Before the day long event that is the oil change of my car, I stopped by the “real meat” fast food joint Taco Bell. I ordered my usual (2 gordita crunches, cinnamon twists and a small drink…free refills) and paid with my card with my Mets logo on it. The cashier looked at the card and then back at me(I was wearing a blue Mr. Met tee shirt and blue Mets cap) and said “really”. Of course this reaction usually implies one of three possible outcomes, the cashier is either a Phillie, Brave or Yankee. After I respond with my antagonistic response “yea…that just happened”, the cashier devoulged he was behind door three…a Yankee fan.
The conversation at this point followed the usual protocol for a Yankee vs Met conversation:
Yankee: Mets suck
Me: Yankees suck
Yankee: We have 28 world championships
Me: You werent alive for at least 20 of them so who cares
Yankee: We make the playoffs like every year
Me: You mean you buy a playoff ticket every year
Yankee: .:: loud laugh ::.
At that point I moved over and let the guy do his job with the patrons behind me. After I got my meal and started tearing into it, he just “happened” to clean the table next to me and decided to reignite our little debate. After our bouts of verbal assassinations, he admitted that the Yankees payroll may have had something to do with their championships. He was none too happy when I gave my opinion that the Yankees big money era seems to be on ice and they were trying to go with a “home grown feel” now that the pillars of the recent Yankee golden era are on the verge of retirement. He said to me “everyone knows who the Yankees are, they never made any bones about it and old George would not have signed off on this”.
Change is never easy and rarely smooth. It comes with its share of turbulence and tribulations but the idea is to come out ahead in the end. One last point the gentleman from Taco Bell pointed out during the “payroll” phase of the argument was one name to disqualify my point…Carlos Beltran. His point was the Yankees were better than the Mets because during their spending frenzy which he likens to the Yankees day to day they were only able to make it to the playoffs once. After pointing out that the Yankees had a roster of 10 people earning Beltran’s paycheck and probably some scrub bench player making 10 mill, I began to wonder about that era and the new one to come.
There is no doubt that Sandy and company have changed the culture of the New York Mets. Everything from a pretty much drama free media season to a team that was picked to finish last in the division by EVERY single analyst holding strong at 3rd place. This is a Mets squad that has faced a 2009 like injury plague and has still not called it quits or seemingly given up. While that might be cause for some optimism about the future of the Mets, this also made me wonder about those who would look at a guy like Prince Fielder in baby blue and orange. Many would argue that Prince would put the Mets a cut above most in the east and make the Phillies look over their shoulder. The problem of course is that Sandy has already squashed any indication of a higher payroll of 120 million…so much so that people are questioning the Mets resources to sign Jose Reyes even after the Mets held on to him during the trade deadline.
I totally agree with Sandy’s approach to the Mets. It will hurt to miss out on a talent like a Prince Fielder but in the long run many teams have made more with less. The Mets have had a bloated payroll for years now and have only managed to get one division title for their efforts. This change in philosophy will be difficult and will most likely ween the superficial Met fans for years to come as this will not be an over night fix. The Mets have some serious holes opening up and it will take some time to fill them. There is no doubt the Mets have talent in their system, what im looking at is what the league will look like once it matures? Will the Phillies be able to keep pace a few years from now when their core is older and no prospects in the wings? Will the Braves survive without a clear cut clutch player like Chipper has been for so many years? Will the Marlins be able to hold on to their talent with a new stadium and a seemingly lack of baseball interest in Florida? Will the Nationals stop sucking? The Mets are cleansing themselves of bad contracts and piss poor management and while the initial pain of “rebuilding” seasons will hurt, the opportunistic moment that the Mets can capitalize on a weak division is something that might be worth waiting for. Question of course is, will Met fans give Sandy the time to make something great? Year two of the Omar Minaya regime saw the Mets win their division and were a virtual lock for the world series. I sincerely doubt year two of the Sandy era will see the same success and it will be interesting how the Met fans will deal with that.
21 comments
Anonymous
9/5/2011-3:09pm at 3:09 pm (UTC -4)
I usually avoid these discussions but I typically respond with:
a) well the Yankee’s have better chemists than othe baseball teams, you know like A-Rod’s cousin.
b) Derek Jeter is a lousy selfish Captain since all he did was preside over a clubhouse full of overpaid cheaters who had to juice up to win their titles.
