Met-Lovin' Big Shots

Don't look now but the Mets are in full-blown struggle mode again, with a dry offense and pointless bunting punctating a punchless 4-2 loss to the rival Braves Friday. The Mets played without disappointing import Ryota Igarashi, demoted all the way to Class A St. Lucie to get his stuff together and give the Mets a righthanded bench bat Jerry didn't bother using in Nick Evans, recalled from Class AA Binghamton. Evans has been bobbing between the minors and the Met roster now for three seasons and seemingly spent much of the last one in Jerry Manuel's doghouse, ideal for a Met No. 6.

Cliff Lee's trade to the Rangers this afternoon seems to have officially opened the doors on deadline trading season, and it will be interesting and probably exasperating to see what the Mets do and don't do with the opportunity this year. In the event you were wondering: Ted Lilly wears 30 and Roy Oswalt 44.

Don't forget this Monday, July 12, is Amazin' All-Star Monday at Two Boots at Grand Central Station, where Greg Prince and I will co-host an evening of Met-centric discussion with Howard Megdal, author, journalist and self-professed candidate for Mets general manager; and Marty Noble, Mets beat writer for more than 30 years at the Bergen Record, Newsday and MLB.com. Marty will be taking questions from the audience, and Two Boots will be serving pizza and drinks. Please stop in: Details at the Facebook invite here.

It was only a matter of time before six men in the bullpen proved far too radical a challenge for Jerry Manuel's management skills, and so, two weeks after returning to Class AAA Buffalo, lefthander Raul Valdes was recalled Monday. Interestingly, room for Valdes on the roster was created when the Mets disabled Fernando Tatis with a shoulder injury, raising the question of who Jerry will turn to when the opposition counters pinch hitter Chris Carter with a lefthanded pitcher: It's quite possible his head will explode and it will be left to Dave Jauss to decide.

My apologies for the lengthy layoff: I had little to report as far as numbers went and I tried to stay out of the way of the Mets when they were playing well. That obviously came to an halt last week in Puerto Rico, where the Mets began exhibiting many of the same traits that made them look like one of the league's worst teams earlier this year: Pitchers falling apart with two outs and none on, sloppy bullpen work, and questionable managerial tactics seemingly contributing to a team suddenly losing its nerve to win. Let's hope it's just a stumble in an imperfect but hardly disappointing first half.

The photo above is a snap of coach Bill Monbouquette's 1982 jersey as being sold on eBay by MBTN reader and jersey collector Nick, who wrote in recently. Check out his stuff here.

One of the few working writers to cover both Monboquette and Manuel, Marty Noble, will be the featured guest at a special Amazin All-Star Monday coming to Two Boots pizzeria in Grand Central Station next Monday, July 12, at 7 pm. Don't miss this! Marty is a terrific writer, a great interview and a 35-year chronicler of Metsdom. Also on the program will be Howard Megdal, author of The Baseball Talmud and candidate for the next Mets' General Manager. Faith & Fear in Flushing's resplendent penman, Greg Prince, will co-host with yours truly. Two Boots, located in the lower dining concourse at Grand Central Station, will offer a special All-Star inspired pizza and a free drink for all fans in exchange for a Mets baseball card. The Home Run Derby will provide televised entertainment. 

Not to toot my own horn here but the latest JJ Putz flap only goes to support the idea expressed way back when that the Mets cared not about the results when they committed five guys and $10 million to get Putz, only the illusion that they'd boldly gone out and created some kind of impenetrable bullpen.

That said, I think there's more room for debating whether the team treated JJ Putz's injuries properly than whether an impenetrable bullpen really exists. In other words, the Mets screwed up no matter how Putz's health turned out.

A look at the Mets roster will tell you how unspectacular this offseason's been by contrast. A little more than two weeks before pitchers and catchers report, and 11 men on the 40-man roster have yet to be officially assigned numbers, and a couple of them (Eddie Kunz, Tobi Stoner) are no locks to return in what we saw them wear last (40 and 29, respectively).

