No Easy Answers

By Metstradamus
Posted Sunday, September 23, 2007

The recent almost/not quite there yet fall from grace of the New York Mets has one, very small bright spot to it. It means that, as a member of the F.U. Faculty, I may actually get to do some teaching.

Up until now, it’s been more conversational … more of a light lecture in the breeze. Ooh hooray, we’re winning. But now, the ineptitude of the team to catch, throw, or run means it’s crunch time. And when it’s crunch time, we cannot abandon the students by panicking and flipping out. We can’t turn our backs on the youth of America.

One student of mine came up with an interesting theory regarding Jose Reyes. I warn you, this one is out there. First, let’s look at Reyes’ splits this season. His stats before the All-Star game were most valuable at .307/.387/.439. Afterwards? His numbers are throwback — as in 2003, at .265/.329/.412.

The All-Star game in an interesting breaking point because the immediate area of that game features two incidents of note. First was the Friday before the All-Star game, when Jose Reyes was benched for not hustling. It was an interesting crossroads for Reyes, who had been thought before that as a guy who was full of energy and has been compared to the Energizer Bunny at times. The second incident, which happened about a week after that, is a curious move when placed upon the backdrop of the first incident.

The Mets hired Rickey Henderson.

There is at least one conspiracy theorist out there who believes that the recent shoddy play of Jose Reyes and the hiring of Rickey “I am the greatest of all time” Henderson to be their first base coach are tied together. One could think that the last thing that a young, impressionable future super-mega star such as Reyes needs is a former stat-obsessed, currently Rickey obsessed Rickey Henderson, who has been rumored to turn triples into doubles just so that he could steal third base and pad his stats. Is it a coincidence that Reyes has nine triples before the break, and just three afterwards? Is it a coincidence that all of his numbers have gone down since the All-Star game, and Rickey’s arrival?

Here’s the answer:

Yes.

Look, there’s no simple answer as to why the Mets are starting to collapse. Everybody has been looking for the “be all/end all” answer. The most popular one is the one where Willie Randolph’s failure to argue with umpires has caused this. The one where the Mets are tanking because Omar Minaya traded Heath Bell back in the winter is another popular one. Jose Reyes being “me-ified” by Henderson is the kind of theory you hear from that crackpot professor you had in college that believes in second shooters, aliens, and Sasquatch.

There’s no easy answer except to say that when those players get in between the white lines, at a certain point they have to get the job done. And I’m not exonerating Randolph and his baffling fascination with Guillermo Mota. I’m not exonerating Minaya and his early-season love affair with Julio Franco. But even if it’s a bad idea to put a player on the field, that player has to produce.

For Jose Reyes, he’s gotta produce. Let’s not exonerate the players by going to the old stand-by of blaming the manager, or blaming the GM, or even blaming the first base coach even though we really have no idea how much Henderson even talks to Jose Reyes.

For all we know, Rickey Henderson probably spends 10 hours a day in front of a mirror admiring his physique and wondering why nobody has signed him to be their leadoff hitter because there are players — damn good players — that are not getting the job done.

Take what Lastings Milledge did last night, going insane at Jim Joyce for a called strike that he didn’t like. I can already hear the cries of “well, if Willie Randolph would argue more, his players wouldn’t need to go insane like Lastings Milledge felt he had to.”

Here’s an idea for Lastings: Don’t go insane and get yourself ejected in the middle of a pennant race! How’s that?

It’s just one incident in the myriad of small disasters that have put the Mets in the position that they’re in. Identifying the problems and coming up with solutions isn’t that simple. Heck, I wish I could fix it in 10 minutes. I can’t. Neither can you. The only ones who can fix it are those wearing the uniform. And the ones who have the most say are the ones who step on the field with the bats and gloves in their hands. Willie Randolph is going to play a role here. But at some point, the players are going to have the stage all to themselves. What they do when they’re on that stage will tell the story of whether we make it to October, or whether we have a long off-season.

Whether the Mets are playing in October or not, you can always find me at home base complaining about something. Hopefully, there will be little things to complain about in October, instead of one big thing.