M-E-T-S METS METS METS!

I never had a baseball team, having grown up in D.C. (and yes I did see a couple of Senators games when I was little…like I said, I never had a baseball team).

So after college, and moving to NYC, a friend easily talked me into the Mets. And then 1986 happened. The ball, Buckner, teh funny.

Anyways, rest easy, Substance McGravitas. I don’t live in NYC anymore, I don’t watch baseball, and Cheney, Alberto ‘Abu’ Gonzales, and their puppet all need impeaching. (And a trip to the Hague.)

So.

He must not have believed very hard in the Rangers, eh?

I’m pretty speechless before the hilarious-yet-horrifying spectacle of the whole Rapidly Aging Bush phenomenon. It’s like watching a slo-mo of that guy who drank out of the wrong grail in Indiana Jones and the Blonde Nazi. Or like watching the Black Eyed Peas’ Fergie.

It’s like watching a slo-mo of that guy who drank out of the wrong grail in Indiana Jones and the Blonde Nazi.

Faster, please!

How can everyone fixate on trivial matters like Bush and a Cardinals jersey when Gerald Ford is alive?!? He’s alive, alive, I tell you!!! Learn more at http://www.gerryfordhoax.cabanova.com.

I don’t think the Mets jersey would do him much good either its New York the symbol of everything he can’t stand smart people, different races getting along the whole nine yards – perhaps a team even more famous for losing – like the St Louis Browns would be best.

And don’t forget Bush’s standard method of introducing “experts” at his Town Hall meetings:

“This is Dr. Welfare Queen from the Wingnut Economic Institute. He’s a real smart guy. I got all C’s, and I’m the president.”

Every fucking time. Yeah, W, we know: daddy bought you the office. Thanks for rubbing that in, asshole.

M-E-T-S METS METS METS!

I thought that was the Jets slogan.

What are you going to do if Carpenter doesn’t go eight innings, Mr. LaRussa?

Well, I’ve talked to a lot of smart people, baseball folk, and they think he’s going to go eight. So we are going to give him a chance to go eight. And he’s going to go eight because he has to. Not going eight is not an option. I understand that people are afraid that he won’t go eight. But you only embolden their batters by pointing out that Carpenter threw 157 pitches two night ago. We can’t let that happen. The plan is for eight… but people out there should know that we can always adjust on the mound.

I think Bush’s team is more accurately pegged as the Orioles, or maybe the Selig owned Brewers. It’d be easy to say the Yanks because of how much they spend, but I’m a fan, and they win. The O’s, on the other hand, are run by a relatively incompetent rich guy who’s fond of nepotism and cronyism, suck despite having the resources to at least compete, and are usually reduced to trying to convince their fan base that half assed moves that waste money amount to a plan.
Other options include the Dodgers, with DePodesta in a Gore role, or, if I want to start shit, the Bosox, with a history of massive failure being contradicted by victory in late autumn of 04. Schilling was a Bush man, remember.

I think there’s a strong correlation between the Tinkerbell Party’s unflagging support for Dear Leader’s war and the sphincternauts who actually believe that wearing a jersey replica on gameday helps their favorite team to win.

On the other hand, trying a new plan of a surge of David Eckstein clones might just bring us victory in Iraq. If one David Eckstein has enough heart to win a title and a World Series MVP despite not actually playing that well, imagine what 50,000 could do.

Cheney received his jersey in a secret, undisclosed location. His number was 666.

I’m the decider. Rangers in 4. Every year. If you don’t like it we’ll Shock and Awe the rest of the AL West. If you’re not with the Rangers, you’re against us. Then we occupy the entire American League. It’s called freedom. Free people have the right to lose to the Rangers. Don’t mess with Texas. Bring ’em on. Then the World Series. I’ll be like Eckstein turning a routine pop out into a double by having the ground soggy. It’s called stragety.

M-E-T-S METS METS METS!I thought that was the Jets slogan.

It is. No one says that at Mets games, although the Nets fans have adopted it (now that they have fans). Personally, as a Mets fan, I’m wary of doing anything that might rub Jets karma off on my team.

Also, I never realized it before reading this post, but Eckstein is the perfect analogy for Bush. He’s talentless. He’s only got his present job because he’s perceived as a Likable Guy You Might Like to Have A Beer With. Anything he has done has come on the coattails of people better at their jobs than him. And the press can’t stop fellating him. That picture of the two Scrappy, Dimiwitted Overachievers is a classic.