Behold the unassigned:

Jack Egbert, P

Kelvim Escobar. P (probably 45)

Clint Everts, P

Ryota Igarashi, P (probably 18)

Arturo Lopez, P

Jay Marshall, P

Henry Blanco, C

Chris Coste, C

Shawn Bowman, INF

Chris Carter, INF-OF

Gary Matthews, OF

Also invited to camp on minor-league deals:

R.A. Dickey, P

Elmer Dessens, P (wore 64 last year)

Bobby Livingston, P

Russ Adams, INF

Jolbert Cabrera, INF-OF

Mike Cervenak, INF

Andy Green, INF (wore 10 29 last year)

Mike Hessman, OF

Jesus Feliciano,OF

Frank (Smithtown's Own) Catalonotto, INF-OF 

Quick note to remind readers that the final Amazin' Tuesday of the regular season is scheduled for this Tuesday, Sept. 15 at Two Boots Tavern on the Lower East Side. Join your fellow suffering fans for an evening of pizza, drink specials and futile rooting for the Mets to stave off their 81st loss of the season on the big-screen TVs, beginning at 7pm.

The special guest speaker that night is Jeff Pearlman, the former Sports Illustrated writer (and current SI.com columnist) and author of THE BAD GUYS WON, the dynamite revisiting of the triumphant 1986 season and easily one of the best books ever written about the Mets. Jeff's writing career also includes books profiling Barry Bonds (LOVE ME, HATE ME), The Dallas Cowboys (BOYS WILL BE BOYS) and Roger Clemens (THE ROCKET WHO FELL TO EARTH) and he came out of the vaunted University of Delaware journalism program, so you know he's got the goods.

Also on the bill that night: Greg Prince of Faith & Fear in Flushing; John Coppinger of Metstradamus, and, a live unveiling of the much-anticipated Top 10 Number Sixes in Mets History as delivered by yours truly. Trade in any Mets baseball card -- even a 1991 Wally Whitehurst-- for your first drink free!

Two Boots Tavern: 384 Grand Street 212-228-8685

 

You wanted to see me Sir?

 

Yes, come on in. We got to do a sports movie and I was wondering what you can get out of this. (tosses book onto the desk)

 

Faith and Fear in Flushing, by Greg W. Prince?

 

That’s the one.

 

Terrific book, sir, I’ve read it myself. And I…

 

They say it’s like ‘Fever Pitch’

 

That’s a fine comparison, Sir. Hornby and Prince are both outstanding writers whose works examine how a passion for a sports team becomes an inextricable part of who we are.

 

Hornby? Who the hell is Hornby? I’m talking about Drew Barrymore and Jimmy Kimmel.

 

Jimmy Fallon, Sir.

 

Whatever. Can we get Ben Affleck to play the lead?

 

Of Greg? I get more of a Paul Gamatti vibe…

 

We’re not going for Academy Awards here, son. We’re making a sports movie. And get Matt Damon to play his sidekick, Jason. ‘Lethal Weapon’ meets ‘Bull Durham’ I like it.

 

Well, boss, this is more of a love story.

 

Then get Drew Barrymore to play the girl.

 

I’ll call her agent.

 

And write in a little more drama. Have him have to win her from a Yankee fan. Or maybe from the Matt Damon guy. That’s the kind of spice this picture needs.

 

But Sir, you don’t understand. It was love at first sight between these two. In some ways, it mirrors the burgeoning relationship between the boy and his team, one that continues to this day.

 

She doesn’t have to compete for his love with the team?

 

Nope. It’s about devotion in good times and bad. It’s about what it feel like to be uplifted in 1986 and to bear witness to 1993, on 15 separate occasions.

 

Well then who’s the bad guy?

 

Oh, there’s lot of them, Sir. There’s Cesar Cedeno, M. Donald Grant, Benji Molina, Joe Grahe, Keith Lockhart … Page 157 is full of villains from the 1988 postseason alone and it pointedly doesn’t even include Mike Scioscia.

 

So this Scioscia fellow is innocent?

 

No, guilty as sin, Sir. It’s just one of many instances in this book where even hard-core fans will be reminded of how much more there were to the stories we all experienced than what may remain in popular memory. This is the testimony of a writer who has seen much, and forgotten little. Quite remarkable.

 

Yes, yes. But these bad guys? They all get it during the Big Game at the end, don’t they?

 

No sir. This is a story of the Mets. They’ve won the Big Game quite infrequently, as a matter of fact.

 

So it’s a tearjerker?

 

Certainly, some is. It reminds us that baseball, like life, often is a hard thing to endure. We might see ourselves as the awkward child who humiliates himself in a chance meeting with his hero -- or the awkward adult whose Mets gear draws idiotic responses in the supermarket. And the story of a loved one with whom we’ve had complicated relationship dying of a terrible disease? Yeah, that one just might hit home. Thanks to the Mets, we all know what it feels like to look at a called strike 3.

