With the incessant snow and the global-warming-defying cold snap across the country, it seems a good time for thoughts to turn to spring and baseball in as positive and uplifting a manner as only a Mets fan can summon.
So: Jason Bay. Just signed with the Mets. Thirty one years old. $66 million over four years. Three-time All Star. Right-handed pull hitter with thirty-plus home runs. Wants to try and make 2009 nothing more than a distant, bad memory.
Here’s the question: How long will it be until Bay winds up on the DL?
My instinct is that he’ll blow out a tricep waving to the crowd on opening day, but I’ll be generous and give him until May 15. I figure a blown hamstring from slipping on a banana peel dropped on the dugout steps. Kathleen gives him until Flag Day when one of the jets that typically does a flyover the field on that day has a piece break off and falls on him.
PAD
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Mr. David you are just insane. How can you write novels, comics, do this blog, go to conventions, raise children, watch tv and movies, satisfy your wife, bowling, eat, sleep, shower AND watch baseball?
Come on, Something has to give?
It’s easy. I just produce duplicates and they do it all.
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Hey, write what you know.
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PAD
Actually, we should probably check with Kathleen on a couple of those.
(random cheap shots are my specialty. I don’t know why. It’s not malicious.)
PAD, you’re being very generous in your guesses. You’re assuming he makes it out of spring training….
I suspect PAD was going more for cruel/disappointing/perverse. It’s far more cruel for all involved if he actually manages to step out onto the field during an actual game before he’s struck down. Getting it spring training is tragic, but doesn’t have as much of the “Universe hates me/the Mets” vibe that PAD seems to be going for.
The Mets have had a run of bad luck, injury wise. Bay is far from a great solution to the LF hole, but neither is Matt Holliday for 7 years, $120 million. If he blows his back out (Mattingly-style), or something else (Albert Belle style) in year one, that is going to hurt.
I refuse to think this way. As of today, he’s healthy and under contract, and until he or anyone get hurt, I am not going to be one of the naysayers.
Knocked out in the second inning of the opening game when an eagle drops a turtle on his head from a great height, thinking his baseball cap in a rock.
Baseball stat-monkey here (or SDCN for old timers).
Bad signing from the get go, no matter who. Age 31, on the downside of offensive career, beginning to decline defensively already and will be a boat anchor in the latter half of his contract.
He passed the physical, so that’s a start.
I give him until a week from Tuesday. Career-ending carpal tunnel from signing autographs while avoiding falling turtles.
As a Red Sox fan who’s currently pìššëd at them for letting Bay slip away, I personally hope that he’s the one man on the Mets roster who manages to avoid anything bad… and in fact, has a stellar year and breaks records. Y’know, just to prove Theo Epstein an idiot. Mind, also as a Red Sox fan, I’d be just as happy if the Mets got all the bad luck out of their system last year and totally dominates all the press over their crosstown-rivals-who-shall-not-be-named. Not to mention the interleague play…
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That being said, I give him ’til the Fourth of July and a freak fireworks accident.
He’s a good Canadian boy, ya got a keeper, no worries.
Bay has played 150 games or more in 4 of the last 5 years (he played 145 in 2007). That’s pretty durable, if not quite iron man status. While I expect he’ll probably break down at some point during his contract, expecting him to just fall apart because someone breathed on him seems ridiculous.
Rather, I think you should look forward to some adventures (or maybe just flat-out doubles and triples) while he’s in left field. His defense is not good, and it will probably get worse.
I’m a Red Sox fan, and while I was happy the Sox had Bay for the time they did, I think they got the last of his peak years.
Just be sure he stays away from bathtubs. They can be pretty tricky getting IN and OUT, not to mention all the pitfalls that go along with it (water, soap, rubber ducks…). Bath time might be a lot of fun but any number of things involved could cause tears, ruptures, or fractures.
Hey at least you don’t have to follow the Pirates, the taem that’s been rebuiling since 1992.
Geeze Peter, you make it sound like he signed with the Cubs.
Bay came to the RedSox from the Pirates around the same time the Yankees bought another Pirate outfielder who has been hurt most of the time since they got him. So that outfielder has taken the bad karma upon himself and Bay should be good to go.
Unfortunately the Pirates’ owners look at their own club like it’s the only AAAA team out there. Anybody who plays well gets traded away before they can ask for a bigger salary. The entire team makes less money than ARod. But at least they aren’t the Cubs.
Cards fan here. Gotta love the waves of optimism that comes out of Mets Nation these days. If you want, you can trade us Bay for seven years of Matt Holliday at $17 mil per.
I am divided about this. I feel Bay is a good guy and a decent player, but he’s no Manny Ramirez, for instance. The Mets had to do SOMETHING to show they were trying to improve, but I feel this had to be the most lackluster group of free agents available in a baseball offseason in a long time. I mean, really. Jason Bay? Matt Holliday? These guys are commanding big bucks, but do you see either one of them getting a whiff of the Hall of Fame after they retire – unless they buy a ticket? It was one of the best signings the Mets could have made, which further highlights the slim pickings.