Ace High

I'm not a big fan of Jason Stark. Especially after his nonsensical defense of Roger Clemens. What a sellout.

But I must admit, in his latest column he makes a great point in regards to the Mets and Johan Santana. Simply put, Santana takes a team that won 185 games the last 2 years to an EVEN HIGHER level:

As you watched Johan Santana overmatch the Phillies on Friday in his first visit to Philadelphia as a Met, it was hard to resist asking this question:

What if he'd been a Met last year?

Suppose the Mets could have sent Santana out there to save the season on the last Sunday of regular play. Or to prevent one of those seven straight losses to the Phillies down the stretch.

How different could things have been?

Unfortunately, Jason, we were stuck with another lefty named Tom "I still love Atlanta" Glavine. And we see what happened.

He continues by stating:

How much of a difference might Santana make this season in the life of the NL East? Well, it's still about five months too soon to answer that one. But Santana gave quite the spectacular sneak preview Friday in the 6-4 Mets victory. The score -- and his final pitching line -- bore no relationship to how dominating he actually was. For seven innings, Santana carved up the Phillies, dialing up a 10-strikeout, zero-walk two-hitter that was ridiculously efficient.

No Philly hitter went to the plate with a runner in scoring position. The only three-ball count was against the first hitter of the game. And among the 24 hitters who arrived at home plate and the 96 pitches they saw whooshing their way, it was hard to count more than five good swings.

Exactly. Every 5th day the Mets will send someone to the mound who can win the game all by himself. A true stopper.

And that's all this team needs. There will be no epic collapses as long as Santana is in the rotation. He neutralizes the lefty-heavy Phillies lineup. He stops the Braves in there tracks. That's all the team needs. A true ace.

How stupid do those Mets fans that booed him look now. Idiots. Holla back.

Tragic...

From ESPN.com:

A fan died at Shea Stadium on Tuesday night when he plunged from the railing of an escalator, the New York Post reported for Wednesday's editions.

Antonio Narainasami, 36, of Brooklyn was sliding down the railing when he lost his balance and fell two stories to the concrete on the loge level, sources told the Post. His two daughters were with him at the time of the accident.

Narainasami was taken to New York Hospital Queens, where he was pronounced dead.

"We have been advised of a tragic accident that resulted in the death of a fan attending tonight's game," said a statement from the Mets, according to the Post. "The Mets, the City Parks Department and the New York Police Department are investigating the incident. Our deepest and heartfelt condolences go out to the fan's family."

The accident reportedly happened at 10 p.m., after the Mets beat the Nationals.

A cousin, Vinnie Narainasami, told the newspaper that Antonio Narainasami was a huge Mets fan.

"Even his kids were into them -- they all went to see the game," he said, according to the newspaper. "He was really excited. It's his favorite team, basically."

Just sad.

Big Mike

Great game for the Mets. I think we are in for a roller coaster of a year. Today we saw a lot of good. The return of Jose Reyes (in terms of being a spark plug) , the flashes from Wright's ability to carry a team, the return from Sanchez for the first time in 21 months, and the encouraging start from Big Mike Pelfrey.

He had possibly his best game to date. Granted it was against one of the weakest teams in baseball, but lets hope that this will be a sign of things to come. He looked like he was much more relaxed and seemed to trust his stuff. He has the goods to be in the mold of a Roy Halladay, Brandon Webb or even Chien-Ming Wang, which is the type of pitcher that gets outs by generating weak contact from batters. He will never be a big strikeout pitcher. But he can definitely be the kind the pitcher that pounds the strikezone and creates groundball contact. Lets hope he continues his growth this year, especially with the news that Pedro may be out until mid-June. You can navigate the season with one weak 5th starter, but you can't with two. Big Mike may hold the key to a successful season.

Jackie Robinson Day

On this day 61 years ago, Jackie Robinson stepped on the field and forever changed to face of baseball and the face of a nation. It took a lot of courage on the part of Branch Rickey, the Dodgers and Jackie Robinson to defy the collective conscious of the country and bring to a crashing fall the color barrier that divided a sport and a country.

Click here for coverage of Jackie Robinson Day.

Jackie Robinson became a symbol of all that was right and wrong with America at that time in history. He gave black people like my uncle and grandfather a reason to cheer for a team and a renewed hope that things would change. It is no coincidence that most of the elders in my family are/were Dodger fans. It is also no coincidence they they all hate the Red Sox (last team with a black player) and the Yankees (who thought black players could not meet the high "Yankee standard").

I asked my grandmother a while back why she became a Mets fan. And her answer was, "Well there's no way in hell I can be a Yankees with their racism against black players. The Giants and the Dodgers moved. Then the Mets came and I used to go to the games at the Polo Grounds and Ebbets Field and the Mets were so bad. But I liked them anyway. So I kept following them after that."

In some strange way I think my grandmother's hatred for the Yankees was genetically passed down to me. Made me into Mets Brotha. And while I don't HATE the Yankees, I do have issues with this whole idea of "Yankee standards" and the "Yankee way of doing things." The higher the horse, the harder the fall I guess. I can't wait for that fall, it's going to be a doozy lol.

Holla back

They're Not Focused Mannnnnnnn!!!!

Right now the Mets are like a cloudy lense on a 10-year old Canon camera. Out of focus and the picture ain't too pretty.

Case in point. With a 6-2 lead in the fourth inning of Sunday's game against the Brew Crew, my main man (not to be confused with Maine, man lol) Ollie P. heads to the mound and promptly implodes. He's only able to go 4 and 1/3 innings and gives up 6 runs.

Here's my thing... if he had been throwing strikes and the Brewers were just giving him the bidness, I can deal with that. But he wasn't throwing strikes. He was trying to be cute on the field like Madonna in League of Their Own. There's no crying in baseball, Ollie!

The funny thing is the Mets can survive a blowup from Ollie P. every once in a while. I mean it's sorta inevitable with the guy.

What they can't survive, however, is their total lack of cojones in clutch situations. As I noted before, the only player who has shown any ability to hit in the clutch this year is Angel Pagan. And when a guy who wasn't even projected to make the club out of spring training is your best clutch hitter... well... in the immortal words of the Apollo 13 crew - "Houston, we have a problem."

Same game that Ollie blows up, the Mets hit into 5 double plays. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot.

No. New York, WE have a problem. Jose, Jose Jose Jose is on the mend and wasn't showing too much life anyway. Beltran, as good as he is, still baffles me with some of the pitches he lets whiz past him. Delgado, while looking better than he did last year, is still showing signs of slowing down. D. Wright has been OK but nothing special.

So in comes the Nats. Lo Duca has been spitting off at the mouth. Milledge is motivated to play against his former team. Looks like a couple of babies are just asking for a good old-fashioned spanking. It's time for the Mets to pump it up and get focused.

Tell 'em Joey:



Holla back.