YANKEE PRIDE

This was a serious photo shoot.

I can't get enough of the Clemens bashing. While starting the revolution in Burma this last winter, I missed out on the Mitchell Report findings and Clemens' demise. Of all the things I "missed" while I was gone (I didn't really MISS anything), I think watching Clemens' decline would have been the most entertaining. Giants win the Super Bowl? Na. I can watch that on tape. But Clemens going down like the lying scumbag without a shred of dignity remaining, that must have been great to watch.

I have two friends who were proud, and probably still are blindly Yankee proud, that they were in the stands, and subsequently shown on TV during Clemens' 300th win. Sorry about that guys. Now you know it was all a big scam that you fell for. Oops.

Keep "Boo"ing

I would still like to see this scene(left).

Delgado, as we all know, finally put a good game together yesterday. And this asshole doesn't go out for a curtain call. Shea stadium was waiting, and they probably shouldn't have, but they wanted the curtain call. But no, look out, Delgado's gonna show us fans. I guess we're not allowed to 'boo' him. I guess all that ticket money, $16M of which is going to be his this year, isn't enough from us. Now we're not allowed to criticize him either. What a prick.

The fans deserve some shit for this too. They were supposed to give him the silent treatment. Just sit on your hands. The guy hasn't produced in two years, and he gives us the same ridiculous sound bites about how he's "seeing it well", and "just need to get quicker". It's just a bunch of shitty excuses for being old and having 34 different hitches in his swing. If the guy starts putting a few good games together, I might get excited about it, until then he's still a .205/.304/.341 hitter.

FYI, .205/.304/.341 is awful.

*I think I dislike Teixeira more than Chipper at this point. Chipper creeps chicks out, and has hit alot of homeruns against the Mets, but Teixeira is a tool.

*Lose to Jair Jurrjens, then knock Hudson out after three innings and Smoltz after four. Fine with me, anyway the Metsies can take 2 of 3 from the Braves is good.

*John Maine has all but abandoned his slider. He's been using mostly changeups as his secondary pitch. The results are about the same: solid, but he still walks too many batters and throws too many pitches to go further than the 6th inning.

*Figueroa has fallen back to Earth a bit, but the guy is still throwing good innings. And he grew up a Metropolitans fan. Just keep pitching him.

Overmanaging.

Yesterday we talked about Girardi's micromanaging, today we'll talk about Willie's overmanaging. And Aaron Heilman.

The Mets have played 21 games. Heilman has pitched in 13 of them! This has been bad for many reasons. First, he's being abused like Joe Torre abuses the uniform burning Scott Proctor(poor Scott must have been excited to finally leave Torre, and then the Dodgers go out and get Torre! Proctor currently has 11 appearances already). Second, Heilman has basically been brutal at times. He's allowed four homeruns, 24 baserunners in 13 innings, and since he's almost always brought in to close games, he has really hurt the Mets in a few games. My professional scouting opinion (smiley face) is that Heilman relies on his changeup too much. I think the fastball is Heilman's best pitch, and what happened to the tight slider he was throwing in the first week of the season? That pitch was working but it's like he's forgotten all about it. Bring that back,.... again.

I give Willie the blame for last night's game. He took Ollie Perez out too early. In the 6th, Perez gives up two singles to start the inning, then makes a great play on a bunt, and follows it by getting a groundout. Two outs now, Milledge comes up to pinch hit, and Willie brings in Heilman. It's a tie game at this point, and Perez looks like he might get out of this himself. But for some reason, every time a starter gets in a little trouble in the 6th or 7th inning, or sometimes the 5th, Willie goes out and pulls him. When is he ever going to let the starting pitcher pitch in a crucial situation? Sometimes, the bullpen just needs to be spared. Sometimes a pitcher, like Ollie last night, might still have enough to finish another inning. Sometimes NOT making a move, is making a move.

*Castillo is already up to .273BA with a .360 OB% and 6 SB. Entonces, don't worry about Castillo.

But Mommy!....

