Ike Davis Applesauce - Davis hits grand slam in AFL, Gary Carter managing, Mets to meet with Kikuchi

by Joe Budd on Oct 14, 2009 11:38 AM EDT in Applesauce

Meet the Mets

Ike Davis made his Arizona Fall League debut yesterday and hit a grand slam. Davis finished with 6 runs batted in. Jenrry Mejia will make his first start today.

Remember when Gary Carter was at least a remote consideration in terms of the Met managerial position? Well, he's now coaching a Division II program in Palm Beach. Also, the Athletic Director thinks he's a baseball genius.

Metsgrrl (sic) complains that we deserve an organization like the Twins. She may be right, but I'm so sick of hearing these types of complaints. Seriously, if you dislike the Met organization change your allegiance. Otherwise you are simply rewarding them for the behavior you want to change. It's much easier and more enjoyable if you stop caring if the Met organization respects and thanks you. I can take comfort in my absolute knowledge that they don't and concentrate fully on the on-field failures.

The Mets will be one of seven teams meeting with 18 year old Japanese pitcher Yusei Kikuchi.

Ron Darling owes the IRS around half a million dollars.

SNY's ratings were down 17.2% this year.

Around the NL East

As the Phillies are enjoying marvelous success (again) we also have to suffer from Cole Hamels looking down on us from his skyscraper.

Tim Hudson is likely to test free agency. JC Bradbury writes that he will probably be worth around $12 million/year.

Add Larry Bowa to the list of potential Nationals' managers.

Around MLB

Tim McCarver sings the classics and wants you to listen... for $13.99.

Joe Torre makes the motions about calling it quits after 2010.

Joe Posnanski lists his best hitters of all time, topping the list with the Babe.

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Comments

Hudson = 3 / 36 from the Mets

just watch it happen.

by fxcarden on Oct 14, 2009 12:30 PM EDT reply actions

Well, 2/24 plus a vesting option

would be ok with me, I think. He would be our second best SP in all likelihood.

by deadspy3 on Oct 14, 2009 12:37 PM EDT up reply actions

Will he really get 12mil a year?

I was thinking maybe something like 2/20 with a 14mil option that can increase based on number of starts made or something along those lines.

by Balagast on Oct 14, 2009 12:40 PM EDT up reply actions

nah....

Rosenthal had it all wrong….

http://atlanta.braves.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20091014&content_id=7454764&vkey=news_atl&fext=.jsp&c_id=atl

"It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone." A. Bartlett Giamatti

by sddbaker on Oct 15, 2009 4:33 PM EDT up reply actions

Geez, Ronny

How do you owe that much? Not good.

As for Ike, if he hits well in spring, no reason he can’t win a roster spot and start at first or in the outfield.

by Mackey Sasser on Oct 14, 2009 12:41 PM EDT reply actions

Bean Stringfellow

Can’t get enough of that name. As expected, he says Wagner has no intention of retiring.

by Bieser's Balk on Oct 14, 2009 12:47 PM EDT reply actions

any suggestions on what mejia's music should be

i wouldn’t mind him coming out to raining blood.

as an aside, i think the best song for a closer to come into would be genesis by justice. it sounds like robot godzilla is about to be unleashed.

2bad mejia’s goin 2 b da next cy young.

yes, i’m feeling a bit loopy today.

by firejerrymanuel on Oct 14, 2009 1:21 PM EDT reply actions

Praise hail Slayer

I would seriously be pumped if any Met used a Slayer song for their entrance music.

It definitely would a welcome addition to my “Mets Mix” Ipod playlist.

by dcmetsfan on Oct 14, 2009 2:29 PM EDT up reply actions

Can't disagree with Pos' top 10 hitters list

I’m glad he resisted the temptation of putting Mays and Aaron in the Top 10 – great players though they were, on a pure batting level I don’t think they measure up to the 10 who made the list. It’s almost scary to think of how good Mantle could have been if he hadn’t torn up just about every muscle in his body.

