Tag: jacob degrom

Mets Drop Doubleheader; Wheels Are Falling Off

On By themetssiah5 Comments

Final Scores (For both pathetic games): Pirates 3, Mets 1

Yesterday, the Mets disproved the popular notion that doubleheaders are fun. They are in fact sad.

Game 1: It was literally the exact same story in both games. Steven Matz battled. In the first inning, he gave up a leadoff triple to Josh Harrison, and Harrison wound up scoring on an RBI single by David Freese. After giving up back to back singles to start the third inning, Matz got a strikeout, and then got Jung Ho Kang to hit into a double play. In the 5th inning, Josh Harrison hit a leadoff single and stole second base. Then Andrew McCutchen drove him in to make it 2-0. But Matz managed to wiggle out of that inning and limited the damage. He admitted he had nothing in this game, but he still went 5 innings and gave up only 2 runs while striking out 8.

Steven’s performance on the mound just didn’t matter. The Mets had no offense to speak of. Jon Niese shut them down over 7 scoreless innings. They loaded the bases with two out in the fourth inning and Michael Conforto struck out. He’s been awful lately. It’s bad. Steven Matz tripled with one out in the 5th inning, and the Mets couldn’t get him home. What a joke. Curtis Granderson hit a solo home run in the 8th inning. I’d like to celebrate it, but Grandy has been terrible. He’s batting .200. It’s a problem.

Game 2: Jacob deGrom experienced the exact same lack of support in game 2. He battled through 6 innings and gave up 3 runs with 9 strikeouts. He gave up a single to Jordy Mercer in the second inning and then a double to Sean Rodriguez. Cole Figueroa followed that with an RBI ground out. Chris Stewart then singled on an infield ground ball that was deflected by Asdrubal Cabrera. That run made it 2-0. The game felt over as soon as the Pirates took the lead. That’s just the way it is with the Mets offense lately. DeGrom gave up a fifth inning RBI double to John Jaso that made it 3-1. Jacob pitched fine. The Mets just can’t score. They had four damn hits. Kevin Plawecki hit an RBI single in the fifth inning. They had no other opportunities. Everyone is either injured or ice cold.

Déjà Vu Kinda: I cannot believe the 2016 Mets regular season is 2015 Déjà vu all over again. Well it’s kind of Déjà vu. It’s the same in the sense that we are decimated by injuries and the offense is historically incompetent. The difference is last year before the season, I said with confidence “umm hello, we need an impact bat. Why didn’t we get one?” I knew and most fans knew that without that bat we’d be screwed. And of course as soon as we landed one the season took off. This spring training, I said “umm hello, we can’t depend on David Wright and Travis d’Arnaud for anything at all. They are hurt every season. And we have no backup for Lucas Duda so he better not get hurt.” I think those things were fairly obvious before the season started. The problem is the impact bat solution was fairly straightforward and the solution for injury prone regulars is not straightforward at all. As much as depth is important, it’s challenging to build a team through external acquisitions where you carry extremely talented replacements for key regulars. The primary way to account for the injury prone regulars problem is by having a stacked farm system with a bunch of internal solutions. It’s a major luxury and not many teams have it.

We’ve Got Nothing: To further emphasize that point, all you need to do is look at the Cubs. Outfielder Jorge Soler just got hurt for them and they put him on the DL. So what are they going to do? They are dipping into their farm system and calling up Albert Almora another top 100 prospect who plays the outfield. When the Mets dip into their farm system their fingers wind up in an ice cold bowl of Soup. The point is, the only real way to prepare for injuries to regulars you depend on like Wright and d’Arnaud is by having big time minor league talent at Triple-A. The Mets unfortunately lack position players at Triple-A in areas of need. Dilson Herrera is a top second base prospect. The Mets can’t squeeze him in to help. Period. There’s no where to put him. Same goes with Brandon Nimmo. He’s crushing it right now in Vegas. He’s an outfielder. There’s no room at the inn folks. I guess we could bench Granderson considering he’s batting .200. But there’s no chance that happens. The season will be up in flames in late August before the Mets consider benching an outfielder that helped get them to the World Series and makes 15+ million dollars. The Mets may need to find a way to turn Brandon Nimmo or Dilson Herrera into players that fill positions of need. I don’t want to trade them and the front office probably won’t because they don’t live in Panic City like I do. But there’s no room for these guys right now, and we need help.

