Ceetar

metsguyinmichigan wrote: Easy for me to say, being so far from New York. But I wouldn't want to let disagreements with owners get in the way of my enjoying my team. I don't know of too many perfect team owners. My team is always my team. If I didn't renounce allegiance after June 15, 1977, I never will. Go to the games and have fun. We're also all commenting on the supposedly last place team on a holiday weekend in cold December. If you have the chance to see Wright and Duda and Ike smack some home runs in May, you gonna turn around as say "No! Fred kicked my baby!"

Gwreck wrote: Edgy DC wrote: Well, they've already lowered ticket prices. Yeah, from an artificially inflated price. The quality of the product presented and the pricepoint are still way off. Yankees lowered ticket prices too. (in a very similar manner if I recall) That's more a factor of the economy than the state of the team. I'm not really convinced they're way off from the quality of product (meaning a baseball game at a terrific stadium, not the team itself). I think this is a factor my age. i didn't buy tickets in the early 90s or before that. my ticket stub for an Upper in 2000 against the Giants says $9. the comparable prom reserved seating is very comparable a whole 12 years later.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: Edgy DC wrote: Ben Grimm is already getting shakey on his promise. Well, I never made any kind of promise. I know that if I go once instead of twice, or nonce instead of once, it's not going to make any real difference. I want the Mets attendance to be zero. If I go to one game with my kids, they can still potentially draw a total of 3 for the 2012 season, and I'd be quite happy with that. well, they probably all have like a 1.8 commitment.

As Edge said, it's been a WHILE since ticket sales were sub-2 million, and all but ten teams topped it last year (Christ, the Marlins drew 1.5). Ticket prices are comparable to the movies, or beach pricing, or other summer family/date/group outing options. If the weather is nice, a day at the bargain-basement-tickets-priced-to-move ballpark makes for a nicer outing than a trip to see Elongated Man: The Movie or Saw 7: Murdering the Chicks From Those WB Shows in Increasingly Lurid/Creative Ways. I'll go with 2.3ish announced. The movies have a huge advantage all summer long: air-conditioning You've got the Mets mid-summer marketing campaign all written. "Buy Delta or Ceasar Club tickets! It's Air Conditioned!" Not rooting for 0. rooting for 0 is rooting for the Mets to fail. I'm not rooting for the Mets to fail. Especially when we don't know the color of the grass on the other side of the fence. It could be worse. I'd rather the Mets make a magical run and the Wilpons are solvent in 2013 then the Mets suck for 3-4 years and they're eventually forced to sell and it then takes even the most magical of owners 5 years to dig out of the dept and negative profit/revenue ratio it pushes them into.

Edgy DC wrote: I continue to believe that the risks of climbing Kilimanjaro are minimal. In fact, it may prove to be less dangerous than the roller coaster and all those loopty loops. I am encouraged to learn that a 7-year-old named Keats Boyd and an 82-year-old man named George Solt both have summited. I bet they both had ulnar collatoral ligaments, though. I bet the Mets would prefer he not go on roller coasters as well.

It's so hard to tell because it's so results driven. They're presumably healthy so a hot start from Ike and Duda especially coupled with Santana staying on the field could lead to April excitement and prompt an attendance drive. (There's also the idea that 2013 renewals get dibs on the All-Star Game, and you know they're going to hype that very fact in the 'buy the rest of September' marketing drive. Except they lost Reyes. And that's going to be a big blow, both in the chances they win as many games and in the convincing anyone to go see a middle of the pack type team, if it even turns out to be that. If Reyes was here I feel like they're so far removed now from the collapses and disaster that the marginal improvement over last year with some excitement with some of the younger guys would've drawn interest. Now they'll be seeing as spiraling downwards with no hope in sight instead. But who knows, maybe it works to the Mets advantage (just due to luck, something will one of these days..) They're going to be viewed as a 70 win last place disaster, so if they come out winning games and surprising people, the differential from expectation may turn into excitement. So hey, I'm gonna say they're going to have a bounce back season, coupled with a fairly substantial step back from Philly and the possibility of a 5th playoff team (has that been determined?) gets them pushing 2.4ish.

Nymr83 wrote: I barely read Law's articles but I love him on the 'Baseball Today' podcasts also produced by ESPN. I selfishly hope he doesn't go to Houston I find him extremely arrogant and annoying. I hope he gets the job so I see him retweeted less.

G-Fafif wrote: Ceetar wrote: geeze, what was I doing two years ago that I wasn't here blabbing about this?. You were here, babbling about this. Apologies to Dave Gallagher. Jason Bay's no him. Apparently I've been begging for 'one more pitcher' for a while. Checked my own blog. Didn't write about Bay. my next post is about Rick DiPietro and hoping for a healthier blue and orange 2010. yeah..that worked.

geeze, what was I doing two years ago that I wasn't here blabbing about this? I remember the initial reaction being mostly positive though.

