BATTER UP: NEW YORK METS

Counting down the seconds till Opening Day when life begins anew involves providing a "starting nine" for all 29 major-league teams, plus the Tampa Bay team... whatever it's called this week. Presenting: The New York Mets.

1. Their window to win another World Series is small: However, it has little to do with their aging lineup -- Julio Franco, age 48; Tom Glavine, 41 and Moises Alou, 40, among others. The Mets have two years left at Shea Stadium before moving into the lavish $420 million Citi Field. Frankly, the thought of the Mets being housed in a state-of-the-art stadium and winning the World Series there is scary. If it's going to happen again, it better happen at Shea.
   
   Shea is the last of the 1960s and '70s city-built stadiums. It's a concrete sea replete with the eardrum-assailing din of airplanes taking off and landing at La Guardia Airport. Mets fans, though, have given it character, and it always projected a different air of New York than that other ballpark over in the Bronx. From here, it's the late '60s-'70s-'80s New York of Billy Joel and Lou Reed songs, or Times Square before Disney got it meathooks into it.
   
   The Mets have always kind of existed more for the misfits and the poets. Shea Stadium, plus mostly bad teams, have helped create that vibe and once the Mets leaves, a little more of it will be gone for good, so the Mets need to win the World Series this year or next before moving into the new ballpark and becoming a little more like a lamer version of the Yankees.
2. Proof they're morphing into the Yankees: MetsGrrl has expressed displeasure with the team's season-ticket ads, which feature an uninspired design and simply say, "See 81 Games. Minimum" -- implying the Mets are a sure bet to play in October. Careful, Mets management. People might think you're cocky.
3. I don't see it happenin': The Mets have never successfully defended a division title and that won't change this year, even coming off a National League-best 97 wins. It all comes back to the all-important balanced strength. Half of the everyday players -- Carlos Beltrán, Carlos Delgado, José Reyes and David Wright -- need no introduction for fantasy league obsessives. After that, it gets hazy, especially whenever manager Willie Randolph writes Paul Lo Duca into the lineup as the No. 2 hitter, or when anything is hit toward Shawn Green in right field.
4. The pitching is all kinds of dodgy: The Mets starting staff resembles Fort Lauderdale at this time of year -- anyone who is neither old (41-year-old Tom Glavine and Orlando Hernandez, listed at 37, wink-wink) or young and unpredictable (John Maine, Oliver Perez) sticks out like a sore thumb.
   
   Maine (6-5, 3.60 ERA) last season does not seem ready to be a No. 3 starter on a contending team. Hardball Times has pointed out, his strikeout rate doesn't really support the low hit rate he yielded last season, and he's prone to giving up the gopher ball.
   
   New York's bullpen also pitched over its head last season. Relievers tend to regress from one year to the next. That's just the way she goes.
5. That's why they're called the Amazin's: It's been 45 seasons and the Mets are still waiting for a batting champion, a National League MVP and the franchise's first no-hitter. Even more astoundingly, last season Mets pitchers hit a franchise-record 62 batters, but not one was named Craig Biggio (source: Plunk Biggio).
6. You can never go home again for a rehab assignment: Wright grew up a Mets fan since its Triple-A team was in his hometown of Norfolk, Va. The Mets just switched their affiliation to the New Orleans Zephyrs.
7. Retro Mets: Rick Aguilera (right-handed pitcher, 1985-89) and Dwight Gooden (right-handed pitcher, 1984-94) get the nod since both sum up the saga of the '86 team which every North American male who was between the age of eight and 14 that fall supported.
   
   Aguilera had a central role in one of the '86 Mets' greatest acts of arrogance. Like the '85 Bears with their Super Bowl Shuffle, the '86 Mets had a video. Actually, they had two -- one the team created and another, Get Metsmerized. The latter is not on YouTube, which might be justified since as Jeff Pearlman noted in his book The Bad Guys Won, Aguilera was its sole saving grace. His teammates variously sounded like "a teenage prom queen," "97 percent unintelligible," and "as if he's chewing on rocks." Aguilera's verse was as follows:
   
   When they want a batter filled with terror
   They call on me, Rick Aguilera
   Slider's hot, I'm on the mound
   With cool control I mow 'em down
   
   Aguilera was later one of many good players then-Mets general manager Frank Cashen traded away in a vain bid to recapture the magic of '86. He was sent away in a 1989 trade for Frank Viola that gave the Twins some key parts of their 1991 World Series team. As for Doc Gooden, greater minds have already told the story of Doc's drug problems and dashed potential.
8. Need-to-know: Teams with big-name offensive stars who play in major media markets are always overrated. The Mets, who had everything go right in '06 until the NLCS -- Pedro Martinez's elbow woes nothwithstanding -- are riding for a fall. The scenario which seems likely is a team that scores a ton of runs, but won't be able to get anyone out or buy a hit in a 2-1 game. The hitting, though, is good enough that it will prop the Mets up until GM Omar Minaya acquires pitching help. The Mets likely won't repeat, but the wild card spot should provide a soft landing.
9. Lastly a FYI on behalf of Keith Hernandez: First of all, contrary to how Newman on Seinfeld told it, on June 14, 1987 the Mets played the Pirates and Hernandez was 2-for-4 with a double and home run while handling 12 fielding chances flawlessly. Secondly, he is a cool guy and still totally sponge-worthy at age 53, even if Elaine Benes wasn't wavin' him in. It's her loss, Mex. Solidarity, 'cause in a way, we all played first base.
   
   
   

That's all for now. Send your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.