BTW, it looks like my favorite AL team by default, the Red Sox, got Helton. If so, good shit. Can you take that division away from the Skankees now, please?

The Helton deal is not happening, period, according to the Rockies’ owner tonight. And, much as I love fire joe morgan and finding ways to say David Eckstein is overrated, the truth is the guy has done an incredible job with a small, unathletic body to become a generic replacement level player. Yeah, he’s overrated and should be at best a utility guy, but he had to work his ass off to get where he is today, and he deserves some credit and respect for that.
If anyone can find anything, ever, that George Bush deserves credit and respect for I’ll……… doubt them.

I hate to say it, but the Bush “thinking” that goes: “I really want this, so it has to happen” isn’t limited to just him. Isn’t that the nation culture of the US now? If you don’t believe me, just watch American Idol.

I thought we misunderestimated Him.

Be forewarned: Praise by the president can lead to low self-esteem.

Craigie: In a recent AI episode, a tone deaf reject screamed at the panel that she wanted to be the first American Idol who couldn’t sing and damnit why wouldn’t they give her a chance?

“Listen, David, I’ve made a career out of people underestimating me,� Bush said.

That’s great, because Eckstein has made a career out of people overestimating how much everybody underestimates him. Plus the blue whale-sized heart that beats in his chipmunk-sized body, of course. And the 20 extra helpings of hustle the Good Lord put in his deformed, albino bloodstream. Oh, also his strict diet of pure grit, that he shovels three times a day into his grotesque, never-say-die wee mouth that looks like it belongs on the smallest, whitest, most throwbackest paperboy you’ve ever seen in your life instead of on the most improbable little Major Leaguer of them all.

Lesley, that’s precisely what I was thinking of. Funny, buy only in a deeply deranged way.

21 posts and no one says the obvious

The fucking New York Yankees. Evil, losing, full of themselves. Send the president a Billy Martin jersey and be done with it

Oh, and the Mets chant is Lets Go Mets

As the token Yankees fan, I must object. What part of 26 world championships and 8 or 9 straight division titles (among 30 or 40 over the years) counts as losing?
Yeah, they fucked up by trying to spend instead of develop and haven’t won a title in a long time by pinstripe reckoning, but exactly where does a guy with no record of ever doing anything right fit in with arguably the most successful sports franchise in American history, the Globetrotters excepted?
We yanks fans may be rich spoiled assholes, fine, call us that. But we know what’s right. When Cheney came to the stadium, he was booed. Steinbrenner is a piece of shit, but he cares about the fans, and winning. Does Bush really care about anyone but himself?

It’s like the atheletes that thank God for their win. As if the losing team’s problem was that the manager didn’t believe they would win.

As the token Yankees fan, I must object. What part of 26 world championships and 8 or 9 straight division titles (among 30 or 40 over the years) counts as losing?

Well, I won’t speak for Mr. Gilliard, but I read it as present tense. Los-ING. I don’t really give a fuck what happened when my grandpa was in junior high school. Right now, they’re unlovable losers who can’t get out of the first round with a lineup full of All-Stars. If you don’t see futility in that, you’re not being objective.

And no offense, but I don’t think any Skankees fan can seriously hang their hat on winning a division championship and then going out in the first round in four games. If they didn’t win the division with double the payroll of the next closest team, they should be ashamed of themselves.

Owning the biggest choke in sports history has to count for something, too.

Yeah, they fucked up by trying to spend instead of develop and haven’t won a title in a long time by pinstripe reckoning, but exactly where does a guy with no record of ever doing anything right fit in with arguably the most successful sports franchise in American history, the Globetrotters excepted?

I think the analogy, though not perfect, is fairly apt for the current Skankees — they’re losers in the same way Bush is a loser. I mean, Bush is worth billions of dollars — by your logic, he is a success. But, it’s all a product of his environment. He can step in shit over and over and over and he has courtesans and family members to bail him out, the way the Skankees can make bad move after bad signing and patch up the holes with more signings.

We yanks fans may be rich spoiled assholes, fine, call us that. But we know what’s right. When Cheney came to the stadium, he was booed.

Was he? I remember a huge standing ovation for Bush from Skankees fans. But I don’t recall Cheney ever going to Skankee Stadium. I do know that Mets fans booed Cheney off the mound after his effeminate first pitch at Shea.