Anonymous
9/5/2011-3:15pm at 3:15 pm (UTC -4)
Good read, as always. Yeah, it’s going to be another year or 2 before this starts looking really good. Frustrating to go through, but a little pain to make the patient better.
As for Fielder, I believe Wanny mentioned once that the Mets first round pick was protected (not sure if that is still the case), so they could lose Reyes, sign Fielder and have 2 first rd picks, a sup. pick and lose their 2nd round pick. Not a bad plan if you rotate Ike to RF, Duda to LF. And yeah, I know that isn’t happening.
Anonymous
9/5/2011-4:21pm at 4:21 pm (UTC -4)
“Real meat?” Real meat from what animal is the question!
Great read Dirty. Really nice. It’s unfortunate that the Yanks’ 1996–2000 teams really were largely the result of homegrown players (Jeter, Mariano, Pettitte, Bernie, Posada) and second tier trades and free agents.
But the recent teams are the single best example of buying your way to the postseason in baseball history. No teams have ever outspent the league as the recent Yankees have. Not even close really.
As for the Mets, part of why I have been largely absent here is that I really have not felt this pessimistic since the mid 1990s. Yes, I totally support Alderson, but the team’s just bad. Look at the last month–we’ve been beating SD, FLA, and WASH, and gotten destroyed by good/winning teams (AZ, MIL, PHIL).
I love Collins as manager and I see him as a large reason why we are ahead of the Nats and the incredibly and surprisingly bad Marlins (what the HELL was up with their fielding?) We don’t have any all-star players aside from Jose, and while I want him back badly, it just doesn’t look too good. Fielder? I have wanted that forever, but it will never happen.
Based on the numbers we have seen tossed around (100 mil? 110 mil?) Omar’s horrific legacy leaves us paying Bay and Johan 35–40% of that next year, so Jose and Fielder are probably pipe dreams.
Bottom line–just as a good month deluded us in 2010, this team started horribly and is finishing horribly—they went 50-40 and had three good months, and let us pray that this does not delude the new braintrust into thinking we are a few players away—we’re not. We stink and need wholesale changes once and for all. Winning 6 of 8 from the Marlins and Nats means nothing right now other than that we are a little better than they are. We’re still not good.
Anonymous
9/5/2011-5:07pm at 5:07 pm (UTC -4)
Man, you’re bringing me down – j/k.
Hope all’s well in the North Country with the deluge of Irene. Anyway, can’t really disagree with anything but in an attempt to put a positive light on somethings consider that the changes are already happening. It took years to get into this position and it’s going to take a few to get out of it. However, I look for small revolutions in the cycle of change. Such as, winning 6 of 8 over the Marlins & Nats is better than losing 6 of 8, such as in prior years down the stretch. Albeit, yesterday when I saw the lineup I said to myself, “why not a lineup with Satin, Tejada, Turner, etc against Livian. The established players haven’t been able to beat him maybe these guys can”. So, yes I get the talent gap and the irony of looking for a lineup mix to beat a pitcher who’s real age may be closer to 50 then listed.
We only have 25 or so games left in the season and it’s important to see how the staff and players treat these games, if they can win enough to get to .500 then kudo’s for playing hard through game 162 unlike the past few years. All I know is when I’m looking for game 163 I’ll be missing Mets baseball so I’m enjoying this rebuilding year for what it is, and having Sandy already making a number of changes this year while assessing what’s in the cupboard has been working to plan imo.
As for next year, the fences will be brought in to help and quite possibly the addition of another wildcard spot to the playoff scheme could make the next step of achieving the playoffs in the rebuilding plan move in a little closer. Yes, we’ve got talent issues when matching up against the cream of the crop but as the axiom goes in baseball “you’re going to win 60, and lose 60, and then you fight over the other 60 to tell what kind of team you are”. So yes, we’re getting killed by the elite in the lose 60 column but if we can fight to attain .500 in the 60 that are a toss up then that’s a first step towards the ellusive wildcard and then on to 2013 when we can hopefully start mixing in the next crop of youngsters to build a serious looking team that can take on the big boys.
