Thursday, May 16, 2013
Silva: Time to End the Collins Era and Bring On Backman
(metsmerizedonline.com)
...and Wally dug the Mets out of the basement.
Read More...Backman is known to be a great motivator and teacher. He won’t wave a magic wand and make this 4-A squad a contender, but I guarantee the players will maximize their potential- whatever that may be. He can manage a bullpen, and certainly will run a clean clubhouse. He will demand respect and a winning attitude. The Mets may not win under Backman, at least not right away, but they will compete. This is not what I can say has been the case 100% ...
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1 2 >And again, I've been following him since his Mariners days. So it's not like I'm new to coverage of him.
EDIT: OTOH, the fact that the author of this story is Ken Davidoff (one of the very few New York sportswriters who I respect) gives me at least a moment's pause.
Isn't this one of those attempts at irony that might have failed?
This bore repeating, censoring and all.
I'm not big on overpaying players because at one point you underpaid them. After all, you don't hear about players sucking and en masse giving millions back. But to let the price of a backup middle infielder get in the way of this is stupid, especially when yammering about it can only hurt your leverage. I don't think it puts the Mets in a hole, but it can't possibly help.
But, it's the Wilpons' fief, and Dickey apparently declined to do a personal appearance for Fred. That's about all it takes.
The Eddie Murray effect. If you don't kowtow to reporters, you're a bad guy.
Yeah, but except for the last year and 6 weeks,the Red Sox have been competitive for quite a while. If this was a ownership that gave the indication they knew their butt from a hole in the ground, I would cut them some slack for leaking this stuff. I don't think the word "Amazin'" applies anymore. Maybe "Regretable".
The hit job in the Post was strange though.
The Mets aren't even the worst jagoffs front office in their own division.
And most people have said that a good trade is defensible. The issue has been the public slamming of Dickey by the Mets in an attempt to save face if they do trade him.
Mind you, I do not agree that they can't contend next year. There is no powerhouse divisions in baseball, and if there was it is in the Al and on the west coast. The NL east, even with the Nationals performance last year, isn't a division that screams impossible to compete.
Good point.
That was really stupid; there's no way to win a PR war with Dickey. Everyone loves the guy, probably because he's awesome. I feel like that one had Jeff Wilpon written all over it.
You'd think Davidoff would actually report the bad stuff Dickey said, which presumably is determinative for his argument.
If he's writing for the Post now, he has lost the benefit of the doubt. Apparently, he aspires to be the new Dick Young -- or the new young dick.
Normally, I would never read the reader comments at the Post, but it is interesting to see that they are running around 9-1 in favor of "Davidoff is an ass".
Not that this would make the assessment more accurate, or fair. But it does add to our knowledge in an interesting way.
The Mets wont give the reigning Cy Young winner coming off a 140 ERA+ season (3 years 129 ERA+, 616 IP) an offer higher than $20M?
If Dickey can’t control his verbiage at a holiday party — “Folks, not today, not with the kids here” was all he had to say to reporters — then how would a full season of uncertainty feel? How many times would Dickey spout off publicly? Or work behind the scenes to make the Mets look bad and boost his own brand?
I think I am going to fucking throw up.
Eso, take a deep breath. I don't think anyone thinks a single thing about politics when they think about the Post's sportswriters. I personally think of blocked, overflowing, putrid toilets in old Shea.
And based on your offensive screed, I see no reason to give you the benefit of the doubt either, as you are just another poster who pointlessly throws politics into sports thread, just to stir up dust. Go back to the OTP thread.
My initial fear was that the players may get fed up that he sucks the entire media oxygen out of the room and aggressively marketed himself through the NY press while the team was going through another horrid season. Hearing how great he is and that the rest of you stink can be hard to take for an entire summer.
Too bad the Wilpons who were too ignorant to see that the cult of RA Dickey helped knock the Madoff financial mess off the sports pages.
Esoteric, The Post is known for sensationalism and low quality, regardless of politics. Yes, they do get stories right sometimes, too.