On the flipside, the Skankees are also one of the few teams that still plays the awful song God Bless America every single fucking game, when most other teams have scaled it back to once a week. Pseudo-patriotic sap will always have a place in Skankee Stadium, and their fans tend to eat it up.

Steinbrenner is a piece of shit, but he cares about the fans, and winning. Does Bush really care about anyone but himself?

Steinbrenner cares about the fans?! Is that why he let fan-favorite Annie Pettitte walk because of their little in-house beef? Is that why he practically tripped over his own feet courting Jason Giambi when almost every Yankee fan wanted to bring back Tino? Puh leez. Steinbrenner the humanitarian? You would have made a better argument saying that unlike Bush, Steinbrenner succeeded in business.

I agree with Kathleen. My fondest wish is to see a professional athelete inteviewed after a loss saying, “God did not want us to win. He was with the other team today… Why have you foresaken us? Damn you, damn you God! I heretofore pledge my eternal allegiance to Satan! Hail, dark master!”

Tonight’s umpire, Diebold!

I still can’t believe Beltran took a called third strike with two outs in the bottom of the ninth in game seven.

When he met the Cardinals’ slugger, Bush said, “Heh-heh. The Democrat Party is a bunch of Poo-holes!”

When The World Champs visited the WH, Jeff Suppan (the ex-Cards pitcher who starred in the anti-stem cell ad in Missouri) was the first one through the door to meet the Shrub.

He was a decent pitcher and all (most likely due to the great coaching of Dave Duncan), but as a Cards fan I am very happy that he is gone for 2 reasons, one he was commanding waaaay more $$$ than he’s worth IMHO, and 2 he’s a flat-earth wingnut.

You learn something everyday. To think that I thought he had made a “career”, if you can call it that, out of sponging off his dad’s mates.

he’s a flat-earth wingnut.

I love baseball, but the sport is _saturated_ with wingnuts, on the field and in the front office.

“We would have won the game, but Jesus made me fumble.”

Hey, Cutler John, you left off the end of the response:

“Oh! And as an afterthought, Billy, I really should point out how glad I am you volunteered to go to baseball games and how happy I am that you asked me that question that I’m not gonna answer. See, I appreciate the sacrifice of the fans, their honor and their courage, even though lots of people don’t. Appreciate it, I mean. I’m an appreciator, and I appreciate.”

I still can’t believe Beltran took a called third strike with two outs in the bottom of the ninth in game seven.

Yep, and after he struck out Floyd looking, too, with the same hook, in the same inning. Can’t end the season looking. Just stick the bat out and poke it foul. Even a roller to second, hey, you tried.

Y’know, 3D, you’re using wingnut logic. You don’t like the Yanks, therefore everything about them is bad.
Taking your points at random…
2000 was your grandfather’s era? You have amazing typing skills for an infant.
Boston spends a lot more than half what the yanks do on payroll. Small point, but sheeit, reality, huh?
As for losing now, ummm, what? I think, maybe, say, the Royals or Pirates or damn near every other team in baseball would take the record of “losing” the Yanks have had since their last title. 2 world series and the playoffs every year? It must suck for you to root for your team, if that’s your def of losing.
As for saying my definition of success is tied to money, nope, you inserted that. My def of success is winning many more games than you lose for decades, along with a couple dozen titles. You put money in the equation, not me.
Finally, for a team you hate you sure have set opinions about what they should’ve done. Tino as proof Stein hates the fans? Are you fuckin kidding me? A replacement level 1b versus an MVP?
Pettite wasn’t resigned because he wanted more than he was worth. They gave the money to Vasquez instead, which is a mistake in retrospect but was the right choice at the time. Maybe the fans loved Andy, but they still came out the next year. There’s a difference between caring about winning and the fans and doing everything the fans want. The fans would probably want Mattingly at first, even now. You really think that unless Stein puts yogi at catcher and donnie baseball at first he doesn’t care about the fans?

Oh, n to add an unimportant bit to a pointless argument on a dead thread, before doubting Cheney being booed, try, say, googling “cheney booed yankee stadium”.
As for Bush getting an ovation, for fuck’s sake man, that was game three of the 2001 world series.
In Yankee Stadium.
Not that you missed it, but note the date, again. We hadn’t even invaded Iraq. They weren’t appaulding George Bush, they were applauding the President. He did poorly in nyc in 2000, it wasn’t an endorsement of everything he is and was. It was an emotional expression of patriotism in a city that had been through a bit lately. Go watch, or hopefully rewatch, the documentary Why We Fight.

