Dear Skill Sets,

What impeccable timing you fellows have as I received your e mail to let me know that I can bid on every piece of Shea Stadium from bricks that will be in the ruble of the excavation of the stadium to the outfield walls, and the letters that spell out S-H-E-A.  I have to say it is an impressive list of memorabilia you’re hawking and I’m sure the monies collected for the items will be going to good cause but that’s not why I’m writing to you. No, after reading this list of items and the prices you want for them all I’d like to know is when will you stop fucking with your fan base? Do you ever get tired of embarrassing Mets fans and treating us like shit? Or do you get some perverse enjoyment knowing that your fan base or “customers” as you like to call us, are so loyal to the laundry you put out on the field that we will put up with more annoying bullshit this side of 34 Street and 8th Avenue?

Who came up with the price of $869 bucks for the pair of seats? Wouldn’t it have been more appealing to your working class fans to make the seats $200 or $250 for the pair. Even at that big price I would take a chance of calling a family meeting to request the family discretionary funds for a couple of Shea seats. We could forgo heating oil for a month as we could all wear our quilted Mets jackets, with the Mets hoodie and our Mets wool caps as we drink hot coco from our Mr. Met coffee mug. Same with the signage and posters wouldn’t $75 to $150 dollars be a decent price to pay for section signs and even an exit sign?

I guess I just don’t get it. The disconnect that you, the people you employ especially the game day staff that treat your “customers” like inmates at Gitmo. I’d like to chalk it up to the what I call the “9-11 syndrome” where anyone with a sliver of authority thinks they are part of the Fighting 69th as your rent a cop security force acted like total assholes on the last day of Shea trying to get fans out of the ballpark as soon as the closing ceremony was over. What was the rush?  Why couldn’t the few of us that hung around stay and chat about the ball park that we have spent the better part of our springs and summers in?  Oh and by the way I hope at $iti Field you have better attire for this force as 300lb men in tight orange golf shirts are not just an eyesore but they look as sloppy as your team in a September pennant race.

I know Freddy and Jeffey I have taken a nasty tone with you guys here and in other letters I’ve sent you but you have to understand you guys a fucking with something that is near and dear to my heart, my baseball team.  How can I defend my team against the forces of evil from the Bronx and Quakertown when they say everything you guys touch turns to shit? I try to defend you but you do things like this auction or not allowing the fans to walk on the Shea field for the last game or letting a woman gather dirt from the pitchers mound as a remembrance of her dead father. I try very hard to defend this franchise but you keep doing stupid shit that makes me throw up my hands. Now I know how John McCain’s campaign manger feels.

So I hope you find some deep pocket suit to buy your scrap and hopefully the money you raise goes to the Rebuild The Bullpen Fund as that would be a worthwhile cause if it’s for Jeffey’s Beach House in Amagansett then there will be another nasty missive in your future

Sincerely,

Steve Keane

The Eddie Kranepool Society

If Erik Aybar puts that bunt down, Mike Scioscia is a genius but because Aybar could not take that 2-0 fastball and drop one down as Reggie Willits was bustin’ ass down the third base line and Jason Varatek had to haul his big ass plus tools of ignorance down the third baseline to tag Williets on the butt for the out, Scioscia is now one dumb fuck. Amazing simply amazing. Was it the right call? For the Angles yes it was because that’s the way the Angels play baseball and quite frankly I love that kind of play as I also love the hit and run , the stolen base and batters who work the count to their advantage. If you say “wait a minute , there was one out so you have two shots to get Willets in from third sure you do but as I said this is the way the Angles play so it was no surprise that Scioscia called for the suicide squeeze and that missed bunt is the difference between sugar and shit.

Now the Angles need to take a big swig of Shut The Fuck Up.

The Rays are a hybrid of the 1969 and 1986 Mets. Going from the last to first with pitching, defense and timely hitting is the ’69 Mets part and take no bullshit,  charge the mound ask questions later is the ’86 component. So this series against the Old Town Team should be must watch TV this week.

I never thought as a proud Brooklynite I’d ever root for the Hollywood Carpet Baggers but St Joseph of Torre and his healing green tea about to make the Corky Steinbrenner look more special ed than ever and future Met Manny Ramirez taking on the Phucking Phillies  this one is easy GO BUMS!!!!!!!!!!

Tim Dierkes at MLB Trade Rumors has a link to 10 gallon Tracy’s column that Manny from The Heights is looking for a 5yr/$85 mil deal and speculation (as it is has the last three off seasons) Omar is ready to make the offer to the Boras Extortion Agency to hook Manny.

