Talkin' Pitchin' With Aarin' Heilmin'

Cue lights.
HEILMAN
Today, kids, we're going to learn about pitching. You can learn from me, and my good friends Mike Pelfrey, Scott Schoeneweis, and Rick Peterson. Here, at Talkin' Pitchin', having fun comes first, keeping the Mets in ballgames comes second!

I'm first going to answer some viewer questions.

Sal from Brooklyn wants to know: "Aaron, what is your key pitch?"

Well, Sal, my favorite pitch is the hanging changeup. I enjoy giving up home runs and scowling, and throwing the hanging changeup, especially to lefthanded hitters, makes it awfully easy to erode a lead in the late innings.

John from Staten Island writes in: "Aaron, how have you managed to earn six wins on the season, despite a VORP of only 2.6?"

John, thanks for the question. I learned the key skill of luck through communication with my good friend Joe Carter, formerly of the Toronto Blue Jays. He would consistently drive in 100 runs, while hitting barely over .250, not walking, and sustaining his reputation on an especially clutch moment in the World Series.

You all can remember my great playoff successes, right? Remember a little duel I had with Yadier Molina? Exactly. So part of my ability to win is based on my impeccable postseason record.

Brady from Cleveland wonders: "What is the outlook for Notre Dame football this year?"

Well, Brady, even with Jesus and Charlie Weis on our side, I'm not sure the season is shaping up too great. Prep QB Jimmy Clausen underwent a little arm surgery, and I'm not sure the offense can withstand the departures of Jeff Samardzija, Rhema McKnight, and Darius Walker.

I've heard they're planning on facing some tough teams like the Coast Guard, Merchant Marines, and the TSA training program because the other service academies aren't difficult enough.

Okay, so now we're going to learn this week's new pitch. This one is a real favorite of mine. Victor Zambrano taught it to me, and starting a sentence like that automatically makes you a legitimate pitcher. I call it the changeup-in-the-dirt. How do you think I've managed 15 hit-by-pitches and 13 wild pitches in my short big league career?

So, you assume the normal changeup grip, with four fingers over the ball. Then, in an important count where you can't really afford to throw balls, you proceed to throw the pitch towards the ground, preferably way inside or way outside. Don't be afraid to bounce it to home plate, but take heed: it is of the utmost importance that you don't confuse this pitch with my hanging changeup, which I taught you last week.

With that pitch, you assume the changeup grip, and throw it down the middle or on the inside half of the plate to a lefthanded hitter. Guaranteed to provide fan-pleasing fireworks at all times, especially in opposing ballparks. Take a look at my home run rate: it's no coincidence that it's higher than those of all other Mets pitchers except my next guest, Scott Schoeneweis, and I intend to change that.

Speaking of which, Scott is joining us in studio now. Thanks, Scott, for comin' on Talkin' Pitchin' With Aarin' Heilmin'.

SCHOENEWEIS
No problem, Aaron. I always would love to help out a fellow useless reliever.

HEILMAN
Well, about that, Scott, I was a little upset when I noticed that you hadn't given up an earned run on the road all season. I understand there are small sample sizes and all, but I was a little disappointed in your road splits for the season.

SCHOENEWEIS
I can understand that, buddy. I can try to give up long home runs, but somehow the opponents just can't touch my meatballs on the road. But I mean, look at you, you did manage to strike out the side today.

HEILMAN
Don't you dare try and trick the fan base. I allowed two runs in that inning, and by all accounts I should have given up even more.

SCHOENEWEIS
Fair enough.

HEILMAN
And, to wit, I have managed to allow all those runs in a very short career. I was a first-round draft pick, and I have had the fan base turn on me several times. Remember 2005? Of course you don't, but I was nasty. Mets fans were even insisting that I replace Braden Looper as closer. Thank God those times are over.

SCHOENEWEIS
Didn't you want to be a starter at one point?

HEILMAN
I'll handle the questions here.

(awkward pause)

HEILMAN
So, Scott, do you have any questions for me?

SCHOENEWEIS
Aaron, I was just wondering about those days when you wanted to be a starter.

HEILMAN
Well, ah yes. I still do want to be a starter, though the Mets seem to believe that failing in the bullpen doesn't seem to make me a better candidate for the rotation. I might add that I was sterling in the rotation in 2005, and although I have had bumpy times in my career as a starter, the Mets' campaign of hate against me is totally ridiculous.

SCHOENEWEIS
I've been a starter before, and I'm not sure it's all that much better. Also, Aaron, I'm not sure exactly what campaign of hate you are referring to.

HEILMAN
Oh, Scott, I'm not sure you really understand anything. I am great, and you might notice all of the options the Mets have utilized to keep me from entering the rotation: Jose Lima, Jeremi (né Geremi) Gonzalez, Alay Soler, Jason Vargas, Mike Pelfrey, Dave Williams, Steve Trachsel, Oliver Perez, Brian Bannister, Pedro Martinez, Tom Glavine... must I continue?

SCHOENEWEIS
I'm not sure how many of those guys you mentioned have actually pitched for the Mets, but I digress. Aaron, have you not considered the fact that you throw only two pitches, neither of which is exceptional?

HEILMAN
Take a look at Tim Wakefield. He throws only one pitch, and he's probably the most celebrated pitcher in the history of the major leagues. With double the pitches, I will double Tim Wakefield's success: he has 159 career wins, pencil me in for 318.

SCHOENEWEIS
Aaron, I went to Duke, and aside from learning how to run an offense from Coach K, I learned a little thing about logic. That's flawless. I also met some very fine strippers there, though they kept trying to swab me in between dances.

HEILMAN
That's quite enough, Schoeneweis. Win a few games, and we'll talk again, okay? Special thanks to Scott Schoeneweis for appearing on this program, and while I'm on the topic, I would like to note that all guests on Talkin' Pitchin' With Aarin' Heilmin' receive a $5 gift certificate, erm, coupon, to the Olive Garden, and a urinary tract infection. Let's bring in our next guest, Mike Pelfrey, joining us via satellite. Hi, Mike. You're appearing via satellite from New Orleans, as you've just been demoted, correct?

PELFREY
Aaron, I'm backstage. Making the footage a little grainy doesn't make it seem like I'm appearing via satellite.

HEILMAN
Okay, okay, save the criticism for your parents, those who delivered such an incomplete pitcher into this world.

PELFREY
Aaron, you're a dick.

HEILMAN
Dry, acrid wit from you as always, Mike. Tell us a little bit about your methodology on the mound today, managing to allow three runs in five innings to the Phillies with three walks despite not pitching in nine days, bringing your record to 0-6 on the year. I have six wins on the season. Mike?

PELFREY
Well, Paul Lo Duca told me to go out there and just throw, and I managed to --

HEILMAN
Excuse me, Mike, but our good friends at Elias are telling me that in my last start, in 2005, I struck out 7 against the 2006 World Champion St. Louis Cardinals. What are your thoughts on that?

PELFREY
(flips off camera, walks offstage)

HEILMAN
Well, it looks like we're having a few problems with the satellite feed, but I'm sure Mike will be back soon. Then again, maybe he could use a little practice at pitching. Let me remind you, all guests on Talkin' Pitchin' With Aarin' Heilmin' receive five dollars off a meal for four or more at the Olive Garden and a real bitch of a urinary tract infection. At the Olive Garden, when you're here, you're family.

Let's welcome our final guest in-studio, Dr. Rick Peterson, the Mets' CEO of Pitching.

PETERSON
Namaste, young grasshopper.

HEILMAN
So, Rick, do you think you could fix me in ten minutes, huh?

PETERSON
Time represents that which cannot be governed by the heavens, Aaron. We are trapped in this submarine, and doomed to repeat history's mistakes if we shall fail to pitch below thigh-level.

HEILMAN
Yes, definitely. What do you think of my changeup?

PETERSON
Aaron, without your changeup, it would be as though Jimmy Page without hands, Louis Armstrong without a mouth. One cannot make beautiful music without sinking action on the changeup, or essential organs.

HEILMAN
Absolutely. Let me take a second, Rick, to complement you on your fine polyester/nylon-blend jacket there. That is puffy beyond belief; you resemble a man of great stature with it and a Jheri-curl atop your head.

