The second half of the baseball season has started similarly to other second halves over the last few years for the New York Mets. That is to say, badly.
Remarkably, the team suffered yet another season-shifting injury when Dillon Gee was lost for the year with a blood clot in the shoulder area. There is probably no record-keeping on injury-riddled franchises, unless you count days on the disabled list entries, but if there were, the Mets would easily be contesting for that mark. They don't simply sustain injuries and contract illnesses, they do so with astonishing consistency, and for durations that defy standards. A player strains a hamstring on the Mets, and he's entered into the witness protection program. Gee's condition is rare, again a Met specialty...see David Wright's broken back, Ike Davis' Valley Fever, and so on and so forth.
Couple the injury and the potential for more given the Met penchant for same, together with the frightening regularity in which the bullpen surrenders runs, leads, and momentum, and the knee-jerk reaction is to clamor for trade deadline action.
The Mets have a plan buried somewhere in the Wilpon's front office, and for once, they should stubbornly stick to it. The team does have a few headliner stars waiting in the wings, but after the few, there is little else. The Mets should resist the temptation to replace Dillon Gee with an outside arm, because these teams will be coveting the few future bright spots in the organization. As well, they should sit tight with this horrendous bullpen for the same reason.
It might cost the team an improbable push for a playoff spot, but really, such an accomplishment is unlikely with or without the Huston Streets of the world anyway. At any time, the Mets could be ambushed by a chink in any of the other team's armor plates. We're already witnessing a diminishment in the production of R.A. Dickey and Johan Santana. David Wright probably won't stay rooted at the .350 mark, and heck, there's probably another injury or two waiting just around the bend.
Let's allow the team that has orchestrated this implausible half-season finish the job, and save chits for future seasons of promise.
Glenn Vallach has been a New York Mets fan since foolishly abandoning the mighty Yankees in his youth after Mickey Mantle retired. Since the fond, fleeting memories of the Tom Seaver, Cleon Jones, Tommie Agee years, he sits quietly yearning for a fraction of the success enjoyed annually by the team that inhabits the borough in which I was born...waiting and hoping...waiting and hoping.
Sources:
- · Yahoo! Sports New York Mets page
- · Yahoo! Sports Johan Santana page
- · Yahoo! Sports R.A. Dickey page
- · Yahoo! Sports David Wright page
- · Yahoo! Sports Dillon Gee page
- · George Henry, The Associated Press, Heyward keys 3-run 8th, Braves win 6th in a row
