 7 Ildemaro Vargas (S) 1b 7 Marcus Semien (R) 2b 8 Alek Thoma (L) cf 8 Carson Benge (L) lf 9 Jorge Barrosa (S) lf 9 Francisco Alvarez (R) c Zak Gallen (R) sp Freddy Peralta (R) sp

Baseball teams need eye dudes. I used to know John Olichney, who was an attending physician with the Mets. He was the first guy on hand when Mookie took that ball to the face that shattered his sunglasses into his eye. I think John's specialty was neurology, but what was needed at the moment was an eye guy. Be the Mets eye guy!!

So, everybody's covered but Piazza. So the last answer must be ... Billy Wagner!

Yeah, the 2026 Mets have already had 10 games and two days off. In 1977, April 7 was opening day. Also, in 1977, the first nine games were day games.

I think he was a minor-league pitching coach back when.

FREE SHIT: If you have a need for shit, I have a shit to give! Will deliver free!

Well, 20 hasn't been used in the 10 games since Alonso left the Mets. Nimmo's 9, McNibben's 1, and Diaz' 39 are also vacant so far in 2026, but your point is taken.

Lee Smith stuck around long enough to get tagged by Piazza. (So did Gossage, but he is off the hook.)

Not many live a life as full as Ronnie Paul. That 1967 Winter Haven team he won those 17 games for was pretty stacked. His catcher was a not-yet-injured Steve Chilcott, but they also had Nolan Ryan, Ken Singleton, Steve Renko, Ed Figueroa, Mike Jorgenson, and others. Their .671 winning percentage puts them just a tick or so behind the 1983 Lynchburg Mets (.691!) in the great history of Mets minor-league juggernaut teams.

One takeaway from this kwizzicle is to underscore how notably few Hall of Fame starting pitchers the 80s produced. And one Hall-of-Famer who did peak in that era — Jack Morris — made it despite not having the strongest case.

Then clearly, Kranepool caught up with Rich Gossage during that awesome year Goose had with Pittsburgh before joining the Yankees. (I'm really stinking this kwiz up.)