metsmarathon

could any of that record be related to an inability or unwillingness to sign players who would demand exorbitant signing bonuses or the like?

pinball alley. it was my idea first. damned mets just stoled it. also, is it worth noting that met batters hit 63 homers at home versus 65 on the road, and have a higher ops at home?

i'd like to stand up and preemptively come out in favor of the notion that schaeffer voting does not necessarily fall in line with conventional value assessments of players. the schaeffer player of the year need not be the most WARest, or WPAest, or wOBAest, or win sharest (are win shares relevent still, or have we moved past them?) player. i like that it offers a relativistic look at the sum total of player of the game contributions. it is a unique look at player performance. who cares if it doesn't account for a guy single handedly blowing a 9 run lead in the 9th. it doesn't need to. it measures, instead, how often and how much a player contributes to winning individual games. i like it for that. david wright contributed more and more often to winning games than did any other metly player. i can live with that. do we not adequately capture defensive and relieving contributions? eh, maybe. but that's a different argument.

i think the most difficult thing for schaeffer-voting to capture is rangeyness for defenders, particularly the lack of range. rangey outfielders may get rewarded for getting to na unlikely ball, but a ball that a rangey of could get to, but an unrangey of cannot is rarely counted against him. ditto for infielders, though that may be more readily determined. like any ball which subsequently shall land within 3' of a dugout railing. we can surely say from now on that ike woulda got it, so those should be accounted for by those non-ikes who do not get it.

not that there's anything wrong with either. we should step up our game. quick, find more wives!

how's this: "if you play fantasy baseball, you've surely had him on your team this past decade. and odds are, you curse him and the early-round pick you squandered on him for ruining your entire season."

i don't think anybody's getting the last guy without cheating.

well, my only concern is that i'm wary of needing to have a 4th outfielder who can play half a season, if needed. i'm not willing to give carter's glove/arm that half season, i don't think. could we give it to a platoon of some combination of him, duda, evans, and fmart? maybe. i'm fine with carter as a lefty ph. i need a 4th outfielder. and jerry's an idiot.

todd helton

if i'm running the team, pagan is my starting centerfielder for 2011, regardless beltran's fate. well, unless beltran comes to spring training light and limber and loose and fast. but i'm not counting on his legs suddenly becoming younger. i'd go bay | pagan | beltran || carter | duda | evans | fmart | etc, if i were to live with the current roster. i expect that pagan can maintain a similar level of play. i expect better things of bay, as i'm hoping that he had the citi-heeby-jeebies. if i think beltran is really going to be unhealthy or unproductive, i look into a jason werth, but i really expect him to be way overpriced. i think the most important piece we need for the outfield is insurance. with a reasonably healthy beltran, i feel like we have three guys who could play any of hte three positions capably. but who steps up to fill in? is duda ready to be that guy? is fmart ever going to be that guy? does nick evans even have a chance? can we bear to give carter a glove?

pedro didn't have a bad year. he was ridiculously effective against lefties, holding them to an 0.574 OPS, and stranded all but 9 of his 50 inherited runners. (18% vs 32% league average) i mean, i'm not saying the metsies should throw buckets of money after him, and if another team is willing to do so, then they can have him, but for a reasonable sum of money, the mets could do far worse than to bring him back as part of bullpen2011

i'd like a cool badge, maybe a decoder ring, and a formal ceremony with undue levels of pomp and circumstance. i've preemptively taken the liberty to report an error using such a function on the nytimes page. i can't wait to get that badge.

holy cow, number 4 on the list! ahead of bbref, even. if only it linked here...

is "hasn't failed elsewhere" really a criteria the mets should be using in their search for a new gm? doesn't that necessarily mean "inexperienced"? i mean, unless we're somehow drawing, say, brain cashman over from the evils (not advocating, merely offering his name as one who hasn't failed elsewhere), where are these unfailing gm candidates with experience? it doesn't sound like the suggestion is to raid another team's sitting gm, so what could that leave? n00bs, that's what. i'd like to think that "gee, what will the media say?" wouldn't be one of the selection criteria, but i know better, sadly. i'll keep on hoping, regardless. at some point, the mets may eventually come to realize that it doesn't matter what the rabble says, and that, more than anything, nothing wins the hearts and minds of new yorkers like good prolonged and sustained success. but i won't hold my breath.

Willets Point wrote: I always thought he was good at big things - signing Martinez & Beltran, trading for Santana, et al - but poor at getting the supporting cast for the big stars (often erring to players with impressive track records who were on the verge of precipitous decline or already declining). i would say that omar was pretty good at reeling in the big fish that he cast after, and was fairly creative in trolling the shallower pools, but did a terrible job of catching the kinds of fish you could put round out a meal with. he'd pay wild salmon prices for canned sardines, all while the sockeyes are runnin' up in alaska.

how does the uniform selection correlate with the day's starting pitcher?

well. a little blood for the fans i see. they do care!

so was i!

i want that eagle fellow to be our next gm.

jeez. cc's gotten almost twice the run support as king felix (5.9 vs 3.1 runs per game start). but no, if felix were the better pitcher, he totally would've won more games. cc has won only one game wherein his offense scored 3 runs or less. he's lost six such games. felix has won three games in which his offense scored 3 runs or less. he's lost eleven such games.

Beltran 4.7 Acosta 1.4 Duda 1.3 Green 1.1 Jfeliciano 0.8 Davis 0.7

sem�i�nal ? ?/?s?m?nl/ Show Spelled[sem-uh-nl] �adjective 1. pertaining to, containing, or consisting of semen. 2. Botany of or pertaining to seed. 3. having possibilities of future development. 4. highly original and influencing the development of future events: a seminal artist; seminal ideas. it works on so many levels...

to be sure, there are lessons to be learned from 2003. much as there are lessons to be learned from 2001, 2006, and 1986. but the important thing is that the trend is downward. [table:2owuwl0a][tr:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]year[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]cumwin%[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]3yrw%[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]5yrw%[/td:2owuwl0a][/tr:2owuwl0a][tr:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]2000[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.580[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a][/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a][/td:2owuwl0a][/tr:2owuwl0a][tr:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]2001[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.543[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a][/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a][/td:2owuwl0a][/tr:2owuwl0a][tr:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]2002[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.518[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.518[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a][/td:2owuwl0a][/tr:2owuwl0a][tr:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]2003[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.491[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.461[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a][/td:2owuwl0a][/tr:2owuwl0a][tr:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]2004[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.480[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.438[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.480[/td:2owuwl0a][/tr:2owuwl0a][tr:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]2005[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.486[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.454[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.467[/td:2owuwl0a][/tr:2owuwl0a][tr:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]2006[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.502[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.516[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.485[/td:2owuwl0a][/tr:2owuwl0a][tr:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]2007[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.507[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.551[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.501[/td:2owuwl0a][/tr:2owuwl0a][tr:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]2008[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.512[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.564[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.528[/td:2owuwl0a][/tr:2owuwl0a][tr:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]2009[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.504[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.508[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.527[/td:2owuwl0a][/tr:2owuwl0a][tr:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]2010[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.502[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.489[/td:2owuwl0a][td:2owuwl0a]0.523[/td:2owuwl0a][/tr:2owuwl0a][/table:2owuwl0a] our cumulative win percentage for the decade is trending down. our 3-year win percentage is trending down. our 5-year win percentage is trending down.

so, uh, lefty, can we presume your answer in fman's seminal poll? and welcome abordick!

hey, cool. pneumothorax. don't see them in the baseball news all too often. little known fact: it was a wacky combination of a collapsed lung, youthful exuberance, and, surely, morphine that's responsible for my running career. the kid should be fine.