So with the financial crisis hitting our country how does this affect the sacred sanctuary of sports team, the luxury suite? According to Mets Mouth Organ David (The Lawyer) Howard there is no financial crisis:

   {Executives at Yankee Stadium are monitoring the economic situation but have not seen any effect, said Alice McGillion, a spokeswoman. She did not provide specific sales figures, but the luxury suites are nearly sold out, according to news reports. The same is true at the Mets’ Citi Field, said Dave Howard, the team’s executive vice president for business operations.

“Timing is a part of this,” he said. “The firms we’ve sold to haven’t had any major issues, and the people who have them realize they’ve got great value for the quality of what we’re offering here.”}

I, like Calcaterra, think this is a smoke screen as well, who did the Mets and the Highlanders as well, sell these dens of greed and excess too? The only guys making enough coin to buy a luxury box drink their cordials from a pimp chalice.  And who is to say that by opening day $ti Financial will still be in business? The Mets could be taking the field at Cathouse Stadium come April.

That’s why this financial crisis hasn’t hurt me at all as I’ve invested all my money in illegal gambling, prostitution and out of state cigarettes and I’m livin’ large!

Leave it to the Skill Sets to piss me off after a great weekend. With J-Man back as Warlord and his willingness to toss some of his weight around with Omar,  J-Man agrees with Mets fans that the team needs to leave it’s pussyifed ways behind them, along with thoughts of Manny, Pierzyniski, Peavey and Sugar from Survivor running through my head (not only does Sugar ooooozzzzzeee sexiness she’s from Brooklyn too)  a couple of articles this weekend have my blood boiling which doesn’t take much when it comes to the Mets and the Sill Sets.

First, there is a story of the woman who had sprinkled her late father’s ashes on the pitching mound at Shea Stadium a few years back. Now that the ball park is being dismantled, Lisa Hanson and her son Ben went to Shea with the wish of scooping up some dirt from the mound as a remembrance of her dad. But of course the management of the Mets, which we know is totally clueless when it comes to customer relations, told Ms. Hanson that she could not go on the field because of the work being in done on the take down of Shea. Okay, she did show up unannounced and maybe a bad time but you would think some dolt in management would have come out and made an arrangement with Ms. Hanson to get her remembrance but that would take intelligence and compassion which is in very short supply under the Skill Set regime as we see here with this quote from Skill Set Court Jester Jay Bird Horowitz:

  Mets spokesman Jay Horwitz said the organization could not let Hasson on the field for “safety reasons,” as workers were tearing out the bleachers and using large machinery.

“”I’m not trying to be hard about it,” Horwitz said.”But the stadium is closed.”

I think Horowitz was juggling and wearing a five pointed jester hat when he made this stupid remark (I can’t substantiate this rumor but I heard when he looked out of the new $iti Field press box, he said “Oh look I see Russia”.) I guess it would be too much to have some GOOD publicity out of Flushing as the Skill Sets could not figure out how to give this woman a date to come back and go on the field to scoop the dirt,  maybe if she bought a couple of  $869.00 seats they’d  do her the solid.

Thankfully a couple of Mets fans/construction workers came to Ms. Hanson’s rescue. I want to see Jeffey say something to the hard hats for doing this good deed so they can attach the hook from one of the cranes to his arse and lift him off the ground until he cries.  

We all know that Shea was inundated with felines and their job was to keep the rat droppings off the sausage grills (I know you’re all going EEEWWWWWWWWWWWWWW, but you know what I doing you folks a favor stop eating that shit it’s no good for you.) but the cats have been a Shea staple and now a team of animal rescuers want the cats to be moved over to $iti Field. I don’t know what these folks are even bringing it up, the cats are smart enough to know to go next door as the rats from Flushing Bay and the Iron Triangle will be on the $iti Field doorstep. Along a new closer and a slugging outfielder, a good tabby is escentail to success at $iti Field. Just remember that when you hit the Shake Shack concession.

More anger from bloggers about the rip off by the Skill Sets when $iti Field opens. This one comes from Andrew Beaton of Hot Foot with his post Outrage At $iti Field. I wish there were a way t ofind out who is buying up these luxuary boxes and paying all the dough for the seats behind the $iti Field backstop and if any of this bailout cash is going to Mets tickets?  

