Get Your Thetans Tested At Citi Field

The thetans are important to judging one’s overall mental health.

At least that’s what I’ve heard.

Or is that Scientology? Was it L. Ron Hubbard who “discovered” this phenomenon or was it Amway? Am I  getting confused?

Considering the reaction to the Mets’ decision to go into a business partnership with Amway and allowing the company to place a storefront at Citi Field, you’d think they had entered into agreement with a cult to recruit weak-minded Mets fans (insert joke here) to leave the religion of their birth or choice and enter into the wondrous world that has engulfed the lives of so many of your favorite Hollywood stars like Tom Cruise, John Travolta and many others. Or, judging from the indignant eye-rolling, endless ridicule, public recriminations and accusations of more financial and ethical sleight of hand, you’d think the Mets had opened a combination sex shop/peep show/whorehouse/Euro-style hash bar in a New Amsterdam tradition of libertarian personal freedoms and challenges to the current conservative orthodoxy.

Just when the Amway aftershocks had subsided, up steps Howard Megdal—the self-styled “dogged” reporter of all supposed misdeeds of the Wilpon family—paying a visit to the Amway store located at Citi Field. The tour took on a strange note that made it feel as if it was a cult that was trying to recruit new members or, as other implications have suggested, a pyramid scheme trying to accrue more money from the bottom up by continually finding new people to take part in the “scam.”

As I said after the deal was announced and the public shaming of the Mets for entering into a bargain with such a “disreputable” company began in earnest, Amway is a reputable company that’s been in business a long time. They work with other sports teams such as the Detroit Red Wings in the NHL and have well-liked endorsers in former NFL star Kurt Warner among others.

None of that is relevant. The Mets and Amway came to an agreement to have a storefront at the park. It’s a “pilot” program. In other words, they put the storefront there to see how it works. Presumably, if it doesn’t work out well and they don’t expand their business or make money with the endeavor, they’ll shutter it and chalk it up to an idea that failed. If it works, this will continue in other venues. Does it suggest a malicious intent on the part of the Mets or Amway? Will there be a Jim Jones massacre amid the tailgaters at Citi Field over the summer? If you read the constant haranguing and triangulation of the Mets as constantly evil, then that’s the logical conclusion.

Reading Megdal’s piece in a singular fashion as something you found on the web or was linked and you happened to click onto it and you won’t see the transparency in his endless stream of attacks against the Mets’ ownership. But if you know the history and the long-term desire to take the franchise and portray it as the epitome of evil and/or ineptitude in all of sports and you see a trend that is clearly advancing his personal biases. I can tell you from experience that the gist of the article was already planned out before Megdal set foot in the Amway store. Every writer does their thing in a different manner (I jot stuff down on Post-It notes), but like Sun Tzu says, every battle is won or lost before it’s ever fought, the desired conclusions of a particular writer—portraying him or herself as an “investigator” or not—are known before the first word is written.

What Megdal writes about the debts ownership has accumulated; the payments upcoming; the reasons for the settlement from the Bernie Madoff case trustee Irving Picard all appear to be based in fact. I’m not questioning the facts. I’m questioning the agenda and the analysis.

How many times has Megdal shifted the goalposts to make himself be maybe, possibly, eventually “right” down the road? It’s a neverending wave of expectations, predictions, and movements to not be wrong. The problem with that type of predictive speculation is that while he may not technically be wrong, he’s not right either. Or should I say “Wright” because he was also wrong about David Wright and the third baseman’s prospects to stay with the club.

Repeatedly there were shadowy suggestions that the Mets wouldn’t have the means to keep their star third baseman in a similar “cut-their-losses because they can’t pay him in the future” manner as they did with Jose Reyes. When the Mets stepped up and paid Wright to keep him for the rest of his career, even that wasn’t good enough. Because the contract was backloaded and deferred, that morphed into a point of contention. So now, instead of “the Mets will trade Wright after putting together an offer designed to fail,” the construction of the contract is an issue. Not only do they have to sign their players, but they have to sign them to a contract structure that is Megdal-approved.

It’s not a matter of disagreeing with the methods in which the club does business, but in seeking out and finding any small thread of perceived wrongdoing to craft a new piece to savage the organization and make unfounded and new accusations whose veracity won’t be proven for years and leaves enough wiggleroom to “explain” with “explaining” being a more palatable word than backtracking or, even worse, admitting one is wrong.

The reality with Reyes is that if the Mets truly wanted him back, they’d have found a way to sign him. It was a baseball decision. While keeping Reyes at mid-summer of 2011 was obviously designed to sell a few extra tickets, is that so out of the ordinary with a sports franchise? Keeping a player to make some extra money? It may have been a mistake, but it’s not unusual.

The Mets signed Wright, but they traded their Cy Young Award winner R.A. Dickey, so it turned into a financial decision in spite of (as even Megdal admits) getting a substantial return of young players for a 38-year-old who just came off the year of his life and whose future as a knuckleballer isn’t as simple as Phil Niekro and Tim Wakefield comparisons because he throws the thing harder than they did. Mets GM Sandy Alderson makes a deal of an older player questionable to help the Mets when they’re ready to contend and who wanted a lot of money in a contract extension for a large package of high-end talent and the decision was based on cutting costs; Andrew Friedman does it with the Rays and gets Wil Myers and other prospects for James Shields and Wade Davis and he’s a “genius.”

Much like Maury Povich discovered a marketable niche in paternity tests, Megdal has the Madoff Ponzi scheme and the Wilpons. He is the father!!!