 

Maudlin don’t sell popcorn, kid. Punch it up some.

 

Don’t need to Sir. It’s actually quite funny throughout. I particularly enjoyed the lighthearted but vicious gutting of Yankee fans in Chapter 23. I’ve taken it upon myself to contact the agent for Stuttering John Melendez.

 

I see. So how does it end?

 

They lose the Big Game – and for the third year in a row. Only, and I believe this is the central point, we don’t have to feel bad about ourselves because of it. And we needn’t be ashamed, because that’s what being a fan is all about. This is a story about loving the endings, some happier than others. It’s about being a Met fan. It’s about us.

 

(Summer 2010)

BEN AFFLECK DREW BARRYMORE PRINCE OF FLUSHING MATT DAMON PAUL GAMATTI and JOHN MELENDEZ as ‘THE UNCLEVER TOOL’ BASED ON THE MEMOIR ‘FAITH & FEAR IN FLUSHING’ BY GREG W. PRINCE

 

 

 

That's a request, not a rhetorical question. As many of the readers here know, Greg W. Prince, who co-authors the outstanding Mets blog Faith & Fear in Flushing, has come out with a new book, also called Faith & Fear in Flushing and aptly subtitled An Intense Personal History of the Mets.

I will contribute a full reveiw when I'm finished reading it (I'm up to 1987 now, congratulations on meeting your wife, Greg) but thought now would be a good time to replay my explosive two-part interview with Greg that ran in this space last year. I was way out ahead of the market in declaring Greg a Big Shot then.

I had a fair amount of self-interest in doing this: In addition to pushing my own book, I was also hoping to understand how the heck he does it. The answer: He just does.

Here's Part 1

Here's Part 2

Enjoy!

* * *

I consider it good news that Freddy Garcia has agreed to extended spring training and/or a minor league assignment. He obviously wasn't pitching up to his standards, but perhaps at some point he will, and with the kinds of starts the Mets pitchers have been turning in lately, depth is going to be an issue over the course of a long season. Valerio de los Santos was released and Rule 5er Rocky Cherry -- I was rooting for that guy -- went and signed with Boston.

* * * 

Thanks to those who showed up my chat last night in Roslyn; and to Victor and Rosemary for helping to set it up; and to my sister Jennifer for putting me in touch with them.

Available this week at area newsstands is the Maple Street Press Mets Annual, to which I contributed a couple of articles including a bio of skipper Jerry Manuel that was a lot of fun to research and write. I had to attack this peice without knowing whether I'd get any help from the Mets in terms of an interview, and that uncertainty forced me to get off my butt and actually commit some journalism, for which I'm thankful. Among the people I spoke to was Jerry's high-school baseball coach, Guy Anderson, who if you can believe this, is still coaching at Rancho Cordova High in Sacramento and couldn't have been any more accommodating. I also got some valuable insight from the editor of the White Sox Interactive web site, who didn't pull any punches when it came to the fan's take on what went wrong during "The Tinkerererer's" tenure there.

In the end the Mets were able to come through with some responses to my questions via email but the background work, as it often turns out to be, provided the best insights, were the most fun to pursue and ultimately make up the vast majority of the story.

Anyhow, please don't pick this book up just for that: There's quite a bit more good stuff in there including stats and analysis, a look at the minor leagues and draft, a look at the past (1969 and my favorite year, 1984) and the future at the new ballyard. Really, it's a nice way to start looking forward to the season.

* * * * *

You may have seen the list of links to the left has been reorganized recently, and I'd like to call attention to a few of the new arrivals. I stumbled onto Centerfield Maz one afternoon recently and felt right at home reading a blog that discusses the drama of Cesar Cedeno and the first album from KISS in addition to Mets history.

Alex G., who in addition to starting a flattering Facebook Group that I'm declaring to be the official Facebook home of Mets by the Numbers, has also launched a new Mets blog, Bleeding Orange and Blue. Busting the other links into categories has also allowed me to add good stuff like Ron Kaplan's Baseball Books and Mark Weinstein's Bluenatic that didn't really fit into the old architecture.Yeah, this is a minor innovation but I like it.