PETERSON
Why thank you, Aaron. But I ought to warn you- there's no chance of you becoming a starter, ever. We have some fine talent coming through this organization, as silk through the roads of China during the time of Marco Polo, and I fear you might have the wrong impressions of your likely fate.

HEILMAN (crying)
Is this really what you think of me, Jacket? I've made all of these sacrifices for you; I gave you my clean sample, and this is how you repay me? How dare you?

PETERSON
Relax, don't do it, when you want to go to it.

HEILMAN (still sniffling)
That's all the time we have, on Talkin' Pitchin'. I would like to thank my middling guests, and I'll be back at work, throwing some games for the Mets, as we continue along this road trip. For all of us here, at the Olive Garden, I'm Aaron Heilman, and I will haunt your excretory system. Good night.

FIN

Just a note: I was disappointed to find that my blog is only the seventh hit if one Googles the phrase "Aaron Heilman stinks". I'm determined to change that.

Crosstown Rivals is sponsored by JustGreatTickets.com, your home for Chicago White Sox Tickets.

In Defense of Steve Phillips and Joe Morgan

Please accept my most sincere apologies for the title of this post, and understand that I have made these two my favorite punching bags in my years of watching Baseball Tonight, an absolutely atrocious program shoved down our throats by the good people at ESPN.

The two mentioned actually bring some sense into the fray, for the first time ever.

Now, tonight's 7 PM show featured discussion of the All-Star selections, something I was looking forward to while seething about the obvious ignorance of John Maine's great season. John Maine is tied for third in the NL in VORP among pitchers. Cole Hamels is nineteenth. Somehow he made it. Hamels ranks behind El Duque, by the way.

Regardez, s'il vous plait: Maine isn't even in the final five left for voting. His stats: 9-4, 2.74 ERA.

The final five:

SP Brandon Webb: 8-5, 3.05 ERA,
SP Roy Oswalt: 7-5, 3.42 ERA.
SP Carlos Zambrano: 9-6, 4.20 ERA.
SP Tom Gorzelanny: 8-4, 3.05 ERA.
SP Chris Young: 8-3, 2.14 ERA.

and, just for kicks,

SP Cole Hamels: 9-4, 3.87 ERA.

This is absolutely disgusting. I try to avoid putting too much stock into these things, but Maine outpitched all of the above but Young as measured by ERA, and he won more (or as many) than all. This is grotesque. Fire Selig.

P.S.: Zambrano's ERA is 4.20. Look at that. Oliver Perez would sooner deserve a spot.

Instead, the idiots on tonight's panel (Eric Young, Steve Phillips, and John Kruk) decided to debate why Jose Reyes made the All-Star team instead of Jimmy Rollins, who sucks, by the way.

Reyes OPS+: 131
Rollins OPS+: 116

Reyes WARP: 4.5
Rollins WARP: 3.9

Listen to our good friends at BT:

KRUK: "You don't go to the All-Star Game to watch a guy [Reyes] hit singles and run. That doesn't happen. Hit a home run."
KARL RAVECH: "You know that's ridiculous."
STEVE PHILLIPS: "Thank you."
KRUK: (incredulous)
RAVECH: You don't want to see Reyes run? Steal?
KRUK: He's not going to. It's the All-Star Game. [ED NOTE: There were two stolen bases from the NL in last year's ASG, and Reyes wasn't even playing.] And Jimmy Rollins can't steal a base?
YOUNG: I like Jose Reyes. I think he's one of the most exciting players in the game, but when we think about performance, who should be the all-star shortstop for the National League, no doubt about it, it should be Jimmy Rollins. Look at the numbers!
PHILLIPS: Come on!
YOUNG: His power, his slugging percentage, it's over .500! Take out the average and the stolen bases. What do you have?
PHILLIPS: You have on-base percentage. There's a 60-point difference between the two.
YOUNG: Ugh.
PHILLIPS: You're playing this game to win! Here's the thing, Jose Reyes has 25 more stolen bases than Rollins, which means those singles become doubles. Jimmy Rollins slugs? When you look at Jose Reyes's OPS, it's better than Jimmy Rollins'! He puts himself in position to score more runs than Jimmy Rollins! Runs scored come from the people behind you in the lineup! He's the most exciting player in the major leagues. And 2.5 million of my closest friends agree.
YOUNG: The Mets' lineup is not good?
PHILLIPS: The Mets' lineup with Beltran and Delgado behind him struggled this year compared to Howard and Utley.
YOUNG: They've been tearin' it up [ED NOTE: No, they haven't. They suck.] How about Ryan Howard earlier this season?
PHILLIPS: I'll trade you right now, Jose Reyes for Jimmy Rollins, you'd take Reyes.
KRUK: We're talking about an All-Star Game!
YOUNG: Not about trades! [ED NOTE: So cute. They're finishing eachother's poorly-thought out arguments.]
PHILLIPS: Okay, who would you say gives that team a better chance to win that game?
KRUK and YOUNG (in unison): Jimmy Rollins! [ED NOTE: According to the Hardball Times, Reyes has four more win shares this season than Rollins. Just thought I'd point that out.]
PHILLIPS (incredulous, once again): It's not even close. Jose Reyes does everything.
KRUK (interjecting): You wanna throw situations out, let's throw this one out: bases loaded, 2-run game, bottom of the ninth inning, who do you want hitting? Jimmy Rollins or Jose Reyes?
PHILLIPS: I'll take Reyes. Absolutely. He does everything, he doesn't strike out.
KRUK: Then you'll lose. [ED NOTE: Rollins is 0-for-5 on the season with bases loaded. Reyes is 4-for-12.]
YOUNG (changing the topic and making no sense): You also have to think about the opponents' batting averages against those guys. It's not going to be a piece of cake for him to get on base and steal. [ED NOTE: So is it going to be easy for Rollins? I don't understand... they would face the same pitchers.] You got Pudge behind the plate. Pudge shuts down.
RAVECH (trying to save Young and Kruk from their stupidity): There are people in Milwaukee saying, why are you even having this discussion? Where's J.J. Hardy? People in Florida, the few that actually watch the Marlins, saying where's Hanley Ramirez?
PHILLIPS: Hardy's 2nd best, Ramirez's 3rd best, Renteria's fourth best, and Rollins is 5th. [ED NOTE: By WARP (which takes defense into account), your top NL Shortstops: Reyes, Renteria, Rollins, Ramirez, Hardy.]
YOUNG: I can't believe you're saying that.
KRUK: That's why, as a GM, you're here with us.

(later in the show, another exchange with JOE MORGAN)

RAVECH: You were listening to that discussion we had, about Reyes and Rollins, and you were a speed guy. Who would you have selected, Reyes or Rollins, given that choice?
MORGAN: Well, you know what, I'd flip a coin, either one that comes up, I'd be happy with. [ED NOTE: If you read Fire Joe Morgan, this must sound familiar.] But if you forced me to make a choice, I'd have to take Reyes. I think Reyes is the most exciting player in the game right now. [ED NOTE: He also leads all NL Shortstops in WARP!] I think Jimmy Rollins is exciting; he's a great player, a great clutch hitter. I just think that that's a real snub not to have him on the all star team. But I would have to take Reyes.
RAVECH: [blah, blah] Some have compared Jose Reyes to you in your prime.
MORGAN: I didn't get that. (having some audio issues)
RAVECH: I just complimented you.
MORGAN: Well, that's high praise, because I think he's an exciting player.

One final ED NOTE: If Rollins is so bothered about being left off the roster, he might want to ask Tony La Russa why he took Aaron Rowand as a manager's selection. I don't think he's very good. Or why he took Albert Pujols, who has not been Albert-ly this season (SLG down by nearly 140 pts. compared to last year).

==================

I'll be back tomorrow with something coherent which hopefully can spear Aaron Heilman. Stay tuned.

Crosstown Rivals is sponsored by JustGreatTickets.com, your home for Chicago White Sox Tickets.

Schoene' Him The Door

Tonight's game, a 5-3 extra inning loss to the hated Cardinals, which ended the Mets' one game winning streak against the Redbirds at Shea, was a failure on many levels despite the unlopsided score.