It was in 2008 that Madoff was arrested. We’re coming up on five years since it happened. Since then, the Wilpons’ finances have been expected to collapse with a liquidation and sell-off of everything including their beloved baseball franchise. And they’re still here. I’m not saying it’s good or bad, it just is. Fred Wilpon did not make the money he’s made in life and become the level of successful businessman by pure graft due to Madoff’s diabolical schemes. No one gets to that pinnacle without having a relationship with bankers and banks and the ability to manipulate their businesses, secure loans and keep things running in the bleakest of times. Doesn’t it behoove the bankers who would like to get a return on their investments to refinance these debts and help the debtor keep their businesses running? No one benefits from the Wilpon financial situation disintegrating, but that’s what’s expected if you continually read the doom and gloom of Megdal in E-book and web platform.

Digging through any and all sponsors and business partners of a sports franchise and the questionable tactics and profiteering are self-evident. Do you think the beer companies are truly concerned about fans leaving a ballpark and driving home after six overpriced cups of beer? In a legal and human sense, perhaps; in a business sense, no, and no amount of signs that say, “Enjoy responsibly” are going to change that.

You don’t want to know how sausages are made; you don’t want to think about the slave labor in Indonesia that’s sewing MLB licensed clothes and memorabilia; and you don’t want to scrutinize the people who are bringing money into the clubs. These morally despicable tactics have assisted MLB as a whole and helped to make the game of baseball into the cash cow that it is.

Seeking out the negative finds the negative. Formulating scenarios based on the worst possible outcome yields the worst possible outcome. If that’s what someone wants to look for, that’s what they’ll find. But maybe that’s the point.

Join Amway!! Or Scientology!! Or become a Mets fan!! Of course they’re different entities with zero connection to one another unless you’re reading the litany of columns like a wrestling main event, Megdal vs. the Mets. Then, like professional wrestling, the denouement is known before the fact and we as viewers, suspend disbelief and watch, putting our mind at rest because it’s an unnecessary inconvenience to the crafted and inevitable end.

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The Wilpons Are Going Nowhere, Part II—Evil Fred

It’s time to stop with the “yeah buts” and come to the realization that the Wilpons are more resourceful than they’ve been given credit for. Fred Wilpon didn’t get rich by being stupid and the money they’re borrowing, while viewed as a desperate lifeline with the opportunity to pay down a debt that’s set to rise exponentially in 2014, is a daily business endeavor for people who have the money to purchase a sports franchise in the first place. If a person owes the banks hundreds of millions of dollars, it benefits neither the banks nor the borrower if there’s a default. In fact, it’s a disaster. Therefore it behooves the Wilpon creditors to help them, and if that means providing a loan at favorable terms and the Wilpons borrowing against SNY, then that’s what they’re going to do. It’s easier to assist the current owner than it would be to stage a liquidation or for MLB to force them to sell the Mets.

Since the Bernie Madoff swindle was exposed, there’s been an overt attempt to display the Wilpons in an unfavorable light by tossing everything that’s happened to them personally and with their ballclub into one giant Dutch oven and somehow concoct a palatable meal with ingredients that don’t mesh.

When they backed out of the agreed upon deal with David Einhorn they were “being the Wilpons.” Actually, the deal was unfavorable to them as Einhorn wanted significant say-so in the operations of the club and preapproval as majority owner. With Einhorn being so aggressive, the relationship was doomed to end with a power struggle for control of the club and it was a battle that the Wilpons, still trying to find their financial equilibrium, would probably not be in shape to win. They were wise to pull out from it when they had the opportunity to do so.

Steve Cohen and Jim McCann were buying their way in? Both have questionable histories in their business lives with Cohen employees investigated and arrested for insider trading and McCann’s 1-800-Flowers operation accused of overcharging customers.

Is it the people or is it the businesses they’re involved in that leaves them ripe for financial mistakes that, to the layman, would view as “illegal” or “wrong”? I have no idea what Cohen and McCann were up to. Perhaps they knew what was happening with their companies and perhaps they didn’t. Either way, it’s ridiculous to link that with Wilpon involvement. Because these people were investing in the Mets, it was equated into the Wilpons being at fault as if they’re supposed to comb over every little instance in a friend/potential business partner’s past before accepting his or her money to be a partial owner of the club.

Bill Maher bought his way in as well and he’s a controversial, potty-mouthed, unabashedly left wing political commentator and comedian who likes to smoke pot. Does that mean that Fred Wilpon is sitting in Maher’s Jacuzzi with a group of strippers and getting high? Given the nature of the attacks against the Mets owners, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the implication.

All that’s missing is the ominous music in the background, Fred and Jeff Wilpon walking in slow motion, and a ludicrous connection from so far in outer space that people believe it because it’s so asinine.

Every huge business with tentacles flowing all over and poking multiple pies on numerous platforms will have circumstances that don’t look quite right. Sometimes that’s intentional and sometimes it’s not.

In opposition to the obvious accusations of graft that accompanied Frank McCourt’s tenure as Dodgers owner in which MLB essentially shoved him out the door as bankruptcy filings indicated that he was possibly taking money from the club to maintain a lavish lifestyle like some sort of Beverly Hillbilly, the Wilpons are well-liked by the other owners in baseball and Fred Wilpon is close with Commissioner Bud Selig. Selig, if he could help it, wasn’t going to take steps to force the Wilpons out. Perhaps it was friendship or perhaps it was that Selig and his inner circle people examined the Wilpons’ plans and understood that if they settled the Madoff lawsuit with trustee Irving Picard, regained some of the money they lost, and got their array of businesses back on solid financial footing, then they could do as they just did and secure a loan to have more cash available to spend on the team.

While the easy decision is to take that money and purchase cosmetic upgrades, given the manner in which GM Sandy Alderson and his staff have gone about rebuilding the farm system and swiped top prospects from the Giants (Zack Wheeler) for the soon-to-be-free agent Carlos Beltran in the summer of 2011 and Blue Jays (Travis d’Arnaud and Noah Syndergaard) for R.A. Dickey, it would make little sense to spend for the sake of it. There are players out on the market that can help the Mets, but the strength of the NL East and their own weaknesses makes it risky to even part with a second round draft pick as compensation plus pay the amount of long term dollars it will to get a Michael Bourn. The Mets could use Bourn, but is it worth it at his agent Scott Boras’s current requests? No.