I think if I knew when I started this site that it would be the among the longest surviving in Metdom I mighta turned it into a Cerronesque cash cow if only I'd been less discerning about linking out (and maybe a little less lazy). On the other hand there has to be value in leading you not into bad writing. It's all approved for your reading pleasure.

 

It should come as no surprise to regular readers that I'm rather indifferent to the news that Billy Wagner will miss the remainder of this season, and all of next, with elbow surgery. You needn't twist my arm to convince me that having a healthy Wagner is better than not, especially as we reach the homestretch with a 1.5 game lead, but I certainly have enjoyed seeing the team rally around this supposed weakness and the results (22-11 since his assignment to the disabled list Aug. 2) say we'll be just fine. To be perfectly honest I dreaded the alternative of Wagner's return this week every bit as much as I bemoan the fact that he's not coming back. It's forced everyone to sack up a little and revealed potential heroes like Luis Ayala and Brian Stokes. Even Pedro Feliciano has performed in ways that don't make me want to strangle him lately.

I'm less convinced this event teaches the Mets anything, even if it would be cool if it did. They blamed the strategy, not the injury, when Braden Looper didn't work out: Wagner wouldn't have been here otherwise. As for Wagner, while I respect his ability and will to win, I always felt he was here for Wagner more than he was for me. Not that there's anything wrong with that. But by the point in his career he arrived in New York, he was as much about burnishing his stats and Q rating for what looked to be shaping up as an interesting Hall of Fame debate, than he was about being a Met. A big contract with an ironclad no-trade clause took that worry off his mind and allowed him to speak maybe too freely of his teammates and management.

 

* * *

One thing I forgot to mention while recounting the new arrivals and their uni numbers was this weird factoid: Gustavo Molina's return represents a fifth issue of the No. 29 jersey this year. It started on the back of Jorge Sosa who was released in May. In June, it went to Chris Aguila, then to Andy Phillips as he flipped in and flopped out. Aguila took it back again in July for a second visit, and here it is back with Molina.

Wanna see a Mets game before they tear down Big Shea? Matt Silverman says he still has a few leftover tixx for the Sept.24 game in the Picnic Area. Contact Matt and join a distinguished group of diehards. Who knows? We could clinch that day. Maybe.

 

 

Welcome back, Ryan Church. The brain-damaged Mets right fielder returned Friday after a lengthy absense while superfluous catcher Robinson Cancel was sent back down to AAA. A more difficult, Obama-picks-a-running-mate type question faces the Mets on Saturday, when unpopular second baseman Luis Castillo is expected to return from an extended break during which he was barely missed.

To be honest the solution ought to be clear if painful -- Argenis Reyes for all his good press isn't the kind of hitter you couldn't do without for a few days and to my knowledge only plays second base, so Castillo is probably an upgrade. Castillo in fact makes fewer outs than either Reyes or Damion Easley, and if actually and finally healthy, then he's the player they probably ought to have out there. A strong offensive showing out of the gate is essential though.

If Reyes won't go down you wonder how seriously they're ready to consider Duaner Sanchez who clearly isn't the same as he once was, while Luis Ayala is (what he was once but wasn't recently).

Met-Lovin' Big Shot George Thorogood is a guest on this week's episode of Mets Weekly on SNY, airing at 12:30 p.m. Saturday. The SNY people pursued Lonesome George as a profile subject after seeing the interview published here.

Just as we suspected, Brian Stokes appeared tonight, wearing No. 43, and in place of Ruddy Lugo, who returns to AAA without having made an appearance. And Stokes, though not charged with a decision and guilty of surrendering two 2-run home runs, evidently pitched well enough, by Met standards, to remain with the club even after John Maine returns. Which probably means that Carlos Muniz would return to AAA when Maine comes back, but let's not get ahead of ourselves.

* * * 

Quick note to let you in on a great opportunity to see the Mets from a unique perspective before they dismantle Big Shea. Matt Silverman, my co-author for the Mets by the Numbers book and writer of a bunch of other great Mets-related books (Mets Essential, 100 Things, Total Mets, etc), has purchased a bunch of Picnic Area seats for the Sept. 24 game -- that's a Wednesday night vs. the Cubs -- and is selling a limited number at his website, MetSilverman.com. Details including pricing etc. are there. I'm here to tell you I will be there, and that Matt's a trustworthy guy who is likely to draw a crowd of knowledgeable and enthusiastic fans: If I were you, I'd be making plans to go. And do it quick -- prices go up Sept. 1.