213 Miles From Shea

Usually I'm on top of uniform/logo/color changes, but I've also been “away” for the last two weeks, so I missed a “change”.

The Mariners apparently announced earlier this month that they will be wearing their teal throwbacks as an alternative uniform next season up to twice a week at home:

(via MLB.com, example of the color)

Overall, I'm for this. When you think about it, once the Devil Rays became the Rays, the amount of green, or similar to green colors worn by Major League teams really dropped. Outside of the green trims for the Mariners, and the Oakland Athletics, I'm pretty sure no other team has green as a major color in their uniform design (not including the Padre camo look).

This green/blue/teal/something is also unique. When baseball teams wear odd colors, it is at least refreshing for the eyes. Uni Watch blog is saying that this uniform change will move the Mariners navy blue alternates to the road.

EDIT: I'm an idiot. I forgot the one team in our division that “wears” green: the Marlins. Thank you mysterious commenter for pointing that out.

Wrestling with my opinions about Luis Castillo has not been an easy task. His numbers have been bad. But at the same time his numbers have been good. When he came to the Mets in 2007, he finished off the season batting .296 with 20 RBI's, in about 50 games where he had 18 RBI's in his previous 80 games. Then in 2008 he hit a low where he batted only .245. At that point it seemed perfectly fine to be agrivated with Luis. He would then respond in 2009 being one of the more consistent players on the team batting .302 with 40 RBI's and playing in 142 games, which was no small feet with the 2009 club. In limited time in 2010, his 2008 self showed in his .235 batting average.

There are a lot of reasons for his last decline, but this article isn't about that. That topic is covered in many other articles over many great blogs. Also, you can probably ask anyone on the train, and they will give you a fairly good opinion about why Castillo has been on a decline.

What I want to know is why do I not like him as a baseball player. I am generally a nice person and a very understading person. What is it about Luis Castillo that gets me angry? How has he been connected in my Mets memory to become such a villian, when in reality he is not a villian at all. Castillo generally plays with grit and usually runs hard. These are aspects of play that I usually praise, and are my favorite in baseball.

After deep reflection for about a month (seriously), I think I know why I'm upset with Castillo. Through years of repressing the 2007 collapse, I think I somehow correlated his addition to the 2007 Mets as part of their collapse. At some point in my personal history of being a Mets fan, I must have felt that although he played well in 2007, when he came aboard the Mets really started to fall apart. Castillo harbors some form of that 2007 collapse unfairly, which is probably why I judge him so harshly. So Luis, I apoligze about that.

That revelation isn't my complete Castillo story. From 2009 and forward, Castillo has been another mental focus. I believe that I seem him as a full representation of the old, overpaid portion of the Mets. This disdain is not Luis' fault but rather my feelings about upper management. As I alluded to before, I like baseball teams that have grit. I like teams that are built around young talent because when they lose, its not so bad, and when the win it feels like an achievement. Somewhere again in my psychosis I have set Castillo = Bay, Beltran, Krod, Bonilla, etc.

In short, my negative feelings about Luis Castillo are not about his play, persay, but are rooted in a deeper reflection of this team in the latter half of this past decade. He has this ambiguous, intangible connection to the 2007 collapse and he, by being a part of the overpaid, overage component of the team, has unfairily made him the poster boy for what feels wrong about the 2009 and 2010 team. His play alone has been poor, but it also has been good. The reception he gets, at least for me, is a representation of why the Mets need a clean house of sorts, to start anew and on a clean page.

After seeing the last out in game 6 of the 2010 NLCS, I feel compelled to compare that at-bat to an infamous AB in Mets history. For those who missed it, the Phillies were down by one run in the bottom of the ninth in a must win game 6. They were able to get runners on the corners and at the plate is one of the most well-known Phillies for the bat, Ryan Howard. Fast-foward the story, he struck out looking.

Carlos Beltran was at the plate in game 7 of the 2006 NLCS, down by two runs with the bases loaded and struck out looking at an Adam Wainright curveball.

Now, there are a lot of differences. Beltan was game 7, Howard was game 6 (mentally completely different, even though they are both elimination games). Beltran was down two runs, Howard down one run. Howard was on a team that just won two straight pennants including a World Series, Beltran was not.

Differences aside, on the fan perspective, the feeling of “hope” was almost identical. At their respective given times, victory felt more than possible because of the players at the plate. That fleeting feeling of hope, I argue, should be the same between last night and 4 seasons ago (wow that was a long time ago, but feels like yesterday).

Well, just a thought.

You know what's insulting? Go to any MLB site. Any of them?

Did you?

Good.

Notice anything?

Every single MLB site is advertising the NLCS and World Series on each side of the web page superimposed on top of teams normal backgrounds. For the Mets that means these logos age over Citi Field, the Mariners (an AL team), these logos are over Safeco field. It is just a painful reminder that we are not in the playoffs.

Thank you MLB-Capalisitic-Advetising-Money-Grabbing-Machine.

