Oh Dickey your so fine...

If you read my last blog you'll see that I, by no stretch of the imagination, am even remotely close to being a fan of the New York Mets. Aside from a guy like a Mike Piazza the players on the team, the managers and the front office people have always just irked me — and they still do, especially today.

Yesterday, off the back of Wednesday's 8-7 loss to the St. Louis Cardinals, the Mets salvaged the series finale winning 4-0 thanks to the efforts of R.A. Dickey, a 35-year-old knuckleballer in his first season with the Mets.

I'm not bothered that they won, partly because they can't lose every game but mostly because Dickey is a great story. Coming up to the majors initially with Texas as a part of the draft class of 1996, Dickey was a conventional pitcher with an unconventional problem; he was missing is ulnar collateral ligament in his elbow, more commonly known as his Tommy John ligament. According to Rangers physicians, Dickey shouldn't have been able to turn a door knob without pain much less pitch. Still Dickey took to the hill in 2004 for Texas and enjoyed modest success as a conventional pitcher but not enough to amount to a long career.

So, with the desire to compete still burning Dickey spent two years reinventing himself as a knuckler because there is no stress on the arm with that particular pitch. And eventually after kicking around several teams Dickey seems to have found a home in New York where he is now 7-4 with an ERA close to 2.00.

So with this feel-good story what do I have to be irked about? The answer is simply management's treatment of Dickey, particularly that of manager Jerry Manuel.
All season long Manuel has found a way in comments and interviews to backhand Dickey, even after wins Manuel finds something to fault him for. Mostly it seems because Manuel's arrogance won't let him accept that knuckleball pitcher could be consistently successful (despite the fact that, in his prime, Tim Wakefield was one of the better pitchers in baseball).

But it was yesterday's comments that really made my anger boil over. In commenting after the game Manuel said that he didn't realize that Dickey was such a competitor.

Are you kidding me?

The guy has been one of your best and most consistent pitchers all year. Forget Johan, forget Pelfrey, the Mets top guy has been Dickey. And you are just know realizing that he's a competitor? Wow Jerry way to backhand a guy. Furthermore, how could you not realize that if he weren't such a competitor he probably wouldn't even be there to pitch for you. You're the manager, you're supposed to know these things and see these things.

Hopefully though justice will be served and after this year Dickey will get a nice contract and Manuel will, fingers crossed, be fired.

My advice for Mets fans

While waiting at the drive through at Taco Bell for my lunch I tuned into WFAN and caught a little bit of Beningo and Roberts yacking about the abysmal state of the New York Mets and what, after the standard good start and then prompt collapse, must be done to salvage the season.

Beningo, the seeming voice of reason, appeared resigned to the Mets ultimate fate of yet again missing the playoffs despite the loud overtures earlier in the season that this was "the year."

Roberts, refusing to accept fate, launched into a tirade demanding the Mets "Do SOMETHING," to get back on track. He argued for the firing of manager Jerry Manuel, even though this recent collapse is not entirely his fault, to the firing of hitting coach Howard Johnson, a tactic the Phillies tried late last week before promptly scoring a quartet of consecutive wins.

He even suggested the Mets go after some of the big names that could potentially be on the move before the looming Trade Deadline.

The simple truth though is Mets fans really should just accept that this is a lost season. They aren't catching the Braves for the division and shouldn't come within a stone's throw of the Wild Card and here's why:

1) Yes teams who have fired their managers mid-season often get a spark and win games. But the teams that actually carry that the whole season are the teams that are extremely talented to begin with and only tailed off because of some sort of locker room issues with the manager. And honestly who are you going to get to come in and light a fire? Bob Melvin, sorry, that doesn't frighten me, Bobby Valentine? He's probably the only guy out there with the personality to reinvigorate the Mets but I find it funny that Mets fans want a guy back who they practically ran out of town the last time around.

2) The Mets can't and won't get any big name players in a trade. Sure they could try and they probably should just to save face. But who is going to wave a no-trade clause to come to the Mets? Certainly not a guy like Roy Oswalt who is likely to entertain serious offers from real contenders like the Phillies, the Cardinals, Dodgers and, yes, the Yankees. Beyond that, who are the Mets going to put up as trade bait? Their only players worth anything they desperately need and the rest of the guys are average at best and miserable at worst (see Oliver Perez).