The important fact is, though, that they can do something significant with the money available. This team isn’t far away from contention. With the young pitching they’ve accumulated; their new young catcher with All-Star potential d’Arnaud; David Wright having re-upped to stay long-term; the pitching and Ike Davis, they’re on the verge of taking the next step.

It has to be remembered that the Madoff nightmare began in December of 2008 when the contending Mets from 2006-2008 were on the downside of that cycle. It took another two years for the entire apparatus to come down completely with Omar Minaya fired and a new regime—with the aforementioned limited funds and mandate to rebuild the farm system—in place with Alderson.

Five year plans are five year plans for a reason. It takes at least three to get rid of the dead weight (Jason Bay); change the template of how they find players; draft well and let the young players develop; and to alter the perception of the team as a dead-end, transforming it into a destination that players will welcome rather than use because they were traded there or have no other choice.

It’s hard to remember, but there was a time that no one wanted to go to the Phillies, the Dodgers, the Yankees, the Red Sox. Things change.

No matter when the club finally turns the corner, the Wilpons will be the owners of the team. They’re going nowhere. By the time 2014 rolls around (or even 2013 if the young pitching comes along faster than expected), no one’s going to say a word about the ownership since the on-field product will make the Mets fans and fans in general forget that Bernie Madoff even existed and the media members whose agendas are all-too-clear will run out of places to put the goalposts to salvage their predictions—few of which have come to pass.

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The Media Vultures Circle The Mets Again

Since the Mets have come apart after a surprising first half of the season when it was being speculated as to whether or not they’d be heavy buyers at the trading deadline, the same reporters who were so sure that the Wilpons days as owners were numbers just a few short months ago and wrote relentless pieces about the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme and its damage to the franchise have popped up again.

They were silent for a period of time, trying to maintain an aura of credibility that only exists because they’re in the media, as if that matters. Being paid by the New York Post, Newsday, ESPN or whatever other entity you can name doesn’t automatically imply knowing what they’re talking about. No one—no…one—I read speculated on the possibility of a Madoff settlement to save the Wilpons. In fact, the Wilpons might even wind up getting money back after all is said and done. They didn’t get rich being stupid and to suggest that they’re broke and the team is still in danger of being lost to the family is based on the same shoddy speculation that was indulged in months ago and turned out to be wrong.

It’s similar to the same so-called experts who felt that the Mets’ farm system was destitute of prospects. As it turns out, Omar Minaya’s scouting/drafting operation was far better than anyone thought.

Now, as the team has stumbled from their unexpected heights of contention at the All-Star break, the doom and gloom has returned. I’m not talking about from the fans—that’s expected; I’m talking about from the supposedly credible “insiders” in the media. Just the other day it started again about the possibility of David Wright leaving the club after next season. Compared with the Jose Reyes situation, will the Mets let Wright leave as they did Reyes? Are they going to be a stripped down version of other teams that haven’t spent one penny more than the bare minimum? Of course not. Wright’s going nowhere. The two situations were totally different on and off the field.

The Mets front office baseball people didn’t want to spend the necessary money to keep Reyes and wouldn’t have done so even if they had the money to spend and were allowed to run the team as they wanted. Last winter the Madoff trial was hanging over the oraganization’s collective heads like a guillotine. But money or not, GM Sandy Alderson would not want to allocate $100+ million to a speed player approaching 30 who’s had multiple injury problems; and if you look at Reyes in 2012 with the Marlins, it’s trendy to point to his recent hitting streak and solid play after a slow start, but the Marlins exponentially more dysfunctional than the Mets, are terrible and in the midst of a housecleaning that’s put them in a worse position than the Mets. Don’t bet on Reyes being with the Marlins past next season.

Wright’s different. A power bat that walks, is the de facto captain of the team (the Mets should make it official already), and who plays a difficult to fill position is not getting traded, nor is he going to be allowed to leave as a free agent. It’s true that the Mets have a large financial commitment to Jason Bay and Johan Santana next season ($50 million with their contracts and buyouts), but that will free a large amount of money to re-sign Wright and import players for 2013 with either backloaded free agent contracts or via trade. This idea that simply spending money would’ve made a significant difference in 2013 is ignoring that the teams that have spent tons of money on players in recent years haven’t succeeded. The Red Sox were supposed to “challenge the 1927 Yankees” as the best team in history in 2011, but collapsed in September and that collapse revealed disciplinary and personal fissures that resulted in the departure of manager Terry Francona, the hiring of Bobby Valentine and desperation maneuvers to patch over their holes and hope that they’d revert to performances and team-oriented behaviors of the past. Needless to say, it hasn’t worked and the Red Sox are in deep trouble moving forward as long as there are factional disputes and power grabs in the front office and the insistence that they don’t need to substantially alter the personnel.

The Phillies? They had an all-world starting rotation, signed a top-notch closer and had an offense that should’ve scored enough to support that rotation. But they’re old and injuries removed significant names from their everyday lineup and rotation. They’re not getting any younger and have contract commitments that made it necessary to trade Hunter Pence and consider again trading Cliff Lee to re-sign Cole Hamels and hope to have the health and performance they’ve lacked in 2012.

The Angels? Jered Weaver is 15-1; Mike Trout is on his way to winning the Rookie of the Year and the American League MVP; they traded for Zack Greinke; stole Ernesto Frieri from the Padres; Mark Trumbo is having an MVP-caliber season of his own and will eventually hit a ball that will never land; and signed Albert Pujols (this generation’s Joe DiMaggio) last winter, are still hovering around mediocrity and are in serious danger of missing the playoffs. Could the fact that they had too many players for too few positions and a manager, Mike Scioscia, who was used to being totally in charge and found his power usurped with a roster that doesn’t fit his style have something to do with their lack of cohesion and simply looking off?