Yankee Mom, er, manager, Joe Girardi, has taken candy out of the Yankees' clubhouse. It's funny, really. The fact that professional baseball players are given candy bars in their lockerrooms completely fits with the childish image we have of them. Players are constantly begging for more money, asking for private jets, and whining when something doesn't quite go their way. Just like when these guys were spoiled kids begging for more allowance or more oreos. But unlike those of us that grew out of that and sometimes act like adults, most pro ballplayers haven't quite advanced that far. The fact that Girardi has to take their candy away from them because they are so spoiled that they can't control themselves around it, is hilarious, but not that surprizing. I hate going on some bullshit 'high horse' type rant here, but it is just so symptomatic of the culture of professional baseball, and America.

Does this mean Bobby "El Comedulce" Abreu needs a nickname change?

The selfishness doesn't elude the Mets' franchise either. The way these guys are coddled is shocking at times. Delgado finally got moved down in the lineup, from 5th to 6th last night, and it was treated like such a big deal. Everyone wondered how Delgado would feel. How is this going to effect the team? What the fuck!?!? The guy is washed up, bat him eighth, release him, something. How is it going to effect the team? The team will obviously be better without that hole in the lineup. And Castillo gets moved to eighth last week and Willie has to worry about how Castillo is going to feel about it? Of course he's not going to be happy about it, but fuck, get a few hits and you can bat second again. It's just a shame that once players sign big contracts, their status on the field is dictated by the contract, and not by their performance anymore.

Snakes and Clowns

Simply put, Chris Russo is the least knowledgable 'sports personality' in the business. He is also afraid of snakes and clowns.

I actually watched some of the M&M show yesterday, and I had a headache after five minutes. Then, knowing that so many New Yorkers get their baseball opinions from these two morons, I got angry. These clowns are propagating that old, stodgy, meaningless, good-ole-boy baseball talk.

*Ryan Howard will most likely be the first player to strikeout over 200 times in one season. In fact, I think he is going to shatter his own record of 199Ks, and set the new mark somewhere around 230.

*Duaner Sanchez already looks a hundred times better than he did in his first appearance of the season. His velocity is increasing and his stuff looks sharp. I didn't expect this, but I'm happy about it for sure.

the little guy

Leave Castillo alone. People are all over this guy. Why? He can get on base, he plays above average defense, he takes alot of pitches, and he can still steal bases. Yeah, his .226 average is looking a little low right now, but just a few two hit games from now and he'll be hitting .300. And .300 is what he hits every single year. Willie has already been giving him days off so that he can stay healthy all year.

Randolph has batted Castillo eighth a few times, and I think he fits in great in that slot. He has some speed, so when he gets on, he can be bunted around by the pitcher. His high OB% means he will also clear the pitcher spot pretty often. I still like him in the two hole though. Castillo is one of the few 'stereotypical two-hitters' that is actually a good fit for that spot, because he can bunt, run, take pitches, and most importantly, actually get on base himself. Either way, he's one of the players Mets fans should NOT be worried about.

Unless you're talking about the 4-year contract he got, that is worth discussing. But Castillo in 2008, I wouldn't worry about him.

*Johan Santana is a really good pitcher.

*David Wright is a really good hitter.

*Carlos Delgado is awful. I can't think of anything he does well right now. It's time to take notice Omar, the Blue Jays released 'The Big Skirt", you can release Delgado. You can do it Omar, you don't owe anyone anything.

Prima Donna

Beltran sat out last night's game with a 'stiff neck'. When Cohen announced this during the game, Pops said to me, "From what?!?! Bowing after finally hitting a homerun last night?!?!". I keep trying to like Beltran, but he makes it difficult. How could he even let it be known that that's the reason he was sitting out?

*Willie Harris was playing LF for the Nats at one point last night, when Luis Castillo came up to bat. Harris positioned himself just behind the shortstop so that Luis would have trouble blooping a hit in there. But Luis just doesn't give a fuck. You want to play shallow? He'll hit it shallower. And he did, just barely getting it over the thirdbaseman for a basehit. Then the guy steals second somehow. I don't understand how he does it since he usually looks like his knees are about to collapse.

*In the 14 inning game last night, it ended up being Jorge Sosa outpitching Joel Hanrahan. Come on, that's funny. I'm glad I just went to sleep.

It's About Time

I thought Carlos was going to sleep through the whole season.