I can’t figure out who I want to advance to the World Series but I know the Phucking Phillies are not on that list. I look at the Brooklyn Dodgers of Los Angles and I see Manny and the case he keeps making for Omar and Tony B to turn on that Latin charm and Skill Sets coin to bring him to Flushing. I look at the Rays and I see Scott Kazmir and Joe Maddon (I got to get me a pair of Joe Maddon frames) and the fact that Stu Sternberg is not only a Mets season ticket holder but he’s from Brooklyn (maybe me and Stu can go over to Sugar’s house)  then I look at the two pair of Sox and I’m rooting for Tito , Papi and Pap to do his jig but then I love Ozzie “Fuck the Cubs” Gullien as he is the most honest and up front manager in baseball. The Halos play the game they way Little League coaches should teach kids to play from the age of 5. So what to do? The Kazmir, Joe Maddon specs and the Brooklyn/Mets fan component is too strong for me to fight so it’s GO RAYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Tim March man is alive and well and writing for the Wall Street Journal. A tip of the Mets cap to Craig Calcaterra of Shysterball for the link.

I done here; time to watch Sugar prancing on exile island.on TiVO

It’s now time to at least have some diversion after the disappointing Mets season to welcome back the New York Rangers and the NHL season as the Rangers take on the Tampa Bay Mullets in Prague today. I’m looking forward to this Rangers season as Ranger fans have no real idea what kind of team we have. There is youth and more speed and some very good experienced vets with Capt Drury, Scott Gomez and Markus Nasland on board and the great King Henrik in goal but the consenus about this team is they could be one of the biggest stories in the league this year or they could struggle all I know is I can’t wait until 12 noon today.

In a post on NY Baseball Digest Mike Silva links to a must read story by the artist formerly known as the Boston Sports Guy a/k/a Bill Simmons (another of my inspirations to start this blog as I was a faithful reader of his when dial up was in) on Manny Ramirez and how and why Manny was shown the Beantown door and shockingly Manny is not the villain. Also in the post is is an interview Mike did with the Curly Haired Boyfirend (Dan Shaughnessy) back in the summer and is a good listen as he disses our Metsies.

GANGSTA’S IN DA HOUSE BOYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!! I guess Bobby V can cancel that flight as J-Man will be at the helm of the SS Skil Set  for at least 2 more seasons.

WOW it’s not like your team shit the bed two years in a row like our beloved Amazin’s but the Cub fans, fuled by gallons of Old Stlye and pounds Brats are fucking, Fukadome mad that their team is on the verge of ending their season against a team led  by a team led by a Domnican baseball savant and an elderly Italian-American from Brooklyn, kinda takes a little bit of the sting off our little mess of a team. Enjoy!

Good stuff from Can’t Stop The Bleeding as they give the lowdown on the J-Man stalemate with word that Andrew Marchand of 1050 AM in NYC reporting that Bobby V would come back to the USA if the Mets job is open. What J Man has to realize as of right now the Mets have NO manager, so the longer J Man thinks of himselfas irreplaceable he may get a rude awakening.

As I was pursuing the various stories across the web I ran across this on the great site MLB TRADE RUMORS.. It seems that the Padres are sending out feelers on interest in Jake Peavey and the Brewers J J Hardy feels his is as good as gone from the Schlitz City. So if you are the GM of the Mets (a job we all want and feel we’d be outstanding at) would you call SD GM Kevin Towers and offer Jose Reyes in a deal for Peavey? Or would you deal David Wright in a package for Peavey and RHP Mike Adams? I’d do it with Reyes as the centerpiece but for Wright I’d have to think that over because it would be much tougher for me to deal Wright than Reyes. If you could get Jake Peavey for Reyes I’d have to do it and then call Doug Melvin and work out a deal for JJ Hardy.

J-Man better be careful with this hard line stance he’s taking with his new contract. It seems J-Man’s thinking is no matter who the Mets go after to be manager they would have to go 3yr/$3mil minimum and he’s right but when the team you are associated with just collapsed for the second year in a row and the fans and media are questioning if your team has the heart and balls to win a championship you really are not negotiating from strength here. As I said yesterday Gary Carter would be here on the red eye tomorrow morning to take the Mets managers job. Don’t over play your hand here Warlord.

Ok, read this story about my latest man-crush A J Pierzynski and tell me that he is not just what the Mets need. Here is a blurb from Ron Gardenhire one of AJ’s former mangers and and ex-Met:

“A.J. comes to beat you everyday,” said Twins manager Ron Gardenhire, who managed Pierzynski for two seasons before he was traded to the Giants. “No matter how you look at him and how you feel about him. He comes to figure out a way to beat you, irritate you. …

“People don’t like him and all those things, but when he’s on the baseball field you better respect him because he knows how to play and he knows how to beat you and he’ll do all those goofy little things to try and get in your head.”

Read the whole article and tell me I’m wrong to be cam paging for Pierzynski to the Mets in ‘09

Big thank you to Pacjr for the link