dinosaur jesus

Jeff Francoeur pitches a 1-2-3 seventh for the Phillies. Hitting mid- to high eighties, striking out the first batter on a nice slider, and covering the bag nicely on a grounder to the first baseman. Small sample size, obviously, but he really does look like he knows what he's doing. As much as Frenchie ever knows what he's doing.

Edgy MD wrote: I wish him luck, as it's a rare bird that parlays an NCAA baseball coaching career into a big league appointment. Can you name the last? i can't. Bobby Winkles?

Well, he does have a submarine delivery.

LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: Looking for the stats on this, but I'm pretty sure we've run very successfully on him in recent years. Not so much. Against Cishek the Mets have stolen two bases and been caught once in 31 innings. This is a guy who's allowed 15 stolen bases in his career. And 11 home runs; Murphy's was the first one he's ever allowed to the Mets. They've always hit him hard, but that was a pretty fluky inning. Cishek is a righty, by the way. He's got a reason to pitch around Duda.

Now that was hilarious. The fat old catcher just stood there while the fat old pitcher ran up and tagged him.

Dumb interpretation of a dumb rule.

The Commissar's in town.

I guess they would have confirmed an out call, too, if the Marlins had challenged. Awfully close.

Beats "Captain Jack," I guess.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: With insincere apologies to Derek Jeter, the Yankees top four has to be Ruth, Gehrig, DiMaggio, and Mantle. Yup. Then Yogi, then Whitey Ford. If managers count, then Casey, Joe McCarthy, Miller Huggins, Torre. Which puts Jeter about eleventh. That's pretty good, isn't it? It's his bad luck he had to play for the Yankees, because there are teams where he'd definitely be in the top four.

Sounds like about 90% ghostwriter, 10% Babe. It's funny how the sportswriters in those days didn't really try to capture how baseball players really talked. With some exceptions, I guess, like Ring Lardner. "Lamps" could mean his eyes, though that doesn't really make sense here. Maybe it's a scanning error.

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: For context, that is the only surviving post in a series of them that ran that whole summer on the board that gave birth to the cpf. Amid dozens of illiterate arguments over Jorge Fabregas and and Rey Ordonez and SIGN AROD!!!! posts he'd drop these lengthy pieces wherein he'd describe watching this team and what it did to him and his life. The "junkie girl" on his couch referred to in the story above figured promenetly into one; his failed career as a pitcher and his ongoing addiction struggles were ongoing themes, but they were also wrapped up in shit about the Mets that was really insightful and funny. We were idiots to have ever assumed they would survive on the net without copying and pasting as Ted did here but maybe they did on "Big Al"'s word processor. I dunno though. There was a dashed-off quality to it that gave it a kind of fresh energy, like it was just written on the spot, that the best web writing has. There were 5 or 6 pieces just as good as this one. This was was darker than most, all had some shade but others were more overtly funny. He would disappear for long stretches between posts but last resurfaced early in 2000 iirc. He said then that he'd been out West to dry out or something. Your very own Frederick Exley. That's good stuff; I wish I'd been there.

When it comes to Matt Harvey, I'm ten years old and he's the best, coolest thing in the world. And I'm okay with that.

91. 2nd. Lose in the second round.

1) No 2) No 3) Yes 4) No 5) Yes 6) No 7) No 8) No 9) Yes 10) Yes 11) Under 12) Over 13) Under 14) Over 15) Under 16) Over 17) Under 18) Under 19) Under 20) Under 21) Murphy 22) Mayberry 23) d'Arnaud 24) Familia 25) Gilmartin

Granderson. I'm afraid Cuddyer is going to be Jason Bay part 2. Lagares's value is mostly defensive, which is great in real life, but he has very little fantasy value. If Granderson can hit at Citi anything close to what he hit on the road last year, he's really a pretty decent player. And he's a lefty, which is ideal for fantasy (for platooning).

G-Fafif wrote: Lynch vs. Seaver in this completely forgotten classic (not that just about everything doesn't get forgotten after 34 or so years). Tom was great, Mets outlasted him. Crucial in the split-season charge the Mets were making at first place that late August. Also, I've decided, critical in costing Tom the 1981 Cy Young. Bob Bailor's finest game as a Met. Drove in winning run, saved game with phenomenal catch. Not forgotten by me. I remember being very happy at how this one turned out. Bottom of the ninth, two outs, Hubie on third, Seaver still in, and the ball gets by the catcher--that was one of the strangest moments in all my baseball-watching years, because while Hubie was racing home, I had to decide what I wanted to happen. If he scores, the Mets win, which is great, but Seaver loses, which is not so great. If he's out, we go to extra innings, and Seaver still has a chance to win--but that, of course, would mean the Mets losing. I had to go with the second, which is what happened, and it turned out perfectly--the Mets won, but Seaver didn't lose.

That story makes no damn sense. Charley Pride was 26 and hadn't played professional baseball since 1960--seven innings pitched in class C. He might have thought of himself as a singer by then, but he hadn't recorded anything. There was no reason Casey or anyone else in the organization would ever have heard of him, let alone had an opinion about his music. (His first record was released in 1966, and it was another two years before his record label let on that he was black.) And why in the world would he send six monogrammed bats ahead of him? That's some serious bravado. (His baseball nickname was Turkey, which might be a clue.) It's also just begging to be written off as a nut. I assume there's a real story there, but it got garbled somewhere along the line. It would be interesting to know what really happened.

batmagadanleadoff wrote: ROY if he's promoted before Memorial Day. Plus, you'll need that if you want the Mets to get to the WS in 2016. Because whenever a Mets RHP wins the ROY award (Seaver. Gooden. de Grom?) the Mets win the Series two years after. Whenever a Mets LHP wins the ROY award (Matlack) the Mets are in the Series the following season. That pattern would be even stronger if they'd given the award to Koosman in '68.

Roberto Clemente was called Bob early in his career. Sounds weird now. Manny Lee announced one year that he wanted to be called by his name, Manuel. I remember some sportswriters snickering about that. Pete Jablonowski never accomplished much until he changed his name to Appleton.

LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: Weird-ass beards are for hockey. Weird-ass mustaches are for baseball. These guys would disagree.

Frayed Knot wrote: Ashie62 wrote: I take it as a sign of progress that Qball is no longer a Met. It's only a sign of progress if the position improves, meaning that either Tejada becomes the backup due to Flores being able to handle the position full-time, or that some better option gets imported prior to the season. But if all that happens is that a different warm body backs up Ruben then things are likely to be pretty much status quo to what they've been over the last three years. And you know what status quo stands for, right? It stands for "Man, the middle-class, everyday Mets fans are really getting taken for a ride."