One Year Later...

So, it's been exactly one year since the 3am Massacre that saw the Mets chop off the head and hack at the limbs of their coaching staff and replace them with the bunch we see today. Given the way things looked for the Mets then and comparing them with things now, it's hard to see too much difference.

Last year, the Mets, to this point in the season, seemed disinterested and lackluster. They were there more often than not, but the results told you everything you needed to know in the end.

This year, has anything changed? Other than the manager and coaches, and assorted players, it's been a whole lot of to do to get to this point in the season in similarly bad shape.

Where do we go from here? Tough to say. Last season, the Mets didn't do anything after letting Randolph go, and under Manuel, they got hot for a month or so before the teams' glaring weaknesses showed themselves.

Do the Mets have a similar hot streak in them once again? Given the sometimes porous nature of the starting rotation and the general inability to drive in runs when necessary, I don't know if an extended win streak is possible. Replacing the Manager, at this point in the season, would be tantamount to admitting to a massive and catastrophic error in judgement by Minaya, and if that were to happen now, Minaya's ouster would be sure to follow. What's besides the point is Manuel, to the best of my knowledge, isn't even on the hot seat (or have the dreaded "leaks" in the Mets system been fixed...). The problem, then, lies with the talent on the field. Much like, despite popular sentiment, it wasn't Willie Randolph's fault that Carlos Delgado couldn't hit and Jose Reyes was a petulant, moody brat, it's not Jerry Manuel's fault that Luis Castillo dropped that popup last Friday, or that John Maine's shoulder locked up, or whatever other injury might have occurred. Last year, I called for Ho-Jo's head and didn't get it. I'll still call for Ho-Jo's head if the team feels a change to the coaching staff is absolutely necessary. In the end, it comes down to the execution of the players, and right now, many of these players should be executed. Rumors are abound. But until any action is taken, it's little more than idle talk.

But, failing everything else, the Mets could always try to fire Willie Randolph again.

The Horror...The Horror...

When Carlos Beltran speaks his mind, it gets people's attention. More often than not, he's 100% on the money.

Beltran's postgame statements this afternoon, calling out the Mets as an Embarrassment is, rather sadly, the truth right now. The Mets left town on Sunday looking pretty good, sitting at 28-21, right down the Phillies' necks in the standings. Three lifeless, miserable games later, the Mets are in complete and total disarray. I guess you can consider last night's rainout a blessing in disguise, because it's more than likely the Mets would have lost that game as well.

It's absolutely baffling the way the Mets run. They go from hot to cold, players seem to get injured on a regular basis, injuries are understated, injuries are kept under wraps, guys get stomach viruses and miss a week, injured players are flown cross-country, guys replacing injured guys get injured...It never stops with this team. Two weeks ago, Jose Reyes was day-to-day. Now, with the revelation that he's got a hamstring tear, we're looking at him possibly being out the rest of the season!

It's very easy to knock the Mets fan while they're down, and right now, it's very easy to be down on the Mets. But just examine the way the past month or so has played out for the Mets, between the hot streak, all these players getting injured at once, injuries suddenly getting much worse than they originally appeared, Jerry Manuel and Omar Minaya talking really quickly and not saying anything...Only the Mets. That's all you can say. This only happens to the Mets. And I'm not quite sure how or why this happens, but it does. Only to the Mets.

The collective Karma around this team right now is so putrid that it wouldn't surprise me at all if the Mets go into Yankee Stadium next weekend and get swept by a combined score of 44-3. The fans would probably commit ritual suicide off the 59th Street Bridge. El Guapo and I will probably end up shooting Maker's Mark by the bottle. But one good thing would probably happen: heads would finally start to roll.

