clueless

You're the manager of a Major League baseball team. You should know the rules of the game. When the other team breaks those rules, you should know how to take advantage of that. Willie has no clue.

Yesterday the Reds batted out of order (Dusty is also clueless, poor Reds fans, but I want to focus on Willie because this is a Mets blog). So the Reds bat out of order, and Willie doesn't take advantage. He jumped the gun and alerted the home plate umpire too early. What you're supposed to do if this happens, is just let the team continue to screw up their order until they get a man on base. Then you alert the umpire before the next batter sees a pitch, the 'proper' batter is called out, and the runner is taken off base. Basically, you don't do shit until you can take advantage of it by getting a runner taken off base and an out called.

It was a hilarious scene though. Willie wore his usual confused look, Jerry Manuel thought he was so smart that the Mets were going to be awarded two free outs on the play, and David Wright held two fingers in the air, thinking there should be two outs. Then, even the umpires thought there should be two outs. Feliciano had no clue, he just stood there on the mound reminiscing about his one season with the Fukuoka Softbank Hawks. Then it was actually Dusty Baker("In Dusty we trusty"), of all people, that seemed to know the rule, and got the umpires to discuss it until they finally figured it out.

Now I know some of you are thinking, yeah, but this is a tough rule to understand, blah, blah, nobody really knows the rule on this, give him a break. Well, they should know the rule. Willie is being paid to manage a baseball team. This is one of those rules that every manager should understand, and understand how to take advantage of. Because if this was a closer game, it would have been nice to know you had the Reds by the balls because of their screwup.

*Friday night's game was rained out, so I watched some Yankee baseball instead. And wow, Wilson Betemit should never see the infield of a major league diamond again. He couldn't make a play on anything, and the Tigers just kept peppering him with hard grounders.

*Lots of new Met-Killers lately, add Bronson Arroyo to the list. 8ip, 4h, 1r, 2bb, 9k, W. Lowering his ERA to 7.14.