Reviews

Free Jacob DeGrom -- For Mercy, Not Salary Dump

8/1/2018

When Cabrera and Granderson Played for the Mets

Out of morbid fascination, I peeked at the Mets Friday night.

Much better I should have stayed with the news from the Manafort trial – his wardrobe, his cars, his crooked accountant, his toady work for oligarchs on both sides of the Atlantic. Manafort is going away.

Poor Jacob DeGrom; he should go away, too – but to a ball club on which somebody other than the pitcher can drive in runs. He deserves it. He has turned 30 and his club has no hope, no foreseeable future.

The other day I wrote the foolscap below, hoping the Mets could keep a facsimile of a major-league pitching staff. But watching this great competitor add to his league-leading earned-run average (1.85) but with a 5-7 won-lost record, I realized he has earned time off for good behavior.

With the money they save on his salary, they could sign six or eight other washed-up position players, since they don’t have enough right now.

Have a fun weekend, with the Yanks and Red Sox acting like the ‘70s.
(my previous screed:)

I confess, I was relieved when the Mets did nothing heinous on trading deadline. For Mets fans, this is a plus.

I always get morose about rumors of Mets trades, particularly for pitchers.

There are so many original sins in Mets history that I have stopped counting.

I still hear the voice of my 19-year-old son on the phone, over a certain 1989 trade that will live in infamy. (see below)
“It stinks,” the voice said. “It just stinks.”

Never mind the great deals by Sandy Alderson that got them to the World Series in 2015. Mets fans just shudder at various trade and waiver and salary-dump deadlines.

I was already depressed at the selloffs of Jeurys Familia and Asdúbal Cabrera in the past week. Familia pitched his heart out for the Mets and Cabrera was one of the most professional and social players the Mets have ever had. He was a pleasure to watch. I will mourn him the rest of the season.

I thought I might be mourning Jacob DeGrom. His once-laughing face has hardened into the stoic mask of a good soldier, but he still jokes with his pitcher pals on the bench. The Mets never hit for him. I won’t blame him if he forces his way out after the season. I can’t stand to watch his games any more – Sisyphus with shorn locks. Then his own teammates roll the rock down on him.

So when the front-office troika held on to the four Mets starters, for the moment, I relaxed and decided I could live with the horrors of the rest of this season. There’s always Weeping Wilmer, el hombre de la gente.

Then they lost, 25-4, on Monday. My Mets-text pals Pete W and Brad W and David V all decided that the two-game series would be decided by cumulative scores, like some Champions League soccer playoff. Our sluggers could overcome 25-4, we decided. In fact, they lost, 5-3, on Tuesday.

It’s all part of the Met-fan psyche. Nothing lasts for long. The Gil Hodges era. Doc and Darryl. Yoenis Cespedes’ heels. Curtis Granderson, one of the best people ever to play in Flushing. Enjoy the day. Things fall apart.

One moment you are enjoying Asdrúbal Cabrera, totally into his hitting and his positioning, with his positive impact on his teammates and even opponents, lifting the helmet off the head of Granderson after a home run. Now they are both gone.

The Mets ….to put it simply…are the meaning of life.
* * *
(Just a few horrors, off the top of my head.)
Dec. 10, 1971: Mets trade young Nolan Ryan.
June 15, 1977: Mets trade in-prime Tom Seaver.
June 19, 1989: Mets trade Roger McDowell – and LennyDykstra – for Juan Samuel.
Aug. 27, 1992: Mets trade in-prime David Cone for Jeff Kent in a new-age salary dump.
(Below: Eternal Met slugger with glorious launch arc but no contact.)

Joshua Rubin

8/1/2018 07:17:58 pm

Who is the almost slugging silhouette? My nickel says it's Kingman.

George Vecsey

8/2/2018 08:34:23 am

Josh: millions of candidates. Swing and miss. Just about everybody, in these days of exit velocity.
I think it might be Don Hahn....no, Don Bosch....no, Joe Foy.....Marvelous Marv had a more level swing. As he used to say, "I'm a sweet hitter...Not a good hitter, but a sweet hitter." I would settle for Marvelous right now. Or my pal Joe Christopher, still with us. He listened to Rogers Hornsby one spring -- hit .300 two years later. GV

Ed Martin

8/2/2018 10:58:48 am

Re: Samuel was a journeyman second baseman, functional. The Mets trading genius traded away the only center fielders they had and stuck him there. He almost was killed by flyballs. The resident genius also had no right handed, good, hitter in the year after 86 WC when they released Ray Knight, WS MVP and got rid if Kevin Mitchell for bad influencing, probably justified. But with no replacement the Cards’ curveballing lefty and others around the league, tied them up. Result, one night stand in WS. Sigh.

George Vecsey

8/2/2018 01:57:44 pm

There were justifications for the other horrors. Ryan was young. Seaver was unhappy with contract from M. Donald Grant. Cone could qualify for the old Branch Rickey adage of "Better a year too soon than a year too late..." This one was just awful. Oh, right, and Kevin Mitchell was a bad influence on Doc and Darryl. GV

ED Martin

8/2/2018 03:28:57 pm

I am glad to see you hated losing Cabrera. During the All Star run up I compared his batting stats with the other second basemen chosen as backups, very comparable, about 18 hr, and well on the way to 80-90 rbis, without another decent b.a. on team. Have not seen him field and know he was converted to 2B so that may have been a weak spot. As batters, I would draft “The little sisters of the poor,” with a couple of holdovers. By the way, the resident genius had a good rep at Balmer, but didn’t show me much. Grumble, grumble, (what old guys do.)