One ought to view this failure in three parts: the failure of the entire team to hit Todd effing Wellemeyer, who has all of eight major league wins to his credit (alongside an utterly sterling career 5.51 ERA), the failure of Scott Schoeneweis to do anything that could possibly help this team at any point in time, and the respective failures of Omar Minaya and Willie Randolph on this night and others.

You might say I'm overreacting, but the Mets' offense, in deslumpifying itself, managed only one run against Oakland on Saturday, one run in the first nine against St. Louis last night, and only three in the first nine tonight. You might remind me that I am forgetting two blowouts against Oakland in the Mets' favor, but then I will remind you that they faced Lenny DiNardo and Joe Kennedy in those games.

So, the Mets didn't fare too well against a replacement level starter tonight. They didn't last night, either. What can I do? There's nothing to second-guess: Delgado looks atrocious at the plate (1-for-5, 4 LOB, including a crucial groundout with men on first and third), and when Jose Reyes isn't hitting (1-for-5 tonight), he isn't stealing bases, and the Mets' offensive wheels aren't turning. No Met had a multi-hit game tonight, and six hits in eleven innings isn't a winning pace. Oh, well.

But, really, that's been a trend of late. The Cardinals don't hit all that much either, despite having one of baseball's top sluggers on their roster. (TAGUCHI!) They have Albert Pujols, too. Yet they manage to circumvent offense and win at the same time, at least when facing the Mets.

How does that happen? Two words: Scott Schoeneweis. He's awful. Totally horrendous. I can't really think of a time, save for a few April and Spring Training games, where I was able to heap praise on Schoeneweis. You might recall this post (scroll down a little), where I discussed and criticized the initial signing. However, I'm not sure there was anyone who expected Schoeneweis to be an instant curse upon entering the game.

Schoeneweis can't be used. Baseball Prospectus lists his VORP as -1.7 runs, which is pretty terrible, and that doesn't even include tonight's poor showing, including a home run ball served up to a rookie who most likely idolizes David Eckstein's power production. His ERA is 5.86, and he seemingly walks/allows a home run to each and every batter he faces.

Perhaps I'm exaggerating: the Mets' record is only 1-5 in the last six games in which Schoeneweis has pitched, and he really wasn't directly responsible for any of those losses, except tonight's. He claims to be injured, but it wasn't that mysterious severed leg tendon serving up the 3-2 meatball to Brendan Ryan.

Even in a best-case scenario, Schoeneweis is a mediocre pitcher who has little place on a major-league roster aside from a left-handed specialist role. And Pedro Feliciano already fills that role like convicted shakedown artist Tony Sirico as Paulie Walnuts on the Sopranos. Schoeneweis can't be a mop-up guy: that's Sele's job. Maybe he and Julio Franco could take a ride in a late model Yugo driven by Duaner Sanchez's cabby. I'm just saying.

But we have become accustomed to Schoeneweis' failure: he is the Mets' version of a white flag, at least in the minds of the fanbase. Why hasn't the coaching staff gotten that memo yet? We're putting new cover sheets on the TPS reports, too.

This is why much of the onus for the loss must be put on Willie 'n Omar, Omar 'n Willie, the inseparable duo who brought Scott Schoeneweis and Julio Franco into our Mets family, and who now refuse to cut their losses and acknowledge the mistakes. Even George Bush (a friend of Minaya and Franco, I smell a conspiracy!) knew it was time to pull the plug on Rumsfeld and Ashcroft at some point.

What was Willie thinking when he took Wagner out after a nine-pitch tenth? I understand he would have had to go two innings on back-to-back nights, but it would have been more like one and a half after that stress-free frame. It's not as though he had to bat, or as though their most feared hitters were due up in the next frame.

If he is so hell-bent on saving his closer, then what exactly was his reasoning behind selecting Schoeneweis to pitch the next frame? Although his four best relievers were out (although it shames me to include Mota and Heilman in that assessment), he did have Joe Smith to go to. Even Aaron Sele has been better this season than Schoeneweis.

That decision didn't pan out well, and the degree to which it was so poorly rewarded might have overshadowed the even more questionable decision to pinch-hit Julio Franco in the ninth with men on the corners. Franco hasn't had a pinch-hit in three weeks, and his .196/.333/.261 line doesn't exactly instill confidence in anyone.

While utilizing Ramon Castro in that spot probably wouldn't make sense, Willie would have been much better off using Damion Easley instead of Franco. Either option was 0-for-his career against Izzy, but at least we can recall Easley having hits in this millennium that were not bloop singles to right field.

In fact, Willie could have opted to leave Carlos Gomez in to bat for himself against the closer, who had lost all control of his curveball, and then sent up Ledee to bat for Mota. The game had already been tied, and Gomez has been getting on base at a higher clip than Ledee this year.

Instead, Ledee walked, and Julio "Out Machine" Franco went up and was a role model to all the young players, showing them how to overstay their welcome and how to minimize their bat speed and, simultaneously (!), maximize their outmaking potential. The jokes make themselves with Julio on the field. He is absolutely useless, and it befuddles me why Willie chooses to use him as his "ace" pinch-hitter.

Randolph might say that it's nice to have a bullet like that for late in the game: the Mets play Russian Roulette with themselves when the amazing egg-white guzzler steps up to the plate. By the way, did you know that Julio is older than Ron Darling? Almost two full years older? Ron retired in 1995. Hell, Franco's only three years younger than Lee Mazzilli.

Those two decisions are where Willie's at fault: Franco shouldn't be in any major league games at all, and Schoeneweis should be in even fewer than that. But it's someone's fault that these two found their way onto the roster in the first place, and that blame falls squarely on the shoulders of our beloved Omar.

Some have found significant fault with his offseason dealings, and I count myself in the crowd that only vilifies him for a couple of those moves. He deserves praise for passing on Barry Zito's ridiculous price tag, and outfielders like Alfonso Soriano and Carlos Lee. He showed incredible foresight in making both Maine and Perez parts of this year's rotation, and the Moises move might even turn out well, if his legs can be reattached.

But Minaya's failures this offseason lie in a few atrocious moves: two trades and one signing. The signing was Schoeneweis at 3 years, $11 M, just for the hell of it, apparently. The Mets passed on one of their relief aces from '06, Chad Bradford, at an almost identical clip, and he has a 3.49 ERA in 40 games for the Orioles this season. He's younger than Schoeneweis, too. That move has been discussed to death, and with good reason.

Minaya's two trades were even worse: Royce Ring/Heath Bell to the Padres for Jon Adkins and Ben Johnson, and Matt Lindstrom/Henry Owens to the Marlins for Adam Bostick/Jason Vargas.

Lindstrom has a 3.52 ERA in 33 games for Florida; Owens a 1.96 clip in 22 games (4 saves) for the Fish, before going down with an injury. Heath Bell has a 1.42 ERA in 36 games with San Diego, and Ring (right) hasn't given up a run in his four games of MLB work, alongside a 4-0 record and 1.23 ERA in 25 games for AAA Portland.

Three of the relief pitchers the Mets sent away have ERAs under two, and the other still has a respectable 3.52. Do you want to know what the Mets got in those trades?

Adam Bostick has a 3-5 record and 6.71 ERA at AAA N'awlins. Vargas made one forgettable start for the Mets and has a 6-4 record to go with a 4.35 ERA on the farm. Jon Adkins is the gem of the bunch, with his 3.68 ERA in 29 games for the Zephyrs. Ben Johnson posted a downright adorable .185/.233/.222 line in 27 AB for the Mets, and has fared rather middlingly at AAA, with a .264 average and zero power (.368 SLG).

Might it be a little bit more than a coincidence that the Mets have lost or been aided in their losing of several games due to spotty middle relief? The Mets traded away four dynamite major league relievers for nothing. Zero contribution to the big club for the Mets' acquisitions. Ahem, there was actually less than zero contribution as Vargas and Johnson combine for a -3.8 VORP at the plate and on the mound.

It pains me to say that the players the Mets chose to give up have been worth 34.9 runs over replacement level to their teams. Considering that the Mets gave up about 40 runs in two trades, and that a win is worth about ten runs, the Mets cost themselves four wins to this point during the season in these trades. Four wins extra and four losses subtracted would have given the Mets a 46-29 record, which would have been tops in the NL and third in major league baseball.

