I have not blogged the past few days because there was not a whole lot to comment on. A couple wins, a couple losses, a tie.  Nothing really LARGE, no big news.

Now there is some.

First up, the relatively big news. Duaner Sanchez was released, saving a million and a half in payroll. Sanchez never really recovered from his freak injury in 2006, the velocity was not there and his command was off.

To be fair, I think part of the blame for his failure to get back to speed should be laid at the feet of the man I lovingly refer to as the Village Idiot, Willie Randolph. Willie took a page out of his mentor, Joe Torre’s book (not his tell-all Yankee one, but his playbook), and rode Duaner pretty hard in the first half of 2008, not figuring that coming off ground-breaking (for a major league pitcher) surgery would mean watching the workload. Duaner pitched in around half of the games before the all star break, and the workload began catching up to him as the tank got lighter and lighter. By the second half, he was wiped out, and the bullpen implosion took him with it.

He came back this year with similar problems, velocity and location, and Omar decided to cut bait with him and save the money.

Not a HUGE surprise, but a bit of one to Jerry Manuel, who felt that Duaner may have had a bit left in the tank and said so to the press, but what’s done is done.

Now, the HUGE news. Johan Santana has had a couple of very productive bullpen sessions and will be the starting pitcher tonight against the Marlins in his first serious outing of the spring. He is back on track to start opening day.

I still think they should send him for a precautionary MRI to be 100% sure, but who am I? Just your friendly neighborhood Mets blogger.

Other news includes Jose Reyes’ return following the Dominican Republic’s elimination from the WBC and Pedro Martinez making a public pitch for consideration in the Mets’ open #5 spot.

Since Tim Redding got shelled by college kids, Freddy Garcia has looked like the fat toad he is, and Livan Hernandez has been spotty at best, a 91+ mph throwing Pedro SHOULD be a serious consideration for us, I humbly assert.

But, again, who am I to judge?

Well, let’s de what Johan does today, and as always, if you happen across Shane Victorino in your travels, a good, swift kick to the groin would be the perfect move…

There is not much that can be taken from today’s game. It was a debacle. Any gamethat you lose 15-4 is not going to give you too many positives, to say the least.

The game was over early, as the Cardinals had a ton of starters on the field, while the Mets only had Luis Castillo, Dan Murphy, Ryan Church, and Brian Schneider reprisenting the starters in today. The Cards scored in the first four innings, three times in the first, once in the second, twice in the third and SEVEN times in the fourth. That’s right seven runs in the fourth.

OK, game analysis. Freddy Garcia started the game, his second of the season. He had another horrible outing, 2 innings, 4 runs, all earned, 3 hits, and a walk. His curve was decent, but his “fast”ball was non-exisitant. Garcia is DONE. He needs to go. There is nothing left in that tank. Since 2006, he has thrown around 75 inefective innings, had several surgeries, gained a ton of weight, and reported into camp with an attitude. Any more time wasted would be a travesty.

Additionally, the loud “thud” you heard was Luis Castillo’s average crashing back down to reality. He had a good initial game, but since game one of Spring has as many hits as I do.

That would be zero. I guess losing 17 pounds and saying all the right things on reporting mean nothing without actual execution upon actual games.

Dillon Gee had probably the worst inning of work in his career, and I mean going back to T Ball.  It started off pretty well, two infield grounders right at defenders. Problem is that the first one was thrown away by SS Jose Coronado, the the second one, a possible double play, was instead a fielder’s choice that ended up with runners at 1st and 2nd after the “neighborhood” play was not called, and both runners were deemed safe. Then began the hit parade. Three straight singles, a hit batsman, another hit, and 4 runs were in. A sacrifice fly finally gave us one out, but another run scored. a two run double scored two more before a grounder and popup finally ended the carnage. Gee probably could have gotten out of the inning with only a run or two if the first two batters had been retired as they should have been, but he kind of let it get to him and suffered a meltdown.

So, what GOOD can we take fromthis game? Not a lot. Tom Martin pitched well, putting him in a competition with Casey Fossum for the second bullpen lefty spot. Marlon Anderson had two hits in his first real extended playing time. Robinson Cancel had a couple of hits.

That’s basically it.

Sad, huh? Well, you have a game or two like this every now and then, so we can’t be TOO worried, but it is a bit troublesome that the teamis either VERY GOOD or VERY BAD. Hopefully things will settle down to a more even distribution.