Let’s Put This To Bed: In April/May when the Mets had that stretch where they led the league in home runs, fans were panicking that the Mets were dependent on the home run. An equal number of fans were calling these fans out for being idiots, and they were regularly reminding everyone that home runs are the best method of scoring in baseball (like that takes a goddamn rocket scientist to figure out). Well now we can see what the Mets real problems are. The Mets offensive struggles are due to injury and the lack of any quality depth. They have nothing to do with a dependence on the home run. That being said, even when the Mets were hitting lots of home runs, they still ranked very low in overall runs scored. In conclusion, you can hit a lot of home runs as a team while simultaneously having a fundamentally flawed offense that lacks quality depth and the ability to consistently score runs. The Mets are living proof of that right now.

Shut Up About Conforto: Michael Conforto is in a slump, and this isn’t about him facing left-handed pitching. The guy is a young player, and he’s slumping. Period. He’ll turn it around. It may take him a while. He’s super young and growing pains were bound to happen. This is baseball.

My Thumb: Juan Lagares said it will probably be a couple more days before he tries to swing. He added that surgery is not a definite plan even after the season. At this point, I’m just going to add a daily reminder to all my posts that playing short handed is dumb.

Bastard: Antonio Bastardo surrendered a solo blast to Jordy Mercer in the bottom of the 6th inning of game 1 of the doubleheader. He now has a 4.13 ERA. I think we’re starting to see why the Pirates didn’t have a tribute video for his return to PNC Park. I think we’re starting to see why he was sitting on the free agent scrap heap late in the offseason. Meanwhile Tyler Clippard is dominating in Arizona. Ehh Eric Campbell, Ty Kelly, Antonio Bastardo. Juan Uribe, Kelly Johnson, Tyler Clippard. Tomato, Tomahto.

The Pitchers Are Better Again: When Matz hit that triple in game 1, I imagined Eric “Taxi Squad” Campbell watching it from his hotel room and realizing he should probably just stay there for game 2. Remember last season when our pitchers were objectively better hitters than our top backup position players for like two months? Well it’s happening again.

The Plan: What’s the plan? The plan is to batten down the hatches and wait out this offensive funk until fresh supplies arrive. Yoenis Cespedes, Michael Conforto, Asdrubal Cabrera, and hopefully Curtis Granderson won’t be in funks forever. We have a lot of injuries, but these veterans must perform. They will eventually. Until then, we watch these awful games and survive off of Spam and cans of beans (James Loney and Wilmer Flores). The ship will be righted. I think.

Today: Wow we really can’t beat the Pirates. They swept us last season, it feels like they are going to do the same thing in this series. It’s okay. Let’s take a deep breath. We still hold a wild card spot. We still get to play the NL Least all the time. We’ll just keep beating the bad NL East teams and hopefully at some point we can beat some other teams. Any team other than the Phillies, Marlins, and Braves will do. Noah Syndergaard faces top Pirates pitching prospect Jameson Taillon today. I picked up Taillon in fantasy for next week. I’m expecting the Mets to get shutout as are all residents of Panic City. Poor Thor. Can we get him a run or two?

The Mets Are Officially Painful To Watch

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Final Score (in 13 torturous innings): White Sox 2, Mets 1

The Quick and Dirty: Jacob deGrom pitched a brilliant ballgame. He went 7 innings, gave up 5 hits, 2 walks, 1 run, and struck out 10. Unfortunately, he surrendered a solo home run to Todd Frazier in the top of the 7th inning and with this anemic Mets offense that was a guaranteed death blow. Poor Jacob. The pen was stellar as well. Addison Reed, Jeurys Familia, Antonio Bastardo, Jim Henderson, and Hansel Robles combined to pitch 4.1 innings of scoreless ball. Last night’s loser Hansel Robles came in to pitch the 12th inning, retired Tyler Saladino, and then keeled over in pain. Apparently he twisted his ankle or some crap. He left the game and Logan Verrett came in. Verrett got out of the 12th, but in the 13th he surrendered a double to relief pitcher Matt Albers. Then he threw a wild pitch and let Albers get to third base. Jose Abreu then hit a sac fly and that gave the White Sox the second run they needed. Sox won 2-1.

So Embarrassing Part 1: I already typed it, but it’s worth re-typing. Logan Verrett surrendered a leadoff double to relief pitcher Matt Albers, Albers advanced on a wild pitch, and scored the winning run on a sac fly. Are you freaking kidding me? That might be the Metsiest thing the Mets have done all season. Total loser trash ending to a total loser trash baseball game.

