Team Chemistry 101: Verbally Destroy Your Star Players

In this week's installment of "How could the New York Mets possibly sink to a new low" we look not on the field (where the Mets are so damn close to last place in their division) but off the field, to owner Fred Wilpon.

Note to future business leaders of America: if you want to build a winning organization, take a page out of ol' Freddy's playbook and talk trash about your most important employees through the media. Nothing says "go give it your all, kid" like being thrown under the bus by the man who writes your checks.

Here's what this jackass (actually, sorry, he called himself a schmuck in the article so let's stick with that)...here's what this schmuck had to say about his star players:

-On Carlos Beltran (highest paid player on the roster): "We had some schmuck in New York who paid him based on that one series (referring to Beltran's 2004 playoffs with the Astros). He's 65 to 70 percent of what he was."

-On David Wright (3rd highest paid player on the roster & easily their cornerstone): "Really good kid. A very good player. Not a superstar."

-On Jose Reyes (5th highest paid player on the roster): "He thinks he's going to get Carl Crawford money. He's had everything wrong with him. He won't get it."

For those of us keeping score at home, the Mets owner basically just said that his 3 best players are not nearly as good as they think they are. I guess $120 million just doesn't buy what it used to. What I don't understand is that Wilpon wasn't being forced to answer questions about his star players. It's not like he was sitting before a Grand Jury or a mad man with a gun to his head and had to answer truthfully on how good he thinks his players really are. He could have just said...nothing.

And if life wasn't already depressing enough for Mets fans, they get to root for a team where even the owner hates the players. That sounds like a blast (speaking of Mets fans, I better call Freedchips right now to make sure he's still alive). Hey, at least they've got the up-and-coming Ike Davis to look forward to, though I'd bet my life on him succumbing to a horrible tragedy like falling off the George Washington Bridge while rollerskating to the ballpark.

Maybe the Mets will finally get better once Wilpon dies, though the Yankees tried that and it hasn't really worked so far.

The Mets are Still Paying the Best All-Stars from the mid-90s

Fortune - As owners now shop a 49% stake in the team, it's been widely reported that the franchise has around $430 million in bank debt. But a potential investor who spoke to Fortune on condition of anonymity points out that the team's liabilities are closer to $625 million, from a buyer's perspective.
According to the source, Mets financial statements disclose another $100 million in what the team calls "contingent liabilities." Much of that is deferred compensation still due to players long gone from the Mets roster. The documents give two examples of these liabilities: Bobby Bonilla, who left the team in 1996 and has $1.2 million per year coming to him for the next 25 years, and Bret Saberhagen, who left in 1995 and is owed $250,000 annually through 2029.

This article goes into awesome detail about how fucked the Mets are from a financial standpoint. As a baseball fan who hates all things New York, this is such a fun article to read. But the only part I'm really interested in is the details around all the deferred money the Mets owe to players who retired like 15 years ago. For instance, the Mets owe Bobby Bonilla $1.2 million per year for the next 25 years!! That's incredible. A guy who hasn't played for them in 15 years still has a quarter of a century left on his contract. And Bret Saberhagen, who hasn't played for the Mets in 16 years and has been out of baseball all together for more than a decade, is owed $250K for the next 18 years.

Incredible numbers...

Let's do some rough math here and assume the Mets have yearly revenue of about $250 million (I pulled that out of some obscure Forbes article). If they are paying Bonilla $1.2 million against that yearly revenue, that's the equivalent of me paying a friend $400 a year for the next 25 years for him to provide nothing to me. Imagine if you lost a bet with a friend for a shitload of money, and you had to defer the payment because you couldn't cough it all up at once. And then you'd be paying this asshole for the next 40 years...sure it's only $400 a year, but that's so obnoxious. "Oh, yeah here's your check for doing nothing, again, for the 27th year in a row. You sure you don't wanna just call it even, man?"

And the article says that Bonilla & Saberhagen were just 2 examples of players that are owed money. The Mets probably have a full 25-man roster worth of ex-players they have to pay off for most of the 21st century.

I can't believe no one is jumping at the chance to buy this franchise. Sign me up!

Monthly Check-in on the Mets

I understand in this day & age--with the nonstop sports news programs--that every analyst & media person feels the need to make outrageous, polarizing predictions or comments as quickly as possible, but sometimes it just goes overboard. Sometimes a person is so quick to state an opinion, it totally ruins the concept of journalism. I'm talking, of course, about Freedchips' April 6th blog post titled, "The Mets are Dominating!"

As anyone who religiously watches the Red Sox knows, 20 games into the season is too soon to make a judgment, let alone 4 games into the season like Freedchips did.

And how did the Mets do after our fearless leader of the meh blog made his outrageous claims? They promptly lost 10 of their next 11 games, ending any & all hope for Mets fans once again. Oh well, unlike Yankees fans, at least the Mets fans won't be spending the next 5 months thinking their team has a shot.

Go Red Sox.

The Mets are Dominating!

I came into this season with no hope.  I had accepted the Mets fate as a sub .500 4th place team, and it was kind of nice just knowing that while the Mets would suck, at least I wouldn't be disappointed this time. There's just no way after years and years of heart breaking let downs, mind boggling managerial decisions, and complete incompetence in every facet of the game that I could be sucked into caring about this team.  I felt like the Indians fans in Major League.  Just totally cynical about everything the Mets do.

And BAM!  What happens?  They come out firing on all cylinders.  Sure they lost their first game, but then they show some grit in winning an extra inning game against the Marlins before bludgeoning them to round out their first series.  And then they put a hurting on Cole Hamels and the Phillies last night.  Ike Davis and David Wright are smashing the ball all over the place, and RA Dickey is knuckle-balling the shit out of everybody.  They're actually running balls out, playing hard, and playing solid defense.  I'm now only 95% sure that they won't turn into a complete embarrassment.  So congratulations Mets.  Once again you've given me false hope.  Your impending doom will be all the more painful for me yet again.  For some reason, unlike those Indians fans, I'm all too willing to believe in this franchise.  I'm like an abused wife that leaves her husband, but then keeps coming back when he insists he's changed.  Right now the Mets are putting on their finest suits, playing some Barry White, and whispering sweet nothings into my ear.  Won't be long before they are downing a bottle of Jack and beating the shit out of me on a daily basis.  Meh, the life of a Mets fan.