Blue and Orange dot net

The Mets have done absolutely nothing at the trade deadline, and I couldn’t be more thrilled.  There were rumors about the team acquiring Scott Kazmir, or Adam LaRoche, or Matt Murton, but in the end, the Mets did not acquire anybody.  While I would have liked to have seen them sell off some of their spare parts, ultimately they probably would not have gotten back much value for what they had available (Hoops, Sheffield, and Feliciano heading the list) so in the end, nothing was better than anything in this case.

I just don’t think this team can climb back in the race, even if they get 80% Carlos Beltran or 85% Jose Reyes in the upcoming weeks.  They are too far out, behind too many teams.  They can probably finish with a respectable win total with a few healthy months of Beltran, Reyes, Delgado, Sheffield, Putz, and Wagner, but we’re realistically looking at a ceiling of about 83-84 wins at most.  There is just going to be too many games lost to starting players such as Daniel Murphy, Alex Cora, Jeremy Reed, Angel Pagan, Livan Hernandez, and Omir Santos.  Making a token acquisition, even for a good player like a Victor Martinez or Roy Halladay, would not noticeably improve the Mets’ playoff chances for 2009, and would require a price in prospects that would be too great for such a small improvement.

The other benefit to not making a trade means that Omar Minaya did nothing to save his job.  Whether it’s because the Wilpons would not sign off on anything or because he couldn’t put anything together, at least Omar didn’t make a panic trade to save his job.  While there would have been a certain symmetry in Minaya acquiring Scott Kazmir from the Rays as a panic trade to save his job, it probably would not have been a good idea for the Mets.  While it does confirm that the Mets season is over, maybe that’s not such a bad thing.  Hope, in this case, would not have been a good thing.

If you have been reading this site during the various struggles of this 2009 Mets team, you’ve probably come to the very reasonable conclusion that I am not a fan of how Omar Minaya and his plan for this Mets team.  Obviously, nobody could have predicted that so many Mets would get hurt all at the same time, particularly guys like Jose Reyes and Carlos Beltran, who have been relatively injury-free for much of their careers.  But the lack of any viable Plan B in case any of these guys got hurt (particularly John Maine, who missed most of the last two months of 2008 and Carlos Delgado, who has been plagued with hip problems dating back a year) is pretty damning.  Heck, in the case of Daniel Murphy, their Plan A left a lot to be desired.

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Did our GM really just accuse a beat writer of trying to get Tony Bernazard fired because he wanted to get a job in player development for the Mets?  Did that really just happen?  I don’t even know if I have an adequate response for this.  My mind is blown.  The Mets can’t even fire a guy who, by all accounts, was a terrible dude, without causing a stink.  Go read some more on this here, here, here, and here.  This is crazy.

(Sorry for cursing in the headline, it is the only adequate reaction that can be derived from this.  Thanks to the great Mary Steenburgen for the quote, from the movie Step Brothers).

After another demoralizing Mets loss last night, I was reading Google Reader for some Mets game recaps before calling it a night, when something caught my eye.  A writer in the Boston market (well, Providence, but close enough) thinks that Theo Epstein has been overrated, thanks to a high payroll.  After quickly checking to make sure the Red Sox were still in first (actually, they had just fallen into second, but lead the wild card by 3.5 games over the Rays and Rangers), I wondered what legnths journalists go to these days in order to create a story.

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Okay, so this is pretty much a lost season for the Mets.  I can accept this.  Their stars are hurt, they have no timetable for a return, the replacements are sub-replacement player across the board, and the other players expected to make contributions for the Mets…they suck.  Fine.  Not happy about it, but…you know, it is what it is.

But one thing I can’t stand the thought of is Shane Victorino playing in an All Star game.  First of all, he’s not that good.  Literally every other player on the ballot is better than he is.  Secondly, Shane Victorino is an asshole.  There’s his obnoxious feud with Jose Reyes, his grandstanding and showboating during games (and he gives Reyes crap for this? Really?) and there’s the game where he ran straight into Reyes in order to draw an interference call.  Basically, Shane Victorino to me is the worst of all Phillies.

And now?  There’s this open campaign he’s running to get voted into the All Star game.  Read about it here, here, and here.  Or, better yet, don’t.  Like I said, he’s an asshole, and people who like Shane Victorino are also assholes (i.e. they are Phillies fans).  Right now, Victorino is in second place behind Kung Fu Panda, Pablo Sandoval.  But the Phillies internet community is trying to drum up support to get him voted in, and with all of the other indignities Mets fans have suffered so far, and others perhaps to come (such as the Phillies acquiring Pedro Martinez or Roy Halladay), I simply cannot allow this to happen.

I should point out that I don’t even think Sandoval is the most deserving player on there.  Matt Kemp (who is strangely batting 8th for the Dodgers despite being probably their best or second best hitter this season) and Mark Reynolds are probably more deserving representatives.  I don’t care.  Sandoval is in the lead, and I don’t have time to drum up support to push Victorino into third…we just need to keep him out of the game, and if that means throwing support behind a less deserving candidate than others, so be it.  Sandoval still belongs over Victorino anyway.  Plus, Sandoval is not an asshole.

So VOTE FOR PABLO!  Go to MLB.com and voted repeatedly for Pablo Sandoval and…I don’t know, some AL guy.  I’m voting for Brandon Inge, personally, because I like Inge a lot.  But we can stop Victorino before it’s too late.  I could handle this if it were Jayson Werth on the ballot, he’s had a really terrific year and belongs in the All Star game…but Shane Victorino sucks, and like I said, he’s an asshole.  Let’s try to make this year’s All Star Game as asshole-free as possible.