Anonymous
9/5/2011-5:21pm at 5:21 pm (UTC -4)
if nothing else,much better shot to win 90+ with your new 180 game season!
Anonymous
9/5/2011-5:30pm at 5:30 pm (UTC -4)
lol, it’s the new math. oops – if the old axiom’s don’t work then make a new one. OK – fight over the other 42.
MetsFan4Decades
9/6/2011-2:22am at 2:22 am (UTC -4)
The only thing I’d disagree with here Kingman is I would have said:
‘The Mets started average and are going to end more or less average’. –which is pretty much what most who were realistically paying attention would have agreed with going in.
Now, if they tank most of the games this month and wind up in last place – horrible will be a very apt description.
Anonymous
9/5/2011-5:06pm at 5:06 pm (UTC -4)
“This change in philosophy will be difficult and will most likely ween the superficial Met fans for years to come as this will not be an over night fix.”
I’ve been a Mets fan since 1962 and I’ve gone through many changes in philosophy so I doubt very much if I’m a superficial Mets fan. Yet at my age I may very well be dead the next time the Mets are a contender (and that goes for Fred Wilpon and Sandy who are in my age group). So you’ll excuse me if I want to witness a contender in my lifetime and if by some chance I’m still among the living I don’t want to be drooling in my porridge and I still want to know why I’m pinching my nursing home aid’s rear end. It’s not the philosophy that’s a problem but rather the execution. The Phillies and Red Sox are perfect examples of what should have been the Mets philosophy under Omar. The New York market and the number of National League fans in the market would have resulted in the Mets incoming resources being closer to the Yankees than the Phillies and RedSox. Even this “new” philosophy you describe if executed under incompetent ownership and front office personnel would end in failure. The positive outlook is that Sandy and company will bring success to the New York Mets. The negative outlook is that the Wilpon’s insistence to remain in control at all costs and their incompetency in running a New York franchise will thwart Sandy’s attempt to create a top franchise.
Anonymous
9/5/2011-5:24pm at 5:24 pm (UTC -4)
For the yankee fan debate, in BB terms, ’96-’00 is getting to be a real long time ago too. And of course they buy there way into the playoffs every year, but in the last decade, that still only got them 1 title.
Frankly, it is a fluke these days to have guys around from that long ago on the same team (especially so many of them). In a couple of years, when they are all in nursing homes, that era will be about as relevant to today as the run in the 50s!
Anonymous
9/5/2011-7:51pm at 7:51 pm (UTC -4)
Most Yankees fans I know are moronic. I can actually make a better argument for their success than these mentally retarded fans. So here goes. What is wrong with buying your way into the playoffs every year, i.e buying not only top free agents but young talent in the draft that slips through or buying the better IFA’s in Latin America? What is wrong with building a franchise that is incredibly profitable, that brings in enormous resources and is the second most valuable franchise behind an English Soccer team in all of sports? Is it against the law in the US these days to build an enormously successful sports franchise that rewards its fans with an enjoyable rooting interest year after year?
BTW if your hatred of the Yankees and/or Phillies refuses to allow you to even begrudgingly admit they’re successful than what is wrong with using the RedSox as a model for success?
Anonymous
9/5/2011-9:27pm at 9:27 pm (UTC -4)
the red sox are fine. and obviously the phils have (hey, once a century crap happens!) been successful recently. I still can’t stand the team, and detest the fans.
The yankees play within the rules, but economics make it an unlevel playing field. But, that is the way it is. Doesn’t mean you have to like it.
More of an issue to the fans of other teams is the Yankee fan attitude (now adopted, and taken to another level) that winning it all is somehow their birthright, and that by rooting for that team somehow makes them better people (and by extension, a Met fan somehow lesser, IOW a “loser”.
so sure, spend money when the time is right (the foundation laid). Enjoy it while you can, since it is very rare that the run will continue (unless as Knog points out, you have the ability to go a good 20% over the next closest team, and easily 2x average).
So hell yeah, I recognize (being in the phillie market) that the team is winning a lot of games now. I also can’t wait for them to take a few blows, and end up with a huge payroll that is under performing. and they do have a ton of payroll committed for quite a few years to guys that ain’t spring chickens no more.