*Supposedly Reyes will be back in full celebration mode too. Good. The idea that Met handshakes make the other teams try harder is retarded. And if celebrating makes Reyes feel good, and in turn play good, then it's all good. However, I do think Reyes wore down last year, and that was the cause of his late season slump. So, Willie should ease off Reyes about running out every damn groundball. If I'm the manager I'm telling Jose, if you chop a two-hopper to second in the eighth inning of a blowout, please, just jog to first.

The DL

So, Duaner Sanchez is back. I'm not excited. Major shoulder surgeries, lost velocity, plus Carlos Muniz gets sent down. Sanchez was between 87-91mph with his fastball, and relied heavily on his changeup around 80mph. The changeup had tons of good sinking action, but the fastball looked very hittable. Sanchez threw only one breaking pitch last night, a curveball. So, he brought back the same repertoire he had in '06, just not as good(his fastball used to top out at 95mph). Which is what I thought would happen, you can't expect a guy to come back from multiple shoulder injuries and be the same. Metropolitan fans and their GM need to calm down on the Duaner Sanchez expectations.

Then they can all calm down about Orlando Hernandez, Pedro Martinez, and Moises Alou. There is always so much talk about what the Mets are going to have, and what they're going to do, just as soon as they get healthy. Hernandez should be asked to just leave the organization and be forgotten about. Then Pedro needs to have his hand held on his walk out to the mound and should be used college style as Friday night starter. He'll need six days of rest between starts. Moises will need to be a part-time player if/when he gets back. I just hate the talk about these guys. They aren't reliable, and never will be again. Yes, they are good when they are healthy. When Alou plays he should be hitting cleanup on this team. But it's completely unrealistic to think the Mets can rely on any of these players at any point in the season.

*Pelfrey looked good again. He's throwing a real heavy ball so far and the slider looked deadly. He battled through Ryan Zimmerman and Nick Johnson with the bases loaded in the third inning last night. Pelfrey got Zimmerman to pop up on one pitch. Then he K'd Johnson by throwing him five straight fastballs, the last two of which were swung at and missed.

The Judge, Nelson Figueroa

I can't help but like guys that played D-III college baseball. Then, add in that this guy has played all over the world and I've got a full on man crush. Figueroa has gone from Brooklyn, to Brandeis University in the 'Nerdy Nine' conference, to MLB, to the Mexican League, to the Chinese Professional Baseball League, to Taiwan Series MVP, to the Metropolitans. During this time he's rehabbed a rotator cuff injury, designed 9/11 t-shirts, and can make a cell phone out of a beer can and some pine tar.

On the hill, Figueroa throws from a 3/4 arm slot. He doesn't have overpowering velocity, clocking in the upper-80s with his fastball. His command is good though, and his low arm angle gives his fastball decent movement. His secondary pitch is his curve, which gets good bite despite its slow velocity. Nelson also mixes in a slider, but it's a pretty weak pitch. He'll backdoor it to lefthanded hitters, which seems to fool them somehow. Figueroa has shown a changeup in the past, but I don't think he threw one Friday night.

Brewers series notes....

*Carlos Beltran is a good outfielder. He has a good reputation but I've always been skeptical. He ran down a couple balls this weekend that I didn't think he could get.

*David Wright doesn't look like a gold glove defender right now. He still has the same problem he's always had, he can't throw accurately. He can 'pick it' with anyone, but once his feet are set, I have no idea where the throw will end up. Delgado has become pretty good at coming off the bag to 'catch and tag' runners coming down line, and save Wright's ass.

*On Saturday, Ben Sheets just simply out pitched Johan Santana. Sheets throws one of the best curveballs in baseball, and the Mets just struggled against him.

*I like this Carlos Muniz guy. He doesn't have completely dominant velocity, but batters look like they have a hard time hitting him. And, he whipped out a great balk move to pick off a Brewer on Saturday.

*A lot has been made of Prince Fielder's vegetarian diet. If the guy doesn't want to eat meat, great, but I just hope he has some kind of clue about how to get the proper protein he needs in other ways. I also hope he knows that he can get meat from farms that don't torture their animals, if that's his reason for going veggie.