"[The Giants] beat us down. We were beat by a grown-man team, a team we want to be like one day. They came in here and took it to us. Out-manned us, out-gunned us. ... It wasn't even close." - Raheem Morris, 9/27/09

by cjmulrain on Oct 14, 2009 1:31 PM EDT reply actions

is the liver a muscle?

by JoshNY on Oct 14, 2009 1:54 PM EDT up reply actions 1 recs

well he had other problems besides his liver

"I reject your reality and substitute my own"
-Adam Savage

by blueandorange4life on Oct 14, 2009 2:18 PM EDT up reply actions

I know, I was just being snarky

by JoshNY on Oct 14, 2009 5:13 PM EDT up reply actions

Where the hell

is Tony Gwynn? Michael Schell ranks him number one all time pure hitter (not slugger, mind), but he doesn’t even make Pos’ top 30!?

by deadspy3 on Oct 14, 2009 3:14 PM EDT up reply actions

Nothing against Gwynn

but there’s just no way he can stand up to the big hitters at the top of Posnanski’s list. He’s not in the top 100 all-time in career OBP, not in the top 300 all-time in career SLG. You could make a pretty decent list of good hitters who’ll never get into the Hall of Fame without a ticket who’re better than him in both. (JD Drew, Brian Giles, Jason Giambi, the criminally underrated John Olerud.)

by JoshNY on Oct 14, 2009 5:24 PM EDT up reply actions

this

if you read the comments on Pos’ post, there’s a little bit of a debate about what the term “best hitter” means. If you want to get into semantics, guys like Gwynn, Carew, and Ichiro are definitely amongst the best pure hitters, guys who if you just wanted someone to go up and make contact with the ball and hit a single, they’d be your choice. But generally, when someone says best hitters, they really mean “best offensive players,” in which case power and patience become of tantamount importance. Mickey Mantle didn’t always hit .300, but the guy got on base at an absurd rate and hit for ridiculous power, which is why he’s a better offensive player than Tony Gwynn (and Gwynn’s one of my all-time favorite ballplayers, so I don’t mean to denigrate him)

by cjmulrain on Oct 14, 2009 10:56 PM EDT up reply actions

I have to disagree with DiMaggio that high

All-time great player, but I think his legend is a bit overrated

"We must win and we must know how to win rather than win because we have statistical people."

by Evan_S on Oct 14, 2009 3:21 PM EDT up reply actions

Oh

and Bonds is a little better than Williams. Hate to say it, but he probably is.

"We must win and we must know how to win rather than win because we have statistical people."

by Evan_S on Oct 14, 2009 3:22 PM EDT up reply actions

agreed

although it is absurd that going into the last season of his career he had like 20 more career homers than strikeouts – talk about a pure hitter. He didn’t have anywhere near the patience of the Ruths and Williams’ of the world, but damn could the man hit a baseball. I like to think of him as the Greg Maddux of hitters – a guy who didn’t walk that much shouldn’t have been such a good hitter, but he was, just like a guy who didn’t strike out that many guys shouldn’t have been as good a pitcher as Maddux was. They were both just obscenely good at one skill to compensate – for Joe D it was making contact with the ball, for Maddux it was control.

by cjmulrain on Oct 14, 2009 11:03 PM EDT up reply actions

that story about

Stan Musial seeing Pujolses 1st game on a whim is kinda crazy.

by gbaked on Oct 15, 2009 12:54 AM EDT up reply actions

Yeah, that was pretty amazing.

"I dunno. I never smoked any Astroturf"
-Tug McGraw

by squid92 on Oct 15, 2009 10:09 AM EDT up reply actions

yea

that’s why I love Pos so much – he mixes in great stories with advanced stats as well as anyone in the business. He’s as good a writer as any of the old school guys, but he’s not a curmudgeon like most of them.

by cjmulrain on Oct 15, 2009 11:02 AM EDT up reply actions

"Seriously, if you dislike the Met organization change your allegiance."

Come on now, pops. That’s a little like “If you don’t like this country, leave it!”

by Pack Bringley on Oct 14, 2009 2:46 PM EDT reply actions

Yeah

Looking back on it, it was probably too strong. I just still can’t find it in myself to get upset about this stuff.

by Joe Budd on Oct 14, 2009 2:53 PM EDT up reply actions

but your larger point is still correct

The Twins don’t win because they’re nice to their fans. They play in a perpetually bad division that allows them to compete and generally have a well-run organization.

To me, the Mets can be nice to me by putting the best team they can out on the field (I know, this is asking a lot)

by Bieser's Balk on Oct 14, 2009 3:04 PM EDT up reply actions

Technically

The Twins don’t really win at all!

by deadspy3 on Oct 14, 2009 3:14 PM EDT up reply actions

Not to mention

they were owned for years by Carl Pohlad, the Uncle Scrooge McDuck of professional sports team ownership. Guy was loaded and never put any money into his team (which he’s perfectly free to do, just as long as people don’t go praising him or his organization for being fan-friendly). He offered the Twins up for contraction in ’01 or ’02 as long as he got a decent price for the team.

by James Kannengieser on Oct 14, 2009 3:39 PM EDT up reply actions