Importing stars and spending money is not necessarily the answer and with the Mets, who were they supposed to get last winter? Would they be any better now if they’d signed Jonathan Papelbon? First, Papelbon wasn’t signing with the Mets; second, they didn’t have the money. Who else was other there that would fill a hole the Mets had? C.J. Wilson? He wasn’t coming to the Mets. Prince Fielder? Would he take an IOU?

The 1998 Mariners had Alex Rodriguez, Ken Griffey Jr., and Edgar Martinez in their lineup and went 76-85. In 1999, they went 79-83. They traded Griffey for nothing after 1999 and lost in the ALCS in 2000. After that season, they lost A-Rod…and won 116 games in 2001. If you said in 1999 that the team would lose those two stars and win 116 games two years later, people would think you insane.

We don’t know what’s going to happen with prospects; how much luck will be involved; what the future holds. But the Mets have enough young players—especially young pitching—for a bright future.

Madoff was a PR disaster and financial nightmare for the Mets, but what it did was free the organization to let them rebuild correctly. As much as Minaya is savaged for spending money and for the contracts he gave to Oliver Perez, and the soon-to-mature big money deals he gave to Bay and Santana, no one could’ve expected the Wilpon financial empire to come undone. Whether they suspected that Madoff was a fraud or not, did anyone think it would come crashing as it did? Even with the Bay/Santana contracts, they should very well have had some money to spend if things had gone on as they were.

In retrospect, it’s going to be viewed as a good thing that the Mets had to trade Carlos Beltran and got Zack Wheeler; that they couldn’t toss more money at the wall and hope that stacks of cash would fill holes in a foundation that needed what’s being done now: a true rebuild.

If you think that a Mets’ starting rotation in 2013 of R.A. Dickey, Santana, Jonathon Niese, Matt Harvey and Wheeler won’t be able to make a run at a playoff spot if there’s a halfway decent bullpen and a couple of more offensive weapons, then you’re not accepting facts. As for the financial holes, no one knows how much money the Mets have to spend or not. They settled the Madoff case and, much to the poorly concealed disappointment of Howard Megdal, Bob Klapisch, John Harper and Joel Sherman, paid off several of the loans they’d taken out to continue to do business.

And they still own the team.

With the Bay/Santana money coming off the books after next season, Wright will be re-signed. A realistic idea to improve the offense and make Wright more willing to stay and not hold the organization hostage would be to make a serious play for Justin Upton to play right field (signed through 2015 with $38.5 million coming to him from 2013 onward); and pursue his brother B.J. Upton to play center field. B.J.’s not getting the $100 million he’s probably going to want, but would $70 million over 5 years get it done? To play with his brother and Wright, their childhood friend from Virginia? Maybe. And a lineup of Ike Davis, Daniel Murphy, Ruben Tejada, Wright, the Uptons, Jordany Valdespin or Kirk Nieuwenhuis, and a better hitting catcher would score enough runs to support that starting rotation.

It’s doable.

Ignore the media as they’re seeking ways to make up for their inability to write epitaphs for the Mets by writing them pre-death; also tune out the fans who are throwing tantrums as the team spirals. They weren’t expected to be any better than this. The young players are showing promise and things are far more positive than anticipated from December to April. Realistically that’s all the Mets and any organization can ask for when they’re rebuilding from the ground up amid financial catastrophe, declining attendance, media hit squads and palpable fan anger.

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Medicating Mets’ Fans

There’s no shame in asking for help. Nor is there anything wrong with corrective medication as long as it’s dispensed and used within the prescribed dosage.

Mets’ fans need that help.

Now the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme trial that could have forced the Wilpons to sell the team is apparently behind them and the relentless bashers of the organization have shifted their attention elsewhere and are seeking, digging, hoping, searching, conjuring and speculating, Jeff at Red State Blue State sent me a possible solution to that which ails each and every one of us Mets’ fans at one time or another.

See below. Use in moderation.

With David Wright under ridiculous attack from fans for “choosing” not to play with a broken pinky, this type of therapy/chemistry is needed now more than ever in part in keeping certain segments of the fan base quiet to prevent embarrassing the rest of us.

The side effects are negligible and probably no worse than not taking anything at all to dull the agony.

Science is constantly working to find new ways to numb the pain of life.

And the Mets.

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2012 National League East Predicted Standings

	Wins	Losses	GB
1. Atlanta Braves	93	69	—
2. Philadelphia Phillies*	89	73	4
3. Washington Nationals*	88	74	5
4. Miami Marlins	83	79	10
5. New York Mets	69	93	24

*Denotes predicted Wild Card winner.

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Atlanta Braves

There’s a misplaced belief that the team that made the most drastic and biggest moves in the off-season is automatically the “best” team.

Because the Braves did nothing to add to the roster that collapsed out of a playoff spot, they’re virtually ignored as a legit contender.

There was addition by subtraction by getting rid of Derek Lowe; they made significant improvements in-season by acquiring Michael Bourn. They’re going to be helped by the gained experience of young players Freddie Freeman, Jonny Venters, Craig Kimbrel and Mike Minor; the return to form from Martin Prado; a healthy “I wanna get paid” year from Brian McCann; a better start and more consistency from Dan Uggla; and, most importantly, a healthy and “he has to be better because he can’t be worse” year from Jason Heyward.

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Philadelphia Phillies

Chase Utley is hoping to play in spring training games within this week. Obviously his knee tendinitis will forever be an issue, but a great player like Utley doesn’t need the 6 weeks of spring training to be ready. Inside baseball people would never admit this for financial reasons, but spring training is far too long as it is. Pitchers need maybe 3 ½ weeks to be ready to start the season; hitters far less.

