Not so amazin'

High-priced makeover hasn't worked wonders on the Mets

Opening Day for the New York Mets was a worst-case scenario: their pitchers gave up the most runs (15) of any of the team's 42 Opening Day games and walked more batters (12) than in any of the franchise's previous 6,503 games. The Mets chased the ball on defense as if it were an evasive, windblown hot dog wrapper, and manager Art Howe let the contest get out of hand by calling on left-handed long man Mike Bacsik in a four-run game with right-handed sluggers Sammy Sosa and Moises Alou due up. (The Mets skipper later explained that he was saving righty reliever David Weathers for a situation in which his club had a lead. After Bacsik coughed up nine runs, Weathers wound up pitching with the score 15-2 instead of 6-2.)

The press box joke was that Urban Cowboy, the Broadway play that may shut down after only a handful of performances, made a better first impression than the Mets. Are they really that bad? Of course not. Give Tom Glavine (12 of 21 batters reached base against him) a pass because he had no feel for his changeup on a brutally cold and windy day. But the opener did verify what scouts in spring training saw as a fatal flaw of this team: for $120 million the Mets put a poor defense behind a staff that pitches to contact, not to strikeouts.

With Roger Cedeno in center field making like Peter Falk in The In-Laws ("Serpentine! Serpentine!"), Glavine is probably wiring Miss-You bouquets to Andruw Jones this minute. Cliff Floyd showed on Opening Day he has neither the first-step quickness nor the arm of an average left fielder. Catcher Mike Piazza made a throw down to second base on an attempted steal that bounced barely past the back of the pitcher's mound. Roberto Alomar continues to fight Shea Stadium's uneven infield (it's built on landfill) by falling to his knees more often than Martin Brodeur. Third baseman Ty Wigginton and first baseman Mo Vaughn have less range than Steven Seagal.

Let us count the ways the Mets' mitts failed in Game 1 alone:

1. Alomar left second base uncovered on a single by Alex Gonzalez with a man on first, thinking the ball was down the line for a double. Gonzalez cruised into second, keeping the double play out of order.

2. Floyd butchered a carom off the wall for an error.

3. Piazza's Little League throw (and Scott Strickland's slow time to the plate) allowed an easy steal that led directly to a run.

4. Alomar bobbled a tough grounder, permitting a run-scoring infield hit.

5. Cedeno comically lost sight of a fly ball, turning an out into a three-run triple.

The Mets were so bad that their typically sarcastic crowd (Dennis Miller is Al Roker compared to these ruffians) cheered for any clean fielding play. For this show the fans paid "Gold Pricing" in New York's new ticket plan. Call it Fool's Gold.

No, the Mets aren't really this bad. And Howe does have a winning pedigree, even though Oakland GM Billy Beane, as portrayed in the March 30 issue of The New York Times Magazine, fiendishly gave him away like the contents of a recycling bin. And this exchange on the mound Monday, as revealed by Howe himself, with a struggling Glavine in the fourth inning hardly painted the picture of a firm hand at the helm:

Howe: "Whattaya think?"

Glavine: "Whatever you do is OK by me."

What the Mets should really worry about -- especially after watching Cubs hurlers Kerry Wood and Juan Cruz blow upper-90s gas past them -- is that they don't have the defense to support what is largely a thin, old, soft-tossing pitching staff. Al Leiter, who is 37, is New York's hardest thrower among pitchers who figure to exceed 100 innings. NL pitchers, on average, struck out 6.8 batters per nine innings last year. Only Leiter (7.6 in '02) figures to be above average in a rotation that also includes Glavine (5.1), Steve Trachsel (5.4), David Cone (who's 40, sat out a year and didn't throw more than 71 pitches in a spring training outing) and right-handed rookie Jae Weong Seo (who had reconstructive surgery on his pitching elbow two years ago). Bacsik, as he showed Opening Day, brings no heat whatsoever from the bullpen.

Start with Glavine, who seems miscast in New York after all those years with the Braves. The man Atlanta pitching coach Leo Mazzone called "the greatest hot weather pitcher I've ever seen" admittedly often gets out of sorts in the cold and wind, which happens to define Shea Stadium in April and September. And not only did the Braves catch the ball behind him, they also positioned their defense according to their pitchers and scouting reports better than any team in baseball.

Glavine was never a power pitcher. But the fact is he needs his defense more than most pitchers, especially as he ages. His strikeout rates from the past two years (4.8 and 5.1 per nine innings, respectively) are his lowest of the past decade.

"There may be an adjustment period as I get to know them and they know me," the veteran left-hander said of the men playing behind him. "Defense is still a very important part of my game and will continue to be."

I had Glavine down for 15 wins, given his professionalism, his desire for the New York stage, his dogged work ethic and his eye on 300 career wins. He'll need help to reach that total, though -- help that will not be there unless the Mets realize what three other organizations did: Cedeno cannot play center field on a championship-quality club. It's difficult to believe that a team can spend $120 million and be so lacking in quality starting pitching and defense while playing in a pitcher's park. Meanwhile, with Wood, Cruz, Carlos Zambrano, Matt Clement and Kyle Farnsworth, Chicago has riches of exactly what the Mets need: good, young power arms.

"There are," Cedeno said after the opener, "still 159 games to help the team." Fitting. It just doesn't quite add up for New York.

A run on walks

Barry Bonds, while riffing in spring training about how walks wear him down by keeping him on his feet so often, mentioned something I'd never noticed: that AL players don't walk as often as NL players. He attributed the disparity to the absence of hurlers from junior circuit lineups, presumably alluding to NL No. 8 hitters drawing walks in order for opponents to get to the pitcher. It turns out he's right -- though just barely. NL teams walked 6.9 times per game last year. AL teams walked 6.5 times per game, or about six percent less often. Those numbers, by the way, aren't too far off what they were 30 years ago in the last season before the DH: 6.4 in the NL and 6.2 in the AL.

Un-marketing 101

One of the reasons often cited for the lack of a hip sort of buzz around baseball, as compared to football and basketball, is baseball marketing, which the sport continues to prove is an oxymoron. Here are only two of the latest examples of how baseball still doesn't get it:

1. At a time when America leads a coalition of the willing in a tense geopolitical climate and when the sport should be celebrating its increased international profile, the Blue Jays welcome Hideki Matsui of the Yankees by insulting him, taking out full page ads urging their fans to boo him. The ad lacked tact as well as its supposed intent -- humor. Toronto evidently thought Matsui was the personification of Yankee excess, never mind that the Japanese outfielder ($21 million over three years) makes close to David Bell money or that Toronto itself turned classic underachiever Raul Mondesi into an $11 million-a-year albatross. Shame on Blue Jays president Paul Godfrey for signing off on or not knowing about such tasteless tactics. The Blue Jays can expect to hear from commissioner Bud Selig on this one.

2. At a time when throwback uniforms are must-have streetwear, baseball's marketing dolts order teams to wear beer-league softball-style batting practice jerseys and caps. The idea behind changing looks is to get fans to replace their team gear every year or so. But other than knee-high black socks with Bermuda shorts, can you think of a worse fashion faux pas than being caught in one of those Mets creamsicle shirts, or a Red Sox flaming red jersey, or a Pirates bumblebee-yellow brimmed cap? Most of the looks are hideous. Give credit to the Yankees for refusing to take part in the marketing stunt. Oh, yeah. People buy more Yankees gear than any other team.

Sports Illustrated senior writer Tom Verducci covers baseball for the magazine and is a regular contributor to SI.com. Click here to send a question to his Mailbag.

 

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