Imagine the surprise among New York/Metro Area Mets fans when they saw this morning’s Daily News . Sandy Alderson has apparently thrown down the gauntlet. In a supposedly “closed door” meeting – but of course knowing full well that anything quotable would find its way into a newspaper: such is the nature of a leaky [...]
Mets’ spring training is less than an official week old and we’ve already had a mini-drama. This latest teacup tempest involves embattled first baseman Ike Davis. Davis, the subject of many a trade rumor this winter, the man on the hot seat, the repository of much Met fan frustration, boiled over at New York Post [...]
The camps are open. Spring Training is almost in full swing for just about everybody. The Mets seem to be more eager than most clubs: a week before pitchers and catchers were to report and two full weeks before the full squad’s appearance was mandatory, the Mets had 60 – that’s “six-oh” – spring training [...]
In his first year-plus as a Major League pitcher, Matt Harvey has shown us he possesses an impressive set of tools. A biting fastball, a devastating curve and a fine change-up are the main pieces of his game arsenal. A solid pitcher’s build is the principal physical attribute. A bulldog, take-no-prisoners attitude fires his professional [...]
Maybe the long tunnel of snow the Northeast has been living with this year has unusually whetted the appetite of its baseball fans. Every day, there’s a countdown number, correlated to a uniform digit. On various websites yesterday, we saw a plethora of Ron Darling and John Stearns jerseys, telling us there were a mere [...]
The New York Post broke the story last week that Mets owners Fred Wilpon, Jeff Wilpon and Saul Katz dodged a rather large bullet. Remember that big debt payment that was hanging over their heads? It was due in June? $250 million? Well, they don’t have to pay that in June. They don’t have to [...]
There are 15 days until pitchers and catchers report to spring training, 15 days until grass looks green instead of snow-covered white or dingy grey. Many among the Mets’ fan community can hardly wait. There are some staunch glass-half-full types -- right here in our own back yard -- who see the potential for great [...]
Your intrepid columnist is usually pretty bad at predictions. Oh, not a Mike Francesa-level of ridicularity, but the mark is usually missed. If the Mets’ first baseman is projected to hit 35 home runs, he will invariably hit eight. If a star pitcher looks like a lock to win four games, he will break the [...]
It snowed the morning of January 18th. That was the scheduled date for the first annual Queens Baseball Convention – “QBC” for short. Your intrepid columnist wasn’t going to miss this for all the ice in Antarctica; besides, what better way to spend a snowy Saturday than to take three trains and one subway out [...]
All the leaves are gone and the sky is grey. A look out the window yields brittle grass, bare branches, leaden skies and whipping winds. It’s January and even though winter is officially only four-and-a-half weeks old at this writing, it already feels like forever. On these here interwebs, there are countdowns to spring training [...]
The past two seasons have been dubbed “The Year(s) Of The Pitcher.” This is a retread of the label first trotted out in 1968, in response to record-shattering mound performances by the likes of Bob Gibson, Denny McLain and fine years by several other hurlers, including our own Tom Seaver and Jerry Koosman. At that [...]
You can still hear the clattering. The Hall Of Fame vote – made public almost a full day ago – has elicited much moaning and shouting about how flawed the process is. The words floated about are “broken,” “unworkable” and “antiquated.” You won’t hear any argument here; your intrepid columnist is about to join the [...]