So Embarrasing Part 2: Yoenis Cespedes didn’t start today’s game, so it’s not that surprising we couldn’t score at all. The Mets only run came on a second inning RBI single by Rene Rivera. The Mets offense collected 13 walks in this game. The Elias Sports Bureau said they became the second team since 1893 to draw 13+ walks and score 1 or fewer runs. The other was the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1953. Jesus H. Christ.

They hit into 5 double plays. Curtis Granderson walked in the first inning and Asdrubal Cabrera hit a single to get him to third base. They had runners on the corners with no outs and failed to execute thanks to a Michael Conforto strikeout and a Neil Walker double play. They squandered opportunities thanks to double plays in the fourth inning (Ty Kelly) and fifth inning (Grandy). Other than the 8th inning, the Mets really didn’t threaten the rest of the way. Grandy came up in the 11th with two men on and two outs, but flew out. Asdrubal led off the 12th with a walk and Conforto instantly hit into the fifth double play. It was a brutal day at the ballpark.

Playing Short: In the 8th inning with one out, James Loney singled and Juan Lagares walked. The Mets had a real chance to take the lead and hand the ball to Familia. But because they are playing short handed, the Mets couldn’t pinch hit Yoenis Cespedes for Ty Kelly. Wilmer Flores was the only infielder left on the bench, and I guess Terry was too worried to play without any infield option left. I would have been scared too quite frankly considering we can’t score for shit and everyone keeps getting injured. And what did Kelly do? Double play. He stinks too, but we already knew that when they called him up.

So Embarrassing Part 3: The White Sox came into Citi Field on goddamn crutches, bleeding out, struggling to breath, with their season spiraling out of control. After the Mets took game one of this series, the Sox had lost 7 in a row and 15 of 19. They leave Citi in an all out sprint ready to conquer the world. Looks like Robin Ventura gets to keep his job a little longer thanks to his old team.

Jesus Christ Conforto: Michael Conforto is funkalicious right now. Actually that sounds like a good thing. Let me clarify. He’s in a terrible funk. He went 0 for 6 with 4 Ks. He’s going to have to adjust because the league sure has. He will.

Fan Interference: In the 6th inning, James Loney hit a ball down the left field line and a fan interfered. Melky Cabrera would have caught it in foul territory and the umps agreed. People who interfere at baseball games should be taken to the dungeons at MLB headquarters and spend the rest of their days in solitude. For the record, the dungeons are right below the MLB replay review center.

The Answer was Three (Or One): So the answer to the question “How many injured starters does it take to turn the Mets offense back into the anemic 2015 version?” is three starters. The absence of Travis d’Arnaud, Lucas Duda, and David Wright has finally taken its toll and the Mets are back to being the worst offense on the planet. Also an alternative answer to the above question is one injured starter when that guy is Yoenis Cespedes. Without him the Mets have no chance.

What Do We Do?: Sooooo this was a brutal homestand. We lost 4 of 6. I mean it’s the same story over and over again. We have nobody to step up for these injured players. Kevin Plawecki and Rene Rivera can’t hit. Eric Campbell couldn’t hit. Ty Kelly can’t hit. Wilmer Flores can’t hit. And right now Cespedes and Conforto ain’t hitting either. I have no idea why the Mets didn’t do exactly what the Cubs did. The Cubs had arguably the leagues best starting position players last season. And they had some of the best backups as well. What did they do? They kept all those guys and signed Jason Heyward, Ben Zobrist, and re-signed Dexter Fowler. They’ve had major injuries, and they have the depth to make up for it. The Mets let Daniel Murphy walk, Kelly Johnson walk, Juan Uribe walk, and they dumped Ruben Tejada. The only reason they signed Alejandro De Aza was because they thought they weren’t signing Cespedes. We all thought Wilmer would at least hit off the bench. But he’s regressed into oblivion. What do we do? We wait for Sandy to make one, two, three moves and pray. This roster ain’t going to cut the mustard and Duda/Wright/d’Arnaud may never come back. Seriously. Lucas Duda is out for months. Terry said yesterday that d’Arnaud isn’t even close to a rehab assignment. And David Wright is the most dunzo of all these guys. Every time Terry talks about David it feels like he’s reading his eulogy. He’s got his lower lip trembling with sadness permeating in his voice. Just awful.

