Mets putting on a clinic

I find myself torn lately.  No it’s not about whether Jose Reyes should hit leadoff or third in the order.  It’s about who deserves the blame for the disaster that is the New York Mets.  If you were looking at how to run a franchise into the ground, the Mets have underperformed at every single level of the organization.

Ownership – I touched on this in my last post, but I’m surprised the Wilpons aren’t taking more heat right now.  I’ve read reports that state the Mets were the most profitable team in baseball last season and it makes sense.  Their ticket sales were strong all season, they locked up a lot of their sponsorship dollars before the market crash, concession and parking dollars were flowing and they have their own TV network.  I think it’s easy to assume the Mets easily made over $100 million in profit last season.

Meanwhile the team on the field was putting up one of the most disappointing seasons in franchise history and Jeff Wilpon called 2009’s performance “unacceptable”.  So what do the Wilpons do?  They cut payroll by $20 million, leave the same GM and manager in place and bring in one major free agent and that’s it.  What!?  How do you call last season “unacceptable” and then do next to nothing in the offseason!?  And how do you justify that to your fans?  I’m shocked no one is calling them out on this right now.  And for people that say “Well the Mets payroll is still among the highest in baseball.”  Then explain why the Mets spent less money their draft last year than any other team in baseball.

General Manager – I won’t go into too much detail on Omar Minaya because everyone has chronicled that pretty well.  Omar has made mistakes all over the place and it certainly seems like he had at least a little more money to do something this offseason.  Why didn’t he sign one of the Ben Sheets, Joel Pineiro, Jason Marquis group?  And they couldn’t upgrade at any position besides left field?  A lot of that blame falls on Omar even if he was hamstrung for dollars.  Look at how much talent the Jets have assembled this offseason without adding too much payroll.

Manager – I think Jerry is getting a pass as well.  The guy has been a brutal manager.  Keith was defending him the other night saying Jerry is a good manager.  Someone needs to show me how that’s possible.  He brings in Fernando Tatis to pinch run last night in the 10th after the count is 2-2 and then is forced to use Alex Cora to pinch hit since he’s the only guy left on the bench besides the backup catcher.

Everyone said the team needed to get off to a hot start and Jerry is the guy to motivate these players to do so.  He’s failed to motivate for two straight seasons now.  And then he said his players were “unprepared” on Sunday.  How is that even possible in the first week of the season after what’s happened the past few years?  Jerry deserves a lot of blame but it’s true that it wouldn’t matter who’s the manager before there’s been so many failures by ownership and the GM.  And of course a lot of blame falls on the next group.

Players – No one else to blame for last night’s 1-12 with RISP.  They’re hitting about .150 with RISP for the season.  You can certainly fault Jerry for Sunday’s performance, but if you can’t get motivated to tee off on Livan Hernandez, then maybe you shouldn’t be in the Major Leagues.  The Mets might not have a ton of talent right now, but there’s really no way they should be less than .500.  Why can’t the starters get ahead of the count?  Why is seemingly everyone’s velocity way down?  Why can’t guys move over the runners when it’s 1st and 2nd and no one out?  Has there been a single clutch hit all season?  The players deserve a huge chunk of the blame just like ownership and management do.

Now what’s your take?