Appetizing

Some of you have been offended by the puking pumpkins and the ugly fish. Never let it be said that I don't listen to your concerns. So to find the picture that truly speaks 1,000 words about the Mets 4-1 victory over the Marlins, which included a key hit by Carlos Beltran, another gutsy ... if not crisp ... outing by Oliver Perez, and a huge cushiony home run by Carlos Delgado, one must go to what they know. And that win was tasty.

Better than puking pumpkins, eh? I mean, who doesn't like cheeseburgers?

Oh, right ... vegetarians. Don't worry, I have something for you too.

Whichever way you want to order, this win was appetizing ... mouthwatering even. And before you start thinking "you know, Metstradamus is reaching here with the food references. There's no way that food can be relative to Tuesday night's victory, can it?"

Well, food is relevant not just to be pleasing to your eyes, but it plays on the words that Chris Russo gave us on Tuesday during his ... "show". I paraphrase:

"You know, when a team like the Marlins plays for its dinner, they can be dangerous."

But when a team like the Mets play for their dinner, children go hungry? What does that mean?

It's simply more of the same negative slant that our friends at WFAN drive time deliver. When the Mets win a game the tone is "Yeah, good win, let's not get crazy." Marlins win, it's "Oh, they're scrappy and hungry and they like food. Shame on the Mets for not liking food. The Mets don't care about starving children."

(Come to think of it, that sounds like some of our esteemed commenters. Hmmmmmm.)

Next, Mad Dog will tell you that Oliver Perez must hate food because he hadn't won a game in a month before Tuesday night. He must stink. No wonder he's so skinny.

***

They say that John Maine has a mild strain in his rotator cuff. I guess that's good news since he may go on Sunday. But I tend to think that where rotator cuffs are concerned, no strain is mild.

***

The final nine games against Atlanta will be Teixeira-less, as the great Atlanta sell-off has begun. How are your World Series picks looking?

Teixeira can now channel his energy towards beating the Yankees in the playoffs.

A Nadir At Every Turn

Is this the way the season is looking?

Keith Hernandez said at the head of tonight's game that last night (Wednesday) was the nadir of the season.

Keith failed to realize not only that nadir is much too fancy a word for me, but that a nadir is only as low as your next game, when you go to the hill with your ace and still lose.

So this is the nadir now, right? Sure it is. Until Friday.

So ... team, is it all right to boo now? Now that Ryan Howard is heating up, the Marlins (a team that makes less than Carlos Delgado and Luis Castillo) are steaming towards June in first place, and the Mets are closer to last place than they are to first place while everybody is calling last rites on you and you've given us no reason to believe otherwise, please do us all a favor and lay off the "boo hoo why are we being booed so much" rhetoric until you can get Larry Jones and Mark Teixeira out, or perhaps string together a few hits off of Odalis Perez, Tim Redding, and f***ing Jorge Campillo?

Your 2008 N.L. East Preview: Part One

Today, we begin our preview of the National League East by looking at what should constitute the bottom half of the division.

It's easy to dismiss the Florida Marlins as 2008's permanent resident of the N.L. East cellar. After all, their best two players are in Detroit gearing up for a World Series run, while the average age of the Marlins roster is the lowest in the league at 12 (it would have been 7, except for Luis Gonzalez.) But remember that we all had the Nationals as 120 game losers last year (not me ... I had them at a much more reasonable number, although it was still well off). And on paper, the Marlins have a better starting staff coming into '08 than the Nationals had going into '07, with former New Jersey Net Mark Hendrickson (who was once posterized by Michael Jordan), Scott Olsen (who was once posterized by the Miami Police), and super-phenom Andrew Miller leading the way.

The Marlins strength this season might be in the bullpen, where Kevin Gregg was a pleasant surprise as their closer last season after Jorge Julio took another step towards oblivion. The combination of Gregg, Matt Lindstrom (who will continue his assault of the Mets while Jason Vargas is on the shelf for four months), Taylor Tankerseley and Justin Miller had 272 K's in 260 innings pitched. And don't forget Logan Kensing, who was injured for much of '07.