The only other news to report is that apparently Johan Santana’s initial start of the season may have been put off until the 5th game of the season instead of opening day. It’s not necessarily horrible news, as long as this is not a lingering thing. Again, the Johan situation bears close scrutiny as the season wears on. Our “crack” training staff would not put out pollyanna information after all, right?

Like last year when they assured Met fans that Ryan Church’s concussion was a day to day thing. That Moises Alou would be out a week to ten days max, Pedro Martinez would be back and raring to go in May, Orlando Hernandez’ toe was healing faster than expected…

Well, since the game was a total and complete blowout, I will jump into it later.

To briefly sum up, the Mets took on the Tigers at Port St. Lucie today, and stomped them 13-1. The Tigers had virtually their entire starting lineup there and it mattered not.

OK, the more important news was that Johan Santana threw today, testing the elbow that he has had tightness in and caused absolute panic all over Mets Nation.

He came out of it feeling fine, and the team actually canceled the schedule of sending him to New York tomorrow (a day off) for an MRI.

Not sure if I totally agree with THAT, I’d feel much better if he at least got an MRI done in Florida (they must have one sitting around down there somewhere, right?) and sending the results for evaluation. Couldn’t hurt, and might spot something that is not felt yet. I’d prefer we be 100% certain, but who am I? Just a Mets Blogger.

Anyway, the offense looked GREAT, obviously, and that is a good thing, since we will be losing much of the team to the WBC (15 Mets total are playing), so no name kids and scrubs? Here is your shot at stardom (or at least catching the eye of a scout or two) starting Tuesday!

Oh, well. Enjoy the day off (even though we have not had baseball since October…) and the updates will resume then, although if I get a hair across my but I my actually don the analysts hat and do some player profiling of my own.

Oh, and as always, if Shane Victorino is crossing the street in front of you, “accidentally” slipping your foot off the brake and hitting the gas COULD be justified.

Not death, mind you, but a few weeks on the DL would be good for his mental acuity!

LET’S GO METS!

OK, this really does not have much to do with the Mets per se, but I felt like I had to comment on this.

As a fan of sports in general and New York sports in particular, there is one person who looms large in the media there that has a great deal of power, but maybe more than he actually FEELS he has.
That man is Mike Francesa, heretofore known as Fatcesa. I don’t usually like to get personal in my criticism, unless warranted. In his case it is warranted.

Fatcesa is a Yankee fan, and makes no bones about it. That is fine, I have no problem with that. However, letting your bias cloud your judgment, and allowing it to help you to ignore actual facts makes your supposed objectivity as a media observer suspect.

Some background, Francesa has been calling David Wright an “unclutch” player all winter, and has put forth the rumor that Ryan Church wants out of New York (supposedly does not like the fans).

The problem? There is absolutely NO basis of fact for EITHER assertion.

To attack both statements, I’ll begin with the second one first, since there is written evidence of it.

Ryan Chuch stated flatly several times, both to print reporters and on air media outlets that not only is he NOT dissatisfied with playing in New York, he actually RELISHES it. A simple google search would put that rumor to rest, but I guess fat fingers can’t type too well to actually fact find.

Now, as to the assertion that David Wright is not a clutch performer, there are a few caveats:

Most importantly, the actual DEFINITION of “clutch” is a ephemeral one. What actually IS “clutch”? We know it when we see it, but how do you define it? Impossible.

Second, in a famous example stated over and over by Mr. Fatcesa in one major clutch situation last September, specifically against the Cubs the last week of the season, David came up with Dan Murphy on third and none out and struck out on three ptiches. Admittedly, DW looked really bad in that particular at bat.

Does that mean that DW is NOT a clutch player? Really? ONE at bat in ONE game?

Let’s look at the actual statistics. This will get a little dry, but the numbers are stunning, in my opinion.

Everyone knows that a .300 average .400 OBP and .500 SLG are optimal numbers, Hall of Fame, even.

What are David’s numbers in “clutch” situations for his career?

Late and close (Plate appearances in the 7th or later, with the score tied, or team behind by one run with the tying run at least on deck) David has hit .307/.407/.483 for his career with 13 homers and 52 rbi in almost 400 PA.

Looks like he gets the job done.

