Author: Shannon Shark @metspolice

I have posted this every year for many years now.  This year, I am so mad at the 2021 squad that I can’t be bothered to look at last year’s roster (or this year’s) to see if I should add anyone.  If you were “Irish” on the 2021 team you either booed the fans or were complicit in your silence so I can’t be bothered to add your name.   So here’s a rerun post.

The rules? Be Irish, have Irish Ancestry….or be “close enough” that we can include you (you’ll see what I mean soon enough).  No birth certificates will be checked.

And it is a Happy St. Patrick’s Day from William A. Shea Stadium (and a big thanks to Bill Shea for giving us the gift of baseball) –let’s welcome Bob Murphy to the microphone.  Tim McCarver</span> is up in the TV booth) to introduce the Irish Mets – a list of Mets who have at-least Irish-sounding names, or have some Irish in their heritage.

It’s another mostly rerun post. I forgot to knock one of these out too. Man, I am as off my game as Pete Alonso will be in June when you guys are booing him.

The rules? Be Irish, have Irish Ancestry….or be “close enough” that we can include you (you’ll see what I mean soon enough).  No birth certificates will be checked.

This year…some major changes!

And it is a Happy St. Patrick’s Day from William A. Shea Stadium (and a big thanks to Bill Shea for giving us the gift of baseball) – lets welcome Bob Murphy to the microphone (Tim McCarver is up in the TV booth) to introduce the Irish Mets – a list of Mets who have at-least Irish-sounding names, or have some Irish in their heritage.

Introducing the pitchers:

Our starters: Nolan Ryan, Tim Leary, Terry Leach, Jim McAndrew, and David Cone. (Half-Irish Matt Harvey has a photo shoot and is unable to join us today.).  The bullpen:  Sean Patrick Gilmartin,  Colin McHugh, Tim Burke, Greg McMichael, Chuck McElroy, Tug McGraw, P.J. Conlon & Roger McDowell. Sam McWilliams joins the AAA All Irish Team in case we need to bring someone up mid-season, and Sean Reid-Foley has a shot at making the squad.

Behind the plate: James McCann. Mike Fitzgerald, Todd Hundley, Duffy Dyer and of course Charlie O’Brien

Third base: Daniel Murphy gets moved over to cover.  Murph is a good guy always willing to switch positions to help the team.

Shortstop: Roy McMillan

Second base: Jeff McNeil takes over for past incumbent Doug Flynn

First base: he is part-Irish on his mother’s side, The Captain, Keith Hernandez

In left: Kevin McReynolds

In Center: Brian McRae

And the Right Fielder: Dave Gallagher

We have room for five players in the bench: Super-sub Joe McEwing, Justin Turner (with that hair I am assuming he is Irish), Jeff McKnight, Doug Flynn, WBC Team Israel’s star Tyler Patrick Kelly (son of Patrick Kelly),  and this year Tom O’Malley is depth at  AAA All Irish Team.

Pete Flynn will take care of the grounds, and to manage this not-so-impressive lineup, I have no idea what his ethnicity is but both Terry and Collins are names found in Irish households, so please welcome number 10 – Terry “Colactus” Collins, along with his bench coach Regis Philbin.

There were several others who didn’t have enough games to make the cut (O’Malley has the fewest total at 91, Erik O’Flaherty from 2015).

Every year I miss somebody, let me know who, and like I said at the top, I didn’t put any effort into this this year.  If you are Irish and didn’t make it, you should have said something about Baez.

LGM

My friends the Mets would like you to know they acquired some new guys that neither booed the fans nor were complicit in their silence (for example Pete Alonso and Jacob deGrom who said nothing).  Always good to have Mets players without those sins on their hands.

METS SIGN OUTFIELDER TRAVIS JANKOWSKI
AND LHP CHASEN SHREVE

FLUSHING, N.Y., MARCH 17, 2022 – The New York Mets today announced the club has signed outfielder Travis Jankowski and left-handed pitcher Chasen Shreve to minor league contracts with invitations to Major League Spring Training.

Jankowski, 30, appeared in 76 games with the Philadelphia Phillies in 2021 and slashed .252/.364/.351 with 24 runs, six doubles, two triples, one home run, 10 RBI, 22 walks and five steals. The left-handed hitter owns a career .239/.322/.318 slashline with 35 doubles, nine triples, nine home runs, 52 RBI, 69 steals and 118 walks in 426 games over seven seasons.

The 6-2, 190-pounder was originally selected by the San Diego Padres in first round (44th overall) out of the 2012 First-Year Player Draft.

