Reese Kaplan -- Baseball Was Back (Warts & All)

With the weekend of hometown baseball rivalry alive and well on broadcast media, it finally felt like the game was back and normalcy was returning...kind of.  It wasn’t until the scores appeared, questionable defense arrived and mostly decent pitching counteracted the bad things happening on the field that it began to feel like a somewhat normal pre season game. 

For about three hours no one was talking or thinking much about the pandemic, the change in team owners, the roster composition nor the outcome of the game.  It was about watching the players on the team you love in competition.  It was about seeing rookie manager Luis Rojas handling the lineups and the strategies.  It was about talking to your fan friends (with over 100 messages passed back and forth online).  It was as close to a pre-pandemic reality as we can get.

Of course, those non issues like team ownership are still there.  A-Rod inserted one of his athletic feet into his mouth by kissing up to fellow owners when he advocated the use of salary caps (fully contradicting how he felt on the receiving end of the enormous paycheck he received as a player).  That highly embarrassing statement has quickly pushed him from the front to the back of the list of people the fans would like to see in charge of the club.  Granted, A-Rod alone can’t singlehandedly make salary caps happen but his indication of thinking in this cash-poor position already has people questioning whether or not he’d be good for the team.

The other potential buyers seem much more focused in getting deals pushed into the Round 2 of bid proposals than they do in sucking up to the league and fellow owners.  They know there’s plenty of time to make headlines good or bad if they win the bid.  Consequently they are doing the diligence necessary to be considered viable contenders rather than becoming bigger celebrities than the players who make up the team.  What was it about 24 and 1 that the WIlpons used as an excuse not to pursue the man now hoping to own and run the team?

There were some good notes in the first of the two games.  Rick Porcello turned in a highly credible pitching performance despite a floater that masked Clint Frazier deposited over the wall.  He suffered the bad defense that will plague the team this year and got precious little offense in return during the eventual 9-3 loss on Saturday.  It kind of felt like a real Mets game in which the team was begging for runs while pitchers and glove men gave them away.  

On the plus side from the bullpen was a commendable outing by Jeurys Familia who danced around bad defense to turn in a highly credible performance.  It’s just a pre season game and too soon to declare the aberration of 2019 a distant memory, but it certainly felt good seeing him retiring hitters.  Even the much maligned Edwin Diaz was throwing major heat.  

What wasn’t as good were the taxi squad members showing why Uber driving may be their long term future.  Believe me, as Mets fans if we have to see the likes of some of the very distant 30 at CItifield this year, the 60 games will seem longer than 162 (and not in a good way).  Yes, Jeff McNeil and Wilson Ramos were on a scheduled day off, but the reinforcements were not filling anyone with anything but anxiety and trepidation.  Thankfully the pre season results don’t count in the standings for the so-called real season.  

Yes, it’s just later this week that the Mets will begin the 2020 season for real and everyone is looking forward to whatever that means.  A pennant would be great, but I think most would settle for playing competitive ball that brings them into the extended post season.  From there it’s a matter of who plays best, who manages best and who has the drive to take them all the way.  This year will add in the variables of who will make it happen and what the DH will do to the results.  It’s going to be a strange season.