Excuse me while I blow my brains out.

Y’know, 3D, you’re using wingnut logic. You don’t like the Yanks, therefore everything about them is bad.

Nonsense. John Sterling is my favorite New York sports announcer next to Gary Cohen. That’s something good. (Of course I’m biased because he used to do Islander games. ISLANDER GOOOOAAAAALLLL!!!!!)

2000 was your grandfather’s era? You have amazing typing skills for an infant.

Read it again. That one-liner was responding to the statement that they are the most successful franchise ever. Are they the most successful franchise because of the run ending in 2000, breaking an 18 year drought? Or because of the 50 year run they put together back when indentured servitude was allowed in baseball, making 3/4 of the teams in baseball a farm system for the Yankees?

So yeah, fuck what the Yankees did pre-Curt Flood. Means shit to me. Unlike most Yankee-haters, I think their 1996-2000 successes were a shining example of fiscal restraint and sound decision-making, and should be emulated by other teams, and their post-2000 free agency excesses are what have contributed to their demise. I say, let the fuckers spend $300 million, maybe they’ll find third place.

Boston spends a lot more than half what the yanks do on payroll. Small point, but sheeit, reality, huh?

Factoring in 2005 luxury tax penalties paid in 2006, the Yankees’ 2006 payroll was $230M to the Red Sox $124M. So, technically you’re right. The onion shaped thing wasn’t destroyed, it was just firebombed and had a hole blown it. Seems like quibbling though, to me.

As for losing now, ummm, what? I think, maybe, say, the Royals or Pirates or damn near every other team in baseball would take the record of “losing� the Yanks have had since their last title. 2 world series and the playoffs every year? It must suck for you to root for your team, if that’s your def of losing.

All relative. The Yankees aren’t the Royals or the Pirates, they are the team with 75 years of winning championships under their belts. So, you can’t have it both ways, moving the goalposts to say a first round choke is a successful season. Either morphing into the Braves of the AL is a paragon of success, or it isn’t.

Like I said in the last post, if you can’t see even a glimmer of futility in $200 million worth of All-Stars flopping on their asses in 4 games to a rotation made up of rookies, or performing a historical choke against your biggest rival, you’re too biased to be having this discussion.

Finally, for a team you hate you sure have set opinions about what they should’ve done. Tino as proof Stein hates the fans? Are you fuckin kidding me? A replacement level 1b versus an MVP?

Am I not supposed to have opinions on other teams’ moves? I’m a baseball fanatic. I read the Transaction Guy like I read Sadly, No!

Anyway, I didn’t speak to the relative merits of the move. (Nor did I say Steinbrenner “hates” the fans, BTW.) I said it was the opposite of a “fan-friendly” move. Not to get too off-topic but I thought it was a mistake at the time and still do. They traded the heir apparent to Tino for Javy Vasquez who has not hit a 100 ERA+ since. Nick Johnson’s offensive performance has only been a shade worse than Giambi’s over that time not to mention at all defensive value, and he has made, what, 48 million dollars less? Keep Tino (who BTW had a 108 OPS+ that season, not great but not “replacement level”) for one more year and phase in Johnson.

BTW, I always thought that Beane played that negotiation brilliantly, that in truth he never wanted Giambi back. But to save face with the fans he made a reasonable cash offer, instead refusing to budge on a no-trade clause and other details that he knew Giambi wouldn’t cave to. Then he finds Scott Hatteberg to put up a 110-ish OPS+ and has 90 million dollars in his pocket. Now, rather than looking like he bungled the deal for a hometown favorite he didn’t want back to begin with, it looks like the Big Bad Yankees outspent him.

Oh, n to add an unimportant bit to a pointless argument on a dead thread, before doubting Cheney being booed, try, say, googling “cheney booed yankee stadium�.

I didn’t say you lied, I purposely phrased it to avoid offending you by saying I hadn’t heard about it. “Was he? I remember a huge standing ovation for Bush from Skankees fans. But I don’t recall Cheney ever going to Skankee Stadium.”

Everyone knows that the Mets cheer is “Let’s Go Mets!” That goes all the way back to 1962 and the “Amazin’s” Everyone should also know that Gerald Ford is alive! If they don’t know it now, they will soon. Read all about it at http://www.gerryfordhoax.cabanova.com.

