February 28, 2012 • 8:08 pm 0
Join the Krew at 8:30 pm EST for a night of talking Mets.
Our special guests for the evening include Howard Megdal and Steve Keane from Kranepool Society.
Filed under: Kiner's Korner Podcast, Howard Megdal, kiners korner podcast, kranepool society, Kult of Mets Personalities Podcast, steve keane
February 26, 2012 • 8:00 am 0
I don’t know about you, but I am really excited to see Ike Davis play this year.
For many reasons. I feel like he’s going to have something to prove, since his season was cut short in a freak bump with David Wright last year.
We’re also in an interesting time here in the National League. Since the premier first basemen have left the proverbial building (Albert Pujols to Anaheim, Prince Fielder to Detroit), Davis has an incredible chance to have a breakout season.
And also, to become a premier first baseman in the NL himself. In fact, he’s projected to be a fantasy sleeper in 2012…so take a tip from your Auntie Coop. Draft him.
Ryan Howard is coming back from an Achilles heel injury, that he suffered on the very last pitch of the NLDS last year. He’s taking BP right now, and he’s projected to be back in May. The home run/strike out artist though is a big threat on any fantasy roster.
After the Reds’ Joey Votto, there’s plenty of fine candidates for a 1B fantasy guy. Michael Morse on the Washington Nationals, he could easily be a sleeper fantasy pick too.
Yet Ike has the potential to have a breakout year. I feel like his return is easily flying under the radar for many folks, including Mets fans. It’s easy to forget about how well he was doing prior to his bumping-into-David-Wright accident, and even in the previous year.
Let me just remind you of that…
In 2010, he played 147 games. In 601 plate appearances, and 523 at-bats, he hit 19 home runs, 71 RBIs, and boasted a .264/.351/.440 line. In 2011, after 36 games, 149 PAs, 129 ABs, he hit 7 HRs and 25 RBIs, with a .302/.383/.543 line. (Source: Baseball Reference)
I know, he only played 36 games in 2011. After 36 games in 2010, however, in 144 PAs and 120 ABs, he had 4 HRs, 12 RBIs, and was .275/.389/.450.
Also, keep in mind that whole moving in the wall business at CitiField this year. The joke of it is that Jason Bay and David Wright should get their swing back, but prior to that, Ike Davis was pretty much the only one who routinely hit monster shots out of the park. Home run derby might have to change its name to IKE Derby.
So fantasy baseball GMs, I’m calling it right now. Though I feel like if I’m calling it out, it’s gotta be easy. Ike Davis is gonna be huge this year. Mark it down. File it away.
And draft him.
Filed under: Taryn "Coop" Cooper, All-Star, First Base, Ike Davis, Mets 2012, Ryan Howard
February 25, 2012 • 8:00 am 0
By Taryn “The Coop” Cooper
When there’s drama, it must be spring training.
Greetings from Port St. Lucie. Well, not really since I’m not there. But I am there in spirit. Especially when I read the articles coming out of there.
Okay. Here’s a big problem I have with that whole “pitchers and catchers” thing. It’s changed quite a bit from when I was a kid. Though it’s always been optional for anyone other than pitchers and catchers, it’s almost required now. But it’s not. Sort of. But it’s expected too. Sort of.
Possibly a player who will be under the microscope the most this spring (and going into 2012) is Ruben Tejada. The guy has some big shoes to fill, especially at the position of shortstop. We have an idea of what he can do as a player and defensively.
Terry Collins has decided that the minimum amount of flair pieces should be 37, that the pretty boys have so far, and not the 15 that’s supposed to be on the rule sheet.
Only problem here is that Tejada, while he should have made every effort to attend camp as an early bird, didn’t technically have to. After all, Collins mentioned it after Tejada didn’t show up. He also can’t make him report early.
Last year was a bit different, what with Luis Castillo and Oliver Perez. I admit that I was waiting for Castillo and Perez to slip up and do something I could perceive as not being for the team’s benefit. Possibly other fans were too. However, given their precarious situations with their terrible contracts and awful performance, it would have been a nice gesture for them to show up early. Especially since they were told they needed to compete for their roles. Yet they had bad attitudes.
