Willie Watch1. How much time will Willie Randolph be given to get the Mets on track? If it were up to me, Randolph would get no more than 50 games, but I expect GM Omar Minaya to give him most or all of the season. That way, Minaya would try to save his own job by shifting the blame to Randolph at season's end.
Indeed, Minaya has still avoided criticism for releasing Ruben Gotay (blamed on Willie) and for again failing to improve the bullpen.
2. Speaking of Minaya, Brian Bannister, whom Omar could not wait to get rid of, is now 3-0 with an 0.86 ERA after his complete game victory yesterday. Of course, Elster assures us that this does not count because the (7-5) "Kansas" City Royals are not a good team like the (5-6) Mets.
Perhaps one days a Mets starter will pitch a complete game.
Meanwhile, Heath Bell - another Omar castoff - has a 1.04 ERA through 8.2 innings in relief as the Padres 8th inning setup man. That's nearly as good as Aaron (6.23 ERA) Heilman.
3. Prior to yesterday's game, which I had the misfortune of attending, I felt like a kid peaking out of the 7 train to peer out at Citi Field. Between the new stadium and the new Kosher Subway on Jewel Avenue, Queens has not had this much anticipation since it hosted the World's Fair.
4. On Friday someone in Genoa, Italy found this site via the following Google search (in bold):
is the jews community yankees or mets?I cannot express how infuriated I was - and still am - by this search.
Why would "the Jews community" be for either the Yankees or Mets? Do all Jews live in the New York area?
Of course not. There are Jews in lots of places, even "Kansas." Indeed, there is even a New York-phobic Jewish community in Baltimore that is so frightened by the prospect of being engulfed by New York Jews that they have decided to welcome gangs and individual violent criminals into their neighborhoods.
Unfortunately, Baltimore's high crime rate has failed to dissuade New Yorkers from moving there. Apparently, some New Yorkers remain nostalgic for the good old days and thus feel quite at home in middle of the Baltimore crossfire.
posted on 4/14/2008