Rick Taylor

8/2/2018 04:03:54 pm

Listened to Tuesday's game on satellite radio coming back from vacationing in Maine. Stopped listening before the end of the 1st and stopped checking the score once Washington got 14 runs ahead. Been a Mets fan since I was a little boy, 63 now, and will continue to follow the Titanic in Flushing but as I said to a friend of mine the other day," disdain the team, love the game."
Rick Taylor
Bristol, VT

George

8/2/2018 04:30:21 pm

I did give up on Mets a month ago. So why am I yammering? GV

Alan Rubin link

8/5/2018 07:57:19 am

I grew up a Yankee fan in Manhattan's Washington Heights when there were three NYC teams. Although my sport of interest has been soccer for over fifty years, I still keep an eye out for the Yankees and Mets.

I started following the Mets when Josh became a fan as a youngster One of my favorite photos is of him sleeping with a Mets hat and a smile on his face.

I have been asked to re-post my comments from the Daily News topic as it came very late, #41. I'm happy to do so as anything that appears positive is a welcome addition to any Mets thread.

Great review of some of the history of a great newspaper. Every other word brought back fond memories.

It seems ironic that in an age of easy and instant communication, it is becoming ever more difficult to obtain reliable news. Six media corporations control 90% of the market in the United States. In addition, a significant segment of our population either have only one source of news, or ignores any reporting contrary to what they believe.

In the 1940 and 1950’s, when I was in middle and high school, my mother read the NY Times, Herald Tribune, PM, Cristian Science Monitor, NY Post and some others. I never quite grasped what she did with all this information, but I had access to some great sports reporting.

This coincided with the beginning of excellent TV news coverage where facts, differing opinions, and respect for others, were the norm.

Sy Syms’ “An educated customer is the best customer” could also be read as “An educated voter is the best voter.” Instead we get voter suppression and misinformation.

I started working in my father’s retail appliance store at age ten for $.10 an hour. Since then I worked in industry, including summer jobs, for fifteen years and ran the family retail appliance store on Manhattan’s Upper West Side for forty years. After retiring fifteen years ago I have been mentoring small businesses.

Regardless of one’s background, level of education or income earned, I found that most people have an understanding of the issues and can make reasoned decisions.

It is very disturbing to see what is happening to the Daily News and other papers around the country. The Berkshire Eagle in western MA is an encouraging exception to the current trend.

Just over two years ago, four LOCAL investors purchased the paper from a hedge fund based in the southwest. The hedge fund had been shrinking everything about the paper to reduce its costs in order to make the Eagle attractive to a buyer. The Berkshire Eagle had always been profitable.

Since then, everything has been beefed up, including adding staff and consolidating two production facilities into the Pittsfield plant. World news still comes from major news feeds, but several investigative reporters were hired. Things are still a work in progress, but its quality continues to improve.

Although Berkshire County is mostly liberal, the Eagle always has a healthy number of conservative letters to the editor and some Op-Ed’s.

The Daily News headline “FORD TO CITY: DROP DEAD” had a very negative impact upon my retail business. The store at the corner of 98 Street and Broadway was looted during the July 13, 1977 NYC blackout. When President Carter was elected later in the year, he was influenced by Ford’s tough approach and was not sympathetic to the plight of the businesses that were looted.

My daughter Jen’s book about the store and the Upper West Side has just been published.

https://www.rubinjen.com/we-are-staying--the-book.html.

It begins with the looting related to the blackout, but also tells the story of an immigrant and his arc over many years that mirrored the ups and downs of the Upper West Side.

George Vecsey

8/5/2018 10:06:06 am

Alan, thanks for your always thoughtful comments. I look forward to reading Jen's book, since I know how you dealt with the blackout and your love for the city. Be well, GV

Ed Martin

8/5/2018 12:24:02 pm

With Wheeler reincarnated, Synegard, De Grom, Matz, occasionally, may he find the way, and a “day of rain,”. (Old timers may recall in 1948 when the Boston Braves won th NL pennant with, “Spahn and Sain and two days of rain.” Hang on to De Grom and find some people who can hit more than .250. None in Friday’s lineup, one In Sats victory, plus the rookie, who got 4 hits.

Glad to hear about the Berkshire Eagle, the area is a citadel of cultures, pine variety of citadel. We make an annual pilgrimage, high
Ighted by a lovely garden party hosted by L.I. Patron of the arts and N.Y. State Regent, Roger Tilles. Entertainment, the worlds most honored string quartets, “Tokyo,” “Emerson” and this year “Shanghai.”
Such a neighborhood deserves a good newspaper!

Alan Rubin link

8/5/2018 10:22:27 pm

Ed--Berkshire County is blessed with so many World Class venues including Tanglewood, Jacob's Pillow, Shakespeare & Company, the Clark Museum, Norman Rockwell Museum, Mass MOCA, several theater companies and more. There is something to do almost every night of the summer. This is what keeps us going during the winters.

Maybe we can get together one of the times that you are up.

Ed Martin

8/5/2018 10:57:03 pm

Thanks, Alan. It will be next summer if, as the old saying from Bama goes, “The good Lord’s willing and the Creek I learned lately, the Creek does not mean flooding, as I assumed, but rather the Creek Native Americans.

8/5/2018 10:59:16 pm

“If the creek don’t rise.”

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Free Jacob DeGrom -- For Mercy, Not Salary Dump

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