The Phillies are old; there are injury questions hovering around Roy Halladay (as much as people think he’s a machine, he’s not a machine.); their lineup is pockmarked and questionable; but with their starting rotation and bullpen addition of Jonathan Papelbon, they’ve got enough left for at least one more run.

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Washington Nationals

They’re the next hot thing for many reasons.

They have a load of top-tier draft picks ready to make the move into big league notoriety; they’ve accumulated starting pitching; they have a devastating back-end of the bullpen; a lineup that can mash; and a veteran manager who has a history of winning.

They’re going to look back on Chien-Ming Wang’s injury and that they couldn’t follow through on a rumored trade of the severely underrated John Lannan and breathe a sigh of relief; the concept of bringing Bryce Harper to the big leagues at 19 needs to be considered carefully and he should not play center field; Gio Gonzalez is not the guarantee the bounty of prospects and expensive, unnecessary contract he received would indicate; and Stephen Strasburg can’t be considered an “ace” as long as he’s on a pitch/innings limit that Davey Johnson would undoubtedly love to toss into a nearby garbage can.

But they’re very talented and a viable contender.

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Miami Marlins

Never mind the ownership, the new ballpark and the investigations swirling around the way said ballpark was approved and paid for. Forget about the monstrosity that will be on display whenever a Marlins’ player hits a home run and is sure to cause seizures among a large segment of unsuspecting fans. (See below.)

Cold, clinical analysis will tell you that this team is either going to be a major success or a testament to rubbernecking to see how quickly the clubhouse, manager’s office and front office degenerates into organizational cannibalism, whisper campaigns and a media feeding frenzy.

This is a powder keg. I don’t like powder kegs.

Ozzie Guillen’s teams with the White Sox consistently underachieved; Jose Reyes’s health is a question; Hanley Ramirez did not want to move to third base and is going to eventually pout about his contract; their defense is awful.

With a good pitching staff and all these questions, they could be good. With all the other issues, they could explode. Fast.

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New York Mets

Yes. I’m a Mets fan.

Question my analysis, but don’t question my integrity.

Here are the facts: they’re in an impossible division; they’re short on starting pitching; they didn’t improve the club in the winter; the franchise is engulfed by the lawsuit against the Wilpons stemming from the Bernie Madoff mess; and they’re rebuilding.

They’re not good and they’re starting over with young players.

We won’t know much about the future of the Sandy Alderson-led baseball operations or what they’re going to do with players like David Wright until the trial is completed. They might be sold; the Wilpons might maintain ownership; the team might be slightly better than most projections depending on multiple factors.

It is what it is.

Accept it.

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Click here for a full sample of Paul Lebowitz’s 2012 Baseball Guide (this link is of the Blue Jays) of team predictions/projections. My book can be purchased on Kindle, Smashwords, BN and Lulu with other outlets on the way.

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Joke Or Not, If Alderson’s Unhappy, He Should Leave

To the best of my knowledge the Mets aren’t paying Sandy Alderson with IOUs from one ply peeled from two-ply pieces of toilet paper.

Nor are the checks written in the penmanship of someone right-handed trying to write left-handed and signed, “Jeff’s Dad” as if Jeff Wilpon were trying to pay Alderson with whatever’s left of his dad’s teetering financial empire.

Alderson’s being paid in real money and he’s being paid a lot of it.

Alderson has decided, as he’s making his way to spring training, to start a Twitter account. The first tweet was either a badly worded or misunderstood joke or a shot at the Mets’ paucity of funds.

Under the handle MetsGM, Alderson said:

Getting ready for Spring Training-Driving to FL but haven’t left yet. Big fundraiser tonight for gas money. Also exploring PAC contribution.

Whether it was an attempt at comedy or a legitimate kick at the fact that he doesn’t have any money to spend, he’s oblivious if he didn’t realize that saying that would be construed as a negative toward his employer.

Can you imagine one of George Steinbrenner’s GMs saying something like this and still being the GM the following day?

Or Vince Lombardi so openly disparaging a team that he tried to craft into the epitome of professionalism and year-round proper representation of the Green Bay Packers?

It wouldn’t happen because there was a baseline, known code of conduct of what would and wouldn’t be acceptable from any and all employees of their teams.

Alderson was a Marine and should understand that even if the Secretary of the Navy is from a different party as the President or disagrees with policy, he’s not going to publicly say something so negative—even in a joking context—about his bosses or his branch.

Alderson was a lawyer and a respected GM for the first decade of his career with the Athletics. Then, when he moved to the forefront, his own personality came to light.

Along with the resume of being Vietnam veteran and well-spoken military man and adaptive, intuitive corporate lawyer, there’s another side to Alderson—a snarky, credit-seeking and obnoxious side that has reared its head repeatedly.

As GM of the Athletics, Alderson’s success was tied to two things: money and Tony LaRussa. When the A’s spent money under Alderson and were managed by the Hall of Famer LaRussa, they won. When the money dried up, they slowly declined; then LaRussa left and the team came apart.

Alderson went to the Padres, behaved like a capricious tyrant and created factions that were beholden to him to craft an aura of dysfunction where everyone was looking over their shoulders for someone holding a knife.

It’s been this way in every job he’s undertaken since and is now happening again with the Mets.

Whether he wanted the Mets job (and it certainly appeared he did when he was interviewing for it) or took it as a favor to Bud Selig is irrelevant. He took the job and is being compensated heavily for it. He’s gotten everything he wanted including the high-priced hirings of his lieutenants Paul DePodesta and J.P. Ricciardi. He hired the manager he wanted in Terry Collins. If he had a load of money at his disposal, there’s no guarantee he would’ve wanted to spend it on Jose Reyes because it’s never been his modus operandi to invest so much money in a player who relies on speed and doesn’t get on base.

But that’s neither here nor there.

The circumstances with the team are what they are, financially and practically.

