Remember's Ramblings - September 9, 2024

 

Remember’s Ramblings – September 8-9, 2024   

 

                               

As I was sitting on the bench being the 26^th guy on a 26 man team, watching the likes of Reese, Tom, Mack, Ray, and Paul carry this team to the blogsphere championship, I was summoned into a pinch-hitting role to write a Monday morning article. 

So I immediately did what anyone else would do and try to find some data on what other good pinch-hitters did for their cameo appearance.    Unfortunately, there is not a lot of readily available info to help, but in the limited time that I had for research, I found a couple little tidbits:

• Mark Carreon is still the career leader in Mets pinch hit home runs with 8.
  
  
• Ed Kranepool hit .485 as a Mets pinch-hitter in 1974, which I understand to be an MLB record for all pinch-hitters with at least 30 at bats in a season. 

I also got thinking about some of the other Mets pinch hitters including Rusty Staub.   An interesting fact that you can use as a party conversation starter:    Staub and Kranepool finished their respective careers with pinch-hitting batting averages of .276536 (Staub on 99 for 358) and .276923 (Kranepool on 90 for 325).  

Of course the best of the best in pinch hitting duty was never a Met – I did find that Manny Mota is considered the best career pinch-hitter for three different teams – the White Sox, Pirates, and Dodgers.

On to some of Remember’s other Sunday musings

I have not been particularly active in Mack’s comments lately as I just returned from a great two and a half week drive across country to Seattle to see the grandkids (and my daughter and son-in-law).    I tried to read the articles daily (when I wasn’t driving), but am unable to comment on my phone – not sure why.   Back at the computer now,  you’ll probably be seeing some more Remember 1969 comments sprinkled in – and perhaps a pinch-hit article now and then.     

 Hot topics    

The two biggest topics of late are the Mets run to the post season and what players will they have in 2025.   I am not going to go too deeply into either as the other great writers have been covering them very well – how ‘bout Paul Articulate’s great mathematical analysis of the Mets chances the other day!   That was classic and must be checked at the end of the year. 

It was interesting that most of the year I have been thinking that the first (last?) team to 87 wins will gain the last wild-care slot in the NL, but just the morning of Paul’s article, I adjusted my thinking to say that 90 will be the cut-off.   I am still thinking that 90 will guarantee the playoffs, but it is still possible that 87 or 88 will get the #6 draw. 

I gotta give a shout-out to Gus who has been saying the D-Backs peaked too early and are the team most likely to fall back to the pack.     The Mets are now (Sunday morning 9/8) just 0.5 games back of the Snakes after trailing by 6 just 10 days ago.   Great call Gus!    I tend to agree that the three WC teams will be the Padres, Mets, and Braves. 

As far as the players for next year go, my personal tendency is to not waste too much energy on that.    I do think that Stearns and co. have done a better job on the edges this year than the last couple which certainly helps their playoff chances.    

 One of the things I find intriguing and quite mysterious is how relief pitchers are thought of or ranked.   It seems like Alex and Danny Young should be getting some love as solid bullpen guys now.   We had Aaron Loup and Brooks Raley as lefty specialists at one point, but Young and Young are doing everything right now.   I really hope they don’t get caught in the numbers game when Senga and/or Blackburn comes off the shelf.  

More Kudos

And to keep the shout-outs going, another big one going to Mack for his continuing and tireless work introducing us to the names and stories of the up and coming players.   I look forward to Sunday on Mack Mets.   Unfortunately, I am as guilty as everyone else in not generating the comments on these, but please do not take that as a non-interest. 

And Tom . .  love the work you have done to bring the minor league results and player takes.   That is a great addition to the daily/weekly reads.    Who’s hot and who’s not on the farm is good stuff.   Unfortunately, that is all about to end as we have gotten to September.    Thank you for your efforts in tracking all the Mets teams!

 In conclusion- likes and dislikes

Lastly, as a final ramble of the day, I will paraphrase a conversation I had with Paul Articulates a couple months back.  As I may have written in past articles or comments, I have pretty much completely given up all interest in most other sports, including football and basketball.   I used to be a college basketball junkie with the day of the release of the NCAA Final Four bracket being one of the biggest holidays of the year.   For whatever reason, I now do not follow it at all.   

With that lead-in, I am finding my interest in my beloved game of baseball – well over 50 years of Mets fandom – waning rather quickly.  It is too early to tell if I will ever get to the point of not following any sports, but I will lay out a few of the things that bother me that are leading me down that path (in no particular order):

•   I do not like the pitch clock.   I also do not like long games. Baseball is a unique sport because it is one of the very few that do not have a clock.     There are many tangent thoughts here that I will leave alone for now, perhaps I will someday develop them into a larger epistle.
     
•    I do not like the transformation to the complete game of power.    I get the ‘Chics love the long ball’, and I do too, but I also really like seeing a well executed bunt, a single to the opposite field to drive in a runner from third, going first to third on a single, a stolen base, scoring from first on a double, etc. etc.    It seems to be acceptable that the main stat of a pitcher is his K rate while the K rates of hitters do not make much difference anymore.   I want to see pitchers that can throw strikes and get contact outs and hitters that can hit for contact and get the homer when it makes sense
  
  
•     I do not like the runner on second base in extra innings.  
  
  
•     I do like the larger bases. 

•     I do not like the “city connect” uniforms.   The Padres wearing a pink and mint green uni?   Yellow in Boston?   Even the Mets gray NYC are no match for the blue and orange pinstripes.

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  Really?
  
  
•     I do not like the amount of legalized gambling in sports today.     And you can keep Pete out of the Hall?    
  
  
•    As an extension to the second bullet above, I do not like that starting pitchers can only throw 5 or maybe 6 innings per game.   Getting 21 outs from a starter is an anomaly.     Tom Seaver had 61 games where he threw (at least) 9 innings AND DIDN’T ALLOW A RUN!   It now takes about 5 years for there to be 61 complete games total in the major leagues.   Tom Terrific finished more than 1/3 of the games he started. 
  
  
•    As an extension to the last bullet, how will it be possible to ever have another pitcher enter the Hall of Fame?  

So, I will continue to follow the Mets as they make their way to October, but I admit that I do not follow the rest of baseball nearly as closely as I used to (getting into fantasy leagues as I used to helps that).   If the Mets become non-contenders again, baseball, as football, basketball, and hockey have done, may lose me completely in a few years. 

Until then, I will be reading, commenting on, and yes, potentially pinch-hitting here on Mack’s Mets!   Keep up the great work!