Let’s cut Tejada some slack though. He’s a young dude who is making probably close to league minimum and has to come in from Panama as well. I’m sure there are other players who are coming in from great lengths, but I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for some reason.
No one asked Tejada to take the place of one of the most popular players in Mets history. No one made the early report mandatory. Is it really going to kill the team if Tejada, who is supposed to report Saturday, misses a few days? I can tell you, they are pretty much conditioning and doing exercises. He plays a grueling 162-game sport. Trust me, he’s in shape. (Well, he should be…he’s never had a problem with that before).
I guess my point is that there needs to be some kind of conflict in PSL each year, and Tejada is an easy mark. I’m sure Collins will give his pep talk as to why he should show up early, but the reality is, he’ll be there this weekend, and we’ll forget this has all happened once they start playing some games.
Okay? Okay. This is just a problem with flair. Nothing to see here, please carry on with your day.
Filed under: Taryn "Coop" Cooper, drama, Mets 2012, port st. lucie, Ruben Tejada, spring training
February 21, 2012 • 4:44 pm 0
The Kult of Mets Personalities returns TONIGHT with a vengeance after a short hiatus, rejoining the Ivie League Production network. Our show airs live at 8:30 pm EST, and we have a jam-packed show featuring former Mets pitcher Kris Benson.
We’ll also have a tribute to Gary Carter, whom we interviewed last year around this time. See you then.
Filed under: Kiner's Korner Podcast, Taryn "Coop" Cooper, gary carter, kris benson, Kult of Mets Personalities Podcast, Mets 2012
February 17, 2012 • 2:33 pm 0
Join the crew (“The Kult Of Mets Personalities”) as they talk to Hall Of fame catcher Gary Carter. This was unfortunately the last recorded baseball discussion Gary had before being diagnosed. All of us at the “Kult” send our love to Kimmy & Team Carter and want to thank him for supporting us.
Gary wanted everyone to visit http://garycarter.org/ and at a time when we now honor a man who lived as we’d like to see ourselves, we should respect his passion for charity and visit/ donate.
Thanks – and we’ll miss you Gary
Nik Kolidas, Matthew Fazelpoor, Taryn Cooper, Gene Anthony and Rob Z.
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/ivieleagueproductions/2012/02/17/gary-carter-thu-feb-17-2011
Filed under: New York Mets 2009-2010
February 16, 2012 • 9:01 pm 2
by Taryn “the Coop” Cooper
Photo Credit to EJ Stankiewicz from The Happy Recap
I apologize in advance if this turns into a blubbering, rambling mess. People who know me have asked me why I’ve been resistant to writing about Gary Carter, his position with the Mets and his illness. To be honest, I was in denial. I was in denial about my hero from the 1980s Mets teams. I was in denial that my heroes had the capacity to get sick, to have brain cancer and ultimately would expire.
My heroes didn’t do that.
We had the opportunity to talk to Kid on our Kult of Mets Personalities podcast last year, and when I checked the date, I was shocked. The episode aired on February 17th. Yet, we had pretaped the show on February 16th.
I tell people often that I became a Mets fan because I saw Dwight Gooden pitch in his rookie year. My first favorite Met, though, was Gary Carter.
The trade that brought him to the Mets happened in December of 1984. I was still too young to know his impact in baseball, but I know that ultimately the Mets changed on that day. I changed too, but didn’t know it.
It wasn’t until Opening Day 1985 that I knew the full impact of this move. My dad had gone to several Opening Days in a row, but he couldn’t go this year. So we taped it. For those of you who have no idea what that means, the primitive versions of TiVo and DVRs were the VCRs (or if you were really unlucky, Beta). I don’t know or maybe I just don’t remember whether I knew the Mets won that day before we watched it. What I do remember is that I watched that game over and over and over to see just one moment. And that one moment was Gary Carter hitting a walk-off home run in the 10th inning against the hated St. Louis Cardinals that day, and the irony was Neil Allen threw that pitch. Neil Allen was the guy Frank Cashen traded (along with Rick Ownbey) to St. Louis for Keith Hernandez. I’ll never forget Lonnie Smith in left field, slamming his glove on the ground. It was Opening Day, for Pete’s sakes, and here he was treating it like Game 7 of the NLCS or something.
