Roster of Rubbish? I know some people were down on who joined Armisen on stage…but this is ridiculous!

And Collins’ team isn’t winning. So you should understand why he might be losing it. He turns 64 later this month. He was run out of Houston and Anaheim. There is no next managing job. This is more than his last best chance. It is just plain his last chance to prove he is a good major league manager.

...For if you know whether Collins is a good manager or bad manager based on his Mets ...

...and Wally dug the Mets out of the basement.

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% ...

The Valdespin: Misdirection and diversion.

On Friday night, with the Mets down a sizable margin to Pittsburgh, Valdespin admired his ninth-inning home run. We all knew what was coming Saturday: the outfielder was sent up as a pinch-hitter and promptly got drilled by Pirates pitcher Bryan Morris.

Valdespin was greeted to crickets in the dugout, and the hit-by-pitch wasn’t met with retaliation. Some fans and media personalities – including WFAN radio’s Mike Francesa – got all over the ...

And had an increase in workload of more than 766 tries in the previous seasons!

Most Wins with Mets, 1983-2013 Draft Picks

1. Bobby Jones: 74-56
2. Mike Pelfrey: 50-54
3. Rick Aguilera: 37-27
4. Jon Niese: 37-36
5. Dillon Gee: 23-19
6. Aaron Heilman: 22-23
7. Jason Isringhausen: 21-24
8. Bobby Parnell: 17-19
9. Pete Schourek: 16-24
10. Jeff Innis: 10-20
11. Joe Smith: 9-5
12. Matt Harvey: 7-5
12. Dave Telgheder: 7-5

Now you get an idea of how rare it is for Harvey, a 2010 first-round pick, ...

The Mets have reached a deal with free agent outfielder Rick Ankiel.

Ankiel, the pitcher-turned-outfielder, was hitting .194 but had five home runs in 25 games before the Astros released him. Ankiel, 33, could provide pop at a time the Mets are looking for a boost. He was on the way to St. Louis to join the Mets during a series vs. the Cardinals, one of Ankiel’s former teams.

The Mets’ outfield has been an issue since before the season. GM Sandy Alderson answered “What outfield?’’ in answer ...

Megdal’s latest…

Each of his first two years, Collins has been fortified by an unexpectedly strong start. The Mets were 46-45 at the All Star Break in 2011, 46-40 at the break in 2012. The second half each season was an unmitigated disaster, but Collins had, at least, a period of overachievement to point to during otherwise glum late-season postgame news conferences. Collins got credit for managing with what he had, and he deserved it.

This year, he’s working with a team that is, on paper, ...

They said he rides the train to Orioles…

If Ike Davis doesn’t clean it up quickly in the cleanup spot, ticket him for a trip to Triple-A Las Vegas.

The Mets cannot afford to waste Matt Harvey’s starts. They cannot afford to have Davis continue to strike out in crucial situations.

Manager Terry Collins is counting on Davis to drive in runs, and he put the first baseman back into the fourth spot yesterday. The clock is ticking. If the lefty doesn’t hit, he could be sent down to the ...

#8 Johan Santana, 2012 – Game Score: 90

#4 Al Leiter, 1999 – Game Score: 86
Leiter threw 135 pitches that day — he threw 120+ pitches eleven times in 1999 — in a performance that should go down as one of the Mets’ best all time.  He was never pretty, walking four, but he sure got the job done.  A little more than a year later, he would throw 142 pitches in Game 5 of the 2000 World Series.

#2 David Cone, 1991 – Game Score: 99

You spend a good piece of your Met season gripping a Vodka Collins and in the end it turns out that it was the other way around all the time.

The countdown on Terry Collins began on the first day of pitchers and catchers and nothing so far has made it any easier to believe he’ll be back with the Mets in 2014. Of course, Collins has handled his lame-duck status with grace and maturity — he’s an honest guy, good with people — but that hasn’t stopped Sandy Alderson from letting his ...

The Marlins eventually won, 4-3.

Here you had what ought to have been a taut, exciting affair, but the alarming thinness of both rosters meant, really, that neither team was up for it.

It started back in the sixth inning. Matt Harvey, the Mets’ ace, entered the inning having thrown 99 pitches. Harvey did not locate his fastball with his usual precision, but thanks to a slider that more than made up for it, he had his team ahead, 2-1. Typically, a young pitcher who’d struggled through five ...

(pulls out Dr. Feelgood/Bums Rush)

The NY Mets have been the Humpty Dumpty of the National League since missing their shot at greatness in ’06, when Carlos Beltran’s frozen mime impersonation on a called third strike ended the NLCS against St. Louis.

It’s been a broken cipher of coaching changes, blown division-leads and minimal talent. The final fall came when they sat on a wall with Ponzi-python Bernie Madoff.

The Mets have been rebuilding and preaching patience ever since.

... ...

This almost makes up for Darling’s “The Great Escape”/“The Sand Pebbles” Steve McQueen mess up from the other day.

Today’s game on SNY (the home of the Mets on TV in New York) between New York and the Dodgers featured riffs on “Dodgeball,” Darling’s fellow Hawaiian-born major leaguers, and lastly, a rant about the guys who cover the NFL Draft, which featured an old wrestling catchphrase from Ron. Cohen and Darling were talking about SNY pre-empting a potential game broadcast featuring Met ...