I hope that this doesn't sound like an excessively impassioned rant, but at this point in the season, there has to be some blame assessed for a 2.5 game lead that could have been 6.5. Minaya has time to remedy his mistakes: promote Willie Collazo (the AAA squad's best reliever, as long as Ambi "The Lorax" is disabled) and 1B Andy Tracy (.311/.418/.571, 18 HR, 58 RBI) while DFAing Julio Franco and DLing Schoeneweis.

Just a humble suggestion, but one that's intended to avoid all too certain failure.

----------------------

Two quick notes:

-Check for an article regarding Delgado, Franco, and Andy Tracy by me (!) on Mike's Mets tomorrow. I will be writing there weekly, for the foreseeable future, but I'll still be here to provide you coverage on my usual semi-semi-regular posting schedule.

-I'm going to tomorrow night's game (Anthony Reyes and his 0-9 record and 6.69 ERA vs. Tom 296, 7:10 p.m.) and hope to fare better than I did last time. If I don't, be sure to keep your cursor on that refresh button to indulge yourself in my horror.

Crosstown Rivals is sponsored by JustGreatTickets.com, your home for Chicago White Sox Tickets.

Rock Bottom

It's hard to imagine things would have gotten any worse for this Mets team after a sweep at the hands of Philadelphia, letting the subpar Phillies reenter the division race.

Well, it's been two weeks, and they have. The Mets lost this evening, 6-2, sending Oliver Perez, this season's unlikely ace to the hill, against the Twins' Scott Baker, whose 1-2 record and 7.33 ERA so far this season are an embarrassment to anyone named Scott or Baker.

It marks the sixth straight series dropped by the Mets. This used to be best described as a funk, then a slump, then a lengthy losing streak, Now, however, the Mets' precipitous decline resembles a collapse. The team has been awful defensively, awful offensively, and awful on the hill.

A loss used to be a refuge for this club, infallible, and unable to be threatened by hard-charging opponents. These Mets are weak, resembling in no way or shape the team we grew accustomed to seeing since the inception of "the New Mets."

Sure, the team is 38-32, a record we would have been exceedingly pleased with during the reign of Art Howe. But this isn't working. There are no strings being pulled from above, no Met seemingly threatened with an unsatisfactory fate besides Carlos Gomez, who is the only player on the team giving a consistent level of effort.

Let me amend myself: others on the team are giving a consistently low level of effort, as Carlos Delgado's recent defensive (and offensive) performance makes me pine for Doug Mientkiewicz. Shawn Green ought to be envious of Barry Bonds' range, and Jose Reyes might not even win a home run derby against Jason Tyner right now.

I never anticipated asking this question during this season, especially after a sterling April and May, but can things get any worse for this team? They have been ravaged by many injuries, including Beltran's nagging quad, Moises's shredded quad, and the Duck's shattered thumb.

Pedro's absence deprives the Mets of their true ace, and Duaner Sanchez's cab ride from hell still haunts the Mets in the late innings. One might not be able to credit late-inning collapses for any of the failures since the Phillies series, but Joe Smith has lost his luster and the rest of the pen never had any.

Injuries have shepherded the club to this point, but with no imminent returns from anyone, including Firstings, is it safe to say that things will get any better soon? Pedro might be the jolt who can fix things, but he's nowhere near all there yet. There's nothing there in the minor leagues, unless you long for OF Chip Ambres, whose name's reminiscence to that of a Braves superstar (and announcer) makes me doubt his readiness.

The issue is complacency, at least in part, as Delgado has watched his OBP sink below .300 and Beltran's last homer came on June sixth. Carlos Gomez is the only player capable of pushing Beltran with Endy out, and if Beltran sits, the outfield contains Green and Ledee flanking Gomez.
What's worse is that Julio Franco is the only first baseman on the Mets' roster, and allowing him to spell Delgado might just sink this team even further. Recent ostensibly false reports suggested that Franco was an impetus for conflict within the team, but perhaps Minaya has retained his employ as a personal favor to Delgado, who cannot face any heat from a man old enough to be his father. (**may not be true; I shall consult my inside sources)

Nevertheless, this team plays with varying senses of urgency, none of which seem to be exactly proper, as evidenced by the losing streak. The Mets are fortuitous, as they have the opportunity to end this horrendous interleague play against Oakland while missing their ace, Dan Haren, though Joes Blanton and Kennedy aren't exactly Scott Baker. The Mets will also face Lenny DiNardo, a former Met property.

Don't imagine another sweep, another lost series. Visualize a Mets sweep, a reversal to perpetuate an unprecedented hot streak. Things can't get much worse. My fingers are crossed.

p.s.: new white stripes and smashing pumpkins within three weeks? does it get any better? (no.)

Crosstown Rivals is sponsored by JustGreatTickets.com, your home for Chicago White Sox Tickets.

Karma

I love it when these karmic shifts occur: when someone due for an unpleasant outcome finally meets it. And nothing makes me happier when the mighty Yankees are toppled.

Earlier in the season, we might not have been prepared to use the phrase "mighty Yankees." After all, the club was in a seemingly unprecedented state of disrepair, as their pitching was struggling and their offense was nearly as bad.

The Mets took two out of three against the Spanks earlier this season, when legends such as Darrell Rasner and Tyler Clippard showed up as starters. One might summon up the image of Mighty Mets, with Carloses Beltran and Delgado resembling actual baseball players.

Oh, how the mighty have fallen. The Mets have been middling at best in June, with an exceptionally dismal stretch of four straight series losses. Perhaps you might recall a recent Yankee winning streak, of nine straight games. The Mets were 1-8 during that span.

Yet the Mets deserve to be relevant within New York. The media (of which I am certainly not a part!) decides to print papers either about the Yankees winning or struggling. You might not find out anything about the Mets, especially not with all the manufactured drama in the Bronx.

Suffice it to say that their time, at least for now, is up. The Mets rebounded tonight, as you might have heard, with a brilliantly-pitched 2-0 win over the Yankees and their $28 million dollar Rocket Man.

The Yankees were certainly out of their element during that winning streak: after all, the team is still poorly constructed and is perhaps the least cost-effective entity in existence (with the obvious exception of the federal government). Carl Pavano is pulling down a cool $10 M and Jason Giambi and Johnny Damon, both of whom abstained from tonight's contest, are earning eight-figure salaries.

Regard now, this team, sans any sort of budgetary restrictions, which placed former Met superstar Miguel Cairo at first base and Melky Cabrera in center field. Josh Phelps DHed. Pardon me if I take a second to indulge myself in a quick chuckle at the Yankees' abject failure to put a halfway decent team on the field.

Okay. You might say that I shouldn't be so joyful. After all, the win was anything but resounding, as the Mets averted chaos in the eighth inning with Pedro Feliciano and Joe Smith on the hill. Don't tell me you weren't on the edge of vomiting when you saw Aaron Heilman and Scott Schoeneweis up in the pen during that eighth. I'm not sure Willie could have scared us any more without flying in Braden Looper or Dae-Sung Koo (he has a 2.51 ERA for Hanwha in 14+ innings in the Korean League so far this year; I checked).

But the Mets managed to sneak by, thanks to outstanding performances tonight by Jose Reyes at the dish and on the basepaths, Oliver Perez on the mound, and Carloses Beltran and Gomez in the field. Gomez, too, was probably the second or third best Met at the plate, recording two bunt hits and blinding us with his speed.

I would give a game ball to Carlos Delgado at the dish, but I think a game steaming pile of dog excrement would be more suited for his 0-for-4, 4 K performance. The humorous thing in all of that is that he probably couldn't have managed to do any worse at the plate. Like, if I went up and faced Roger Clemens, I would probably do no worse than that.

Yet indicative of an incredibly successful ballclub is the ability to win in spite of various upsetting occurrences. The bulk of the lineup, as has been the case with so many of these recent contests, was ice cold. Oliver Perez's wildness was a little frightening.

However, the Mets persevered and won an impressive game. Maybe the case is that the team just needed an intense atmosphere to win, although I might contest that there is no reason to develop a playoff air in the middle of June. We shouldn't be unhappy with tonight's outcome, though.