It also fit neatly into the narrative of "Omar and Jerry are doing desperate things to save their jobs!"

smg58 wrote: Has anybody since Reyes and Wright come through the Mets system and had a better career to date than Pelfrey? Maybe Kazmir, but I don't know if he's really had any more good seasons than Pelfrey and his career might already be over. hardly already over. I dunno, Pagan? Probably up there with Pelfrey in terms of contribution. Guys like Humber and Bell and even Mike Carp have had some spots of success.

Meija went from basically unknown, to the next Gooden, to an example of the Mets bungling the farm, to yet another prospect that can't stay healthy in warp speed didn't he?

LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: The main issue most seemed to take with Mejia's treatment-- and I agree, to an extent-- was that he wasn't just kept from regular starting work for the marginal benefit-- third or fourth man out of the pen-- of a far-from-contending major-league team, but that he was apparently actively encouraged to "focus on what 'worked,'" rather than trying to develop/control his offspeed stuff. Well now you get into the differences of organizational goals versus on the field ones. (the overall quality of the team is basically irrelevant. The team doesn't proceed as if they have no shot, and the on the field guys certainly don't. The goal is to win games at the major league level) That last part is definitely the crux of any issue, but there is still value in determining how your fastball works with major league hitters. We're talking 27.2 innings here. That can helpful, and isn't necessarily detrimental, particularly if you then go back to working on offspeed stuff based on what you've learned about how guys see your fastball. I think 2010 was too much of a hold pattern type year, and they probably should've either ridden Minaya through 2011 or let him go prior to 2010. The Meija decision was a shining example of what appeared to be organization disagreement on many things. (Omar was insistent on the minors and slowly changed his mind, or was overruled) That year reads like a free-for-all where decisions were made with three different plans that ultimately led to no clear long-term focus. It wouldn't surprise me if the final decision to promote Meija was made by a different person than chose to sign Jason Bay/a slugger and a different person who signed off on the Ike Davis promotion/waiting period. As regards to guys they developed..part of it's that they were so active in the free agent market most years that they had less picks than others. Some of their drafts were pretty good, some were pretty bad, and all in all, with less picks you have less chances to find that 'diamond in the rough' type guy in a game that's a fairly big crap-shoot as it is.

Frayed Knot wrote: It's not so much that they think his use caused the injury and subsequent TJ surgery but rather the idea that his early call up and sudden conversion to a reliever stunted his overall development as a pitcher seems to be an article of faith among those who opine on this sort of thing. It's impossible to prove of course (one way or the other) but it's a more or less accepted 'fact' at this point. Sickels in particular has been critical of teams in general and the Mets in particular for what he sees as rushing prospects through the lower levels of the minors so this one is right up his alley. There's a lot of The Mets Used To Do It This Way So This Way Must Be Wrong going on though. They promoted guys aggressively with Bernazard, but it's impossible to say that was clearly wrong. They were also criticized, although maybe not so much by the same people, for not starting Ike once Murphy got hurt in 2010. They did ultimately demote Meija and he probably would've hit his innings goals had he not gotten hurt. I heard an interview recently, I think it might've been the Mostly mets one with Colin McHugh, where he mentioned that the Mets occasionally force guys into different roles in the minors so they're used to different situations because often times the major league need doesn't exactly fit the best minor league player.

Edgy DC wrote: With two assertions that Mejia was badly handled, I'd like to see that argument fleshed out. I think too much is probably made of that. Maybe if he'd stayed in the majors as a reliever all season.. (although Jerry/Dan going all "Only throw fastballs" on him may have been a bad idea) It wasn't those innings that caused him to need Tommy John. That was probably coming anyway.

LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: And also, to be COMPLETELY fair... Dickey is a guy doing a selfish thing for an ostensibly selfless reason. There are an almost innumerable amount of ways he could bring attention to this issue-- and do more to stem the tide of human trafficking-- that don't involve him going all Hemingway Man on a Tanzanian mountain. Oh, it's definitely selfish, but despite what professional sports franchises like to think, they don't actually _own_ the player.