“Hi, I’m David Wright. I invite you to the…

New York Mets Third Baseman David Wright has been selected as Major League Baseball’s official spokesperson for T-Mobile® All-Star FanFest, the world’s largest interactive baseball fan event, to be held at the Jacob K. Javits Center from Friday, July 12 through Tuesday, July 16. Wright joins a distinguished list of MLB stars who have served in this role including Torii Hunter, Derek Jeter, Albert Pujols and Justin Upton. In addition, Mets ...

“It is all over his face.” (psst…don’t tell Murray Chass)

When I look at players who have been surprises, the one that jumps out at me the most. I can’t really even say it is that big of a surprise. What Matt Harvey is doing for the Mets is phenomenal! I say it’s not that big of a surprise because of what I saw out of him last year. I said he is the closest thing I’ve seen to Roger Clemens come along. Not just his stuff. But more importantly the way he carries himself on the mound. That ...

Jeez…Travis Bickle spent more time playing a Sport than Travis d’Arnaud.

Mets prospect Travis d’Arnaud has a non-displaced fracture in the first metatarsal of his left foot and is currently in a walking boot, Mets reporters (including Marc Carig) were told Thursday in Colorado. The highly-touted catcher is heading back to New York to be further examined.

D’Arnaud, 24, missed the last few months of the season with a torn PCL in his knee last season, holding him to only 67 games.

In those 67 ...

“And then swept off the Mets” sez Carlos.

Just after 6 p.m. Tuesday, Rockies owner Dick Monfort walked by the media cafeteria. He was no longer hunched over or limping from shoveling snow for four hours.

While his effort was admirable, it raised the question of why team employees were needed to clear Coors Field, delaying the start of the first game of Tuesday’s scheduled doubleheader with the Mets by 2 hours, 2 minutes.

Colorado swept the doubleheader, winning the first game 8-4 with Todd ...

Now where is my fully nucleationed copy of Doug Morris’ “Frigid Digit”?

Kind of like the Supreme Court on obscenity, the Mets will know it when they see it. Or feel it . There is no set criteria by Major League Baseball for it being too cold to play a baseball game, Sandy Alderson said Saturday, before the Mets played the Twins in 36-degree weather.

“Twenty-eight, 26, I don’t know where you draw the line,” the general manager said. “Nine would seem to qualify.”

Alderson was ...

In other news, I am monitoring Kate Upton. Up in a tree. With binoculars.

When the Marlins traded Jose Reyes and Josh Johnson to Toronto last November, Mets officials began asking one another questions that remain in their minds today: Can we get Giancarlo Stanton?  Would we trade Zack Wheeler to do it?

According to three team sources, the Mets then spent time at the winter meetings debating whether to make Wheeler available in a variety of trades, including for Arizona’s Justin Upton and ...

Ike Davis, future hitting coach.

“I feel great, I’m seeing it great and I swung at one bad pitch [Monday] and that was basically it,” Davis said. “I’m fouling back a lot of pitches I should hit. Once I actually start hitting those pitches instead of fouling them back, that’s when I start to get hot.”

President of the “Bring Back the Boater!” movement investigates.

The only thing visually different was the new marketing hats the Mets broke out, with their garish orange brims that had the look of Oriole beaks, and the funky, white-trimmed, almost indiscernible “NY” on the peak.

So, yes, it must have been the hats. You certainly can’t blame Dillon Gee for this loss. The 26-year-old righty, making his first regular-season start since last July 7, when doctors discovered a clotted ...

 
‏@AdamRubinESPN
.@CMPunk to throw out ceremonial first pitch at Citi Field on Friday. Never heard of him, but he has 1.6M followers, so maybe I should have.

First pitch on Friday, first to beat The Undertaker on Sunday.

Well…Piazza did say he was a James Dean type in his freakishly out-of-step book.

Longtime big-league catcher Mike Piazza will make his ballet debut on May 3 as the gangster in Miami City Ballet’s production of George Balanchine’s Slaughter on Tenth Avenue at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts in downtown Miami.

I’d be less inclined to believe this had I seen it on Monday, but it doesn’t appear to be an April Fool’s joke. From the release:

  Piazza will not be dancing, ...

As players, managers and front office executives embrace the esoteric statistics, teams increasingly want their radio announcers just as fluent in the language of WAR, VORP and B.A.B.I.P. (Those stand for wins above replacement, value over replacement player and batting average on balls in play, for those of you dusting off your radios as the season begins.)

“They wanted a broadcaster who is at least comfortable with exploring the idea of discussing advanced statistics and what they mean,” ...

CLUELESS MAWhat’s your relationship with the Wilpons? HAD THANKLESS JOB

In this week’s Q&A, Steve Serby hurls some questions to Bobby Valentine — the former Rangers, Mets and Red Sox manager who joins SNY’s on-air team as an analyst for its pre- and postgame coverage starting Opening Day. Valentine will be paired with lead studio analyst Bob Ojeda and host Chris Carlin. [...]

Q: What’s your relationship with the Wilpons?

A: Fred and his wife have always just been class acts to ...

The Dear God/Another Mets Season Project is a global platform for sharing inner hopes, fears and aspirations through the medium of prayer.

It’s a drab, uninspiring team from the starting lineup to the rotation to the bullpen, but at least they’ll look good. The 2013 Mets have eliminated all traces of black from their uniforms and replaced it with the traditional blue and orange. For home games they’ll wear the occasional blue jerseys with an orange “Mets” across the chest, and—who says the ...