Two trades that made the ’80s Mets the ’80s Mets. Two trades that piggy-backed off one another to lead the Mets to those great years that defined 1980s culture, that defined 1980s sports, and helped define my childhood.
I probably watched that home run on a continuous loop when I was bored. Which was often, as a kid living in the suburbs. But with that home run, a message was sent. A message that the Mets were going to be a force in the National League and in baseball from now on. That a dynamic shift had happened in baseball.
I’ll never forget Tim McCarver and Steve Zabriskie’s call that day. “Welcome to New York, Gary Carter!” “There’s a World Series atmosphere here.”
Hard to believe that the Mets had something to cheer about, Schadenfreude if you will. I wasn’t aware of the previous years since I was in diapers during the Mets downtrodden years. Yet, as I got older, that home run and the irony behind it really symbolized how the Mets were coming into their own and that the Gary Carter trade was a game changer.
Heroes though. They’re not supposed to expire.
I could go on and on and recap every single thing that Gary Carter did but I won’t. I can tell you though how he’s impacted my life without even knowing it. Take away that 1985 Opening Day, which I blubbered over him on our interview that it was one of my fondest Mets fan memories (it’s my thing, let it go).
Late in the 1986 season, I remember my mom and I took a trip to Woodbridge Mall in New Jersey. Back then, there weren’t many malls in Jersey (shudder the thought), and my mother liked the old Stern’s store there for some reason. I had some allowance burning a hole in my pocket, but I saw what I wanted, and it wasn’t in my budget (sort of).
A Cabbage Patch Doll wearing a Mets uniform.
Uh, score?
So I looked at my mom — puppy dog eyes didn’t work nearly as well with her as it did with my dad — and she said, “Ok, fine, I’ll buy it.” I think she knew that I really liked it (plus, I think deep down, she thought the sucker was pretty cute).
What did I name him? Gary Carter Cooper.
At Shea Stadium in 1985, and maybe in other stadiums, there were cardboard cutouts of players that were life-size. The Mets showcased the battery of Doc and Gary, with a Polaroid picture stand. Of course, I held onto Gary’s arm. Doc may have made me a Mets fan, but Kid was my first favorite player.
Perhaps signifying the denouement of those great teams was in 1987, when Carter started to show signs of wear and tear. When there was talk last year of retiring #8 after he got sick (I’ll weigh in on that in a minute), people pointed to him .249 BA and overall he had two good years out of five. The amount of goodwill he brought to the team and the amount of respect his trade brought to the organization made him the Mets great, not a .249 BA.
Back in 2002, I started going to Brooklyn Cyclones game. I was there with two other people, and one of my friends said, “Hey, that guy in the dugout. Not for nothin’, that looks like Gary Carter.” I probably started hyperventilating. GARY EDMUND CARTER. IN BROOKLYN. Turns out, since he was buddies with Howard Johnson (the manager) and Bobby Ojeda (pitching coach), he sat in as a special coach to the team.
That night, the starting pitcher for the Cyclones took a perfect game into the 9th inning. I totally blame the idiot behind me for telling us all to sit down when we all stood up for the beginning of the 9th inning. “What? What? You really think this kid is gonna pitch a PERFECT GAME.” Well, 8 1/3 innings…
What made that game a perfect one for me was waiting like a 10 year old by the players’ entrance. I held onto a ball like an eager kid, then when he came out…I could tell, he was probably tired, and probably wanted to go home. But for selfish reasons, there was NO WAY I was letting the opportunity to talk to my childhood hero slip by.
“GARY!” He looked right at me. I handed him my ball and a Sharpie. All I could say to him was, “I’ve waited my whole life to meet you!” I got a genuine Kid smile out of that one, and the woman next to me, guessing she was about my parents’ age, said, “Oh, I have too!” Then there was a little kid next to me, a real 10 year old and not just a mentally 10 year old, who handed her ball for him to sign, and asked, “Wait. Who is that again?”
Oh, you young whipper snappers, you.
In 2003, Gary Carter was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Against his wishes, and many Mets fans, Carter was inducted wearing a Montreal Expos cap. He even requested there be a way to split the hat into two and meant it. I’m not about to find that link today. It’s impossible with how his name is flooding the web.
