Wow, Joel Sherman is bringing it hard this week! Â Some excerpts:
I told Mets officials that during this offseason I have been besieged by angry Mets fans telling me either face-to-face or through e-mail that they were giving up their season tickets or partial plans; and that I have yet to have one person tell me that they were purchasing a package of any type.
But Mets officials said that was unscientific and that they are doing just fine in selling packages, specifically partial plans.
It is just that the Mets are again falling for what I call the WWE referee trick. You know how in wrestling that the referee has to fall for the same stupid ruse every week so that the chair can get into the ring behind his back … Well, the Mets’ version of that is annually convincing themselves that all of their players will be healthy and productive and never really coming up with a suitable Plan B. And then being as surprised as that WWE referee when the chair is in the ring, or in their case when the injuries and bad seasons come.
That’s just a taste…a must read and it makes me wonder what the real story is. Â Sherman isn’t going to write this three days in a row based upon some gut feeling.
As much as the Wilpons made sadden us at times, I worry about who the next owner may be. Â I fear the Dolans, and I fear MegaGiganticCorp. Â Now if Mark Cuban can get a team, that would be super-entertaining, my blog woul dhave plenty to cover every single day, and hey he actually lets bloggers get credentials (to be fair I have not asked Mr. Horwitz for credentials).
Nothing about Sherman is striking me as must read.
Particularly the part where he implies that the random subset of Mets fans that emailed him is a better indication than the ACTUAL SALES FIGURES available to the Mets.
Mets fans that decide to buy or renew season plans are not looking to email Sherman to tell him about it. And his persistant negativity towards the Mets encourages people that decided to not renew to email him.
Not to say figures aren’t hurting (but everything is in this ecnomy as well.) The 6-packs suggest that. But that doesn’t mean the best way to procede is to listen to Sherman’s personnel suggestions..who does he think he is, Adam Rubin?
fair points, I think we’ll know about ticket sales when we see Game 2.
Yeah, maybe Sherman’s trying to get everyone fired so he can get a player development job. [rolls eyes]
I wish he’d brought more attention to the fact that in addition to 1 of the “5 elite players” being out, 1 only plays every 5th game, and 1 only serves his purpose if you’re already winning.
Sherman’s spot-on on one thing: the Mets simply did not address their needs this off-season. They were killed last year due to weak pitching and a lack of depth. They’ve done next to squat about either.
Bascially, the Mets plan for 2010 is to have 6 or 7 of the players on the field at any given time to all have career years. How dare the media and fans not buy into such an air-tight strategy?
I’ve enjoyed every word he’s written this week. Really bringing it.
I don’t think we’ll really know about ticket sales until May. Game 2 is typically the slowest day of the year (given the freezing cold April nights) and April in general is slow. But we’ll see, personally I suspect the Mets will be a lot more competitive then most people give them credit for, even with Manuel doing what he does, and people will get excited again forgetting that they predicted 70wins in February.