Tomorrow: Day off tomorrow to mourn after that horrible loss then off to Miami. I’m shocked that we only went 14-15 in May. June is looking like it’s going to be a lot worse. Goddamn Mets. Of course Matt Harvey and Jacob deGrom start to kick things into gear right as we finish making headstones for three of our starting position players.

Grandy Saves Familia On deGrom Velocity Reunion Night

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Final Score: Mets 6, Dodgers 5

Here’s the short recap: Jacob deGrom pitched a great game, the Mets hit some dingers, Jeurys Familia came in to pitch in a 5-1 non-save situation and blew the game. Then Curtis Granderson saved the day by hitting a walk-off solo blast in the bottom of the 9th. It was one hell of a ballgame.

DeGrom Velocity Reunion Night: Let’s start with deGrom’s night. Jacob has been good all season long, but he hasn’t been dominant. In 2016, his velocity has been down and his command has been slightly off. That being said, unlike Matt Harvey, Jacob has had strong results all season. Last night he finally took a huge step towards a return to dominance. He gave up a sac fly in the third inning and wiggled out of trouble in the 4th and 5th inning. But he was hitting 96 MPH consistently on the fastball and averaged 94 MPH. His command was good, and his secondary stuff was working. He went 7 innings, surrendered 3 hits, one run, and struck out 7. His 3 walks were slightly out of character, but still this game was an extremely promising sign for the direction his season is going. What if deGrom completely returns to form? DeGrom, Steven Matz, and Noah Syndergaard? Daaaammmnn.

Juanny Beisbol: The Mets got off to a nice start on offense. Asdrubal Cabrera had a one out single in the first. Then with two outs, Yoenis Cespedes walked. Then Neil Walker doubled in a run and Juan Lagares doubled in two more. 3-0 before you could blink. Juan came through big time all game with 3 RBIs.

Blasty McBlastersons: The rest of the offense was the Mets typical blast show. Solo bomb from David Wright (4-1) and from Juan Lagares (5-1).

Oh No Familia: As I mentioned, Terry brought in Jeurys Familia in a non-save situation. He had all the velocity you could ask for on his fastball last night (97-98 MPH). But he ultimately just got rocked. A couple of soft singles to Adrian Gonzalez and Howie Kendrick. Then with one out Yasiel Puig singled and Familia walked in a run to make it 5-2 when he walked Yasmani Grandal. Familia then struck out Trayce Thompson for the second out. But in true scripted fashion, Chase Utley came up with bases juiced and roped a double to score 3 runs and tie the game 5-5. Familia got the third out to keep the game tied. But he got rocked last night. Terry took a lot of heat postgame for bringing in Familia in a non-save situation. Terry said F-U to everyone. Bringing in closers in non-save situations can be a thing. Sometimes guys don’t have the same focus, and it messes with their results. My problem with that theory for Familia is he’s always focused and always elite. I think last night he just got rocked. Bad nights happen. My real beef is the same one I always have with Terry. I’m worried about overuse. If you bring him in for saves, non-saves, rainouts, special occasions, birthday parties and everything else, at some point he’s going to fall apart. Only Mariano Rivera had the superpower to pitch forever. Everyone else has limits.

Grandyman Saves The Day: Familia’s bad night was immediately nullified by a leadoff walk-off solo blast to right field off Grandy’s bat in the 9th inning. After striking out 3 times in this game he saved the day. He’s been at the damn Mendoza line all season with that .200 average, but he still comes up so big. We need the Grandyman. He’s part of the winning formula.

Rook: 19 year old rookie starter for the Dodgers Julio Urias pitched bleh. He was basically yanked right away, but he’ll have a great career. Frankly I was surprised he didn’t shut the Mets down because rookies always shut us down. Maybe the problem was he was a notable rookie. Usually it’s the obscure rookies that show up and pitch complete game shutouts.

Happy Birthday Terry: Yesterday was Terry’s B-Day. Happy 67th birthday to Terry Collins. He’s the oldest man in a Mets uniform and the only one that doesn’t consistently get back spasms. Speaking of Collins, he was in rare form pregame. On the first base question, he officially poo pooed the idea of moving someone to first base. He said “This isn’t junior high school where you put the fat kid over at first.” That’s an early leader for Cantankerous Old Terry quote of the year.

wright soup back

Secret Back Transplant: David Wright hit a solo blast last night. He has homered in his last 3 games. You may think it’s a random resurgence, but my sources tell me last week Eric Campbell finally agreed to take part in a controversial back transplant performed by head trainer Ray Ramirez at the Hospital For Special Surgery. Soup agreed to give up his strong young back to David to lengthen Wright’s career. Bless Soup. He finally came through as the hero we needed.