Yet, the Mets did a classy thing on “Gary Carter Night” in 2003. I dragged my then-boyfriend, who was not a huge baseball fan at that point, to the game. This was a night that celebrated Carter’s accomplishments with the team and his Hall of Fame enshrinement. They gave him his own plaque, based on the design of the Cooperstown one, with a Mets cap.
It’s nights like those that I don’t think the Mets are totally clueless with honoring their own. It was one more night of chanting one of my favorite chants, “GA-RY! GA-RY!” Showing all those famous reels of his from the great ’80s.
People have asked me whether I think #8 should be retired. I’m torn. According to Mets by the Numbers, no one has worn the number since Carter was inducted into the Hall of Fame. The right thing to do would be to retire it, since it’s unofficially retired anyway. I mean, is anyone truly going to wear it again? Then again, Cal Ripken Sr’s #7 has not been in circulation since he passed away…and I don’t think the Baltimore Orioles have any intentions of every retiring it.
I don’t want to diminish the affect of retiring numbers as I’ve had it in my head that the next one to be retired should be #31. I don’t know if I feel comfortable with it now. What I would like is for the Mets to honor him with some part of CitiField, akin to Seaver, Stengel and Hodges. There’s a Shea Bridge, we should name an area the “Piazza.” Perhaps the area behind home plate could be the Carter area.
I don’t know.
Today, Gary Carter has passed away at the age of 57. In the last year, we’ve lost a lot of good ones. My friend Dana Brand passed away, and we’re honoring him at Hofstra University, where he taught, by keeping the 50th Anniversary of the Mets alive. That day he died was the day we found out Gary Carter was sick. My friend, whom I lovingly referred to as Uncle Johnny, passed away from a bought of pancreatic cancer. My friend Solly’s mother passed away. His childhood memories are very similar to mine, although I went to Mets games with my dad, he went to Mets games with his mother. We both became Mets fans because of watching Doc pitch.
My mom was born the same year as Carter. My dad is a few years older than he is. My uncle passed away from brain cancer in 2001. Ultimate Mets hero Tug McGraw passed away from brain cancer. This same year, I’ve decided to start raising funds for the Tug McGraw Foundation by running on Team McGraw in the New York City Marathon in November of this year. I’ll be taping an “8″ shape on the back to run in honor of Kid.
All I can say is, Gary Carter is gone. My childhood hero is gone, and he’s not supposed to die. Heroes are supposed to live forever, they’re never supposed to get sick, they should never have anything they can’t overcome. They’re supposed to wear a cape and save the world, and even hit a home run to win a game in their very first home game.
Or keep the team alive when all the outs are against them in a situation they’re supposed to lose.
Yet, at the same time, we’re lucky to have been able to watch him and to root for him when he played for our team. The thing with heroes like him is that he’s enshrined in the Hall of Fame. I’m watching a Mets Classic of 1985 Opening Day, like I did several times on a continuous loop as a child. Every year, we’ll never get over Game Six of 1986 on October 25 every year, when somehow that conversation comes up and it becomes a “where were you when…?” contest.
Gary Edmund Carter may have left us in this life. Yet his spirit, his heart, his hustle, his art, his games, the way he played it, will live forever.
I was able to fawn over him on our podcast last year to tell him that one of my fondest childhood memories was watching his walk off home run on April 9, 1985. He seemed very grateful. Looking back, it was the day after his 31st birthday. I am now 36. I’ll always have that fangirlism towards him for the rest of my days. As I watch today, I’m brought back to being a 10 year old, hitting rewind on my VCR, and seeing his at-bat over and over and over again, and never getting sick of watching it.
I watch it today, and it’s like I’m nine years old all over again.
Filed under: Taryn "Coop" Cooper, gary carter, mets 1986, Mets History, The Kid
February 15, 2012 • 8:12 am 0
By Taryn “The Coop” Cooper
It’s tough to imagine a big market team’s fanbase being content with being just “competitive.” Sometimes, I wonder why I continue to justify it, but I guess because we’ve been through several roller coasters of seasons with this team, I figure, why the Hell not?
After 2003, I think we would have been happy with the Mets just “competing,” till we got to 2006 and they were more than just competitive…they were winning and it looked like the division, and perhaps many championship titles were on the horizon.