How about in a tie game? Try .318/.394/.544 with 37 homers and 140 rbi.

Down a run? Hmm.   .323/.405/.544 with 66 homers and 256 rbi.

Down two? Wow.   .324/.421/..556 with 92 homers and 340 rbi.

How about High leverage at bats? .315/.397/.531 with 23 homers and 160 rbi.

Still think he is not clutch Fatcesa? Maybe a simple look at the well, ACTUAL FACTS would enlighten you.

I mean, really, by ANY metric you choose, David Wright is a clutch player. ONE infamous at bat does not change that fact.

Did the Mets as a team collapse in 2007? Sure. Was the 2008 season a collapse? I say more a fade than a collapse, but if you want to say the bullpen collapsed, fine.

Did David Wright collapse? Was he unclutch? Has he EVER been unclutch? The numbers say no.

Oh, and also for the record, in September 2008 Wright’s numbers were: .340/.426/.577 with 6 homers and 21 rbi.

In September 2007 he went for a .352/.432/.602 line with 6 homers and 20 rbi.

Is there any question why I turn off WFAN from my computer from 1pmto 5 pm?

If you are going to call David Wright unclutch, then you can’t be a fan of a team that blew a 2 out in the ninth, no one on, 3 games to none lead in a 4 game series.

Pot calling the kettle black, Fatcesa, pot calling the kettle black. Keep drinking the Diet Cokes, but it sure ain’t working.

Sorry for the delay, any who were pining for my thoughts (riiiiiight), I finished watching the game this morning.

Since my esteemed co-host Jeff pretty much summed up the game already, I will just make a couple of notes culled from the game and other news.

First of al, at least the team tried to fight back. Down a lot relatively early, they could have easily said that since it was a spring game, who cares, let’s get to the tee box. So that is nice.

The hitter’s are ahead of the pitchers, as to be expected, but some interesting things can be discerned about the #5 spot in the Mets rotation. First, Livan Hernandez looked really good in his two innings, lively pitches and movement on his offerings. However, the other two major candidates for the spot, Tim Redding and Freddy Garcia, are not showing ANYTHING. Redding has not even thrown a pitch and Freddy Garcia would have been better off NOT throwing a pitch.

Garcia actually looked like absolute, total, and complete garbage. His pitches were flat and had NO movement, he walked a ton of batters, gave up hits, and in general looked like the washed up fat pant load that many of us felt he was when we signed him. At least when we think of Redding, we can fool ourselves into thinking he may be a pitcher, we have not actually SEEN him do anything this year.

Garcia is a waste of oxygen in our camp at this time.

On another note, we saw a couple of the candidates for the second bullpen lefty in the game, and by far the most impressive one was Casey Fossum. Two solid shutout innings put him FIRMLY ahead of Tom Martin, Adam Bostick, Valerio De Los Santos, Heriberto Ruelas, Jon Switzer, and the newly signed Ron Villone.

I like the stockpiling arms, though, sure can’t hurt.

Oh, and Castillo went 0-3, he’s a bum! Just kidding, folks, trust me.

As always, remember, if you see Ryan Howard walking down the street, remember, Tonya Harding had the right idea.

Make him scream “why, why, why, why, why…”

LET’S GO METS!

Niese scheduled to start against Detroit today, the game is at least on radio, not sure about TV yet, but good old mlb.tv will at least have audio!

OK,  first of all the important news. Johan Santana was scratched from his start tomorrow.  This news in some circles causes hand wringing and gnashing of teeth. While it’s not GREAT news, it’s also not a big deal,  just some soreness, and they are being super careful with the left arm of the franchise, as they should.  He may even have his scheduled start on March 3rd moved as well. Again, it’s really not that big a deal, as they are being super careful with their $100 million investment. (Hmm, maybe if the Wilpon’s had been as careful with the 300-900 million dollars they gave Bernie Madhoff, we would have had a different offseason, but I don’t want to get off track)

So, on to the game. Telecast on SNY, but since I don’t have a satellite dish, I watch on mlb.tv. Usually there are no problems with mlb.com, I highly recommend it. Today, however, in the bottom of the 8th I was knocked off and unable to get back onto the site to see the bottom of the 8th and top of the 9th. Frustrating, to say the least.