A lot of times, the coaching staff has this safety net of the fact that their players need to execute, but you have to really be concerned about the general lack of fundamentals this team exhibits most of the time. I'm not sure how often it's happened this season, but it seems like it's just about a daily occurrence that Razor Shines has gotten a runner thrown out at home plate. I'll paraphrase an old Bill Simmons joke about former Boston 3rd base coach Dale Sveum, but if Razor Shines was a school crossing guard, kids would be getting pancaked all over Central Park West. Ho-Jo remains mostly clueless; nobody seems to point any fingers at him because he's a "True Met," but considering the way David Wright has run in and out of hot streaks, and Reyes getting homer happy, and players like Church, Murphy and Castillo being inconsistent, does he actually work with these guys, or does he just stand in the dugout in his shades doing his best Art Howe impression? I'd axe these two first, just to get the ball rolling.

Then, we have the guys at the top. Manuel is homing in on a year as the team's manager, and he's basically been no better or worse than he was last season, except that half his roster is on the DL and the other half has a difficult time picking up the slack. His in-game moves continue to often be baffling, and he's still way too by-the-book. He also gives you just an unsettling enough impression that the patients are running the asylum.

Then, there's Omar, the head of the clown car. Somehow, without any fanfare, Pittsburgh dealt their best player to Atlanta for some meager Minor Leaguers right under the Mets nose. And what I wondered more than anything else was why wasn't Omar on the horn making a deal for Nate McLouth? People seem far too consumed with the Mets need for pitching, but, as the case has been so often in the past, pitching isn't the problem here. Yes, Pelfrey was rather awful this afternoon, but he's also been flat-out excellent for a month prior to this, without a victory to show for it. Santana wasn't great the other night, but whether he finished the game or not, the Mets still weren't winning. Why? BECAUSE THE METS DON'T GENERATE ENOUGH OFFENSE! Nobody, or at least nobody who talks about the Mets in a public arena seems to realize this. You can bring in whatever stud pitcher you want. The Mets will just lose games 2-1 instead of 3-1. THE METS NEED ANOTHER BAT! It doesn't matter where he plays, just get someone. But whenever Omar makes an in-season deal like this, it's always for a guy who's not quite good enough to fill the gap he's supposed to fill. Atlanta goes out and trades with Pittsburgh for Nate McLouth. Omar will go out and trade with Pittsburgh for Craig Monroe. That's not going to cut it. The M.O. for the Mets the last two seasons has been a day late and a dollar short. I'm really starting to get tired of the act.

The Mets are going to Washington this weekend, to play a Nationals team that right now stands at 14-38, on pace to post 43.6 wins this season. The Mets themselves just got swept by a Pirates team that is just slightly better than the Nationals. I have a really bad feeling about just how embarrassing things are going to get for this team.

Sit and Spin

"It's rare that you get that type of talent. I mean, boom! Right in the middle of the lineup type of guy, and right-handed for us, that would be a big bonus."

-Jerry Manuel

It's funny how the same interview can be spun so many different ways.

The outcry for Manny Ramirez that began last week, and which I've wholeheartedly thrown myself behind continued on Tuesday, as Jerry Manuel chimed in on the matter. There are two such places in particular that reported on this, one on the Mets website, and the other on ESPN.com. If you read one of them without reading the other, you probably think that Manuel has one particular stance. But if you read both of them, you come away thinking that Manuel gave two separate interviews at two different times.

On Mets.com, the Manuel article portrays the Mets Manager as being more interested in helping out at a local Food Bank, helping out the community before he heads down to Florida, ready to do battle with, what he feels, is a team completely in place. Sure, he was asked about Manny, but his response seems to be respectfully passive towards adding a surefire offensive force to a team that mangled far too many opportunities to score some runs. If this is what you read, you'd think that Manuel is happy and confident with what he's got, and he's ready to move forward for the 2009 season. The article appears to focus more on Manuel's dislike for his players participating in the upcoming World Baseball Classic, and that he feels Jose Reyes is ready to emerge as a clubhouse leader.

On ESPN, many of the same points are covered. However, Manuel's comments are spun to read that Manuel would love to have Ramirez on the team, and that he'd be fully in favor of bringing him in.

The ESPN.com article is, I gather, closer to the truth. There's no need to put any particular angle on Manuel's comments if you have no vested interest in the team. The Mets, however, would like to have all of us believe that whoever this Manny Ramirez fellow may be, the Mets won't be getting him and we should pretend he doesn't exist. I've already stated my feelings. If I needed any further backing up on the matter, Bill Simmons' latest article for ESPN The Magazine praises Ramirez as an underrated commodity who's showing no signs of age or slowing down. And this is from a Red Sox fan who should have nothing but scorn and ill will towards Manny.