Then 2007 happened. Then 2008 came and went. We survived 2009, 2010 and 2011 by dint of the power of “competition.”
We’re a few days away from 2012, and…the headlines say that the Mets believe they have the pieces to “compete.”
Then I really started to think. Is this the best we can do here?
Terry Collins is entering his sophomore year as Mets manager, coming off a season where finishing under .500 was considered “successful.”
We’re going into 2012 without Jose Reyes in a Mets uniform, and Ruben Tejada taking his place presumably. This also is coupled with a decidedly weaker “up the middle” in the infield…well, at least at second base.
Angel Pagan was traded a year later than he should have, but his replacement in Andres Torres is also a “placeholder” till “Don’t Call Me Captain” Kirk Nieuwenhuis is able to fill in.
Lucas Duda playing right field full time, eh? As Richie says, that scares the beejeezus out of us (at least in the field, his bat is pretty good).
We’re looking forward to the return of Ike Davis for his bat and his glove, but then Jason Bay is a complete question mark at the plate. David Wright may or may not respond well to the moving of the walls.
And Josh Thole is Josh Thole.
Don’t get me started on the pitching staff, where the best pitcher is a dude who hasn’t pitched in almost two years and is a gigantic question mark. But hey, at least the bullpen is shored up.
For a change, though, there’s less of an emphasis on defense, and more of a placement on offense. As evidenced by Daniel Murphy and Duda.
If. If. If.
This is par for the course for the Mets. Every season, there seems to be more questions marks than exclamation points. We go in thinking the best but expecting the worst.
And the Mets are expecting to be “competitive?”
I’m not saying there is much that could be done. If Sandy Alderson had seriously considered trading one of the following of Jon Niese, Ike Davis or David Wright, he’d have felt the Wrath of Coop equivalent of a five-state killing spree.
It’s hard to be competitive when there’s a lack of flexibility and ruining the team for the sake of making moves is not something that I want to see either. In fact, this team has done everything opposite to what
I feel like there’s a question of competition in a team that may not compete at all. We can look at the bright side of things as much as we want. There’s a difference between being competitive and being optimistic. We can be hopeful about the season and root our team to win. After all, we are fans and that’s what we’re supposed to do. It’s hard though to imagine this team as being competitive with so many restrictions being put on them, whether financial or simply waiting for the young guys to grow into the team.
I like the attitude that they can believe in competition, but I guess I’m just expecting very little.
A decade ago, I would have been content with just the idea of competing. I would now as well, but if they win 70 games, I guess that’s considered a success. My dad even joked a few months ago that the Mets might be a lot worse than we think in 2012.
Is that competing? Not really. But I guess we gotta hang our Mets hats on something, right?
Filed under: Taryn "Coop" Cooper, competition, David Wright, Ike Davis, Jonathon Niese, Jose Reyes, Josh Thole, Lucas Duda, Mets 2012, New York Mets, Sandy Alderson, Terry Collins
February 12, 2012 • 8:30 am 2
By Taryn “The Coop” Cooper
I love when creative juices start flowing when I talk about non-Mets issues. Take for instance this Jeremy Lin guy on the New York Knicks. I am not a basketball fan (I used to follow John Stockton and Karl Malone back in the day), but it’s tough to live in New York City and not buy into the hype surrounding this guy after only five games.
My husband is a basketball fan, and we were talking about the Lin phenomenon in our house the other night. So much so that he even wrote a post comparing him to Jon Niese on the Mets (just read it – it makes sense, trust me). What also happened in our little conversation is that I remarked that I wondered if the hype machine was working a little too much for someone like Lin. Please note again that I don’t follow basketball. However, he agreed with me and said, “You know, he could very well turn into Gregg Jefferies.”
This was also truly funny, because our friend and blolleague Metstradamus wrote a post about Jefferies the other day. I was a Jefferies fan and probably was the first player I ever drank the Mets Kool-Aid on in my tenure as a fan. Over the years, I can’t say I’ve gotten any better with overvaluing our home grown talent. Over the years, I’ve bought the hype on Generation K till Dallas Green pitched Paul Wilson, Bill Pulsipher and Jason Isringhausen into the ground. I SURVIVED LASTINGS MILLEDGE. Carlos Gomez, who didn’t even turn out to be the best prospect traded for Johan Santana. Shawn Abner, Stanley Jefferson. The list just goes on and on. I wrote a few years ago that I was sick of drinking the Kool-Aid surrounding Mets prospects, and the one in question was Jenrry Mejia.
