Dipping Into The Archives Vol. 22
1993
The book The Worst Team Money Could Buy was published in the spring of 1993. It came out a year too early, as many of the most embarrassing incidents from this era occurred in ‘93. Vince Coleman accidentally injuring Dwight Gooden while swinging a golf club? 1993. Bret Saberhagen shooting bleach out of a squirt gun at reporters? 1993. Bobby Bonilla confronting reporter Bob Klapisch (one of the co-authors of the above mentioned book) in the clubhouse, threatening to show him The Bronx? 1993. The year would end with 103 losses and a 7th place finish in the NL East. Yep, they even finished behind the expansion Florida Marlins in their inaugural season.
The worst incident from the year also in involved Coleman, as he threw a lit firecracker into a crowd of autograph seekers, injuring three fans including a 1 year old child. Needless to say, that was the end of his Mets tenure, as he was suspended for the remainder of the year and would be traded away in the offseason. I don’t think there were many Mets fans sorry to see him go.
And speaking of trades, we received Maddux! OK, the front office didn’t check the fine print, as it was Mike Maddux. The team did make 2 major free agent signings/trades (3 if you wish to include Joe Orsulak) but once again these were acquisitions that would have made a lot more sense had they been made years earlier.
Frank Tanana was a premier fireballer more than 15 years earlier, but he developed arm problems and quickly lost his blazing fastball. To his credit, he adjusted to his diminished stuff and enjoyed a long career as a classic crafty lefty. Or as he put it, someone who threw in the 90’s in the 1970’s but threw in the 70’s in the 1990’s. 1993 would prove to be his final major league season, but he wouldn’t make it to the end as a Met, as he was traded across town late in the year and finished his career by making 3 starts for the Yankees.
The other major acquisition wouldn’t even last that long at Shea. Tony Fernandez was coming off of a long run in Toronto and San Diego as one of the top shortstops in the game, but he was an unmitigated disaster as a Met. Not only did he hit poorly, but his smooth playing style made it look like he wasn’t playing hard. He was traded away by June, and did manage to rebound slightly, but his time with the Mets are a mere footnote in his career.
Manager Jeff Torborg predictably paid the price and was fired roughly a quarter of the way into the season. He was replaced by Dallas Green. As a general rule of thumb, I don’t like hardass types of managers such as Green. It’s exhausting as a fan to deal with someone who creates such a tense atmosphere, with everyone on pins and needles at all times. I can’t imagine how difficult it must be for players. Having said that, if there was any time that really needed a kick in the pants it was this one. At the time I was reluctantly in favor of the change.
In practice, it didn’t work out that way. Whether it was because he didn’t have the desire to do so or because he didn’t have the power, he never seemed to challenge the veterans who were the cause of the poor clubhouse culture. Instead he spent much of his time belittling the young players. I clearly remember Jeromy Burnitz being a constant target of his ire. Burnitz didn’t become a productive hitter until the Mets traded him away. Did Green curb his development? Did his criticism “ruin” any of the team’s prospects? We’ll never know for sure, but I believe it didn’t help. What made it worse is look who was in the organization at the time. We could have had Wash! OK, a leap from managing A ball directly to the majors is unrealistic, but in dire times you gotta think outside the box.
I’ll close 1993 on this note. 7 years removed from 1986, there are only 3 players left from the championship squad - Gooden, Fernandez & HoJo. That would soon change, but there was one other essential part of the team still around. 1993 was Mel Stottlemyre’s final season as pitching coach. It was a good sign of how much respect he had that like Rube Walker before him, he survived through multiple managerial changes. After coaching for a couple of years in Houston, he would move on to become Joe Torre’s pitching coach with the Yankees. From what I understand, he was successful there as well.
