Be very, very quiet… if you listen carefully, you’ll hear the wheels coming off the Mets. Already the lesson from Sir Isaac Newton have rung true -- whatever goes up must come down, and as hopeful as we were a mere two weeks ago after a 9-1 home stand, we are now sufficiently deflated by 11 loses in 15 games and a gravitation into the NL East cellar. The overworked bullpen and inconsistent starting pitching I warned about is now becoming a liability for manager Jerry Manuel. I warned Jerry’s pitching corps could burn out by Father’s Day… well, late June has come a tad early.
Jonathan Niese hurt his hamstring again. Who knows if or when he’ll be back. Oliver Perez was banished to the bullpen, but may end up back in the rotation out of medical desperation. John Maine? Just when you think he’s turning the corner, he smacks into a wall and starts off with 12 straight pitches out of the strike zone Saturday night in Miami.
Jerry Manuel and GM Omar Minaya must now send out an S.O.S. for healthy and consistent arms. While they’re at it, perhaps some extra oomph in the bats, better fielding, smarter base running, and a hasty return by Carlos Beltrán should be added to the plea for help.
As Yogi once said, it’s déjà vu all over again. Just like last season, our M-E-T-S have become M*A*S*H. Let’s go Mets? How about OUCH, OUCH, OUCH?!
Don’t look now, but while our Mets have slid into last, you know who’s climbed into first? Am I the only one who noticed how dangerous the Cincinnati Reds have become? With a few blinks of the eye, and a string of complete games by their young and talented starting rotation, the Reds have leapfrogged over St. Louis in the NL Central.
You know who’s over .500 and maybe not going away? How about the Washington Nationals in the NL East? And look how the Dodgers have finally awoken from their slumber in the NL West! And don’t laugh, but the Toronto Blue Jays seem to be able to take a hit and keep swinging in the AL East.
Okay, are you sold yet? I’m sold… Ulbado Jimenez is the real deal in Colorado! We’ve now seen enough to sense his no-no in Atlanta last month was no fluke. He’s still pitching complete games, and is 7-1 with an ERA barely one run so far. While the Rockies are treading water around .500, it’s worth noting that Jimenez has accounted for almost 40 percent of the Rockies wins so far. I don’t want to get too ahead of myself, but the last pitcher we saw with that kind of track record might be Steve Carlton with the 1972 Phillies.
Speaking of the Phillies, some folks are starting to think they may win the NL East by default. Well, before we crown them flaws and all, could we just wait and see how the summer goes when the Nats bring up Stephen Strasburg to join an already plucky rotation, including Livan Hernandez, having a great season so far at perhaps the tender age of seventy.
Last baseball point… THE YANKEES ARE NOT INVINCIBLE! As great as they’re playing, they’re an old team, players get nicked (Johnson) up, Mo Rivera can’t get everyone out every time, and Joe Giradi is bound to out-think himself at least a few dozen times to cost himself some wins, such as Sunday’s loss at home to the Twins. And, let’s face it… as long as they can’t win away from Yankee Stadium the way Tampa Bay does on the road, the AL East is going to remain a dogfight for quite a stretch this summer.
So, the Stanley Cup conference finals started. Will anyone notice? How is it NBC broadcasts one game for each conference final and the remainder of each series is sequestered on Versus?! Given the NHL television partnership with ESPN during the regular season, how is it the geniuses in Bristol and Commissioner Gary Bettman’s office couldn’t give the postseason better exposure? Not to complain, but you have to admit Blackhawks-Sharks and Habs-Flyers look like very intriguing conference finals. The least ESPN and the NHL could do is broadcast these games more and not leave them to a network the majority of cable subscribers still may not have, or possibly can’t find in their channel packages.
By the way, kudos to the New York Daily News’ Ralph Vacciano for his Sunday article on what a farce voting for NFL post-season player awards is. It’s a shame it took one more idiot like Brian Cushing to test positive for a banned substance to possibly tip off the Associated Press how much valuable time is wasted on these votes.
Oh, and have you heard there’s positive chatter among NFL coaches to adopt the new post-season overtime rules for regular season games? As I stated back in January, changing overtime in the NFL is a bad idea because it should’ve never been changed in the first place… 1974, that is! Mediocrity 35 years ago is mediocrity today. Tie games are either the result of two teams not playing well enough to deserve to win, or not playing bad enough to lose. There really isn’t anything wrong with regular season ties, and if you compare season records of 35-40 years ago, you’ll see just as much parity as we do today with a bunch of glorified 8-8 teams, give or take a win or loss. Post-season overtime leaves fans unhappy because regular season overtime perverted the meaning of “sudden death”. If the NFL wants to get back the impact of sudden death during the post-season, get rid of regular season overtime and go back to the way things were prior to 1974. Until that point, we only had a handful of post-season overtime games and each one was remembered as a classic. Now we have so many overtime games who can remember the heart-pounding thrill of overtime affairs?! All I can recall is how the losing team’s fans bitched for months afterwards about feeling robbed. Funny… do you think the 1958 New York Giants feel robbed after losing “The Greatest Game Ever”?
Just a thought… it’s not like anyone’s knocking on my door for opinions…
Last, but not least, let’s hear it for ABC’s coverage of the NBA conference finals, which began Sunday with the Celtics beating Orlando, 92-88. Until the fourth quarter, who knew the Magic were even on the court? Did Stan Van Gundy’s team consult the Seattle Mariners about in-game napping? Dwight Howard seemed more animated in his stupid halftime bit as Clark Kent and Superman than he did in the paint and on the boards. I tweeted this thought during halftime and I’ll share it again – if these NBA players put more time into fundamental skills development than their commercial marketability, we might actually see some decent quality games on TV. But as long as these guys are moonlighting thespians – or perhaps full-time thespians moonlighting as pro athletes – we’ll keep seeing the same dreck of sleepwalking until a coach issues the wake-up call.
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