3) THEY JUST AREN'T THAT GOOD! And nothing they do will fix that for this season. No one will question that a guy like Jason Bay has been a huge disappointment and is certainly having one of the worst seasons of his career. Jose Reyes has been playing well as has David Wright, Ike Davis and Angel Pagan. But the rest of the team with its Carlos Beltran's, though in his defense he is coming off an injury, and Louis Castillo's there really isn't much to get excited about. The starting pitching, Johan Santana aside has been surprisingly good but even that is starting to taper off and the bullpen is, well, laughable at the best of times.

No, what the Mets need to do, really do, is play out the season, fire Omar Minaya and the rest of his staff, get some new blood in and take a chance in the free-agent market while trying to dump some dead-weight salary. If that doesn't happen then the Mets will just continue to be what they've been the past few years, only the third best team in the division.

A few simple truths

How many of your have ever heard the expression "you can do anything you put your mind to?"

My guess is most of you.

Now, better question — how many of you actually believe that?

I'm going to say not many do.

It seems that in this society we are conditioned to believe we can do anything while we're young, only to have the same people that told us that turn around when we are older and say, "give it up, have a realistic dream."

It's a difficult blow to take for sure, and more than a difficult thing to hear but readers take heart — it doesn't have to be that way.

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to interview a 28 year old assistant teaching professional at a local country club in Greenwich named Danny Balin.

Balin, a member of the Professional Golf Association, recently qualified, along with 20 other club pro's from across the nation, for the PGA Championship being held in mid-August at Whistling Straits in Wisconsin.

That in itself is not remarkable as it happens every year that club pro's get the chance to rub elbows with the superstars of the PGA Tour in "the season's final major." But what is remarkable is Balin chose not to take the easy path after college and decided to move away from his Maryland home to come up to the metropolitan area, long considered to be one of the premier regions to learn and play the game, to peruse his golfing dreams.

He knew that he wanted to be in the sports industry after college and wanted to make money as an athlete and saw that golf was a great option. He also knew that it wouldn't be easy, since he had only just seriously began playing the game, but he knew what he wanted and was willing to do anything to achieve it. When people told him to give up, that he didn't have the game to make it to the top, he only worked harder and is now reaping the rewards.

Balin has shown that no dream is worth giving up. Yes it takes a willingness to work and you have to be willing to sacrifice certain aspects of your life but the end result is more than worth it.

So the next time someone tells you to give up on a seemingly impossible dream, remember Danny Balin, a man who refused to listen to his critics, a man who was willing to work, and a man who, come August, will be performing at the pinnacle of his profession.

Thank God that's over

There are few worse days for a sports fan than the day after the Major League Baseball All-Star Game. It is, in fact, the only time of year when none of the four major professional sports are active.
Heck — even golf is in between tournaments.
So with little to watch, listen to, talk about, what is a sports fan to do?
The answer, surprisingly enough is to watch, listen to and talk about sports.
Name me one other occasion where we as sports fans can take our collective breath and try to make sense of the flurry of sports activity we've seen over the past few months. From champions crowned to perfect (and one not-so-perfect) games, to the loss of legends like Bob Sheppard and The Boss we rarely get the chance to take all the insanity and make sense of what we are seeing.
We also get the opportunity to explore things that we don't often have the time, or willingness to indulge in, like Minor League Baseball.
Sure most of those guys won't make it to the bigs but they still play great ball and the games are still entertaining. Just last night as I was driving home from my girlfriend's house I tuned into a Brooklyn Cyclones Single-A game. And it was fun to listen to the commentators talk about these young kids, fresh out of high school and college because, you just never know, some day you might hear those names again.
In the end though, I am, and I'm sure most sports fans are as well, glad the break is over because now the real excitement begins with the official start of the pennant race. Fans also can now truly begin to look forward to the start of NFL training camp and so many other great sporting events to come.
So sports fans, I hope you enjoyed your siesta because we're, thankfully, in for a wild ride the rest of the summer.