*Sometimes you're the hydrant, sometimes you're Gabe Kapler. The newest Met Killer came to town launching home runs off Johan Santana and Oliver Perez. Yikes. This guy was retired last year, and couldn't hit in his prime, whenever that was. I'll put the blame on the Mets' lefties though. Both pitches he homered on were supposed to be outside fastballs, but missed locations put them on the inner half.

*I'm done with Delgado. He can't be taking up the fifth spot in the batting order anymore. The only guy he's been able to get the bat around on was Jamie Moyer. He should be occupying the eight hole. Seriously. I wonder what that lineup would look like....

Reyes SS
Castillo 2B
Wright 3B
Church RF
Beltran CF
Pagan LF
Schneider C
Delgado 1B
Darling P

As you can see, I'm a fan of Ryan Church.

BIG PELF

Hard sinking fastball(92-93mph), straight changeup(83-84mph), late-breaking slider(81-85mph). Mike Pelfrey's repertoire. I've never seen his stuff look that good. His fastball was really sinking and his slider actually looked like it had some bite on it. It was nothing like last year's flat slider that routinely got hammered. I still wish he'd bring back the big hook though.

*Ian Kennedy: sensitive to water. What? Talk about embarrassing for the Yankees. Joe Girardi was banking on a rainout last night, he started his bullpen and ended up using Kennedy in relief. "It was a great idea. Unfortunately we played through the hard stuff", Jason Giambi said, meaning yes, indeed, they were hoping for a rainout. No wonder they didn't score any runs, they weren't trying. Girardi had them all thinking the game would get called.

*Can the Mets just forget about Orlando Hernandez now? He's bringing the organization down. The continued bad news he brings is only hurting. People talk about him like he's an important part of the team, but the best thing he does is create hilarious headlines like, "Hernandez to wear a boot for two weeks".

*I think the Phillies have the same number of holes in their squad to match the Metsies. Yikes. Looked like they were playing under a tent last night. Get it, cuz a circus is performed under a tent?.... Ugh.

*Braves closer Rafael Soriano was placed on the DL with an elbow injury. I guess that explains his rapid loss of velocity in Sunday's game.

Nine in a row

This guy cannot keep getting important appearances. I want to read this in the paper.... "Scott Schoeneweis placed on waivers for the purpose of giving him his unconditional release". Sosa can go too.

The bullpen was supposed to be a Mets strength. I suppose it still is when Wagner, Feliciano, and Heilman are pitching. I still like Joe Smith and his new delivery too. And this Muniz kid doesn't look like he has lights-out stuff, but he's put up good minor league numbers as a closer. I'd rather try someone with potential than keep sending out the same two bozos (Sosa and Schoeneweis).

*Philly has now beaten the Metsies nine straight times. Pelfrey goes tonight to shut that streak down.

*The Mets suddenly have many glaring holes in their team, and I'm not sure how they're going to cover them up.

*Keith had an embarrassing moment in the booth yesterday when he confused So Taguchi with Tadahito Iguchi. It was bizarre, and put both Cohen and Darling into a stunned silence.

*Citi Field standing over Shea Stadium is a little strange. First it looked fucking awesome, then I felt sad that Shea will be imploded, and then the Mets started losing and I didn't care either way anymore. It's a better view than the parking lot was.

MET KILLER

Teixeira reached base four times on Saturday, scoring two runs. Then he iced Sunday's game with a two-run jack in the top of the 9th and a diving stop down the line in the bottom of the inning. He was scooping throws from centerfield to doubleup guys, and finished the short series off with his ultimately dorky straight-armed fist into the air after the last out.

Teixeira is just a complete tool box. And yes, that's an '84 Donruss Don Mattingly double shortprint special-rookie platinum card in his hand.

With Chipper, and now Teixeira, the Mets may never beat the Braves ever again.

*During Saturday's Fox broadcast, McCarver was talking about how the rest of the league didn't like how Jose Reyes and the Mets were doing all their handshakes and 'showboating' the last couple years. He claimed that doing that hurt the Mets by giving the other teams extra motivation. So Joe Buck, realizing how ridiculous this sounded, said in the most sarcastic tone he could, "so they're gonna try harder because they don't like your handshakes?". It was a rare moment of hilarity from Buck.

*Ah, spring training. He was so good in spring training. The Mets tried to battle back for Maine, even posting some runs off Hudson. I was impressed until Jorge Sosa got involved and the game was over quickly.