Financially, ownership is under siege from a lawsuit that they claim is doling out blame and holding them accountable for transgressions that they are not guilty of committing.

That will be settled in time and the Wilpons will either find a way to maintain control of the team or sell it.

Alderson may or may not be the GM of the new owner; he may or may not remain as the GM if the Wilpons retain control.

Practically, even if there was a ton of money available, the free agent market was such that the Mets were unlikely to dive deeply into it to bring in enough talent to compete in a loaded division. The farm system needed to be rebuilt and the big league club overhauled. In actuality, the Madoff trial is giving them the built-in excuse to refurbish the club correctly—something I would think Alderson would embrace to put a club together devoid of the $200 million superstar since those contracts almost inevitably become onerous by year four or five.

That too is secondary to the perception of the team.

On the one hand, okay, it’s a joke; on the other, he’s the GM and shouldn’t be openly attacking his club even in jest. If you’re the GM of the team and there’s even a split-second hesitation as to how a joke is going to be interpreted, then it shouldn’t be said. Once it has to be explained, it was a bad joke.

If it was a subtle attempt to say publicly what he says in starker terms privately; if Alderson is unhappy with the money at his disposal; if he doesn’t like working for the Wilpons; if he took the Mets job only as a favor to Selig; if he wants out and is being passive aggressive to get that information into the public sphere, then he should resign and stop taking the Wilpons’ money to be the GM of the club.

This type of stuff is why they’re the “Mets”. I don’t mean the Mets organization. I mean an adjective for a punchline of whatever can go wrong, will go wrong and that the employees—even in the upper reaches of the hierarchy—are willing to make negative and embarrassing comments to highlight that fact.

Done with appropriately hideous timing befitting the “Mets”, while the team across town is enduring their own humiliating scandals involving their GM Brian Cashman and his bevy of girlfriends and divorce, one of whom was apparently stalking him, Alderson decided—as seems to be the Mets wont—to make the Mets the butt of evening gossip and laughter. For the titular head of the baseball operations, someone whose conduct and skills in dealing with the media and manipulating the language to prevent such a thing from happening, it was a stupid and inappropriate comment to make. Former GM Omar Minaya’s biggest fault was crisis control and a lack of skill with the language, but I have no recollection of him saying something like this about his employers.

The Mets are not going to stop being a joke until they cease treating themselves as a joke. It comes from a clear set of rules that are adhered to from the simplicity of wearing a coat and tie when traveling on the road to not criticizing the organization.

From the time of Alderson’s hiring, I said that the Mets have to cease the practice of acting as if any star player who joins the organization is doing them a favor; that any and every player they currently have is here out of desperate necessity rather than out of a business agreement between parties. Until the Mets make the conscious decision to stop laughing at themselves, why should anyone else hesitate to laugh at them?

If there are people within the current organizational structure who don’t want to be part of the Mets, then they should leave. When I said it 15 months ago, I was referring to the players. But it also applies to the GM.

If Sandy Alderson doesn’t want to be part of the Mets, then he should go. They’ll get someone else.

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The Anonymous Met and the Fallen Prospect

An “anonymous Mets player” published this piece in New York Magazine that slams the franchise for pretty much everything. From being willingly oblivious to the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme to the firing of Mookie Wilson, there’s a “woe is me” retaliatory tone sprinkled in with the righteous indignation that tells me it’s probably not a current player who said these things. You can speculate on your own and leave your suspicions as to who it is in the comments section.

I don’t see what firing Mookie has to do with anything. Everyone likes Mookie, but one of the things that has consistently gotten the Mets into trouble has been being too nice and doling out severance jobs and contracts to people who might not deserve them. Perhaps Terry Collins and the front office wants a better first base/baserunning coach than Mookie. They don’t have to give a reason when they fire someone and a player from the 1980s shouldn’t have a job just because he’s a player from the 1980s.

It’s a combination of maudlin reminiscing for years gone by with pleas of loyalty and comparisons to the positive aspects of the Yankees without the negatives.

What’s most galling isn’t what’s said—he’s entitled to his opinion—but that it’s hidden behind the veil of anonymity and not, I suspect, because it’s a current Mets player or employee, but because the person wants to maintain the possibility of having a job with the organization in the future.

And that’s weak.

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On another note, the Mets waived former top outfield prospect Fernando Martinez to make room on the 40-man roster. Because Martinez is only 23 and has a minor league option remaining, someone will claim him.

Given the Mets current circumstances in being unlikely contenders and that they’re looking for cheap talent, they wouldn’t have dumped F-Mart if they expected anything out of him.

This isn’t an indictment of the Mets insomuch as it’s indicative of the fleeting nature of “top” prospects. Some make it, some don’t and every team has situations like this where a youngster is overhyped and falters.

Looking at F-Mart’s minor league numbers, injuries and Angel Pagan-style displays of rockheadedness, the performance and substance weren’t there to warrant taking up a roster spot; those who are criticizing this move as a Mets-style bit of short-sightedness are basing that on nothing. Common sense says the Mets tried to trade him before waiving him and if no other team wanted him, it’s more telling on the player than anything the Mets have done. This front office watched him and determined that he was no longer worth it; that they wouldn’t be able to pump his value to get something for him, so they cut the ties.

If he somehow gets through waivers unclaimed, he’ll go back to the minors and keep trying. Just don’t expect him to suddenly stay healthy and fulfill that potential that may have been limited in the first place.

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Mets Sign Ronny Cedeno and the Michael Kay Scale of Idiocy Shatters

How many teams have a backup infielder that could be considered “good”?

I’m not talking about a super-utility type who plays semi-regularly and could play every day in one particular spot if needed.

Mark DeRosa of a few years ago fits into that category; Tony Phillips of years ago (under Sandy Alderson with the Athletics) was one; Mike Aviles of the Red Sox qualifies now.