Find Yourself: Wilmer Flores is staying in the minor leagues until the end of the weekend to find his swing and his glove at first base. The guys on a freaking scavenger hunt. And on the first base front, Terry Collins squashed the Michael Conforto to first base talk (which he originally started). “Right now Michael has a lot on his plate and I don’t need to add more to it.” Thank you Terry. Thank you for using your brain.

Today: 86 Reunion! Noah Syndergaard! Chance to win another series. Let’s Go Mets!!!

Series Preview: LA Bums Come To Town

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I know the Brooklyn Dodgers were the Bums, but I can’t pass up an opportunity to use that hilarious Daily News front page hobo caricature in a post. Plus, as a Mets fan I’m legally required by the Wilpons to pay homage to the Dodgers in some way in every single thing that I do all day long. Fred can’t get enough of his Brooklyn Dodger shrines, memorabilia, and everything else. So that image is for old Fred Wilpon. Once he pays off the final $58.3 million dollars that he owes to the Madoff trustee, maybe he can save up enough to buy the Dodgers and get the hell out of New York. Speaking of Da Bums, the Dodgers are 5-5 in their last 10 games. They lost 3 out of 4 to the Angels in Anaheim. They lost 2 out of 3 to the Padres in San Diego. Then they swept the stanky Reds at home. They have quietly drifted 4.5 games back from the first place even year Giants. They face the Mets at Citi and then they head to Wrigley to play the Cubs. Yeesh. I don’t envy that stretch of games. I hope we can keep up our winning momentum at home.

Pitching Matchups:

Game 1: Jacob deGrom vs. Julio Urias

The Dodgers are finally calling up their 19 year old lefty phenom pitching prospect Julio Urias. He’s been dominating the Pacific Coast League to the tune of a 1.10 ERA. That’s the same league where Ty Kelly was hitting like .390. In other words he’s dominating in a hitter’s paradise. Last July, Jacob deGrom shut out the Dodgers in New York over 7.2 innings with 8 Ks. In LA a couple weeks ago. deGrom pitched 7 innings and gave up 2 runs. He battled through jams all game.

Game 2: Noah Syndergaard vs. Kenta Maeda

This is a reboot matchup from the series in LA. Last time out Thor pitched 8 innings, struck out 6, and gave up 2 solo blasts (Corey Seager and Yasmani Grandal) which accounted for the only runs. Thor also hit two dingers (solo and three run shots) off of Kenta Maeda. Maeda took the loss after giving up those 4 runs over 5 innings. Unfortunately for the Mets, Syndergaard was the only source of offense in that game. Since that start though Maeda has struggled. He took a loss against the Angels giving up 4 runs in 4 innings, and then he gave up another 4 runs over 5 innings against San Diego. Maeda is 3-3 with a 3.29 ERA.

Game 3: Bartolo Colon vs. Clayton Kershaw

Kershaw is destroying everyone. He’s 7-1 with a 1.48 ERA. He pitched a complete game shutout against the Mets in LA with 13 strikeouts. We should probably try and win the first two games of this series. Bartolo took the loss in LA going 5 innings and giving up 5 runs. It was an ugly start. But in July 2015 at Citi Field, Bartolo dominated the Dodgers over 8 innings surrendering only one run. Hopefully he fares better at Citi on Sunday.

Things To Look For:

Hot Dodgers: Despite his crummy .234 average on the season, Howie Kendrick is hitting .318 in his last 7 games. Yasiel Puig and Chase Utley are both hitting .308 in their last 7 games. Trayce Thompson, who hit the walk-off blast against us in LA, has 7 home runs and is hitting .282 on the season.

El Mariachi Loco: Adrian Gonzalez is hitting .227 over his last 7 games, and he missed some games last week with a bad back. He’s got the backiosis like every single player on the Mets. Supposedly he will be fine for this series, but I’m just disappointed we won’t get to hear his stellar LA walk-up song El Mariachi Loco. Maybe the Citi Field DJ can play it just one time. It’s straight fire.