The handwriting is clearly on the wall, and the outcry from the fans really ought to be getting through, somehow, to the Clown Car that is the Mets upper management. The Mets are SCREAMING for this guy. He's the perfect fit. It's the right situation. Not making this move would be catstrophically dumb. It's the difference between being a nice little contending team that could just as easily finish 3rd as 1st, and being a serious contender to take it all the way to the World Series. So, once again, I wonder: Who's driving this bus, and how serious are they about making their disillusioned fan base believe that they want to build a winner?

Mets' Kitchen open for Business [Mets.com]
Mets Manager Jerry Manuel would welcome Ramirez [ESPN.com]
Bill Simmons: Overrated Overload [ESPN.com]

Moving on from the Madness

They do still play these games, from time to time. I don't know if anyone's actually noticed from in between the fallout from last week.

But the Mets have actually been playing games, and actually went 4-2 on this, their last West Coast swing of the season, and now come home to play a team that actually has played worse than their expectations than the Mets have. That's right, my pick to win the 2008 AL West, the Seattle Mariners are in town for the first time since 2003.

The Mets appear to be playing a bit more fast and loose as a whole, which is good to see. No, they're not looking like a great team, and even if they continue to play somewhat better baseball over the next couple of weeks, and pick up some games in the standings, the true test will come July 4th through July 7th, when the Mets go down to Philadelphia for a weekend series.

If the Mets win that series, maybe we can finally take them seriously. If they get their clocks cleaned, well, revert to what I've been saying all season.

But they do seem like they're having a bit more fun, particularly with the pall of the Willie Randolph situation gone from their heads.

Not that you'd notice it if you're reading the New York papers. These guys seem to have no desire to stop trashing the Mets, turning Willie Randolph into a martyr, slamming Jerry Manuel for his "gangster" joke, and trying to drag out a situation that I believe most fans are tired of hearing about. And for the fans who continue to call in WFAN and the like and slam the move, it's time to move on. Get over yourselves. The Mets fucked up the Randolph firing, no doubt. But let's not forget that Willie was doing a lousy job, and Willie deserved to be fired. We don't need a puffy by-line from Willie about it, we don't need stories about how only now, other players are defending him, and we don't need the Post to blow Jerry Manuel's hilarious "I'll cut him" remark out of proportion as if he were serious. Jerry Manuel obviously has a strong rapport with his players. That's not a bad thing.

Besides, this article in Sunday's Newsday brings up a much more pressing matter: The potential end of WFAN's Radio Dynasty, the Mike & the Mad Dog show. If this show goes off the air, what will happen to us all? I think the radios of the world will all melt, and the rest of the Media will cease to exist. Heaven Forbid! How will we live without Dog's screaming and Mike's stammering? How will we go on without a healthy dose of smarmy, anti-Met rhetoric to carry us through our afternoons? To whom can we turn? It'll be interesting to see how this all plays out.

Hope Dies Last

In the midst of processing the 3AM Massacre Tuesday morning, my hastily thrown-up post might have seemed a bit too sympathetic towards Willie Randolph. That's not to say that Willie isn't deserving of sympathy. Lord knows I've been raking him over the coals for the past however long it was. But, as has been the feeling echoing through Metsdom over the past 20 or so hours, only the Mets could manage to fuck up a move that needed to be made.

I don't know what exactly transpired in that postgame meeting with Willie and Omar, although suffice it to say that it doesn't matter at this point. The situation was too far out of hand to play out any different than it did. There was, in reality, no logical reason to maintain Willie as Manager. But why, then, at this particular moment? Why, after flying cross country and winning? Why, if Peterson, clearly an organizational guy and not one of Willie's guys was fired, was Ho-Jo maintained, particularly when the offense has been an equal, if not a far greater, problem with this team than the pitching. There are many questions on this night that is vastly different from all other nights. Most of them probably won't be answered. That, perhaps, is what is most maddening about this whole saga.