And the Fish will be able to hit some too. They finished a respectable sixth in the N.L. with 790 runs scored, and making their returns will be guys like Hanley Ramirez (who as far as I can fathom, still hates the Mets and everything about them), Dan Uggla, and Josh Willingham. The problem is who's not returning: Miguel Cabrera and his 119 RBI last season. His replacement will be Jorge Cantu, who's going to have to close his eyes really hard and pretend it's 2005 when he drove in 117 runs for the Devil Rays. And as we all know, it's hard to hit a baseball with your eyes closed.

What's going to sink the Marlins to the bottom of the standings is the fact that the top three in their rotation just isn't going to be able to give the bullpen enough quality starts to try and finish off. And the fourth and fifth starters are going to wind up being Rick VandenHurk and Ricky Nolasco. Uh-oh.

While I'm not ready to peg the Marlins for 120 losses, I am ready to buy a housewarming gift for their permanent '08 residence in the cellar. I hear lava lamps are making a comeback.

Marlins: 64-98

***

The Mets this offseason have become the Ronald Reagan of baseball ... supplying weapons to the enemy. Between Paul Lo Duca and Lastings Milledge, the Washington Nationals scare the ever loving life out of me. (Did you know that Milledge already has a fan club in DC?)

Besides motivation, the Nats have all the ingredients for a surprise season. New ballpark. Solid manager. And most importantly, they have one of the budding young superstars in the game in Ryan Zimmerman. The Washington Nationals could contend into September. But there are some questions for me concerning the Nats:

• There are some divergent personalities in that clubhouse ... and as Bobcat Goldthwait once said: "Either this is really going to work or this is really gonna suck." Will they come together and have slumber parties where they break out their fuzzy pajamas, roast marshmallows and sing campfire songs? Can Elijah Dukes, Paul Lo Duca, Dmitri Young, Lastings Milledge, and Ronnie Belliard et al share a clubhouse without driving each other crazy?


• And speaking of Lo Duca, you had Brian Schneider guiding a very patchwork starting pitching staff towards a respectable season in 2007. So what will a change in catchers do? Is Lo Duca's fiery style what guys like Matt Chico, Jason Bergmann, and Tim Redding need to take the next step towards respectability? Or will this pitching staff prove to have a need for Schneider's easy hand and fall apart under Lo Duca?


• How are the Nationals going to turn their extra first baseman (and as of right now it's Dmitri Young) into some parts that will improve the club like, say, starting pitching? And can they even do it? Young hovered close to 300 pounds this spring, and Nick Johnson outplayed him in the spring by a large margin. Can Dmitri even bring back anything in a trade? Or will he just be put on waivers so that the Braves can pick him up?

Nationals: 80-82

***

Speaking of the Braves picking guys up on waivers, I have to be really careful here to not assume that Atlanta snaring Ruben Gotay is going to shift the balance of power in the National League East, or change what I'm about to write. My pessimistic self is tempted to do it, but I'll refrain. Here's why:

I think the Atlanta Braves are overrated.

(Blesses self and makes sure lightning doesn't strike him)

There's no reason to cry and whine about how everybody and their mother is picking the Braves to win the N.L. East this season. It only seems that way. The fact of the matter is that there are are plenty of people out there picking the Mets. But there are an awful lot of pundits that are picking the Atlanta Braves. I understand why ... it's because there are a lot of people who look at the names on the jerseys and want to believe that it's 1995.

And yes, Mark Teixeira is damn good. Anyone who's in his prime and shows an ability to go .300/.400/.500 more than once is deserving of your praise and your awe. And Tim Hudson is back to being a legitimate number one starter. Players like Chipper Jones and John Smoltz have hit those kinds of numbers often. And that's the problem. The Braves are a team that collectively have hit their ceiling. There aren't a lot of guys that are primed to improve by a significant amount, while with all of the old/injury prone guys that the Braves are counting a large amount on, there's potential for disaster. Let me ask you this: If the Mets were headed into this season with the core of their team all over 35 years old, how many people do you think would be picking the Mets to win?