But the Mets sign Ronny Cedeno as a backup middle infielder and the universe is being sucked into a black hole of Madoff-like proportions.

This Mets bashing is self-indulgent, random and is mistakenly equating the financial issues to player moves. They’re separate entities.

Is Cedeno a “good” player?

No.

He’s a backup middle-infielder and defensive replacement for Daniel Murphy at second base.

The Yankees and their fans are openly pining for the return of Eric Chavez to be the backup third baseman, yet Chavez wasn’t much more productive at the plate than Cedeno was in 2011.

Is it because one is a former All Star and recognizable name? Is it because he’s considered handsome?

Chavez played in 58 games; he batted .263 with a .320 on base percentage and .363 slugging percentage. In 175 plate appearances, he had 10 extra base hits and 2 homers. The Yankees paid $1.5 million for that and his scheduled trip to the disabled list.

The fans want him back.

Why?

He did nothing for them in 2011. Nothing.

Teams that are considered “powerhouses” for 2012 have the following backup middle infielders:

Phillies: Wilson Valdez

Yankees: Eduardo Nunez

Red Sox: Aviles

Rangers: Michael Young

Angels: Maicer Izturis

Brewers: Cesar Izturis

Young is DHing and playing some first base and is an All Star caliber player. Maicer Izturis can play every day if necessary as well. The others are players you can find cheaply and on someone’s Triple A roster; or in Mexico; or the Independent Leagues.

The Braves don’t even know who their starting shortstop is and have done absolutely nothing this winter. (Nor have the Yankees, come to think of it.)

But is the Mets decision to sign Cedeno worthy of the laughter and linking to finances as if they’re scanning the crowds for someone who’ll look good in a uniform and can stand at shortstop so they’re not fielding eight players?

Of course the financial woes are contributing to the lack of spending, but to say that because the team is in financial disarray that it’s going to extend to the field with the players they already have is an attempt to find reasons to castigate the franchise. Because the signing of Cedeno and the decision to hire a perceived “bankruptcy specialist” CRG Partners were so closely aligned in time, there’s an “obvious” connection between the two.

Except it’s only obvious if it’s made obvious.

It’s a logical fallacy.

Does Michael Kay really believe that the Mets are going to lose 110 games?

Even on the Michael Kay Scale of Idiocy, it’s stretching it. But not far enough to say it’s impossible that he does believe it.

Statistically and practically, it’s almost impossible for a team to lose that many games no matter which players they’re putting on the field; and with the Mets, they have talent on the roster. If they were in the Central Divisions of both the American and National Leagues, they could hang around contention.

They’re not.

They’re in the National League East.

But 110 losses? The Astros of 2011 were one of the worst teams I’ve ever seen and they won 56 games. The 2012 Mets are worse than the 2011 Astros?

If the Mets have a terrible year or a better-than-expected year, it won’t have anything to do with Ronny Cedeno; his signing has nothing to do with finances either. So why, other than an agenda, is it being treated as such?

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I’m going to be adding a Fantasy Baseball page this season. If you can write and know Fantasy, contact me at the top of the page. I’m still looking to accumulate candidates. It’s unpaid, but people will read your stuff.

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Of Course Bankruptcy is on the Table for the Mets

The Mets have hired CRG Partners, a consulting firm that assisted the Texas Rangers in their bankruptcy and sale. Naturally, it’s being assumed that this is in preparation for an eventual bankruptcy and sale of the financially hemorrhaging Mets.

So what would happen if the Mets’ situation reached avalanche proportions so they had to start selling the light fixtures and they were entirely unprepared for the legal and practical ramifications for such a move?

What would be said then?

It’s at the point where everything the Mets organization does or doesn’t do is dissected to find some underlying “truth” that they’re not disclosing.

But what if what they’re saying is the truth? What if the apparent spin doctoring to keep the wolves at bay is what’s really going on?

Are the Mets preparing for a bankruptcy or did they hire CRG to, as the club statement says, “provide services in connection with financial reporting and budgeting processes”?

Does it really matter?

If the Mets hired a “turnaround specialist” to help with their morass of debt and legal entanglements, isn’t that the wise thing to do? Aren’t they performing their due diligence based on current circumstances?

This story doesn’t automatically imply a bankruptcy filing is on the horizon; obviously that’s on the table, but regardless of public perception and until the Madoff trial begins, the Wilpons are within their rights to do everything they can to keep the team.

As absurd as it sounds, has anyone ever truly considered the possibility that they were victimized by Madoff as so many others were? There’s a presumption of guilt surrounding the Wilpons, in part, because the club has been run so haphazardly on the field and the front office has been adept at telling half-truths and misleading the media and public with semantics. Because of that, they don’t deserve the benefit of the doubt for anything they say, but logically what they’ve done is what they should do to prepare for every eventuality.

The entire episode has turned into a spitting contest over the breaking of the story, what the hiring means and the fans newest attempts to get the Wilpons to sell the team immediately.

This new culture of being the “first to report” has degenerated reporting into stories coming out based on anonymous sources whether they’re accurate and reliable or not. It appears that this story has been reported accurately, but it’s on the short list in that achievement.

I’d rather be right than first.

What Mets fans have to understand is that the Madoff trial and the Mets ownership issues are not going to be resolved in the near future; no matter how much complaining, threats and ridicule are doled out, nothing is going to change that. Fans are of the opinion that they have this power over ownership by their self-indulgent ranting about the way the franchise has unraveled and that their demands will be met immediately.

Mark Cuban is not buying the Mets tomorrow no matter how many times you demand it.

Is it more enjoyable for fans to be talking about the pursuit and signing of big name free agents like Prince Fielder, Albert Pujols and keeping Jose Reyes? Absolutely.

Does the endless public vitriol directed at the franchise affect the Wilpons when they have bigger things to worry about? No.