If there was one consultation for such a terrible year it’s that the Mets earned the #1 pick in the 1994 draft. With that pick they selected Paul Wilson. With good fortune, he can be the keystone of a new group of promising young pitchers. A new generation, if you will. In the meantime, next week we’ll look at 1994 and things did improve. It was the first season in which the leagues realigned into 3 divisions, so another 7th place finish would be impossible. And the season was shortened by a strike, so another 100 loss season would not be in the cards.
An Underrated Factor
As we Mets fans expected back in the spring, both Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander will be pitching in the LCS. Unfortunately, they are no longer members of the Mets, instead they are opposing each other in the Texas League Championship Series. We should have been more specific when placing our collective wish on that monkey’s paw. Lesson learned.
This reminds me of something that my fellow Gen Xers might well remember. Back in the 80’s Ron Berler came up with the ex-Cubs theory. His thesis was that the franchise was so cursed that former members of the team would bring their bad karma to any new team they would play for. For a while there other writers had fun with it and would keep track of that trend. There was actually a long stretch in which the team with the fewest ex-Cubs on their roster would win each playoff series. It was a goofy concept, but purely coincidental. It was no more predictive than the result of the last Washington home game before a Presidential election was.
And yet… we all know by now that someone in the Mets organization must have opened up a hidden sarcophagus and unleashed a curse. Use what you wish with this info, but it bears watching to see if the inherent bad vibes carry over to whichever of the final four teams has the most ex-Mets on its roster. (Side question - do Wilpon era Mets have higher levels of bad mojo?) NL rosters won’t be finalized until later this morning, but here are how things stand now. Apologies if any roster has a stray player or two whom I have totally forgotten had played for the Mets. And this is active rosters only, so Jacob deGrom is not included.
Texas (1) - Max Scherzer
Houston (2) - Rafael Montero, Justin Verlander
Philadelphia (2) - Taijuan Walker, Zack Wheeler
Arizona (3) - Miguel Castro, Tommy Pham, Paul Seward
More Coveted Than The Silver Sow Award
That of course would be my personal MLB awards. There is almost zero suspense when it comes to this year’s BBWAA honors. All 6 appear to be easy calls. And there’s no pointless contrarianism coming from my corner either. I’m in agreement with the consensus picks. The only real questions come from those who care how close individual races turn out to be as well as who places second, third, etc.
Rookie Of The Year - In the National League, Corbin Carroll stood out from the pack from the very beginning of the season and never let up. Kodai Senga should be the runner-up; those who have issue with veteran players from Japan being classified as rookies fail to take into account how massive an adjustment it is to make that transfer. Nolan Jones figures to be the third finalist. In the American League Josh Jung started strongly but injuries and a massive slump in the second half leave him out of the running. The probable winner, and my pick, is Gunnar Henderson, followed by Yainer Diaz and Tristan Casas.
Cy Young - The AL race is the easiest decision of the batch; Gerrit Cole was far and away the best pitcher in the league and should win it unanimously. I’ll go with Kyle Bradish & Sonny Gray for second and third. The NL is a little trickier. Blake Snell had a big September which almost certainly clinched his victory, and he is my choice as well. The one issue I have is that he rarely pitches deeply into his starts. The quality is there, but not much volume. I do think he did enough to separate himself from the field; I just wish he had a higher innings total. My #2 & 3 selections are Logan Webb & Zac Gallen.
MVP - For much of the year the NL race looked like it was going to be a tough choice, but Mookie Betts slumped in September and Ronald Acuna Jr. kept his pace up through the final month, so he’ll be our winner. Betts is #2, & in that tough battle for #3 I’ll place Matt Olson just above Freddie Freeman. In the AL it’s a skirmish between two players who had remarkable seasons - one of whom missed most of the first month & another who missed most of the last. Playing a premium defensive position gives additional value to Kyle Seaver’s case that Shohei Ohtani, as a DH, did not have. On the other hand, Seager wasn’t an ace level pitcher in addition to a productive hitter. My ranking is Ohtani at #1, Seager #2, and Marcus Semien #3.
