Man, today would have been such a good day for a spring-training game.
Gray, frozen, a yawning afternoon to fill up finding something to do
besides the things I should have been doing but knew I wouldn't do. A
great afternoon, in other words, for exulting over the sight of, say,
Victor Diaz catching a pop-up or the sound of Omar Minaya being
noncommittal about moves to be made before Opening Day. Shucks. Soon
enough in the grand scheme of things, but not soon enough today, not by
a long shot.
More David Wright hagiographies today. I really hope nothing bad
happens to Wright — it still kills me to see Edgardo Alfonzo in
another uniform, even though with cold-eyed hindsight that's one of
Steve Phillips' moves that's hard to criticize. Even Jon Heyman seems
to have fallen in love with Wright — apparently there is
at least one person on this Earth whom Heyman doesn't suspect is
secretly a phony or a criminal. Though Heyman should work on his drug
slang — “blow, weed or a bong” indeed. No. 3 in that list is kinda
pointless without No. 2, Jon.
This Mike Cameron trade “guarantee” bugs me. I'd normally be suspicious
of anything in the Post (though Mike Vaccaro has been quite good this
spring), but this sure feels like the usual Mets “no bad PR” move.
Cameron strikes out way too much, but he does have real power, and
that's not the kind of glove you send elsewhere unless it's for a good
reason. Joe McEwing made a great comment last year about how in '03
there'd be runners on first and third and one out early and the next
guy would hit a ball up the gap, and in '03 it would go to the wall but
in '04 Cameron would catch it (OK, most of the time), and what a
difference there was
between being down 2-0 early with still just one out and having there
be no
score and two out. Obvious, maybe, but it did remind me how many games
in '03 became dismal before the hour mark. I actively loathed that '03
Mets team — for all of last year's disappointments, at least I was
glad to see them.
Anyway, who'd be coming back? If Cameron goes to Seattle, there's Raul
Ibanez, who got moved to first base last season and Randy Winn, who's a
crummy outfielder. I certainly don't get the sense Cameron (or Cliff
Floyd, for that matter) is a problem inside the clubhouse. So for God's sake, why?
Ah, Bill Pulsipher. If I remember correctly that first day of our
watching games together, Pulse's first pitch went to the backstop (we
exchanged a Bull Durhamesque glance) and when he got to the dugout for
the first time as an honest-to-goodness big leaguer it was 3-0. “That's
an ugly crooked number,” you said, and I nodded, and it got uglier.
I still miss Pulse. I'd put him in middle relief in a heartbeat. Which is just reason #45,382 that I'm a fan instead of a GM.
I did see “Bad Lieutenant,” but admit I kind of zoned through the
baseball parts while waiting impatiently for more perversion. I'm a bad
person.
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