Maybe 2-9 in the last eleven shouldn't make the Mets superior to the Yankees, though a sweep is thankfully not in the cards. The Mets thereby successfully averted total crisis, backing many of us off the ledge and inducing an overwhelming sense of calm across the fan base.

Call it karma.

Crosstown Rivals is sponsored by JustGreatTickets.com, your home for Chicago White Sox Tickets.

A Hiatus

They are down 6-1 in the bottom of the seventh. Rafael Furcal is on third.

I will take a hiatus of sorts, though I can assure you at least a thousand words, after the next Mets win (if there is one), describing my relief in not having to jump of a cliff.

I am completely and utterly disappointed in this team's lack of effort to avoid resembling their 1962 counterparts.

To quote Casey Stengel regarding that squad, "Can't anyone here play this game?"

Willie should be asking the same. He and the rest of his coaching staff combine for over 4,500 hits in their careers.

Reyes dropped the double-play ball. 7-1. One out. I hate this team.

Crosstown Rivals is sponsored by JustGreatTickets.com, your home for Chicago White Sox Tickets.

Resignation

During Willie Randolph's tenure with "The New Mets," we as fans have become accustomed to seeing a baseball product of the highest quality, and Randolph's managerial style keeps the players hustling. The Mets had a never-say-die attitude, as evidenced by pitching Roberto Hernandez for, like, six straight games, during Willie's first year, for he was the only reliever of any quality.

But when the Mets were snuffed out tonight by Randy Wolf, whose umpire brother needs to cool it on the omniscience, the team seemed resigned to their fate as losers.

Come to think of it, the team has been playing that way for a while. It can be seen in the lack of late rallies, the relievers' inability to hold any lead (or deficit), and other characteristics which have shepherded this team to an unfortunate 2-7 record in their last nine games, with Jorge Sosa having started both Mets wins.

The New Mets aren't resigned, in theory. They fix problems; they never quit. Last year, they were the Cardiac Kids, with Endy Chavez, David Wright, and Carlos Beltran mastering the late-inning walkoff hit. This year, in a game that probably would have proved crucial for stemming the tide of defeat, Willie Randolph sent up his big three hitters in the ninth: Jose Valentin, Ruben Gotay, and Ricky Ledee.

Disgraceful. Valentin was dispatched on a first-pitch swing, and Gotay and Ledee both have K's next to their name in your scorecard. I know Takashi Saito is good, and the rest of that Dodgers bullpen is pretty strong as well, but these are the Mets. Remember that club who ran over the Dodgers in the NLDS, even with Steve Trachsel (by the way, 5-4, 3.82 ERA for Baltimore this season) starting one of the games.

The Mets got out to an early lead tonight, as has often been the case during this losing streak. Yet after three quick runs, the Mets proceeded to cough up runs and hang on for dear life, committing errors and making poor baseball decisions. What is to be made of the smart decision in pitching out during the suicide squeeze, only to see Tony "Not Bobby" Abreu go from first to third on a poor throw by Captain Red Ass.

This team is inexplicably resigned to their fate as a losing bunch: why play aggressively? Why get important hits in the late innings? They are doomed to lose, because of reliever clowns like Mota, Schoeneweis, and Aaron Sele (who was better off in the witness protection program). And don't get me started about Aaron Heilman.
What does it mean for the team when Willie says things like, "Nothing's better." regarding the condition of Moises Alou? The team must sense that sense of urgency from "quality veteran leaders" like Moises, who has missed nearly a month with a pulled left quad.

A pulled quad? Really, Moises? You are making us suffer through Endy Chavez (who's now out for over a month), Ben Johnson, David Newhan, the premature Carlos Gomez era, and Ricky effing Ledee because of your precious quad? Shawn Green, hardly the image that first comes to mind when thinking of tough guy baseball players, missed less time with a broken bone in his foot.

A broken bone, Moises. You have a pulled muscle! I hope your Workmen's Comp is paying well, because if any Mets fan gets a shot at you, I wouldn't be surprised if you met the Phil Leotardo treatment. Moises is not new to this ire, I am sure, as even before joining the Mets he had served fourteen separate DL stints in his career.

Moises is nothing but a cancer. Beltran is slumping. Delgado is seemingly showing signs of life, but can't manage a hit in crucial situations. The Duck is regressing to the mean. Reyes is devoid of that power which showed itself last year.

The spirit of this team is gone, and I don't know who can bring it back. It's more than just complacency: it's that the Mets are essentially smoked for the evening once they fall behind in a game. Fight isn't enough. They have to start coming back. The bullpen needs to keep the team in games.

Sure, there are things that this team is doing right. I like Carlos Gomez, Wright is locked in, Jorge Sosa is a godsend, and the rest of the starting pitching hasn't been terrible, although one would hope they could go deeper into games. I'm not sure the Mets should stop getting out ahead, although it hasn't boded terribly well for them of late. The good behaviors on this team still outweigh the negatives.

Don't stop

Crosstown Rivals is sponsored by JustGreatTickets.com, your home for Chicago White Sox Tickets.

Liveblogging the Mets' 2007 Amateur Draft

8:50 PM-With the 183rd pick in today's draft, the Mets snagged another third baseman, Zach Lutz, out of Division III Alvernia College in Pennsylvania. In all fairness. Lutz was the Division III Position Player of the Year this year, but I'm not sure exactly what the Mets are doing in selecting someone out of Alvernia College.

Lutz was by far the best player on the club, batting .454 with 12 HR and 58 RBI in 40 games. He stole ten bases, hit 15 doubles, struck out only nine times, and had a .541 OBP. Unfortunately, he was a disappointing 4-2 with a 5.18 ERA in five starts. As meaningless as D3 statistics might be, I'm not prepared to argue with a player with such all-around capability.

Perhaps a latter-day Moonlight Graham? I'm not sure. I'm looking forward to the legend of Zach "Triple" Lutz.

EDIT: I very much hope you've enjoyed my draft coverage today, although I could understand if you don't. It might be awful. I won't be covering day two, but I can assure you that the Mets will try an intriguing pick. They haven't netted themselves all that much in the way of potentially extraordinary prospects, and the pitcher who I mentioned earlier as a good fit for the Mets, Roxbury Latin HS's Jack McGeary is still available and perhaps the Mets could throw enough money at him to lure him away from Stanford.

8:13 PM-With pick #153, the Mets grabbed their first position player of the day, selecting 3B Richard Lucas out of Wolfson Senior High School in Florida, the alma mater of Kansas City OF prospect Billy Butler, who was a third baseman at Wolfson as well. He is a barrel-chested, muscular 6' 205 lb. kid with the ability to add onto that frame and develop more power, according to scouts.

Lucas is an aggressive hitter at the plate with good command of the strike zone and scouts indicate that he can hit to all fields, with good power when he pulls.

Wrote Florida State associate head coach Jamey Shouppe,

"He is the best third baseman in the country in my opinion. For a big guy he has the best, softest hands you will ever see in a big kid. He has Major League hands. If it hits his glove, you are out. He won't bobble or miss many. He played shortstop in high school and could probably play there at this level if you wanted a 6'3", 215 pound shortstop. If he isn't that big, he sure looks it. He projects as an outstanding Division I third baseman."

Defensively, he is solid as well, with soft hands and a developing arm at the hot corner. While he will need to perform awfully well to displace the man currently there for the Mets, he has a lot of potential to develop into a solid hitter and a strong fielder as his body matures. He is reportedly of strong character and is a team leader with solid fundamentals. He had a 3.25 GPA during his senior year.

Scouts have compared him offensively to Matt Diaz of the Atlanta Braves, as a hitter who projects best as a doubles hitter and not a home run hitter.

7:36 PM-With the 123rd overall pick, the New York Mets drafted RHP Stephen Clyne out of Clemson. He's 6'1" 205 lbs. and makess yet another college reliever selected by the club.

He's a redshirt senior, which makes him possibly one of the oldest kids in the draft class, and he is regarded as a hard worker and good clubhouse guy, working as a middle reliever on the strong club. He ranked second on the team in saves, with 3 (yes, you read that right), so he's not exactly the relief ace of the Tigers, who have been ranked as high as #5 in the nation this season.