Grandforto: We face the lefties Urias and Kershaw. Terry really loves benching Michael Conforto instead of Curtis Granderson when we face lefties. Grandy is 2 for 14 against Kershaw lifetime and Juan Lagares is 0 for 10. Nobody is going to hit Kershaw, but Conforto needs to be in the lineup. With all these injuries, we can’t afford to sit our competent major league bats.

Big Pimpin’: On Tuesday Yasiel Puig crushed what he thought was a dinger, but it stayed in the yard. He admired the shot and ended up with a single. Dave Roberts yanked him from the game. I’m totally fine with the bat flip culture and pimpin’ home runs. But these are the cases where you need to draw the line. You can’t be costing your team extra bases like that. Puig admitted he screwed up. He really seems to screw up a lot.

Big Timed: In a recent Dodgers/Marlins series, outfielder Joc Pederson (who leads the team with 8 dingers) had a chance to meet his idol Barry Bonds. He went up to Barry, asked if he could take a picture with him, and apparently Barry big timed the hell out of him. Barry straight up turned away and didn’t respond to the request. That’s literally the most insane thing I’ve ever heard. I cannot believe people who live on the same planet as I do, big time people. Not responding to someone in that situation is literally refusing to acknowledge that the person speaking is another human being that breaths air. I’m pretty sure if a deranged hobo came up to me and kindly asked to take a picture because he thought I was Babe Ruth, I would do it. I always kind of thought Barry just got a bad rep in the media because he ticked off a few people, and they consequently decided to paint the picture that he was a dick. Well this story unequivocally confirms that Barry Bonds is a piece of garbage.

Wilmer Reunion: Wilmer Flores is supposedly coming off the DL this weekend and joining the Mets. I have to believe he will immediately take over as the full time first basemen. Good? I guess? He’s better than Eric Campbell that’s for sure. I’m not looking forward to the adventures of Wilmer over at first base. Quite frankly it’s more realistic to expect Matt Harvey to magically figure out his problems than it is to expect Wilmer to be a competent first basemen. At least Harvey has had actual tangible success on the mound before. Wilmer’s been booting grounders since he was a teenager. But who knows, maybe he will surprise everyone.

’86 Reunion: This Saturday is the 1986 Mets reunion game. Supposedly they are going to do a video tribute or something and a bunch of ’86 alum will be showing up. So long story short, if you are looking to bump some rails after the Mets game on Saturday night, look for Keith and Lenny Dykstra in the Citi Field McFadden’s bathroom.

Mets Camp is Quiet; Too Quiet

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The top stories of Mets Spring Training so far have been:

1) Yoenis Cespedes owns nice cars and drives them to camp.

2) Cespedes made waffles on the first day of camp and probably flipped the whisk once he crushed breakfast.

3) Jacob deGrom tripped while running (probably with Jerry “Magoo” Blevins) and then his deGroin hurt for 12 hours but now its fine.

4) David Wright has the spine of an 80 year old man and can’t ride the bus on spring road trips because that makes it hurt.

5) Cespedes wears his hat backwards and Terry Collins does not like that and plans to tell him.

That last story about Terry planning to confront Cespedes over his backwards hat is almost not believable. I mean maybe we don’t know all the details. Maybe the back of the hat smelled and Terry couldn’t stand the stench. Or maybe it wasn’t an actual Mets hat. Or maybe Cespedes met Terry at a church for a funeral and refused to take his hat off. I mean if a backwards hat is an actual problem for Terry and other elderly managers, then I think I see how he got the reputation as a clubhouse “distraction”. I guess Terry has been too distracted by the orientation of Cespedes’ hat to notice that the team spends half the day standing in the Tradition Field parking lot staring at Cespedes’ rocket cars.

Listen, I am not complaining about the lack of news coming out of camp. No news is good news. All I’m saying is stay alert. Keep your head on a swivel. Don’t get caught off guard because we are Mets fans and the other shoe always drops. Speaking of the other shoe dropping, today is Spring Training physical day where Ray Ramirez checks the players for testicular lumps. I think physical day should just be cancelled as absolutely nothing good can come out of it.

Also, runner up for top story of camp was the arrival of Fred Wilpon’s dog Blue. Blue’s full name is Jackie Robinson and undoubtedly lives in a doghouse modeled after Ebbets Field. And his doghouse reeks of Kirkland Signature dog food or “whatever is on sale”.