I didn't know who this guy was until the NLCS.

There is no narrative about Buck Showalter.

"The idea that Buck Showalter is too old to relate to modern (re: young) baseball players is dumber than rocks.

All those pushing this boneheaded narrative, or buying into it, do know that Buck is just two years older than Thibodeau, right?

What really would be dumber than rocks is if the next general manager of the Mets – if they ever get around to hiring a new general manager – doesn’t call Buck."

I thought his bluntness was funny.

LeMahieu had a bad year, Gleyber isn't as good as I thought, etc.

Our strengths weren't as strong as we thought.

A continuing fascination with Buck Showalter.

At this point, one has to wonder why Lupica is such a shill for Showalter. 

Sure, in a quid pro quo world, this will ensure access to Showalter's in-demand observational gems, such as, "run prevention is as important as run production" ... but he's giving that away on the cheap:

"Once Steve Cohen — worst rookie the Mets had this season — gets through chasing the star names as he looks for his next general manager, he ought to go hire Josh Byrnes, the 51-year-old vice president of baseball operations for the Dodgers, who sure seem to know how to do it.

Then Byrnes, if he gets the gig, should hire Buck Showalter to be the next manager of the Mets."

 

Let's talk all winter about Wilmer Flores. You guys wanna talk all winter about Wilmer Flores?:

"We can talk all winter about Wilmer Flores, our old friend now with the Giants, getting a bad call to end Game 5 against the Dodgers on Thursday night.

But it’s not as if Wilmer got jobbed on a 3-2 pitch with the bases loaded.

There were two outs, guy on first, he was up against Max Scherzer, against whom he was 0-for-17 lifetime in that moment, about to become 0-for-18."

Agreed. 

But it was still an obviously bad call to end the game. A playoff game, at that.

No, it wasn't a 3-2 pitch with the bases loaded and two outs in the bottom of the ninth inning of a decisive playoff game with the home team losing by one run.

A situation that has probably occurred zero times in the history of baseball.

 

It was clearly a bad call.

He thought he went. Simple as that. It happens all the time. This was just horrible timing.

But with pro sports embracing pro gambling ... it's something to consider. Some folks are inclined to think the games are "thrown" with or without gambling.

Yes, it's true. The Yankees have to prove they can beat the Rays.

 Let's talk about Alex Rodriguez, huh?:

"Who knows, maybe they can even have the kind of moment that Alex Rodriguez had 12 years ago, when he made things right, for himself and the Yankees, after the Yankees had gone nine years at the time without winning the World Series."

The Yankees have been under-performing for a long time. The projected trajectory following the 2017 playoffs has not worked out. The Rays are better than the Yankees and so are several other teams.

 

Having said that, I can state for sure that the 2021 Yankees are better than the 2021 Mets. So the Yankees have once again won the Battle for New York:

"The Yankees were built to win now. It should have started with winning their division again, something they rarely have done since the last time they won the Series. But the chance is there for Giancarlo Stanton, one of the Yankees’ $300 million stars, to be great in October of 2021. The same chance is there for Gerrit Cole. Cole got paid $324 million in Yankee money, more than any pitcher anywhere was ever paid."

...

Ask the question again: If the Yankees aren’t built to win now, then when?"

Next year. That's when. For sure, 100%.

 

"And say this again: You don’t trade as many prospects as Brian Cashman did at the trade deadline, don’t bring in reinforcements like Anthony Rizzo and Joey Gallo just to be one of the two wild card teams in the American League. Don’t give away that much depth in your farm system, whether they were top-tier kids or not, just to make the tournament."

Yeah, they stink.

Ask the question again: What does that have to do with ARod?