Phixin' for a Phight

I'd been in such a good mood before I checked the news today. Last night I won tickets through the random ticket lottery, giving me dibs on tickets to either the home opener or any of the three Mets-Yankees games at Shea. I couldn't believe my luck.

But then I go to check Metsblog and what do I see? Nothing but a whole lotta chirpin' coming out of that Phillies clubhouse. First it was "Who the Fuck Is" Jimmy Rollins, now it's Brett Myers.

If you're not familiar with Myers, you can learn a little about the kind of player he is by checking out his ESPN page. You can also learn a lot about the kind of person he is by checking out this article in the Boston Globe from last summer.


Normally I like to keep these guys' personal lives out of it, but when you read a passage like this it really sticks with you:

"Authorities and witnesses say Myers then assaulted his wife, leaving her sitting on the sidewalk with a swollen face, crying. She told police her husband hit her in the face twice with his fist, according to the police report. Witnesses said he slapped her and then pulled her off the ground by her hair."

So yeah, Brett Myers... not the kind of guy you hope your sister ends up with.

I'm not sure whether Myers had to attend any anger management classes or what exactly, but it seems he's directed some of his ire toward your favorite team and mine, the New Guys.

"I hate the Mets," Myers said. "I want to beat them more than anyone else."

These Phillies are really stirring the pot here, and you know what, I don't mind it. It's often noted how curious it is that no legitimate baseball rivalry exists between the Mets and Phillies, two teams who are more proximate than the Yankees and Red Sox.

Easy answer to why there's no rivalry: the two teams have never been good at the same time. It's looking like that could change this year, and with the kind of rhetoric coming out of the Phillies' clubhouse, I'm really, really looking forward to Opening Day at Shea when our boys take on the bigmouths from Philly.

I got an e-mail yesterday from a friend of mine about my column on Wednesday. Big Phillies fan, this guy Chris. It's the kind of back and forth we love about baseball; the late February argument about who's got the better bullpen, and who's gonna win the division.

This could really be a lot of fun. Phillies fans show up in droves to Mets games; by the same token games at The Vet and Citizens Bank Park are always densely populated with Mets fans.

It'd be different than the rivalry with the Braves. When we play the Braves there's always one or two guys in your section wearing a Braves jacket. Inevitably everyone in his area starts directing the "Ass-hole" chant his way, but that's it really.

But if a rivalry develops with the Phils it could really turn in to something legit -- anyone who's seen Giants and Eagles fans go at it knows that (granted that Philly's more of a football town, but nevertheless). Best of all, both teams have young, solid cores and would seem poised to be playoff contenders for the next several years.

As for this year, I still gotta go with the Mets. In his e-mail, my friend started by saying the Mets were still the team to beat, but he talked a lot like he believed the Phils had the upper hand.

Sorry, Chris, I just don't think so. I think Phillies fans are putting all their eggs in the starting pitching basket. They think the Phillies' rotation is very good while the Mets' is very bad. In actuality, it's more like the Phillies' rotation is very reliable whereas the Mets' rotation is very unknown. That description of the Mets' rotation sounds worse than it is, and I think the description of the Phillies' rotation sounds better than it is.

Remember what our rotation was in the early part of last year? It was Pedro Martinez and Tom Glavine, who were nasty, Steve Trachsel, who was terrible all year, and some combination of Brian Bannister (mixed), Victor Zambrano (bad), Jeremi Gonzalez (bad), Alay Soler (bad) and Jose Lima (relentlessly terrible).

No question, there's a ton of question marks with this team's starting rotation, but the idea that this year's rotation would be better than last year's, more consistent, is entirely plausible.

As for the Phillies, Jaime Moyer had horrible peripherals as a Phillie, and he's old. He went from a pitcher's park to a hitter's park, and that won't help a guy who basically allows one fly ball for every grounder. Freddy Garcia had a 5.50+ ERA three months last year. Adam Eaton has never been good. Cole Hamels is nasty. If everyone pitches above themselves they'll have a very good rotation. If they don't they'll have an altogether middling one.

Up against that pitching will be the vaunted Mets offense. I'm confident that the addition of Moises Alou (provided he stays healthy, which is a big if) and the continued development of David Wright and Jose Reyes will offset any dropoff we see from Beltran, Lo Duca or Delgado.

Honestly though, of those three I only expect sizeable decline from Lo Duca; Beltran's in his prime, and Delgado had what was actually kind of a shitty season offensively and still hit 38 home runs and drove in 114 runs. He had tennis elbow and a down year and still had an outstanding bottom line.

Perhaps at some point we can do a position-by-position rundown of the two teams. As for now though, I like Billy Wagner's attitude the best:

“Our motivation isn't to beat the Phillies, our motivation is to win the World Series.”

Testify, Billy, testify!

- A.F.O.M.G.

(Image courtesy of static.flickr.com)