A Day to Celebrate for My Friend, Mr. Glass

(Note: Two pieces for you today. The first by A.F.O.M.G. about Jose Reyes, the second by Sippy Momo hailing Pedro's tuyn on the mound last night. Enjoy.)

Hey everyone, A Friend of Mr. Glass' here. You know, I start a lot of my posts that way. Don't really know why, I just fell into the habit I guess.

Ordinarily I write it without thinking much about it. Today's a different story. That's because yesterday my friend and yours, Jose Reyes, signed a 4-year deal with the Mets worth $23.25 million big ones.

Now look, everything that can be said about Reyes has already been said. You all know how exciting he is to watch, how thrilling it is every time he hits a ball in the gap or takes a lead off first.

You all know how much he's improved between this year and last. You all know how high his ceiling still is even in this, a year in which he made his first All-Star Team (and deserved the honor).

So given that you've read all the superlatives about the guy on the day Reyes inked his first long-term deal with the Mets, I thought I would share some personal thoughts on my experience with Jose Reyes.

Most of the people who read this site are long-time Mets fans, people who lived through the lows of the early- and mid-90s, the highs of the late-90s Bobby Valentine Mets, and then again the lows of the early-00s Mets, under the direction of Art Howe.

But there are some of you, I'm sure, who are late adopters. Or perhaps others who stopped paying as close attention when things went south after the years of plenty in 1999 and 2000.

For people like you, what you have to understand about Reyes was how important he was for the franchise at a time when it was really at its lowest. The summer of 2003 was an extraordinarily depressing time.

Why? Well, take a look at this roster that took the field alongside Reyes on June 10, 2003, his first day in the pros:

1. Roger Cedeno RF
2. Timo Perez LF
3. Roberto Alomar 2B
4. Cliff Floyd DH
5. Jeromy Burnitz (RIP) CF
6. Ty Wigginton 3B
7. Jason Phillips 1B
8. Vance Wilson C
9. Jose Reyes SS

Steve Trachsel P

Look at that lineup. Almost everyone in it ahead of the No. 9 guy was a loser -- Cedeno, Alomar, Phillips, Trachsel... err, not Trachsel -- and the ones that weren't losers were the kind of loveable saps you only liked because you had to. (The definite exception being Cliff Floyd.)

I mean, sure, I loved Wiggy as much as the next guy, but look at him and look at the guy who mans third base now and there's really no comparison there.

That 2003 team was on its way to a 66-95 record. For perspective, consider that we have 64 wins already in 2006 and August just got underway.

So things were bad when Reyes got called up, and were made worse still by the fact that the incumbent, Rey Sanchez, had worn out his welcome by getting a mid-game haircut in the clubhouse several weeks earlier.

But no matter how bad things were at the time, when you heard the news that Reyes had been called up to the big club, you had to watch. You had to be there for every Reyes at-bat, just because.

Because you'd read all the scouting reports on the kid. Because you'd seen him kick ass in that All-Star Futures Game. Because you knew every other team in baseball wanted him. Because you knew how highly regarded he was even all the way back then.

And somewhere between knowing all that and knowing how badly things were for the Mets at the time you began to hope that maybe Reyes' debut with the club signaled a turning point.

You began to think that maybe this kid with the megawatt smile, the high pant legs (I, for one, wish he still wore his pants up), and the seeming inability to begin a sentence with anything other than "What can I say?", maybe he was the start of something different for the Mets.

And here we are just over 3 years later and the Mets are cruising toward their first playoff berth in 6 years. It wasn't all Reyes. Indeed, Pedro Martinez is the player most singularly credited with refashioning the franchise's image, Omar Minaya is the man most singularly responsible for our success, and David Wright is the most popular position player on the Mets.

But in some small way at least, everything began to get better the day Reyes stepped onto that field in Texas. And on the day after he signed his first long-term contract, I just wanted to remind everyone of that.

- A.F.O.M.G.