The problem with Clyne: injuries. He underwent Tommy John surgery in 2004, and his stuff didn't really rejoin him until this season, which meant that he wouldn't be on the fast track to the big leagues. He's a two-pitch pitcher in the big leagues, with a 91-94 MPH fastball with good sink and a slider that has been filthy at times. He's not all that confident in his secondary pitches, though, so he relies on the fastball.

His reliance on the sinking heater allows for the rather high batting average against of .253, though he was playing in the SEC, probably the nation's toughest conference He did, however, have a 2.28 ERA and 47 strikeouts in 43.1 innings, so I'd say he projects rather favorably as a big-league setup man or middle reliever if his stuff holds out and the injuries don't return. A solid pick, right about where he should be in late Round 3.


7:07 PM-With the 99th overall pick in the draft, the Mets chose LHP Eric Niesen out of Wake Forest. He's 6' 185 lbs and a reliever on the Deamon Deacons club.

As with many young pitchers, he relies on his fastball as his key out pitch, and it is strong, reaching the mid-90s occasionally. Unfortunately, Niesen has marginal secondary pitches, which is unusual for a left-handed reliever. Without much improvement on his slider, it would be hard to see how Niesen could find his way into a major league bullpen, especially since he struggles too with his command.

He's not a sidearmer, though he does come from a 3/4 angle, which makes it slightly more difficult for lefty hitters but exposes him to righties. His ERA this season was 3.00, his record 6-5, and he held opponents to a solid .218 batting average. He struck out approximately one batter each inning, though he walked nearly one every two innings (38 BB in 83 innings of work).

I'm not sure I love this pick, though if the Jacket could teach him a better slider or a change, he could be a decent long reliever.

7:00 PM-With the 93rd overall pick, the Mets selected RHP Brant Rustich out of UCLA. Rustich is a 6'6" 225 lb. closer who has nasty stuff and control problems. Rustich's fastball is usually in the 93-95 MPH range, though he has been dogged by whispers that he isn't fully recovered from finger surgery last year.

He projects as a closer type in the big leagues, as his stuff is somewhat better than Kunz's if he can stay healthy. He is a redshirt junior, so he's older (22) than most in his draft class.

Perhaps the Mets would prefer that we ignore his statistics this year: opposing hitters batted .265 against him and his ERA was 6.67. He had six saves. He also had 11 wild pitches and 7 hit batters in only 29.2 innings, certainly indicative of the aforementioned control problems.

6:40 PM-The Mets, with the #77 overall pick, gained from the Cleveland Indians because Roberto Hernandez is so essential, selected RHP Scott Moviel out of St. Edward High School in California. Moviel is 6' 11", 245 pounds, so apparently the Mets are deciding to draft the tallest pitchers around.

He is certainly not the model of consistency, as is the usual with pitchers his size, and finding consistency in his windup and with his secondary pitches is going to be essential for him. Given that he has been described as a poor man's Andrew Brackman (Moviel too has a basketball background), it is rather funny that he signed to play at NC State next year if the Mets don't sign him.

His body is very projectable, and his fastball is likely to be his key pitch with the ability to throw mid-90s heat (it's consistently 88-92 now) a possibilty for him as he fills out. His curveball is not where it should be, and that is perhaps his greatest weakness.

Two of his older brothers are in professional ball: brother Greg is a lefty in the Mariners' system, and Paul Moviel is a righty in the Devil Rays organization. Both of the brothers are 6'6".


5:43 PM-With pick #47 overall, the Mets selected LHP Nathan Vineyard out of Woodland HS in Georgia. He's 6'2", 200 lbs, and is ranked as just below the first tier of prospects in a class heavy with high school lefties.

He was ranked as the 26th best prospect in high school midseason by Baseball America and boasts a nasty slider as his key pitch. His fastball is 88-91 MPH on most days, though scouts believe that he will add to his velocity and his command with more reliance on it and less on his slider. He probably projects best as a fourth or fifth starter if he reaches the big leagues.



5:36 PM-Courtesy of stinky old reliever Roberto Hernandez (who came to us last season along with Oliver Perez) and his signing with the Indians, the Mets have selected with pick #42 overall RHP Eddie Kunz out of Oregon State University. He is the closer for that team, and is a big kid at 6'5", 250 lbs.

He was ranked in the preseason as the top draft prospect from the Pac-10, and he projects well as a closer/setup man. His delivery is from a 3/4 angle, so he's going to fare much better against righties, but he's definitely well suited to the back of the bullpen. He's a sinker/slider pitcher who doesn't get a ton of strikeouts (37 in 44.1 innings this year).

He doesn't have a third pitch, though, so he might remind Mets fans of a certain incompetent reliever who takes up space on the mound and blows crucial games against the Phillies. I pray Kunz can get on a plane soon and take said reliever's place in the pen.

His stats on the year:
3-1, 3.05 ERA in 28 games (0 starts). Hitters batted .190 against him and he allowed 0 home runs.

4:47 PM-Picks of interest are taking place:

-With the pick that would have been the Mets', the Giants snagged Wendell Fairley, an elusive left-handed speed demon from high school in Mississippi. People consider him an incredible athlete, drawing comparisons to Carl Crawford, and a totally capable player in all facets of the game. ESPN's Keith Law, who had scouted Fairley, remarked that he was a "top ten/top 15" talent. However, the outfielder is not on the fast track to the big leagues, and it wouldn't surprise me if it took him five or six years to get regular playing time in the major leagues. On the bright side, the Mets don't really need any more toolsy outfielders.

-With the #30 pick, (after all this is supposed to be a Mets and Yankees blog) the Bronx Bombers selected RHP Andrew Brackman, who I mentioned earlier in this liveblog. He was a power forward on the NC State Basketball team, and therefore has huge size and huge upside: he's touched 99 and 100 MPH with his fastball. I mentioned him previously in conjunction with the Mets, and the concerns regarding him are his elbow and his secondary pitches. This is somewhat of a comparable selection to the Yankees selecting Joba Chamberlain last year, and I have a feeling that the Yankees might get him somewhat cheaply in these negotiations, despite Scott Boras' representation. I hate to say it, but nice pick by the crosstown rivals.

4:38 PM-The Tigers just pounced on Rick Porcello, rated by most as the second best pitcher in the draft after Price. It is nice to see that he didn't go to the Yankees, but the new draft rules allot far less time to sign players than previous rules did.

I wouldn't be surprised to see Porcello heading off to Junior College or independent league ball next year, but if the Tigers are prepared to pony up, they might have the best young pitching crop in the majors, such as Justin Verlander, Jeremy Bonderman, Andrew Miller, and Porcello among others.

So far, the most illustrious players are off the board, and what ensues now is a mixture of teams trying to pry high-ceiling high schoolers away from college or average-type collegiate players. One might wonder, though, what exactly the Mets are planning at this point. Will they abide by the Commish's suggestions for slot money, or will they be held under the sway of Scott Boras?

The San Francisco Giants are on the clock with Pick #29, which would have been the Mets' if not for signing the aged, decrepit Alou. Starting left fielder my rear end.

4:03 PM-Steve Phillips made a lovable jab at the incredibly competent Jeff Wilpon when Karl Ravech asked how many people were involved in a MLB draft in the war room:

"You got a whole slew of scouts in there: national crosscheckers, area scouts, regional crosscheckers, owners, owners' sons, you name it; they're in the draft room," said the stoogely ex-GM, his comment met with chuckles from Gammons and Ravech.

Let's look at this from a Napoleonic perspective: if you could exile one to Elba and one to St. Hélène, who would go where? I think Wilpon would go to Elba and Phillips to St. Hélène. If you aren't laughing right now, you probably never took an AP European History Course. What a shame.

I would also advise you to notice that the Boras-advised high school aces like Matt Harvey and Rick Porcello haven't been tapped as of yet. I wouldn't be surprised if one is a Yankee and one is a Red Sox at the end of the day, but if either one of those pitchers slips to the Mets, you've gotta believe the Mets will pounce.

3:24 PM-Keith Law is incredibly vexing... perhaps it's regrettable that I am just finding this out now.