I'll go one step further: If the Mets were headed into this season with a third baseman who has consistently missed a good amount of games in the last four seasons, a pitcher who has missed the last two seasons in full, a 40-year-old pitcher who has had nagging injuries during the spring, and a 42-year-old pitcher last seen giving up seven runs in a third of an inning, how many people do you think would be picking the Mets to win? Certainly not as many as are picking the Braves right now, I'll tell you that.

I think the Braves are a third place team. But put a gun to my head and ask me to predict whether the Braves will break into the top two or the bottom two, then believe it or not I'm guessing lower. Outside of Hudson and Teixeira, the major components to the Braves are old, brittle, or both. And unlike seasons past, Andruw Jones ain't walkin' through that door. (Some might say that these days, Andruw Jones needs margarine to merely fit through the door.)

Braves: 82-80

Part two comin' soon! (Considering the season starts Monday, it would have to come real soon, wouldn't it?)

The Phrase Of Hate

"Only time will tell..."

You hear that all the time when you're watching television. A serious looking face comes on your screen and says something like "Will I be hit by a truck? Will a meteor hit the earth? Will Lindsay Lohan drink again? Only time will tell."

"Only time will tell" is the literary equivalent of a shrug of the shoulders. "I have neither idea nor insight." So you understand how painful it is for me to type what I'm about to type:

Only time will tell (shudder) if Willie Harris is going to be a footnote in this 2007 season, or a thorn for all time. It depends on what the Braves and Mets do during the time that is left (and "time" isn't a nebulous throw away term...the time we're talking about here is a finite about of days and games left). Today, Willie Harris is their Endy Chavez. In time (you know, the time that will only tell), he may become our new Terry Pendleton.

Larry Jones is there already. And he, of course, was up to his old tricks, hitting a three run bomb (and I mean a flippin' bomb) off of John Maine which turned the game on its ear (it's amazing how when I see Jones play against others, the pain in his thumbs make him wince and grimace like he was David Wells at a vegan convention...but against the Mets all that pain seems to wash away like he's taking a Calgon bath or something.)

Mark Teixeira is getting there. Not only for his home run which followed Jones', but for prevention of a Luis Castillo RBI triple in the fifth inning...the same inning in which Fluff Castro popped up with the sacks full to end the inning...and how much more damaging than one run would that frame had been without Teixeira's diving play down the line? Yeah, he's getting there.

But it's always the one that you never expect. I was in the stands when Pendleton ripped my heart out of my chest and fed it to Tom Pagnozzi in front of everyone. I can absolutely tell you that I never saw it coming. The thought never entered my mind that Pendleton would hit a ball that crossed the plate at his ankles out of the ballpark. And it never entered my mind that Willie Harris would rob Carlos Delgado of the tying home run in the ninth. Never would I have thought he would have done that twice in the same game after robbing Moises Alou of a double in the first inning...again preventing a small inning to grow and blossom into a large one.

I wasn't in the stands for this one, although my cat probably would have wanted me there for all the soft objects turned into projectiles around Casametstra today. But that's the way it goes in the big city. One minute, Oscar Villareal's cab is taking him to Yankee Stadium, the next he's getting his first save on any level of professional baseball...against the Mets, of course. But that save was equal parts Larry, Tex, and Willie Harris. At 3.5 games ahead, the world isn't ending. The meteor isn't hitting anytime soon. Or has it already hit the Mets season...

"Only time will tell."

Old Men Need Oxygen

But when the old men need oxygen because they're sprinting around the bases at a high rate of speed, that's a good thing. It was certainly a good thing for Damion Easley today. Unfortunately, Easley (and Moises Alou, who only had to travel 180 feet) needed to be hosed down after his jaunt around the bases on his inside the park home run in the seventh inning. But fortunately...he hit an inside the park home run in the seventh inning.

(Give Alou a break though...poor guy has been doing nothing but running into walls and running into Lastings Milledge non-stop for the last 48 hours, yet still had the energy to get three hits in the last two days.)

