Incredibly, after the Phillies’ win over the Yankees in Game 5, what we seem to have here in the World Series is two managers desperately attempting to help the other team win.
Pedro Martinez
The afternoon after: Demise of Pennington sad, but not a shock
Again, some quick thoughts on the NFL. It’s not “the morning after†since I generally wake up after 1 p.m.
I’ve been a fan of Chad Pennington dating back to his Jets days. He’s gutsy, smart and tough. I think my arm is stronger than his, but his guile and heady play have always set him apart in my opinion. He validated that last year by finishing runner-up for the MVP Award while leading an overachieving Dolphins team to 11 wins, a stunning turnaround and a division title. Pennington blended seamlessly with the Wildcat offense and was a joy to watch. But the problem with Chad has always been his inability to make it through two seasons in a row. And sadly, he was unable to prove the skeptics wrong in that regard. Football’s a tough sport, and you can’t blame someone for having his shoulder shredded. But with Pennington paying greater attention to fitness at this stage of his career, it’s just a bad break. I’m not sure we’ll see him play again, and it’s a real shame: Pennington is a gentleman and a fine player. It’s just too bad that he lived up to his reputation, in a negative sense.
Santana’s Final Destination demonstrates hard truth of pitching contracts
Other sources – like Baseball Prospectus – have started to pick up on our idea of the Mets’ season being like a horror movie. Being that we are horror movie historians of sorts, we’ve specified the movie Final Destination as a direct parallel. And following with that theme, whatever demonic force has targeted the Mets claimed Johan Santana’s valuable left elbow and Oliver Perez’s somewhat less valuable right knee this week.
Sidebar: If there’s anyone out there who thought 150-year-old malcontent Gary Sheffield would outlast Santana, much less Wright, Beltran and Reyes, he or she should promptly begin playing the horses.
Regardless, neither Santana and Perez will pitch again this season, bringing to an end a series of injuries that veered into the land of the occult.
However, these two most recent maladies, particularly that of Santana, brings to attention a couple of shortcomings of the Mets’ organizational strategy.
- Pitchers are too risky to make big-money investments in.
- There is great monetary value in a successful scouting department and farm system.