SNL Recap
Quick reminder before proceeding. Late night shows are covered under a separate deal, so the show’s return is in full compliance with the ongoing actor’s strike. No one who appears on stage is crossing a picket line.
49 seasons in, SNL is one year away from receiving an AARP card. The new year kicked off with Pete Davidson as host. The vast majority of cold opens deal with current events, and in a normal week the sketch would have depicted the shenanigans surrounding the search for a new House Speaker. But this was not a normal week; when the major news event of the week is terribly sad the show open takes on a more somber tone. Without Cecily around to sing a song, the show chose to have Davidson share some heartfelt thoughts. His father was a firefighter killed on 9/11, so he has a unique perspective to offer, and he shared an anecdote that illustrated the healing power of laughter. I understand that a lot of people cringe when SNL attempts to be serious, but it’s hard to quarrel with this one. It set the proper tone.
After that, it was back to our regularly scheduled programming. It’s odd that Pete Davidson attained stardom on a sketch comedy show, as he never became a particularly skilled sketch comic. His strength is as a standup, which is why his most memorable moments often came in his Update appearances. His monologue was strong, approaching the line into tastelessness, without every crossing that Rubicon. He began by talking about his attempts to bond with his sister by watching Game Of Thrones together and ended with a story about a sexual encounter he had on the night of his first ever standup set in Manhattan - that tale grew very dark.
For me the week’s highlight was the showcase sketch, which discussed the other current event the nation is talking about. A Fox NFL Sunday sketch began with Kenan’s Curt Menafee warning the audience that because Kansas City played on Thursday night this week, Taylor Swift would not attend any game that day. But much to Menafee’s chagrin, his fellow panelists spent the rest of the time trying to prove which among them was the biggest Swifty. And the sketch ended with a cameo from none other than Travis Kelce himself.
For the first time, the Please Don’t Destroy trio were included in the opening credits. Pretty solid piece this time; after watching a clip of a teenage Pete Davidson at a comedy club, they tell him of their adolescent appearances at Def Comedy Jam as the Original Princes Of Comedy. Including a cameo from John Mulaney bombing in front of the same audience, the film concluded with a promo of their supposed Original Princes tour and included the tagline “It does not hold up!”
One final round of applause goes to Kenan for his Update appearance as Deion Sanders. He wasn’t doing an accurate impression of Sanders as much as he was resuscitating his old LaVar Ball bit, but it was a well-written piece that Kenan attacked with full gusto. Overall, it was a solid enough return for the show. Due to the abrupt ending of last season and the accelerated return of this one, it’s appropriate to grade it on a curve. Look at it as an addendum to season 48; with a few more weeks the cast should regain a more solid footing, and we’ll see over the next few weeks if any of last year’s rookies are able to Make The Leap. None of them really stood out this week. Good work this week from Kenan and from Heidi. Andrew had a solid show as well.
Oh, I forget to mention the other cameo. Travis Kelce didn’t arrive at 30 Rock alone. Taylor Swift popped in to introduce the second song from musical guest Ice Spice and then quietly disappeared. Next week Bad Bunny joins in to pull double duty as host & musical act. After that the show takes its first scheduled break and that should give everyone involved a chance to catch their breath and give the new season a proper launch upon its return. And hopefully the SAG-AFTRA strike will be settled by then as well. (Things took a pessimistic turn last week as the producers walked away from the negotiating table. I have to hope that was merely last minute posturing. Too many people have too much to lose for this work stoppage to last much longer.) And remember, Jennifer Coolidge was scheduled to host one of the episodes that was cancelled due to the WGA strike. They’d better reinvite her.
Fare Thee Well & A Prize
I’m slowly receiving invite codes for Bluesky, which I would love to share with my loyal readers. I have one to share right now, and I’ll be fair with this one. The first person to request it gets it. Good luck, & I’ll see you all on Wednesday.