The intriguing selections of late have been RHP Phillippe Aumont (From Quebec to the Mariners) and 1B Beau Mills (From Lewis & Clark State to the Indians). Mills is the son of the Red Sox's bench coach, which apparently allows one to play baseball better. The Mets' son of a big leaguer picks last year went in rather disappointing directions: as OF Jeremy Barfield was arrested for pushing his big league father, Jesse, (ironically) down the stairs, while C Stephen Puhl is MIA in the minors.

One can also look at a bizarre storyline: of the first twelve picks, two are from Vanderbilt (a university without an athletic department) and two are from Chatsworth High School in California. How strange.

3:00 PM-Perhaps the doldrums of this draft vaguely do resemble that of those of the NFL. Here are the first nine picks:

1. LHP David Price (Devil Rays)
2. SS Michael Moustakas (Royals)
3. 3B Josh Vitters (Cubs)
4. LHP Daniel Moskos (Pirates)
5. C Matt Wieters (Orioles)
6. LHP Ross Detwiler (Nationals)
7. 1B/LF Matt LaPorta (Brewers)
8. RHP Casey Weathers (Rockies)
9. RHP Jarrod Parker (Diamondbacks).

So far, there haven't been too many surprises. LaPorta was viewed as an odd selection for the Brewers, in part because of the inherent signability issues that accompany him, and because the Brewers already have a budding All-Star first baseman in Prince Fielder. Weathers and Moskos were both viewed as slight reaches, though as collegiate pitchers they tend to be on the safer side.

Be back to recap the rest of the first round.

2:01 PM-ESPN is incredibly courteous. They have lent unto us Karl Ravech and Peter Gammons for this fine draft extravaganza (on the Deuce), as well as emotional baseball video with sunrises and the like. Romanticism is the keystone of the draft, apparently.

It apears as though the most important draftees are here, which is great. So are old players, making the symbolic selections for their franchise. Unfortunately, someone made the mistake of letting Steve Phillips into the building, so we must suffer with him.

ESPN2 has the graphics like those from the NFL draft as well as many of their baseball writers on remote feeds. The best part: no John Kruk! Since the Mets don't select until midway through the sandwich round, I might just cover the coverage until then. Each team has five minutes to make selections in the first round, so be prepared for some pain.

I'll keep you posted.

12:56 PM- We're only about an hour away from the draft, and I wanted to unveil my prognostication. Vanderbilt LHP David Price is the consensus #1 pick, so there's no fun there, but I do have a guess of who the Mets will take at #42. I see Rudy Terrasas, who runs the draft for the Mets, selecting RHP Andrew Brackman out of NC State.

He's somewhat of an injury risk, as evidenced by his lackluster performance this year, described by some as dead arm. But he's got immense upside and incredible size (6-10) and he will likely slip to the late first round or sandwich picks, right where the Mets would be looking to make a splash.

If Brackman is not available, you could look for the Mets to go for a high school pitcher who dropped courtesy of signability issues, like Seton Hall Prep's RHP Rick Porcello, Fitch HS's (CT) Matt Harvey, or LHP Jack McGeary out of Roxbury Latin HS (MA).

During Minaya's tenure, the Mets have shown preference towards college pitchers, but with Mike Pelfrey (#9, 2005) and Phil Humber (#3, 2004), the team was picking incredibly early in the draft, and had more choices talentwise. With last year's selection of Kevin Mulvey, the Mets did take a pitcher with upside, as Mulvey is less of a sure thing than other college products due to his participation in a somewhat weak program at Villanova.

The Mets, as far as I can tell, will probably go opposite ways with the #42 and #47 picks, probably opting for pitching with both, but using one on a more established college pitcher and one on a high school pitcher with a good deal of upside. Due to the Mets' lack of splurging this offseason, it is probable that the club has some money to spend on their picks, especially after last year's fiasco with draft-and-follow Pedro Beato.

10:16 AM-Good morning all, and welcome to what will certainly be an epic occurrence here at Crosstown Rivals. I will be covering, on a pick-by-pick basis, the Mets' performance in the MLB Amateur Draft today.

The Mets shall have their first pick 42nd overall (courtesy of the Indians inking Roberto Hernandez, the key cog of last year's bullpen, obvs) and they will pick again at 47th (courtesy of Chad Bradford to the Orioles) and then an additional 2nd rounder for Hernandez and an additional third rounder for Bradford. They were stripped of their first-round pick because of the signing of Moises Alou.

Because they were the best regular-season team in the National League, the Mets rank 29th out of 30 in the draft order. Last year, the Mets didn't pick until 62nd overall. Last year, I recapped all of the 62nd overall selections and most every draft in MLB history.

Crosstown Rivals is sponsored by JustGreatTickets.com, your home for Chicago White Sox Tickets.

Cap Day: Drug-Addled Maturation in the Third Base Loge

Perhaps this entry should be accompanied with a disclaimer: this story is entirely true, and I am so intensely scarred by its content that I have no reason to exaggerate..

Shea Stadium, facing a rapidly approaching demise, contains many memories of Metropolitan triumph and futility over the years. Yet my most vivid and most acrid memories of Shea were formed this past weekend, at Saturday's Mets-Diamondbacks matinee, aptly named Cap Day.

I attended the game with my father, a self-described hipster, who has a passion for the Mets that is somewhat flickering: he considers himself a Yankee fan as well, ignoring my descriptions of the inherent treachery. As season-ticket holders, we had passes to the Diamond Club, though the world's slowest elevator failed to fit us in, to our chagrin, before ten minutes of waiting.

Fair enough. It's not as though anyone could have a problem waiting in line for overpriced grill room food or being surrounded by a select few who wished to consume shots of Cuervo prior to a 1 p.m. game.

We eventually made our way to our seats, though surprisingly our box was devoid of an usher to wipe our seats, something which was rather rare for us. A family of four who sat directly in front of us soon had their seats wiped. Discrimination, ah yes, the scourge of Shea.

Getting a glimpse of the usher, we noticed his somewhat weathered face. Maybe it was the Mets hat atop his head, but I noticed a resemblance to character actor John Capodice (right), who I remembered as the proprietor of the laundromat in the second season Seinfeld episode "The Revenge." There was a little Gregg Popovich in there too.

The usher is not to be ignored in this story: his, well, incompetence shall play a pivotal role in this fateful occurrence.

Midway through the second inning, what was apparently a group of eight ragamuffin twelve-year olds celebrating a birthday decides to pounce on the prime seating lower in the loge box. I don't much enjoy twelve-year old boys, as I have lived through that age, and perhaps I had improved my seating during that era.

I expressed to my father mock disgust, calling their conduct morally reprehensible. To be fair, the member of the group who I affectionately referred to as "the ringleader" hoisted both of his arms and beckoned the rest of the group to join him in this act of unprecedented indulgence.

"Look! Look at all of these seats," he cried, standing up. Using a mock deep voice, I screamed back at him. "Siddown," I said. He did, but this nightmare was to perpetuate itself throughout the afternoon. I debated whether or not to get the usher: I would have loved nothing more than to see that smug bastard and his cronies ejected from the unoccupied seats, but after surveying the surrounding selections, our geriatric usher appeared to have misplaced himself.

Feigning intense disgust, I decided to assuage my state with a pretzel and a chilled Diet Pepsi (sans bottlecap, to be sure) from the nearest concession stand. As per the corollary laid out by Metsblog, I noticed a somewhat upbeat cashier uniting people with their food and stripping them of their savings. That's great: this will take forever.

And it did; as I waited an entire inning in line. The worst part: an associate of the cashier, best described by my father as "one pill away from the nuthouse," attempted to convert me. To be sure, I had had experiences with Jehovah's Witnesses and ecoterrorists trolling my block in Connecticut looking for my faith or my cash, so I was not totally averse to such conduct in public.

This woman, however, propagated a strange religion.

"Become an electrical engineer," she said. "You should ask your teacher about electrical engineering, or mechanical engineering, or civil engineering."

I smiled, waiting for my Pepsi and pretzel, trying to ignore this outreach.

"Hey you," she said. "Go ask your teacher to take you to the Central Library and check out all of the books on engineering. You need to learn your math, too, study your numbers. And read your Bible, and you're set for life."