Totally agree. Furthermore, the trading partner may want to discuss an extension with Dickey. He'll certainly be less willing to help the Mets out by agreeing to an extension with the new team after hearing this. It does not seem to be the case, however, that an extension is being discussed with Toronto. Probably doesn't help their image with other ballplayers and potential free agents, too.
You know this would have been a lot better if you would have given Davidoff's response to the question.
Look, it's dumb for this thread to devolve into a "you suck/no you suck" flame war, but you don't get to just drop that sort of accusation on me and walk away. I'm the OPPOSITE of a person who throws political arguments into sports threads -- I basically run shrieking from politics on Primer at this point -- meanwhile that is precisely the sort of thing you do nearly all the time. Therefore for you to level this accusation at me is irony writ large.
For the record, I get the point (that others have made) that the Post is a sensationalistic paper...but so is the Daily News. So are any and all tabloid-style dailies. I never really thought of their sports section as sharing the same sort of irresponsibility as their straight news coverage.
On top of that, isn't it logical to think that the writer would maintain his level of quality/standards instead of changing that level just because his paychecks are coming from someone else? At least until he proves differently.
But... it IS what you did here. I personally recognize you don't post in the OOTP thread, and knew that as soon as Srul wrote what he did. It doesn't change that that's what happened this time.
I thought I remembered you saying that Romney would win easily. A simple search shows this
Ken is still a liberal that lives on the West Side of Manhattan.
Perhaps this got the ball rolling - from the NY Times 26th September:
Dickey’s narrative, in this way, has engulfed all others on the team. But the Mets, while aware of the possibility for tension among other players, are adamant that it does not exist within the clubhouse.
“In R. A.’s case, right now, this is kind of a special thing,” Manager Terry Collins said Wednesday. “I know most of the players understand what it means and what it is. There’s always going to be some guy that maybe takes it the wrong way. But you can’t please everybody.”
And then is response his to say 1.) Esoteric, you have no credibility as a person, either; 2.) Go crawl back into the OTP cesspool you slinked out of. I mean talk about about giving me both barrels disproportionately.
Besides, isn't there a more important point here: that some people on the Mets may actually think Dickey is a primadonna? Whether rightly or wrongly so?
That would be an empty point. You accused Srul of bigotry because you believe his political leanings influenced his judgement of the Post. It seems clear to me that your political focus is just a bit tight and misguided.
Anyone else reading between the lines there? I'd find it very surprising were the implied message true, and something that reflected poorly on those people. But if it's true it's true.
Except for the rather important point that Srul didn't say what you perceived him as saying. His problem with the Post, vis-a-vis sports, is not that it's a sensationalist right-wing rag. It's simply that it's a sensationalist rag. IOW, you interpreted what he said incorrectly and as a result, it was you and not Srul who did the politics-injecting. You see that?
Now: back to badgering Bob Tufts into cutting out the cryptic hints and outright telling us what the response was to his inquiry about how other people in the club felt about Dickey during his late season run.
What may have changed? Perhaps items that caused the NYT article. Perhaps there were more than a few people that weren't on board with the drive for Cy. Perhaps Mets' management has been dropping more negative tidbits for reporters to pick up as part of the hardball negotiations process with Dickey.
Again: I'm a massive fan of his (which says a lot considering he's spend the last three years with The Mets!), so I'm not accepting that as proof of his moral failing; in fact, as I said earlier, I'm instead inclined to believe that it just means those people should get over themselves. But there's no question that this is a rather interesting new data point, insofar as it suggests that Davidoff isn't just pulling his angle out of thin air (or doing the bidding of the front office's PR goons).
Accepted.
Bu this:
is B.S. I am NOT one of the regular politics-injectors. The only thing I am notorious for is injecting Hawaii references, particularly in the Winter.
This reads to me like R.A. isn't the one who's being a dickey.
You dog, you!
Enjoy being above sea level while you can! (HAHA See what i did there!)
enh...it's not funny cause parts of Hawaii will always be above sea level.
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