A Few Good Friends

Doc Gooden is getting out of the slammer.

On the whole, this is probably good for Doc. George Steinbrenner (not to be confused with Jesus), who always forgives dominant African-American '86 Mets who were first-round draft picks, played for the Yankees, and had their names start with D, is reportedly considering offering the former Dr. K an organizational coaching position.

I'll flash you back to a post I wrote earlier this year about the fall of Doc. Mostly, it's just a tragedy. There are too many of those these days.

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Speaking of tragedies (albeit one on a smaller scale), Art Howe "battled" his way to a position as bench coach for the Texas Rangers.

I won't claim that Art Howe was actually the reason for the transgressions of the Mets in 2003 and 2004. However, under his guidance, it seemed like the entire team was injured come August, and he really failed to install the authoritarian culture of winning that Willie has in his first two years.

In all fairness, Howe was given some less-than-stellar talent to deal with during his Mets days, and was dismissed moreso as part of an organizational purge rather than as a referendum on his job of field managing.

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The bids for D-Mat are in (as of 5:00 PM EST) and your Seibu Lions have 4 days to mull over whether or not they will accept the highest bid.

A bold prediction: the highest bid was $12MM, placed by the Boston Red Sox.

Ken Davidoff is more or less in line with my thinking, arguing that Scott Boras' projections (my wording, not Davidoff's) of $20-$30MM were pure hype.

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