I'm not going to do an about face and defend Willie at all. There's nothing to defend. When a change needs to be made, you look to the top, but, much the same way that Art Howe got a raw deal, Willie got a raw deal. I've mentioned that before as well. It's not necessarily his fault that he was given a team built to win now two years ago. And it's not his fault that when the flaws of the team began to show themselves in repeated fashion, very little was done to fix it. But with that said, Willie's moves often left a lot to be questioned. From Kaz Ishii's 16 starts, to Cliff Floyd, to Schoeneweis and Feliciano, to Philip Humber, to Mike Pelfrey and Wagner. But such is the peril of being a Big League manager operating in a Media vacuum that seems hell bent on imposing their will on whomever will listen.

It doesn't help, then, that the Mets, at the top, seem all too willing to read and absorb what is said about their team. It also doesn't help that someone within the Mets organization, with a cool ear to the inner machinations, is also the owner of lips far too loose for his or her own good. It's one thing to have this go on in silence. Once it becomes public knowledge, once the Media gets a hold of it, there's no stopping the firestorm as it gains power and blazes out of control.

So, then, we are led to Tuesday, June 17, 2008. One of those days that could live up there with June 15, 1977, October 20, 1999 and October 19, 2006 as days that will live in Met Infamy. In his press conference, which I didn't see and only read about much later in the day, Omar was all too willing to point his finger at the press. He's right to do so, but then again, the onus is now clearly on him for the remainder of the season. If Fabulous Freddie and Ruprecht the Idiot Manchild are conscious at this point, and not polishing off their second bottle of Black Label, they'd say something and make this clear. But we don't hear anything out of them.

It's funny, because it seems like it's always been this way with Fred. On the Bonus Disc of the 1986 World Series box set, there's an interview with Wilpon on the podium. It was Wilpon who cajoled Nelson Doubleday into providing him the muscle with which to purchase the team in the first place. Yet, here he is, at the pinnacle of his reign as owner, referring to the team, his team, as "Frank Cashen and his Mets team." Not "our team." Their team. As though he's somehow detached from all this, save for signing the checks. Perhaps he prefers to shrink from the spotlight. That's one thing. But to provide us with an air of seeming disinterested, or uninvolved, particularly when things are spiraling out of control, and leaving his Houseboy in charge to his personal interests, which appear to be an A-Ball team and a new Stadium, is right on the border of complete and total insanity. I guess my point is that the owner of a team should care about what's going on with his team, right? I'm not seeing that out of Right Said Fred.

I'd like to see Omar get his head spun a little bit here. He seems awfully comfortable right now. Again, he's made the necessary move in a rather ass-backwards fashion. He's built a team that consists of two young stars, two outstanding veterans who are signed to insanely large contracts, and a horrendous cadre of Has-beens and never-will-bes. Last year, he dismissed the hitting coach, and replaced him with a hitting coach who has managed to fix absolutely none of the existing offensive problems, and has even served to create new problems where none existed in the first place! And yet, when Omar has decided to cut off the head and hack the limbs, HE LET THIS GUY KEEP HIS JOB!

I refused to listen to Mike & The Mad Dog Tuesday. I wasn't particularly in the mood to listen to those jokers cackling away about what an absolute joke the Mets allowed this situation to become. I avoided it most of the day, aside from a few comments here and there, and a call from my co-worker, out of the office for the day. I missed the early part of the game, but it seems that Jerry Manuel only needed about 5 or so minutes to attain his first controversy, with Jose Reyes at first, stomping off and throwing his helmet after being removed from the game. Manuel, apparently, then spent the better part of the inning lecturing Reyes on growing up. Reyes sounded mostly contrite after the game, which I suppose is a plus. On the field, blah, blah, blah. The games are still scenery, and everyone seemed to be in a fog after this truly bizarre day in what has been a complete train wreck of a season. I know the right move was made. I know it wasn't made well. I also don't know if it's going to make anything better.

I guess there's still hope, right? Hope dies last.