TransMonk wrote: Ownership should let Dickey climb the mountain and shut their traps. And if they can't do that, handle this shit behind closed doors and not in the papers. This organization is beginning to embarass me on a daily basis...and it's only fucking DECEMBER! That's pretty much what they're doing no? "Dickey, we'd rather you didn't do this. It's more risk than we like our players to put themselves in and you're risking your contract if you do so. " "I'm going." "Okay then." The letter was sent months ago and we've known Dickey was going to do this for a year. I don't understand why the WSJ/Costa felt the need to inject the barb about the team's injuries into what was a story about Dickey's charity work and climb. If you asked any professional sports organization if they'd rather one of their players not climb a mountain, every single one of them would say the same thing.

not quite a parody but a baseball-themed song that made me laugh: Kenesaw Mountain Landis was a bad mother fucker He was seventeen feet tall, he had a hundred and fifty wives He didn't do that much except he saved the game of baseball He put two and two together and he noticed it was four Now the treachery of Shoeless Joe can't hurt us anymore And he'll always be remembered as Kenesaw Mountain Landis Fellow named Joe Jackson was a fielder for the Black Sox And he always wore his black socks, but he never wore no shoes He weren't the nicest fellow and he had a couple problems Cause he drank a lot and he beat his wife and he always acted rude He killed and ate some babies and he copped an attitude And the one man that he hated most was Kenesaw Mountain Landis The mafia said Shoeless Joe You should really run this show You should be the guy who owns baseball And all you really gotta do Is help us make a buck or two We'll bet on the other team You'll lose the game but make it seem Like nothing could be further from the truth Shoeless Joe did what they said he dropped a couple fly balls And he walked up to the pitcher and he poked him in the eye And in the seventh inning with the Black Sox nearly beaten There was someone who was watching from his blimp above the stands Cradling a rifle in his thick and meaty hands And as if you hadn't guessed yet it was Kenesaw Mountain Landis Kenesaw said drop that glove Or I swear by God above I'll make you regret playing baseball And Shoeless Joe looked up and saw The silver rifle's gaping maw And though no one had noticed yet His underwear was getting wet He peed himself in front of everyone Shoeless Joe was finished but he couldn't quite admit it So he raised his middle finger up above the other four And Kenesaw took careful aim and fired a single bullet And he shot that dirty finger off and he dropped his trusty gun And everybody in the stands knew that he had won And today they still refer to him as Kenesaw Mountain Landis Shoeless Joe left baseball and became a famous pop star And he asked the musical question is she really going out with him He had a couple albums and a comeback in the 80's But he never won a Grammy and he never was the same And he never could be satisfied with critical acclaim Cause the critics all confused him with the great Elvis Costello Yes the critics all confused him with the great Elvis Costello [youtube:1cszwpww]tl7V_BcsbMA[/youtube:1cszwpww]

metirish wrote: I agree with much of that too, Dickey is a good guy trying to do a good thing,I'm OK with that. Really discouraging to to even entertain the idea that the Mets might be rooting for a void on a $4 million plus contract, and on one of the better players. The Mets didn't need to notify Dickey in order to void his contract if he gets hurt. (why they leaked it to the WSJ..who knows..) That they did so suggests more that they realize how desperately they need him to pitch. It's clearly not a win-win situation of "We get Dickey, or we get to save $4 million!" or they wouldn't have raised the issue. It's very much just a business move. Just like Reyes. they're pieces to a puzzle, not people. The Mets would like nothing more than for all their on-field employees be cryogentically frozen between the end of the season and the start of Spring Training.

Gwreck wrote: LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: RAD, on the risks involved in the whole Tanzania-altitude-adjustment thing wrote: "I don't think there's really any lethal risk to doing it. It's not like it's Everest." Okay. Maybe he's a LITTLE bit stupid.. My mother had a friend who went to hike Kilimanjaro and got killed in a freak rockslide (the rest of her party survived, fortunately). There is indeed a lethal risk, although, in fairness, it's not necessarily an unreasonable risk. The odds are probably better he gets killed by a car if he spent the same amount of time in NYC than a rockslide on Kilimanjaro. I've got $10 that says if he's not the best pitcher on the team in April, someone will blame it on Kilimanjaro fatigue though.

Yeah, I can see it now; the trade doesn't happen but he backs out of shutting things down because, 'Hey, I wasn't wrong, that was an actual rumor'. Remember when the MOFO used to be full of questions like: Is this [rumored trade] just speculation or is it an actual rumor? And besides, how right or wrong can you be when all you're claiming is that David Wright MAY be the next Philly 3rd baseman? and presumably that could happen next year and still be correct.

Edgy DC wrote: Dude offers to shut down his site if his rumor is untrue. https://www.facebook.com/ThePhillyPhans/posts/10150543430111189 his rumor is already untrue. well the very very soon part. The 'may become' part will never become true or false. oh, read the comments. I read his response to you as basically admitting that this post is just further attention-grabbing and based on very little.

the front. and here's a complementary David Wright.

well Heyman tweeted to stop speculating. May be he just doesn't want to chase down stories that he didn't start though.