The Mets are under no obligation to even respond to these allegations—the club is not a public enterprise; they’re owned by a private entity—so they replied with a statement that’s exacerbated the factions of will they or won’t they file for bankruptcy.

But does it matter?

Really?

In the grand scheme, I don’t think it does.

It’s a story because it’s a story—an end unto itself with no legitimate endgame until the trial and its results are known. Until then, what’s the difference?

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Alderson And The Experts

You can watch the Sandy Alderson interview with Kevin Burkhardt on Mets Hot Stove above and make your own determination as to what he’s actually saying.

The body language/tone/behavior/baseball experts on Twitter and in the media took the “look” of Alderson as ranging from profoundly negative to depressed to near suicidal.

If you read the transcript of the juicy bits of what he said here on MetsBlog, you can make an entirely different judgment.

Those who are ripping the Mets as a matter of course for the relentless need to complain; because there’s an editorial mandate to do so or because it’s designed to drum up webhits in a trolling sort of manner; to push a book; or just because, here’s the truth: they either don’t want to understand reality or are utterly incapable of doing so, and they’re not accepting facts.

If you dissect the Mets 2012 situation financially and in talent, they’re not going to be anything more than a fringe contender for a Wild Card spot if they bring Jose Reyes back and have everything go exactly right.

Some are actively trying to tilt at windmills, aggrandize themselves as influential voices and catalyze a new ownership.

The Wilpons are not selling the team. This is the position they’re in at least until their part in the Madoff lawsuit is completed and they have a firmer grip on what the circumstances are. Anyone hoping for a Mark Cuban to walk in, buy the team and start spending, spending, spending the team back into relevance hasn’t the faintest idea of how an organization—sports or otherwise—is run; Cuban did all of those things the Mets are entreated to do; but what the ignorant outsiders are failing to grasp is that the Dallas Mavericks went through multiple incarnations of players, coaches and a lack of success before hitting the jackpot with an unexpected championship last season.

The Red Sox, Yankees and Phillies proved this very year that spending capriciously for star players doesn’t automatically guarantee a championship.

The Mets have gone down that road. They signed the big names—Johan Santana, Jason Bay, Billy Wagner, Carlos Beltran, Pedro Martinez; they filled all the holes; they did everything the fans wanted them to do including building a new ballpark.

They haven’t won.

In fact, they degenerated into a disaster.

It’s not because of the Madoff Ponzi scheme and the Wilpon’s entanglement in that nightmare, it’s because they were top-heavy and shoddily constructed—built to win immediately for a short window.

The window closed and they hadn’t won.

It’s not Omar Minaya’s fault; it’s the Jeff Wilpon’s fault; it’s not Bernie Madoff’s fault.

It happened. And it happens to the teams that are perceived as doing everything the “right” way.

Sandy Alderson was hired to fix the Mets and that’s what he’s doing whether you like it or not.

Do you believe that John Henry intended to spend $160 million on payroll when he bought the Red Sox? If he did, then what was the purpose of hiring Theo Epstein and his young, stat savvy crew of Ivy League educated, sabermetric wizards? Why did he hire Bill James? Why did he hire Billy Beane only to be spurned at the altar?

Henry wanted to create the Moneyball Red Sox patterned after the cheap and efficient method in which Beane (and, in part, Alderson) transformed the A’s into a dominant franchise without spending a ton of money.

Things morphed into the Red Sox competing with the Yankees for the same players and a championship or bust attitude. It’s part of the reason for the 2012 Red Sox catastrophe and departure of both Terry Francona and Theo Epstein.

People wanted the “Red Sox way” and that’s what they’re getting.

Alderson has the people—Paul DePodesta, J.P. Ricciardi—from that school of thought; a similar school of thought that has made the Rays into a team that wins with a non-existent payroll and an atrocious ballpark. When the Stuart Sternberg regime took over the Rays, they knew they could’ve won a few more games if they’d spent some money on mediocre big leaguers to look better than they were. But is there really that big of a difference between 68 wins? 76 wins? 82 wins?

No.

So why bother wasting cash to lure a negligible number of extra fans?

Reyes will either stay or he won’t;  barring a sudden leap from the pitching staff, some luck with bullpen signings/trades and the new Citi Field dimensions helping David Wright and Bay become what they were before entering baseball’s version of the Grand Canyon, Reyes’s presence isn’t going to help the team escape the morass in which they’re currently trapped. The club will save some face and make people who already have Reyes out the door look foolish, but that’s all.

It takes a brutal assessment and sheer courage to say to the fans that the team isn’t going to be able to contend with Reyes, so why overpay to keep him? The National League East is a nightmare. If the Mets had the cash of the Yankees and Red Sox, they’d be able to cobble a contender from the current market by signing Jonathan Papelbon; C.J. Wilson; Josh Willingham.

They don’t.

This is why Alderson was brought onboard. I saw no negativity in what he said concerning the rebuild—and that’s what it is; his body language indicated what those who are looking for “clues” wanted to see; his tone was matter-of-fact, realistic and intelligent; his content was comprehensive and honest.

Alderson asked Reyes’s representatives what it would cost to sign him; they received silence; the Mets told him to shop around and come back. What else are they supposed to do? What else can they do?

Nothing.

Reyes will be presented with offers from other clubs; the Mets might be able to match them; if they can, he’ll stay; if they can’t, he’ll go elsewhere (watch the Angels) and the Mets will move on in a rational, coherent and coldblooded manner to turn the team into a profitable and successful franchise that can spend money to fill holes, but also has players who were developed internally or are unappreciated foundlings that come through.

This is where they are. Stop complaining about it. If you don’t like the product, don’t go to the games and come back when the team is deemed worthwhile for you to spend your money to watch.

Perhaps the Mets would be better off is Alderson was that straightforward about the team. Maybe then the armchair analysts would shut up.

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