Hope you had a happy Elster Sunday and that your boy got to every egg within his limited range.

Cripes, the real thing is a week away and panic is simmering in this

corner of Metsopotamia. Pedro's lower back. DeJean's right calf.

Cameron's nodding, if that, familiarity with his new position.

Zambrano's refusal to make the Kazmir trade palatable. […]

What on earth do you have against Bruce Chen of all lapsed Mets? He's like three teams from being Todd Zeile.I first read about Rotisserie Baseball in Inside Sports circa 1981. It sounded delightful for the first couple of pages until it was explained that you could have guys on “your” team who might face […]

The tragedy of Bonds is he didn't need the cream or the clear. He was

no Jason Giambi — a perfectly nice doubles hitter with a good eye

before he swole himself up into a slugger — but an organic,

all-natural Hall of Famer. Pending further evidence, I don't believe

Bonds was on the juice in the early 1990s, […]

With XM Radio, you can listen to every home team broadcast of every game this year including a bunch from spring training. Wednesday night, with the Mets and Cards on the FAN from Jupiter, I checked XM and they were carrying the St. Louis broadcast about a minute delayed.

So first I heard Gary Cohen enthusiastically […]

Well, I'm in midseason form — somehow I thought the season started

next week. Along with the time change. This extended winter is

destroying my brain.

Quick question: When you hear “partially herniated disk,” do you think,

“Well, that's no big deal”? Me neither. Not with Trachsel on the shelf.

Not with the ghost of Edgardo Alfonzo hovering over both […]

Game Four, 1988 NLCS: Nobody’s finest hour. Game 4, 2000 NLDS: Somebody’s finest hour. There are a lot of somebodies here who at one time or another appeared to be nobodies. But we knew better.

40. Bobby Jones: Underrated competitor until he got noticed (12-3 start in ’97, consecutive All-Star K’s of Griffey and McGwire), overpaid […]

Some scouring over at Retrosheet

makes me think my flawed brain cells were trying to combine the 6th

inning with this horrible sequence, our last gasp in that dismal game:

METS 12TH: Leary replaced Stubbs (pitching); Sasser singled to

right; Darling ran for Sasser; Mazzilli batted for McDowell; Mazzilli

singled to center [Darling to second]; Jefferies flied to left; Orosco

replaced […]

What I've never gotten about the Ishiis, Zambranos and pitchers who

walk too many batters is the idea that they don't know that they're not

supposed to do that. When erstwhile pitching guru George Bamberger

managed the Mets, he repeated over and over to erratic Pete Falcone,

“throw strikes”.

Pete Falcone didn't look him in the eye and respond, “you […]

Kaz Ishii's old pitching coach said the toughest pitch for him was “strikes” and warned that he'll drive us crazy. I was thinking of a certain departed senator even before Newsday noted that Ishii walked 98 in 172 innings, while Leiter walked 97 in 173 2/3. Of course Leiter went 10-8 with a 3.21 ERA, while Ishii went […]

Billy Beane recently told Sports Illustrated that “emotional decisions can be devastating” to managing a payroll an building a roster. With Jason Phillips following Joe McEwing out the door, unemotional decisions kind of hurt, too. Only Mets fans would get a touch misty for a guy who had to rev it up in September to hit .218. But that’s why […]