It's fun to have games like the one we had this afternoon, a 12-4 victory over Milwaukee with one of our plethora of fifth starters going...this time Brian Lawrence, who got his first win since Game 3 of the 1979 World Series (that's exaggeration speak for August 16th, 2005). Not only is it fun because of the bushel full of runs scored, but because the other team is having fights in the dugout instead of the Mets, which is not a good sign for the other team, but a good sign for us. (Heck, I don't know another team that wouldn't fight after giving up an RBI ground rule double to Jorge Sosa...I would want to kill my manager after that, too.)

Lawrence will be cheered for his efforts today, a five inning outing in which he struck out three and didn't walk anyone, giving up three runs. It's all about perspective, as Mike Pelfrey had a similar outing against Washington last Saturday, giving up three runs in six innings, walking one and striking out five. Pelfrey, with his electric but straight fastball, was booed off the mound. While Lawrence, with his surgically repaired slider, gets an A for effort.

Lawrence was outpitched by a third of an inning. No, not by opposing starter Chris Capuano, but by Pedro Martinez down in Port St. Lucie. Martinez threw 50 strikes out of 67 pitches, and said that he felt better as he went along (while only hitting 86-88 on the radar gun so far). It's still a long road ahead for Pedro, but at least he's actually on the interstate, and not off the beaten path. And yes, I will still act as if Pedro does not exist until he takes his act to a major league stage...only for my own good.

I would also prefer to act as if this new and improved Braves lineup with Mark Teixeira doesn't exist either, but unfortunately it does. At this time, they have wiped out a 5-1 Astros lead with relative ease, proving that this is going to be a lineup that the Mets are going to have to reckon with the rest of the season. Which is bad because now that TBS has decided to put a microphone near Chatterbox Bobby Cox in the dugout, his voice is starting to grate on me like nails on a chalkboard. And I'm about to put my head through a damn wall. And the more runs the Braves score, the more I'm going to want to bleed through my eyes. This can't last.

And Willie Harris is starting to really get on my nerves (lousy Woody Williams...)

Looie Love

People will paint the Luis Castillo trade as the Mets responding to the Braves' trade for Mark Teixeira, and attempt at Octavio Dotel. And that's silly because I'm sure Omar Minaya was working on this long before those deals went down. It's not like Omar was watching ESPNEWS and saw that little box that said "Braves Trade For Teixeira Pending, Omar Had Better Get to Work", and all of a sudden brushed the cookie crumbs off of his Aquaman pajamas and rushed to the phone.

But knowing that the Braves were hot on the Tex trail meant the Mets had to do something...but they were going to do something anyway. And Castillo is just what they needed. I've wanted Castillo for years. Don't believe me? Comb through my blog. You will find plenty of evidence of my man crush on Castillo. I work with a Twins fan. When the Twins initially got Castillo, I cursed that guy out. He didn't deserve it, as it was a classic case of transference. But that's how much I wanted Luis Castillo.

Remember, this isn't merely an upgrade at second base. If it was solely about second base, then Ruben Gotay would hit eighth for the rest of our natural lives and we'd be finished. But this trade was about the two hole. Paul Lo Duca wasn't given a chance to be the regular two-hole hitter, and for the life of me I couldn't understand it. Lo Duca isn't the same hitter this season as he was last season, but in part I think it's because of his changed role in the lineup. Instead, Jose Reyes has had a revolving door behind him, and it's been no small coincidence that you would see Reyes stranded at third base every first inning. Castillo ends the revolving door once and for all, and once everybody gets healthy (I'm talking to you, Mr. Abdominal Strain), that lineup becomes as stable as the Rock of Gibraltar, or any old rock you want to name, for the first time since last season.

The move also strengthens the bench without trading for a bench guy, as Gotay provides versatility along with Damion Easley. And Jose Valentin can even play some outfield along with second base when he gets back. Anybody who thinks that these guys aren't going to play a big part with the Mets down the stretch just hasn't looked at the team's medical reports lately.

It may not be the last move the Mets make until tomorrow at 4PM (perhaps there's some bullpen help coming as Tampa's Al Reyes is a possibility), but it will probably be the biggest move the Mets make. And while it isn't as big as the Teixeira deal, it's big in that it may have just as much of a ripple effect on the Mets lineup as Tex will have on Atlanta's lineup. So game on.