Something has been odd this offseason. The celebrations in the locker rooms have seemed dull. I just finished watching the Braves/Giants game and the locker room seems empty. From the live camera's, the room looks huge, and it seems like there are 5 media members per member of the team, but it just seems like no one is there.

After thinking about this for a while, I think I have a few theories behind this:

My memory is going bad regarding playoff series. I didn't watch the playoffs in 2007, 2008 and 2009. In 2006 I was so excited the Mets made it to the NLCS, I wasn't really paying attention to the after game party, and before 2006 is essentially a memory wash. So is this a recent phenemeon that they bring in the bubbly for making into the Championship Series? It makes sense for getting into the Playoffs, and the World Series, but I feel like its unnecessary at this step in the playoffs.

Thoughts?

The ALDS could have ended yesterday for both teams, but at least one team showed some fight to stick around. Thanks to a late inning rally by the Rays, there is a chance for some post season “drama” if they can win again today and force a game 5. This of course would be beneficial for just about everyone except for the Rangers, since a little competition can go a long way.

For instance, the Twins. The Twins are quickly becoming a regular season team. They have all the tools to make through the regular season, and win well, but they always seem to fall flat for reason or another in the playoffs. Once again they were swept by the Yankees and its depressing, especially when you want to see different teams make it to the higher level. Although they got swept this year, I don't think its as bad as last year when they won the final game in epic fashion to make it into the playoffs, had the entire country behind them, and then fell flat on their face.

Anyway onto today. Two games will be elimination games again as the Rays need to win to prevent an early exit from the ALDS and the Reds will need to win in order to prevent the sweep from the Phillies. They had a good chance on Friday night but they just couldn't seem to keep it together out on the field. The Reds will need to get to Cole early and get some reliable pitching to start a much needed comeback. The third game today is the first game in Atlanta featuring the Braves and the Giants, where the winner will gain (or regain) the advantage for the series.

Elimination Saturday?

It's very possible.

Both games today are in the American League and one team in each of these games is in a dire situation. Both the Rays and the Twins lost the first two games of their respective series at home. They now have the extremely difficult task of sending the series back to Tampa or the Twin Cities by taking both games on the road.

I think the Twins will have it slightly worse than the Rays, but its close. Both the Yankees and the Rangers have almost identical home records with the Yankees being 52-29 and the Rangers being 51-30. Obviously both very good home teams (and the Rangers are a mediocre road team, so its even more surprising they took the first two on the road). Anyway the Rays and Twins differ with their road records. The Rays are almost the same home and away as they have a 49-32 home record and a 47-34 road record. The Twins have the best home record of all of these teams being 53-28 but on the road they are 41-40.

I really hope that both the Rays and the Twins can pull out victories today, extending the series, but it is going to be tough for these teams.

Well yesterday went completely the opposite way that I wanted it to, but if you like come from behind baseball, then you probably had a good night. In the first game, the Phillies were down 4-2 before Baker took out Arroyo and then things just started to fall apart for the Reds. Due to an ineffective bullpen but really due to an ineffective defense with errors everywhere. The short story is that the Phillies bats were able to bail out Roy Oswalt, which is really a shame because now the chances of the Reds advancing out of this series are very slim (but hopefully they will be able to do it).

The Giants looked for a while to take game 2 with force, but it wasn't meant to be. After giving up 4-0 lead to become a 4-4 tie, the Braves were able to win it on a homer by Rick Ankiel in the top of the tenth. Surprisingly, the Braves vs Giants series is the only Division Series with both teams getting a win. They will be the only one that will have to at least play four games.

I guess more on that topic, while this postseason has been exciting, I hope the Rays/Reds/Twins get  a win or something in their next game. It would be a shame for everyone to advance immediatley with no fight from the losing team. There is plenty of Drama within each game, but we could use some overall drama.

The National League has held one thing constant over its 2 Division Series games so far and that is that 2010 is the year of the Pitcher. Literally the only thing that was better than Lincecum's performance last night, where he pitched a complete game allowing 2 hits while striking out 14, would be a no-hitter, which is exactly what Halladay did in his first game.

Anyway the only the two games in the MLB playoff's today will both be in the National League. At 4:30 Eastern Time the Braves will take on the Giants for game two. Last night the Giants got a lucky break with the Posey call, but honestly the Giants deserved it. Lincecum pitched an amazing game and the rest of the Giants rotation, equally amazing, will look to replicate that tonight. The Braves will be looking Hanson to pick up where his season left off and to continue Lowe's work, and the Braves will need to win tonight, because if the Giants go 2-0, this series is done. (Hopefully the Giants will go 2-0 and at least one part of the axis of evil will be eliminated from the 2010 playoffs).

The Phillies look at Roy Oswalt to continue the dominating performance of their other Roy tonight as they try to essentially lock this series up. The first game showed that good pitching is better than good hitting, but I seem to remember a certain Phillies team in the recent past that made the opposite true. The Reds should look for that inspiration tonight and try to take advantage of the close field in Philly and send this series tied back to Cinncy.