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Benjamin Grimm wrote: I'm not 100 per cent convinced that Byrd can't be a contributor to a contending Mets team in 2014, should they actually be a contending team. That's true. I wouldn't start him, but he'd be a great 4th guy getting some starts, power off the bench, good defense. These are the types of guys that you find making contributions to winning teams. Sure, extend Byrd now!

Duda will return to LF. Do we have two other outfielders we really want to see regularly? I'd like to see Nieuwenhuis play regularly the rest of the season, and even though I don't have a ton of faith in them amounting to a ton, I'd like to see Lagares and Baxter too. I don't think ending up keeping Byrd is negatively inhibiting anything in regards to figuring out the outfield for 2013 at least.

LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: So... Byrd would bring back, like, a really-High-A pitcher? Maybe. If someone's desperate. I think you trade him for a _good_ High-A prospect, not for middling gut-shot stuff. Doesn't have to be as good as Synagaard, but at least a plus pitch or something.

bmfc1 wrote: If the game really "mattered", then it must be moved to Wednesday so that all pitchers can be used. Now, someone that started a game on Sunday can't pitch. If the ASG is so important, then the schedule should be altered to ensure that everyone can participate. Until then, yes, it's just a gimmick devised by FOX and MLB to help Selig save face after the tie game. I don't care that they tied. You know what? I love it. Got all the All-Stars into the game. everyone played. Isn't that sorta the point?

Frayed Knot wrote: Swan Swan H wrote: Adam Jones, American Hero. I especially like the part where that HR came in between innings of our game so I could be watching it at the time. Love it when that happens. Also was nice of Johnson not to suck today right afterward. lost a chance to get into third, maybe even second, and a wildcard spot. instead, stay in fourth.

Edgy MD wrote: Brewers jerseys actually the color of Miller Lite, more or leass. they taste better though.

Apparently Marcum requested Buck, hence the change in lineup (was originally Recker) Always makes me nervous when i see "Mets Lineup - UPDATED"

Frayed Knot wrote: The Mets/Brewes game must have gone through two or three batters in the time Hafner's AB alone took. And I know it wasn't just this one time because I've seen him do this before. Can't someone appeal that he's taking more than the 12 alloted seconds or whatever? He didn't ask for time so if the pitcher constantly makes to deliver.. seems like something Bobby Valentine would do actually.

Frayed Knot wrote: At 60 pitches thru 3 innings, this isn't a good beginning considering our worn-out bullpen. And I assume that Torres is unavailable for the evening. Burke's up and fresh at least..of course, he replaced the freshest guy.

http://imgur.com/a/lyehy#uxTsXsb

Keith is starving. Kids have been lined up outside to run the bases since the 8th inning. And i snuck in a quick nap somewhere between the 11th and 13th.

Fman99 wrote: Free bonus baseball! Helps to counter for the nap I took that cost me innings 2-7. Good job, wish I'd thought of a nap. I drank beer to counter my morning headache instead. Oh, and signed paperwork that is going to cost me more than a third of a million dollars. My money's on a Quintanilla homerun walkoff style.

There are 18 qualified starters with a higher ERA than Gee this year, and 28 of them that have higher than his career 4.2. (i.e. every team has someone worse that they're starting regularly) That's certainly getting guys out at the major league level. (Has there been a trend of guys not being quite 'ready' and taking a month to round into form, or is that just Warthen hate bleeding into the facts?) Now just hit.

Rockin' Doc wrote: He is one of the few bright spots to discuss on the team. Particularly on offense. I like Wright, but I don't think his picking up the occasional dinner tab is that big a deal considering the money he is making. It's like me buying abeer for a friend; it's no big deal. nah, not a big deal, good story though. Howie has a lot of nice things to say about him in the book.

Obviously we should have a perpetually running thread about David Wright. Wright? Howie Rose wrote: On more than one occasion, I'd be in a restaurant having lunch, and then I'd ask for the check and be told, "It's already been taken care of." "What?" The waiter or waitress will point to the corner and there's David Wright. Many among the Mets' contingent share that story.