*Braves closer Rafael Soriano lost all his velocity on Sunday after his 20th pitch. He went from consistently throwing 94 or 95mph to 93, 92, 92, 91, 92. His last pitch that Schneider ripped down the line was a 91mph fastball. My point is, maybe in the future, if you make this guy work a little, he'll become very hittable, very quickly.

*Carlos Beltran did a reenactment of the final out of the 2006 NLCS on Sunday. He just stood in the box, take, take, take, take against Soriano on some very hittable pitches until he got punched out.

Ollie

This guy was awesome. Perez pounded the strike zone, hit the corners, varied his sliders, and even used a few splitters. His velocity was back up a touch from the end of last year too, if I remember right. Very impressive.

Looking back, last year Perez did the same thing in his first start too, dominating Atlanta. But then in his second start he had that awful seven walk outing against Philly and couldn't get out of the 3rd inning. I don't think that will happen again this year. Perez had a good season in '07 and Mr. Peterson, with that creepy look he gives his pitchers, might have helped. Ollie did see his walks increase and his velocity dropped (if I remember correctly) around mid-August. Is it possible he tired a bit? Sure. He's still only 26, hard to believe, and has had quite an up and down career so far.

*Schwenny prediction update: my AL Cy Young candidate didn't get the win against the Yankees on opening night thanks to the 315ft pop-up that the "Melk-Man delivered", just barely getting over the Jeffrey Maier fence in Yankee Stadium rightfield. That ball wouldn't have gotten out of any high school field I've ever seen and I'm pretty sure that Mets-Thing contributor 'Turn a Quick Two' could throw a baseball further. But, you know, it's the 'House that Ruth Built', built specifically so he could hit Home Runs easier.

*If you look up Jeffrey Maier on wikipedia (like I just did so I could spell his name right), on the bottom of the page it says, "See also: Steve Bartman". Fucking Bartman. Strange how these two fan interference guys are on the opposite ends of the spectrum. I wonder if the Marlins fans feel the same way about Bartman that the Yankees fans feel about Maier? Oh yeah, the Marlins don't have any fans.

*Dan Uggla was back to his old form at secondbase Wednesday night.

*Ryan Church is a real man. He will throw you out on a line from the fence and then drop a bomb on you in the next inning. He also recorded his own rap album after the game.

*David Wright can mash. And Carlos Delgado, well, he can't anymore.

SEASON'S OVER.

I had a bad feeling about Pedro's start last night, but I didn't think he would die. SNY gave a dugout shot of Pedro awaiting the bottom of the 1st, and he looked wide-eyed and scared. It was strange. Pedro isn't supposed to be scared or nervous. He's the 4'-10" guy that will throw a fastball at your shoulder blades and then grab your coaches head and throw him to the ground. But Pedro took the mound and he couldn't command any of his pitches. The velocity was what we expected (85-88mph fastball), but he was all over the place. The Mets were down 2-0 in two batters and ten pitches. The nervous, dazed look never left his face until the pained look of injury replaced it.

What this means though, is that Mike Pelfrey is going to pitch a lot. Yikes. The guy still doesn't have any kind of breaking pitch. He was famed for a 12-6 curveball in college, but I guess he lost that pitch somewhere in his signing bonus. I don't even know what that means, but he needs to start missing some bats, getting some outs, and throwing some innings.

This also means John Maine is going to have to live up to my Cy Young prediction.

*Luis Castillo is funny. Sometimes the guy looks like he can barely move. He'll make routine plays in the field and then very slowly walk back to his position to recover. But then he'll get up to bat, lay down bunt basehits and steal bases.

*I don't miss LoDuca at all.

*Joe Smith has changed his delivery to a more upright throwing motion. His pitches, especially the slider, was moving a lot more.

*Heilman has added a cutter. The pitch worked well and Heilman seems to have quickly fell in love with it. In his second inning(the 9th), Heilman threw only two fastballs. He used mostly cutters, and a few changeups. He'll use the pitch inside on LHs and away to RHs.

*Keith Hernandez could barely finish getting the words, "you can get hurt upstairs with a changeup", out of his mouth before Wise did exactly that and ended the game.

*There is still nothing wrong with cheerleaders in baseball....