Yet, out of the other side of my mouth, I say, “I’d rather lose with the young guys than the overpaid veterans that have been par for the course these last few years.” And it’s true. I think win or lose, it’s more palatable when it’s young hungry guys who are balls-to-the-wall competitive and just love to play baseball.
Daniel Murphy is someone I am excited to see come back this year. This is a dude with something to prove. While he’s not exactly a “young” guy, since he’s been with the team in some capacity since 2008, he’s not exactly a veteran either. Those of us who are “With28″ are excited of the prospect of him playing a full season. Especially since last year, up till his dramatic injury, he was in the thick of things in the batting title race.
Ike Davis also has the potential to be the home run leader on the team this year. His inaugural season had him hitting monster home runs and driving in lots of runs. If moving the walls in does what it’s supposed to do, Davis could very well have a breakout season after one marred with injury.
Jonathon Niese is a curious case. Many people have proclaimed this could be a breakout year. While I get concerned that Dan Warthen isn’t an adequate pitching coach to bring out the best in his staff, the truth is Niese has the goods to become better on his own. If he can stay healthy throughout the year (and his injury history isn’t even pitching related, it’s mostly overall conditioning), he could be the best pitcher on staff (that is, if the “old” Johan Santana doesn’t show up, which is quite possible).
Dillon Gee is also another character that could easily get better this year in his role as starter. After all, he doesn’t have much of a choice due to lack of depth in the rotation. That’s okay though. Gee is a good problem to have.
Much ado has been made about the nothing payroll that the Mets have under Sandy Alderson’s watch this year. Meanwhile, in the past, all the Mets have done is spend and not win. Perhaps this is a cause-and-effect analysis by this new institution: let’s tap into resources we already have. It’s not a bad plan, since they seem intent on building up within and shoring out the farm system. Plus, Alderson did right by not trading Niese or Davis, which I probably would have keeled over had that happened. I was prepared to let Jose Reyes go…not prepared to trade one or two young guys that I have a feeling are just on the precipice of having a great season. If Alderson pays attention to dollars and cents as much as we are led to believe he has to in order to keep this team at an operating level, he is smart enough to realize that keeping guys who are under team control for a few years are a better alternative than trading them for prospects who may not be ready to contribute at a major league level at this point.
Right now, $57 million on the projected $87 million payroll is devoted to THREE guys: Santana, David Wright and Jason Bay. This is well over 50% of the payroll devoted to a crapshoot, a guy who tries too damn hard and someone who needs to have a wall-induced breakout year so that perhaps his underwater contract can be tradeable.
Letting the young guys duke it out doesn’t sound so horrible, now, does it?
In the past, the Mets have been notorious for hyping up their own prospects. In fact, potential Jeremy Lins have popped up more often than not in the Mets history than we care to admit who have later faltered. Circa 1990, I read an article on Gregg Jefferies titled, “Troubled Phenom.” It was probably the first time that I realized that not all prospects are “sure things.” It was a kick in the head but one that made me realize that not all children turn out to be the future.
In the 2012 Mets case, I’ve seen enough of these players to know they can play. None of them have daddy issues or helicopter parenting and possibly know that to lead is to lead by example. They also seem wise enough to keep things in the clubhouse, where they belong.
Yes, I say I’d rather if the Mets lose, they do with the young guys. Yet, young guys have proven the ability to just go out and play when it matters. So that’s why I am excited about these phenoms for 2012. The Mets may surprise us…my dad think they’ll be worse than we think…but I tend to be a little more optimistic than that.
Filed under: Taryn "Coop" Cooper, Bill Pulsipher, daniel murphy, David Wright, Generation K, Gregg Jefferies, Ike Davis, jason bay, jason isringhausen, Jeremy Lin, Johan Santana, Jonathon Niese, Jose Reyes, Lastings Milledge, Mets 2012, New York Knicks, Paul Wilson, Sandy Alderson
