Pitchers and presumably some catchers are in Port St. Lucie, but it’s not Pitchers & Catchers. It’s Mets Mini-Camp!
One hand is clapping.
The Mets have apparently been doing this in January for six years though I don’t remember anything about it before 2005. I only noticed it then because newly signed Carlos Beltran stopped by and stood next to Joe McEwing for a beat on his way to deposit his very large check at his presumably very grateful bank. Super Joe never did get to play with Carlos for keeps, did he?
Ah, mini-camp memories…that’s the only one I can conjure, and that only because Jason sent me the picture and suggested about ten different captions. My favorite was “why, yes, you can get me a Pepsi.”
What goes on at mini-camp? Mets caps and t-shirts, occupied by minor leaguers mostly, sprint by in anonymity. The GM mouths platitudes that are both reassuring and unprovable at this stage of winter. David Wright finds something to do with himself (I was worried he might sit still for thirty seconds). Otherwise, I don’t get baseball mini-camp. It seems almost insulting to Spring Training.
Oh, Pedro Martinez was on hand. He says he’s doing well and I’d like to believe him. I was about to espouse a theory that while the rest of the free world will be contorting itself in fantasies of peeling away Johan Santana or Carlos Zambrano at the deadline, we’ll have a tanned, rested and ready Hall of Famer healthily ready to lead us over the hump in August, September and October. But then I remembered I spent much of 2006 in denial every time Pedro hit the DL. I think he’s still on it.
Of course believing every veteran pitcher will recover from every rotator cuff is what Spring Training is all about. What precisely mini-camp is for I have little clue.
Comments closed | | 