I wish I could have blamed it on the usher, but it might tie into a general dereliction of the Shea staff. This is not the first time I have been served by someone appearing to be loony, but this was the first time I had to experience exceptionally weak service AND an attempt to sway my career choice.

For the record, I have completed too much education in my life to become an electrical engineer, and in what was a bad omen, presumably, a bad power cord in my house delivered a whopping blow of electricity to my arm the night before the game. My arm was shaking for about five minutes. My lawsuit is still pending.

My father and I returned to our seats, after a little bit more time in the concourse, for he had forgotten his sunscreen and was intensely afraid of the skin cancer that we not-so-cleverly dubbed "hematoma." He's a doctor; he enjoys occasionally making medical malapropisms for my benefit.

The kids were still there. How lovely. When those annoying Shea photographers trying to swindle came around, all eight of them stood up, obscuring the view of everyone within the box. My dad muttered to the photographer if he would make them pose with their tickets, too, but the photographer seemed not to understand.

Since my father and I were sitting a seat apart in the box, the Mets fotog asked us when he came around if "either one of us" wanted a picture. I guess we looked like we were not together: this will perhaps be pivotal later in this story.

The Mets did manage to tack on three runs in the fourth inning, evoking a good deal of cheering from ourselves and others. After that fleeting jubilation, though, we did notice some increasingly conspicuous folks behind us, courtesy of several spilled beers and loud, boisterous cheering.

Mine and my father's aforementioned adolescent experience give us a minimal ability to discern the intoxicated from the crazies, and this pair was somewhat intermediate. They were too loud and too raucous to be merely drunk, but they appeared to be at least somewhat sane. Yet my perceptive father managed to notice that the group made excessively frequent bathroom breaks: could it be cocaine?

Cocaine use was our somewhat reasonable conclusion. You might appreciate that a pair of the alleged cokeheads were dancing in the aisle during Sweet Caroline, and one had her dress fall off. How charming... entrancing, in fact. This is another reason to ban that venerable Red Sox tradition from Shea, and it might also be added that I despise Neil Diamond. Where was the usher during this chaos? Hiding under the overhang, of course, nowhere to be found.

The promotion of Cap Day once again enters into the fray, in this part of the narrative, as my father and I combined amassed, as you might expect, a pair of hats. Yet my father, in an attempt to pay homage to Dontrelle Willis, only will wear this one Mets hat with an unbent brim tilted slightly to the side. So I had two hats.

A woman who wasn't with the cokeheads prior approaches the group, beer in hand, and mutters something indiscriminate, though I hear them mention "Wagner" in between loud whistling and cries of "SMITTY!" to honor the Mets rookie reliever on the hill. Wagner wasn't going to come into the game, as far as I could tell, and I was wearing my WAGNER 13 shirt and sitting right in front of the rowdy bunch. It might also be said that I was unsure if this crew had ever seen a Mets game before; they didn't seem to care much about the action on the field.

Were they talking about me?

I answered my own question when the beer-porting woman approached me. I don't usually have strangers come up to me at Mets games.

"I'll buy your hat from you," she said. I employed my technique of politely smiling and saying nothing. It almost sorta worked when I was with the crazy concession lady.

"I'll either pay you for it or you can [look at my female anatomy]." I crap you not. Perhaps this woman was unaware that I was with my father, although he might insist that his presence spurred the bizarre offer on. I looked toward him for advice, but he hadn't heard the flashing comment and urged me just to hand over the hat. I did, and the woman threw a dollar at me.

It could have ended there, but I seemed to forget that the inebriated often find friends among the anonymous. The loud, tattooed woman behind me asked me if I was satisfied with the transaction's outcome. I smiled, chuckled, and although I should have learned my lesson, I ignored her for the most part.

I heard her behind me. "She's a chicken[expletive]. She got the hat but she didn't show him her [anatomy]. Let's go over there." She soon called to me, "We'll get you at least a lapdance, Wagner!" I shook my head slightly, hoping to avert any sort of controversy and trying to remain as sensible as possible.

She and a crony went over to speak with the girl and her boyfriend, with all parties visibly agitated by eachothers' behavior. I couldn't discern exactly what was being said during the shouting match... after all, this is a baseball game, and no one can speak over the deafening PA... but I listened to the woman behind me after she returned, defeated.

Behind our seats, I vaguely heard some chattering.

"He told me I was crazy; I told him your girlfriend's a slut," mutterred the cokeheadess. "I told him that we'd see him outside."

For the first time in my life, I felt a bizarre emotion. That emotion was not at all sexual, not any sort of embarrassment, but rather that I wanted to leave a Mets game early. I had somehow become a lynchpin for conflict, despite not consuming a drop of alcohol or an ounce of blow.

The Mets dispatched the Diamondbacks rather quickly in the top of the ninth, and my father and I bolted Shea with speed rivaling Jose Reyes with brand-new hamstrings.

Such is life with elderly ushers, in the hot sun, on a day when Paul Lo Duca and Carlos Beltran are sitting. What a day. Cap Day.

---------------------

Tomorrow, I will be your host for the second annual Crosstown Rivals Draft Liveblog Extravaganza, covering the Mets' draft. Pore over, if you will, the coverage from yesteryear. Hope to see you there.

Crosstown Rivals is sponsored by JustGreatTickets.com, your home for Chicago White Sox Tickets.

Failure

I am writing to you, readers, or whatever is left of you, to discuss two failures: the Mets' failure to secure a win in the especially pivotal series over Atlanta and my own failure to update this blog within essentially the past three weeks.

First, let me address the Braves series. Oliver Perez cannot start every game against Atlanta. Perhaps we'd rather him on one day's rest than Glavine or Sosa, or whoever is to take the mound against our chief competition.

I must say that I have become increasingly disillusioned with Glavine's work, and Sosa was due for a regression. Maine dazzled in April, though his May has seen more disappointments than the Ron Paul campaign.

Glavine pitched well enough last night, though the Mets were simply unable to get to John Smoltz. It's not terribly difficult to be in that state: Smoltz has been exceedingly effective late into his career, and his 7-2 record and 2.58 ERA this season despite what appeared to be some sort of finger injury does not belie that.
What should scare all Mets fans is the sudden late-game quitter's tendency of this club, and its equally displeasing failure to drive in runners. Perhaps I appear hypocritical, after all, these observations can often be the result of poor perception.

Take a look at this, though: the Mets' .241 team batting average in the last week is the 23rd highest in baseball, hardly a stat befitting a first-place club. Their OPS is 27th in that span.

Where is the power? Aside from David Wright, the Mets' offense is conspicuously devoid of power. Jose Reyes hasn't hit a home run since April. Carlos Beltran has one extra base hit in his last ten games. Carlos Delgado hit one homer on May 9, one on May 11. That's it for this month; he only had one in April.

I'm not sure how this team is managing to fend for itself: Jorge Sosa and Jason Vargas are in the rotation, El Duque is slated to come back tonight (before his next invariable bout with osteoporosis) and replace Vargas, but top prospect Mike Pelfrey still hasn't been able to figure out big league hitters.

Moises Alou and Jose Valentin are MIA. Despite the success of replacements Endy Chavez and Damion Easley, it would be much nicer to relegate that pair to the bench.

Regarding that bench, might I add, is there anyone besides Carlos Gomez and Ramon Castro capable of getting on base? Julio Franco is awful, David Newhan is worse, and Ruben Gotay is hardly even on this team.

That being said, I'm not hopeless for this club. They're still in first place, and they did take two out of three from the Team Formerly Known As The Bronx Bombers.

Let's get the Fish this weekend...

-----------------

Regarding my failure to post, I might be inclined to explain that I have been incredibly busy this time of year. Sure, whatever, you might say that's my fault and screw me, etc., but I have hope that this will be a daily blog from June-September, and perhaps October, though I won't jinx it.

I do have plans ensuing for a relaunch... this site's name is no longer apt, obvs, and I have plans to make this officially into a site about the Mets, with the Rangers and Jets as secondary fodder.

I also plan to include other writers on the site, so if you might be interested, send me an email at zookman12@yahoo.com explaining what you think you could do to help with a relaunched site.

Trust me, it'll be fun.

Crosstown Rivals is sponsored by JustGreatTickets.com, your home for Chicago White Sox Tickets.