Anonymous
9/5/2011-11:08pm at 11:08 pm (UTC -4)
In the pre-game the bozo Chris Carlin said “…and the Met’s continue to call up some of their young talent as Val Pascucci…..”
lol, note to Chris: c’mon really Val Pascucci and young talent do not belong in the same sentence together.
MetsFan4Decades
9/6/2011-2:28am at 2:28 am (UTC -4)
Good read, Dirty. Love the Yankee fan exchange.
‘old George would not have signed off on this”.’
I’ve been hearing this all over lately from Yankee fans and media alike. All I can think is ‘yeah, get used to it – this ain’t George’s Yankees anymore’.
Only time will tell what they do going forward. I’m sure paying for high priced talent isn’t going to end anytime soon though.
MetsFan4Decades
9/6/2011-2:29am at 2:29 am (UTC -4)
Going forward with the Mets, the book will soon be closed on Omar.
We’ve got some young talent he brought in which should be up in a year
or two. Couple more who might pan out in the lower minors. Outside of
that, it’s all Sandy’s Mets now.
I’m hearing today rumblings of something like ‘Mets FO is kicking around
the idea of a complete rebuild in 2012, moving towards building a
perennial winner every year. As opposed to making just a few tweaks
waiting for young talent to emerge and trying to sell next year as
‘we’ve got enough to compete’.
Going to be interesting to see what this off season brings.
Anonymous
9/6/2011-4:32am at 4:32 am (UTC -4)
As long time Mets fans we’ve both been through total rebuilding and we know the team and it’s fans are in for a rough ride. This is part and parcel with the Wilpon’s effort to maintain control of the franchise during their financial crisis no matter the impact on the franchise or what may be financially better suited for them. For Mets fans sake I hope it’s Custer’s Last Stand. The team needs intelligent, passionate and affluent new ownership.
MetsFan4Decades
9/6/2011-5:29am at 5:29 am (UTC -4)
If I have to live through another total rebuilding – the likes of that
which starter when Grant traded Seaver until Cashen finally took over
and rebuilt, well it’s gonna be one long decade…..
hahahaha
It’s now almost 1:30am in the morning here and I just spent since about the 4th inning of the Met game researching them. I’m tired of spending around $300 and having them only last a couple of years. This is the 4th one that died on me. Think I’m going to move up to the professional grade but man, they’re a lot of money…..
And funny you mention Custer’s Last Stand…..I was watching an old movie after the Met game on that battle and Custer’s demise.
Anonymous
9/6/2011-5:07am at 5:07 am (UTC -4)
From Adam Rubin at ESPN:
“New York Mets left-hander Johan Santana may return to the major leagues next week, coinciding with the one-year anniversary of surgery to repair a torn anterior capsule in his left shoulder. Meanwhile, in another positive injury-related development for the Mets, first baseman Ike Davis indicated he very likely will not need surgery on his injured left ankle.”
http://espn.go.com/new-york/mlb/story/_/id/6933728/new-york-mets-get-good-news-injured-johan-santana-ike-davis
MetsFan4Decades
9/6/2011-5:30am at 5:30 am (UTC -4)
If anyone can make it back in 18 months from that type of shoulder surgery (meaning ST next year), it’ll be Johan.
I just hope he’s 80% the pitcher he used to be.
Anonymous
9/6/2011-5:13am at 5:13 am (UTC -4)
I tuned in the Mets game and was astonished by the number of people in attendance. The PA announcer could have addressed them individually. Talk about meeting in a secluded rendezvous.
I hope Chris Capuano recorded that stellar pitching performance we all raved about because it may have been a once in a lifetime event for him.
Paul J. Festa
9/6/2011-4:36pm at 4:36 pm (UTC -4)
Great post!
The easiest thing in the world to do is root for the Yankees. Mets fans are outside-the-box thinkers who take chances. Rooting for the Mets is a risk-reward proposition. If and when they win another championship, the champagne, as someone once said, will taste sweeter.
Anonymous
9/6/2011-5:18pm at 5:18 pm (UTC -4)
Really now, self aggrandizement???
BTW Then Cubs fans will taste the sweetest champagne in the history of the universe.