A 108 OPS+ out of first sounds around replacement level to me. It’s definitely not particularly helpful. And Nick the stick will have yet another partial year this year. One nightmare season aside, Giambi has been solid, if on the field too much. Tino, on the other hand, bounced around for a while and is out of baseball now. (and the fan ignoring Yanks even brought him back, you might recall)
If you can find a team that’s won as many titles in the free agency period as the yanks, ummm, you’re looking at a different sport. The rest of the league was playing with segregated rosters and non-competitive teams, too. You can say it was easier to win, I can mention that for most of the time the Yanks had to have the best record in the league to make the Series. No wild card, like, say, the 04 Sox used to win. The only way you can slice it to say the Yanks aren’t successful is to pretend not winning a title since 2000 means they suck. They’re the only team to make the playoffs every year over that time, and while you can keep mentioning a 4 game first round loss last season, I can mention no team has won as many postseason games over that timespan. Calling that a record of losing requires ignoring what the word losing means in common parlance. N yeah, the Sox won a big one in 04. And? They missed the playoffs last year.
And if you think Beane was glad not to have Giambi last year, you’ve no idea what you’re talking about. Scott H gave them some good years, and some incredibly shitty years. Now they’ve moved on to their…. what, 4th, 5th solution for replacing Giambi?
Giving yourself 20/20 hindsight isn’t a convincing way to argue. Vasquez was a good move at the time. Instead of an injury prone unproven prospect, an overrated, overpaid (8 or 9 a year for the cards) replacement level 1b, and a league average inning eating lefty, the Yanks had an MVP star slugger and one of the best young pitchers in the game at the time, who everyone thought was poised for a breakout of ace proportions, and one more year to let Nick prove something, in which he didn’t. Everyone was wrong about Vasquez, but at least we admit it. You, on the other hand, knew it from the start, because you’re a baseball genius.
Possible, but not probable enough I believe you. You’re arguing out of hate, not a rational case.

Giving yourself 20/20 hindsight isn’t a convincing way to argue. Vasquez was a good move at the time. Instead of an injury prone unproven prospect, an overrated, overpaid (8 or 9 a year for the cards) replacement level 1b, and a league average inning eating lefty, the Yanks had an MVP star slugger and one of the best young pitchers in the game at the time, who everyone thought was poised for a breakout of ace proportions, and one more year to let Nick prove something, in which he didn’t. Everyone was wrong about Vasquez, but at least we admit it. You, on the other hand, knew it from the start, because you’re a baseball genius.

I didn’t say that the Vazquez trade was bad or that I thought at the time Vazquez would flop. I said the Giambi signing was really bad, in foresight and hindsight, and that keeping Johnson would have served mostly the same purpose without spending 8 figures on a 6 year commitment.

In other words, I thought the Vazquez trade brought back fair value at the time, but I didn’t see the need for it. It only bolsters my argument now that Johnson has had two consecutive monster seasons and Vazquez has become Steve Trachsel.

Also, about Johnson missing time, he did manage to get close to 1200 PAs in the past two seasons which is a vast improvement. If he plays in the AL and can DH for a hundred ABs or so, with Tino off the bench, possibly with the extra rest he becomes less brittle and injury prone in a shorter span of time.

But you’re conflating two off-seasons. They signed Giambi a year before they traded for Vasquez. It was Giambi and Nick or Giambi and Vasquez, and they needed pitching a hell of a lot more than they needed offense. I agree the Giambi deal wasn’t the best idea in terms of length, but they had a huge hole at first, sorry, but Tino really wasn’t cutting it in any way and hadn’t been for years, and inarguably signed the best player available for the spot. They needed pitching more, but aside from Moose there weren’t so many options.
If you want to criticize the Yanks’ choices, it makes a lot more sense to bring up the Pavano-Wright-Womack offseason of hell. Instead of Beltran, they picked up that crap, then had to overpay for too long for Damon the next year. The only good thing about that offseason was it led to Cashman getting the reins. Remember how you respected the Yanks of the end of the last century for being an almost perfect model of how a team is built (tho you did ignore the free agent nature of the rotation)? It’s coming back. And for what it’s worth, Stein’s designated son-in-law heir is one of Cashman’s biggest backers, and one of the biggest reasons Cash is now the man. The Bronx Zoo is history.