The Duck is Roasted
I figured as such. His decision not to speak to the press seems better confined to the Post, but I understand where the Duck is coming from. The paper seemingly exploited a private situation for the cover story (registration required), and in actuality the papers had previously been filed.
You hear these stories about baseball players all the time but rarely is it front-page news. For a fan favorite on a hot team in the big city, like Lo Duca on these Mets, or Michael Strahan on the Giants, it becomes a big story. People may also recall last year, when Manny Ramirez's romantic infidelity was supposedly the reason he requested for what seemed to be the millionth time a trade from Boston and put his Back Bay apartment on the market. I guess it would be "ah-paht-ment" and "mah-ket" though.
Well, I think it's safe to say that this is the best-handled situation involving romance with an Italian-American catcher traded from the Dodgers to the Marlins to the Mets who was married to a nude model at some point, leads the team in batting average and has facial hair.
We're In Maine Now; Philly's In Rearview Mirror
John Maine, the goofy-looking fellow in the above photo, kept the streak alive last night. Sure, he's going to have a bit of trouble catching former BYU great-turned-Met nemesis-turned-Met-turned-Rangers pitching coach-turned-Baseball Tonight analyst Orel Hershiser's 59 1/3 scoreless. But he looked the part last night, throwing a few too many balls, but still working his way out of every jam. Maine was probably a little rusty, due to Mike Peltrey being in the rotation and taking his starts.
Joe Morgan is awful. But last night he actually made some reasonable points that were bordering on conscious, like why RBI isn't such a great stat and why strikeouts are the best way for pitchers to record outs. Bonnie Bernstein did a good job in her interview with Omar, even if he appeared distracted by... the game. What a revolutionary change it would be if ESPN found a way not to interrupt the game with their self-promotion or interviews. I liked how Joe Morgan said "I don't use email." As if that surprised us.
Also, what on earth is the deal with Jon Miller and his incredibly annoying enunciation? It sounds like he's trying to make every word perfect, but it just sounds wrong. And if you're going to say Bell-Tron, why didn't you say our left fielder's first name was On-di? Oh, is that because you're not fluent in Spanish? Once again, another shocker.
Golden Boy Becomes Platinum Boy
David Wright signed a six year, $55 million extension that keeps him in Flushing at least until 2012. The Mets have an option for 2013.
The boys are locked up long-term for the good of the squad. Reyes and Wright will be here for a little bit longer now than we were originally guaranteed. That makes me happy. Because now we don't have to hear any idiot Yankee fans telling us that Reyes and Wright are just playing out their six years with the Mets and then going to the Bronx. Fat chance.
Maybe I can get some Reyes/Wright tattoos now to go with my season tickets for the rest of the year. Explosive. It's now superhumanly apparent that his blog (at MLBlogs) is just another thing of commercialism, though.. The people who run that operation seem to have forgotten that if "David Wright" is to post on said blog, it should not be posted when he is currently playing the field at third base. The time of day when the entry was posted also isn't available. But it was at 10 PM on Friday night. Trust me.
They said "Posted Courtesy of MLB.com." Maybe I should post write my entries mid-day when I'm taking a cat nap and say that they were posted courtesy of David Wright. Equally believable.
Will Curtis Run Again?
With the Hall of Fame game transpiring last night, even though my eyes were interrupted for the first two hours by the Mets game and then for a half an hour by Entourage and then for the Mets game again, football season is officially sort of here. Thankfully, the Jets haven't played their first preseason game yet, though they did face off against themselves in a simulated game over the weekend. Here's the caveat: the most underrated rusher of all time, Curtis Martin, is still recovering from knee surgery.
Now this isn't all bad, because the Jets aren't exactly going to be just one player short this year. But was that game December fourth against the Pats really his last? He went for 29 yards on fifteen carries, both the fault of his wobbly knee and the wobbly offensive line.
From a fan's standpoint, though, it's hard to find the right handle on this issue. Part of me thinks that Curtis should be part of this team with his legend status. But then again, it's hard to figure that it makes sense to push him out on the field for a noncompetitive team despite his injured status. The Mangini lockdown has made it impossible to find out the extent of his injury, therefore it's hard to say what Curtis' fate should be. I want Justin McCareins to get his lazy, good-for-nothing, ass back in shape. That's all I have to say.
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