Shreve, 31, spent the 2021 season with the Pittsburgh Pirates, appearing in 57 games for the club and posting a 3-3 record with a 3.20 ERA (20 earned runs/56.1 innings) with 28 walks and 45 strikeouts. He posted the ninth-lowest ERA in the National League among left-handed relievers (min. 50 games pitched) and held opposing hitters to 15 hits in 101 at-bats with runners on base (.149 average) in 2021.

He has appeared in 292 games across eight major league seasons, going 20-11 with two saves, a 3.63 ERA (115 earned runs/285.0 innings) with 142 walks and 313 strikeouts. He has held lefthanded batters to a .222 (91-410) batting average during his career.

The 6-4, 180-pounder spent the 2020 season with the Mets, going 1-0 with a 3.96 ERA (11 earned runs/25.0 innings) with 12 walks and 34 strikeouts across 17 games. Lefties were 2-32 (.063), the third-lowest mark in the majors (min. 20 left-handed batters faced) against Shreve in 2020.

He was originally selected by the Atlanta Braves in the 11th round of the 2010 First-Year Player Draft of the College of Southern Nevada.

Hey guys, stop worrying about the vaccines story.  Don’t you know how the world works by now?  Let me remind you..

I’m confident Mayor Adams will find a way where all the Mets players can play baseball AND we can all be safe.  Steve’s a smart guy, obviously when he financially supported someone he would have chosen to back someone with the wherewithal to find a safe solution to challenges such as this.

This is a non-story.  I get why you think it’s a story, but it’s a non-story.

The annual look back at the green Mets uniforms over the years

We begin with the Green Murph.

The one above is not mine, but actually Nick’s.  Nick is not messing around. He also has the Kid 8 patch on his 28 who emailed me a few jersey pics.

Nick really brought his A game. Here is a 1985 version via Mitchell & Ness. If you don’t know who 18 was on the 1985 Mets then you are in the middle of the wrong post for your level of nerdiness.

This next one Nick says is late 1980’s, but MBTN shows Mark Carreon wearing 45 in 1990 – regardless, Lukas is gonna lose his mind when he sees the font.

The next one Nick says is early 1990’s. Hubie Brooks? D.J. Dozier?

Next, Nick shares his 2006 Joe Smith.

And finally Nick has this 2008 style. I think I boycotted these or wasn’t in jersey-mania mode yet. You know who #5 is right?

This next one wasn’t an on-field one, but it’s back from when the Mets did Player’s Choice jerseys (those were cool fun) and this is one of my favorite possessions which I got for $30 in the team shop the year Murph was out and you Ike Hypers thought we’d never see Murph again.

You can see the cool front here…

 

Here are some Mets caps from over the years.    I find the third one “racist” (for this post lets just use the word to mean perpetuating a stereotype, and we can parse language some other day).

People get mad at me for calling out this cap.  (It’s cool to be racist as long as its Mr. Met being racist or something.)   I would like to point out that the Mets have not broken this out in a few years.  Bravo Inclusive Mets.

The first one cap is boring and the middle one an abomination.

 

Again, good job by the Mets moving away from that ill-advised stunt cap.

This was the boring 2016 cap.  Looks like this is a league wide template and everyone gets white on green. Zzzz. At least it doesn’t have a stereotype.

 

For 2017, this cap

And for 2018 which is not as nice as last year’s.

 

Here’s my not-inexpensive Green Reds Seaver.  I don’t think I have worn it, maybe once, because I am afraid to get it dirty.

 

 

Here’s a screen grab I took in 2015.  There is that yucky racist Mr. O’Met.  Again, for those of you who get mad why don’t you imagine what that cap would look like on say Cinco De Mayo or Chinese New Year and tell me it’s still cool.

Fortunately this cap seems to have disappeared as people become more aware of the issues.  In general, I didn’t find too many offensive stereotype driven products this year.  Good job everyone!

 

This is my old Original Irish Night cap I have from way back at Shea whenever they did Original Irish Night.

And here’s probably the best of the Irish caps.  The Irish hybrid.  And yeah that’s Regis Philbin!

And now the non-rerun part.

This is the 2019 cap.

And the 2020 and 2021 cap.

For 2022, the MLB Shop is selling these.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day, and remember don’t embarrass my Irish ancestors by acting like a buffoon.

The soldiers defending Ukraine.  Nurses who worked 48 hour shifts during covid.  The guy shooting t-shirts into the second deck.  THESE are heroes, and not all heroes wear capes.