Forever young, i want to be forever young Do you really want to live forever, forever forever Forever young, i want to be forever young Do you really want to live forever Forever young

dinosaur jesus wrote: Which is why I expected them to fall back this year. But they haven't, I'm glad to see. It's funny sometimes how teams that win more games than they should one year--that really aren't that good--really are that good the next year. Like the 1984 Mets, who had no business winning 90 games. What's funny about that season is that the Pirates did the same thing in reverse. Their Pythagorean had them winning 87 games, but they actually lost 87. And then in 1985 they were legitimately terrible. This is just me theorizing, and I'd try to test it if I had the time and hadn't destroyed my database, but I wonder if it's a function of younger players coming into their own. Not quite getting there, but climbing that final step. Like McCutchen for instance although my theory more applies to pitchers. They pitcher real well, most of the time, but fall apart big on occasions. This creates a game or two or even a bad week where everything goes crazy wrong and it throws the pythagorean off-kilter. Call it the "Manny Acosta factor" since last year people were harping on the Mets out-performing but really they were pretty close if you simply released Manny Acosta.

Edgy MD wrote: My real problem with Terry is that he seems to accept and understand and even embrace his role as a caretaker so well that he doesn't seem to have the zeal to win the day. In that, he's like the exact opposite of what the media warned against. And this to me seems to differ from his first year. I've liked him less and less as the years go on (but I imagine that's standard fare for non-amazing managers (and closers)). It seemed like that first year he was pushing guys to commit and work hard and try to win. Perhaps it's simply that those years featured good first halves and he was trying to keep the pedal to the floor through hard work (since he couldn't affect the talent after all) whereas this year they've been bad most of the season and it's more about him throwing crap at the wall a billion different ways trying to find something that will stick for at least a week or two.

and now he has to live out of an ice cream truck.

Building too big a cushion for them to fall below .500 looks like. Shame. The Pirates not being bad sorta rocks my world. Water is no longer wet, ice is no longer cold, boobs are no longer cool..wait, that's still true. I was 10 during their last winning season. I have vague memories of them being good and playing the Mets and Van Slyke was a cool name. But I guess the fans deserve it, even if they are all mostly dirty Penguins fans.

Frayed Knot wrote: Seven PAs for Buck last night -- Zero fair balls hit: 3 Ks, 3 BBs (2 intentional) and a foul out. And that one non IBB (I believe it was that one) resulted in a useless caught stealing with the winning run on third.

Just look up the attendance jump after they signed A-Rod. Front runners, all of 'em. The YES ratings are more interesting I think, than the attendance. Clearly scalpers bought a billion tickets to the place, just like they did at Citi Field. The Mets lost faster and became less of a draw faster, so they already suffered through the scalpers giving up their season ticket packages because it wasn't profitable, and with the Yankees fighting the secondary market harder than the team is fighting to stay above .500, it becomes less and less worth it.

Frayed Knot wrote: Edgy MD wrote: Can anybody make sense of Kirk Gibsons walkophilia in the ninth? Assuming you meant in the 13th inning, I didn't think it was all that out of whack. * The danger, of course, is that he was putting the winning run on when he walked Buck and "The Book" considers that a no-no. On the other hand he did it to get to a pitcher batting (no NYM options) who, if he swung away, was a GiDP candidate or, if he bunted, the 2nd out. * IW-ing Q to get to Brown is a little more suspect in that it brought the game-tying walk into play. But it also gave Collmenter a RHB to face instead of a LHB, a newbie instead of a vet, and worked around the night's hot batter for one recently in the game. Am certainly not claiming it was the only path to choose, but it was not without its reasoning. I fell asleep, poor job by me. When I woke up and it was random sportsnight stuff or something, I managed to wait until the scroll said they won. I don't see how you can walk Q, the AAAA light hitting guy (granted the power doesn't matter at that point) for Brown unless you're thinking "oh, well he's hot today" but in that case, you don't walk Buck. Unless of course you're worried that another AB by him swinging that hard literally tears a hole in the fabric of reality. I mean, that AB in the..8th? 9th? when his helmet came off and whatnot looked like a Charlie Brown comic.

metirish wrote: Seems like part his job is to put arses in seats ... After DePaoli joined the Pirates, the club saw baseball's fourth-largest percent increase in attendance between 2009 and 2012 they also had a bunch of young exciting players......best of luck, a packed CF is fun. but had 17 sellouts last year?! In a year they finished under .500 and was a lot like the Mets season really.