Anyway, once again, the offense broke out the whomping sticks again, scoring a run  in the first, with Luis Castillo keeping up his hot start with a single, steal, moved over on a sacrifice (Perez was batting second, Jerry’s being creative this spring!) and scoring on a grounder by the #3 hitter, Jose Reyes. In the third, another un was manufactured on a walk to Delgado, a head’s up taking of second on a pitch in the dirt by Carlos, who was then moved to third on a single by Wright, and then scoring on a rushed sure double play ball that turned into one out and an error. (The Marlin’s defense was atrocious, three errors yesterday, two more today) In the 4th Reyes came up with the bases loaded and hit a deep fly ball that carried out over the right field fence, off the fielder’s glove for a big fly salami. Reyes followed that up with ANOTHER homer, this one into the teeth of the wind in LEFT field in the 6th, and three batters later Carlos Beltran got a two run homer of his own to complete the scoring.

As for the defense, Dan Murphy mad a couple of nice plays in left. While he does not look like a gazelle out there, he seems to get the job done. Does not hurt that he also went 1-2 with a walk and steal.

Pitching was the rest of the story. ZERO runs against the (mostly) starting lineup of the Marlins, and only 3 hits. Very well pitched.
So, here we stand, after two spring games. Averaging 9 runs a game scored and 1.5 given up.

Sew the pennant up now! (Yeah, right, if only it were that easy) We look as good as any team can in spring training, but again, it’s only TWO games in. Nice to set the tone early, though.

Tomorrow’s game is against St. Louis, and supposedly Livan Hernandez and Freddy Garcia are going to throw in it. Should be interesting, as both are slated to be in the mix for the #5 spot.

I have an interview tomorrow afternoon, so I will not be able to watch it all live, but I will see it eventually, again, the mlb.com package is pretty good about you being able to see the games as they are going on and quickly having them available once they are done.

Until then, remember, if Jimmy Rollins is close by, it CAN be considered a crime of passion to smack him upside the head!

LET’S GO METS!

Well, while not able to WATCH the game, I WAS able to LISTEN to it on mlb.tv audio gameday. Had to listen to it on through the Baltimore feed, and if I offend any Orioles fans, tough crap.

Your radio team SUCKS. Basically unlistenable, and VERY anti New York. I understand that the Yankees and Orioles are rivals, but those guys took every chance to crap on the city itself.

Whatever.

Back to the actual game. The Mets kicked butt, winning 9-3. I am fully aware that it was the first game of Spring, and the Orioles only had maybe 4 actual starters on the field, but a win is a win, and I’ll take them any way I can.

The best news out of the game was that Luis Castillo went 2-3 with 2 runs and 4 rbi. Ryan Church also had a GREAT game, going 2-3 as well with 3 rbi. Angel Pagan was good too, going 3-4 with a walk and a run. Nick Evans was 3-4 with 3 runs, and Dan Murphy was 2-3 with 2 runs.

Wow, lots of offense there. On the pitching side, Shawn Green started the game, but came out after only 2/3 of an inning, apparently he split a fingernail and was unable to continue. It does not sound too serious, but is something to keep an eye and ear on. Duaner Sanchez had a rocky first outing, giving up a run, a hit, and two walks in one inning. Again, it’s early, but something to keep our eyes on.

Brian Stokes had a really good outing, two shutout innings, but I can’t give you too many details on what he did in the second of the innings, because the radio broadcasters thought it was more important to play the tape of the pitching coach for the Orioles talking about a game of catch that Rich Hill had with Guillermo Quiroz yesterday rather than talk about the actual GAME that was going on, so we listeners missed 1 and 1/2 innings of the game to hear that the third string backup catcher for a 4th place team looked good in the cage, the AA third baseman reported in great shape, etc.

WHO CARES! How about focusing on the game?

I digress.

Anyway, it’s only a single spring game against a pretty bad team, but a win is good early, especially the way the team performed. Set the tone for the team, and get the competition started.

Tomorrow’s game is televised, and since I’m not working yet, I’ll be able to watch THAT one early, too and fill every interested person in.

Till then, keep your head in the game, and if Cole Hammels is nearby, don’t feel guilty, throw a brick at the bastard!

Well, I am hoping that this works out. This site is new to me, and I am excited to be here posting about my favorite subject, the New York Mets.

Since I consider myself an amateur “expert” in analysis of the Mets, I guess I should give some background information about myself to give everyone an idea of my “credentials”.

OK, My name is Brian Stark, and I am 40 years old. I have two sons, age 18 and 16, and have been happily married to my wife Stephanie since 1999. I was unhappily married to my sons mother for seven years, but that is a different post altogether.

Anyway, my father was an “Original” Met fan, he was 14 when the team came into being and was there from the start. My Dad’s side of the family was originally from Maspeth, so he was able to get to games both at the Polo Grounds and Shea from the start, and my two Uncles also were there as soon as they could be “trusted”to ride the train to the game without my Grandmother or Grandfather’s supervision. The Mets were their passion, and it quickly became ingrained in their DNA.

In 1967, my Dad met my Mother at a convention in Baltimore MD, and fell hard. My Mom was from a VERY small town in rural North Carolina, and while only 16, her feminine wiles drew my Dad from New York to Podunk NC later that year, and they got married. In 68 I was born, and the indoctrination began. In 69 my Dad could only listen to games on the radio, and was working LONG hours to support his new young family, but he was able to root on his team while listening, often having to go on the front porch to pick up the games on a tiny transistor radio.

We moved to New Hampshire in 1970, as some of my Dad’s friends had migrated there and Dad could get better work there, plus Mom hated living in the deep South at that time, since she had pretty liberal racial views and my Dad, being from New York, was not used to having to watch who he spoke to or ate lunch with at work.

Anyway, although we lived in New England, I was not deeply rooted in the whole “Boston” thing. Frankly, New York was already in my blood. We went to games whenever we could back in the city, and I fondly remember listening to games on that radio in a tiny apartment as a VERY young child.

By the time 1975 rolled around, we were on the move again, this time to the Norfolk Virginia area. This was when the fever REALLY took hold, because at that time,the Mets AAA affiliate was in Norfolk. The Tides played at an old, decrepit stadium, known as Metropolitan Park, but it was heaven to me. I got to see all the famous guys come through town. Mookie, Wally, Darryl, Doc, Lenny, we were there right at the start. Of course, when we first got there, the farm system was a shambles, but those crappy players were GODS to me.

Anyway, by 1983 we KNEW that the Mets were on to something pretty big. I still recall my Dad calling my two uncles, still stranded in New Hampshire, and telling them, “Watch out, we’re gonna be BACK and SCARY soon.

We were right. In the winter of 1983 my Dad bought a satellite dish, one of the old 8′ HUGE dishes, that gave us access to WWOR, the carrier of Mets games at the time, and we watched virtually every game in 1983. I had been taught how to score games as soon as I could write my own name and the names on the lineups, so every game I watched I scored. It became a habit that has turned into an obsession. I have the score sheet from EVERY game I have watched, listened to, or attended since that time (1975). Since the advent of the dish (1983), that is no less than 100 games a year, every year for 26 years. Last year, I scored all 162 regular season games and all 21 broadcast games in spring. That is pretty much the case every year.

Anyway, getting back to the history…

I’ll not go season by season, that will come out as we go along here on site.Moving forward to relatively recently, by 1999, I had gotten remarried to my wife Stephanie, and she had never been a big baseball fan. That was not going to make for a good marriage, and I had already been through that before. I determined that the best way to acclimate my wife to baseball was to actually take her to some games. I did just that. In June (about a month after we got married) we went on a visit to New York, and I took my two boys with us. They were 7 and 5 at the time. We took the train into the game, and I have pictures of them looking out the window at the stadium as you come around the bend. They had a look of absolute joy as they saw the stadium that until then was only something you saw on TV.

We got there as soon as the gates opened, and I left the boys with my Mom and Dad to go through the gift shops and get some food. I took Steph down to the lower levels to watch the team stretching and fielding before the game.

I had an ace in the hole. I knew that once #31 came out of the dugout, she would be hooked. I was 100% right. The second she saw Mike Piazza, Steph was no longer just a football fan. She became a fan immediately.

So, now, I have no problem watching games or going, because I was able to get her hooked. (Now that “her Mikey” is gone, the object of her affection is David Wright)

So, there you have it. A 30+ year dedicated fan, one who has created other fans, and believe me, one who KNOWS baseball and specifically the Mets.

More information will come out over time, but I have Orange and Blue blood flowing through my veins, and that will definitely come out over time!

Let’s end this initial post the only way that it can be properly ended…

Let’s Go Mets!