xxi-xxv

congrats VG, you and your team deserve this.

Now about Omir Santos I think Bay is having that year like Beltran did in 05, bad.

the cowboys won a playoff game and it clearly shows they are ready to take the next step towards greatness.

I specifically remember in 2009 laughing at your notion that Angel Pagan was anything more than a 4th outfielder. I stand 100% corrected. You said from day 1 you thought he could be a very good player and you were dead on. There was not much to go on off 2009, but this guy has done a complete 180 in terms of his baseball awareness and on field ability. In all honesty not only has he proven he can play everyday he might just be one of the Mets top 4 or 5 players. When you play in Citifield you need guys like this and you get credit for indentifying what he could do early on, good job.

I think the one thing we are seeing is a team that actually has some chemistry. Rumors were always there that Carlos Delgado was a bad guy in the lockeroom. I am suspecting that to be true. Still need one more starter IMO and probably another bullpen arm to bridge to KROD, but I suspect this team will compete all year. There really is not a lot to not like in terms of how they play. They may not be the most talented, but they play hard and Id rather play hard and lose then watch what we saw last year and in 2008 and 2007. Keeping the homegrown players and incorporating key veterans is a tough thing, Omar seems to be doing this well now with Niese, Davis, Pagan, Tejada, Pelfrey, Meijia to go along with Barajas, Franceour, Bay

Yes and that does happen often

They have a group of guys you can root for. Franceour, Bay, Wright, Davis, Reyes. I like Barajas D and ability to hit with some pop 8th. I love Niese, think Pelfrey is gonna be ok and am not concerned with Johan even though he looked awful tonight. This team has hope. Can you imagine the way the lineup looks if Beltran can ever get back?

The Mets spend roughly 30 million dollars on 2 outfielders...put franceour and matthews in mix its closer to 40.....anyway I assume you meant they were cheap on SP..

Hes an active 26 year old man I highly doubt thats a concern.

I still do not see a team that has Reyes, Wright, Beltran, bay, Santana and Krod being all that awful. Sure a lot depends on health, but then again whos team does not. What happens to the Yankees if Jeter, Arod, Tex, CC, Cano and Mariano all lose significant time. Not saying the Met players are as good as those guys, but that group of 6 players is not exactly shit. Reyes statys healthy mets will win 85-90 games, as probably would have occoured in 2009 had the entire team not gotten hurt. 2009 was more an indictment of the players behind the group of "stars" then the stars themselves. They all were hurt and the replacement drop off was horrendous.

Never saw the 2006 Cards or 87 Twins huh? Anyway the 2000 Mets were not a great team, but they could pitch and had 2 lefty starters that were very good in Hampton and Leiter and a solid overall bullpen aside from benitez in the big spot. Hugh just explained to the idiots the reason WHY PIAZZA could not charge the mound after Clemens threw the bat at him(he did not hit him in the WS that was in a regular season back end of a day night doubleheader when Piazza was in the middle of a 7-9 4 homers 12 rbis stretch vs that juiced up piece of shit clemens)the team was not very good and had they lost Mike Piazza for an inning let alone multiple games they would have had no shot to stay even competitive. I will say this, had Timo run the series might have been a tad more interesting. I think what sealed it was what Cone said in his book, after slumping down the stretch and only winning 87 games the Yankees went on a new roids cycle and it enabled them to recover from that 3-15 stretch to close the season.

Yes I did not consider Warner or Favre based on the unknown(well now we know about Warner), but I agree they are in that 2nd group and both at one time or another had been in the class of the first group.

84-78 with Joel Pineiro, Bengie Molina and Ben Sheets. I take the former, leave me money for 2011 and rebuild farm system.

Here is who I would take over ELI. Peyton...obvious Brees...this guy is very good and I still wonder what he does outside domes or warm weather but hes great Brady...will be back to his 100% self in 2010 Roethlisberger...2 rings I do not care how he got them 2 rings at the most important position on the team Now the debates...all good qbs though(disclaimer) Rivers...still take ELI, is a hot head, has never won a big game and would never translate with that attitude in NY Schaub...getting better, terrific stats, has won zilch McNabb....very similar to Rivers, seems to crack under instense pressure and seems like a real diva Cutler...come on now Rodgers...just not there yet in terms of winning resume, not to mention holds the ball longer than 2004 Kurt Warner Giant, improved on that though a lot Romo.....see why you take Big Ben over ELI, plus I think hes a dick, his antics before 2007 playoffs not forgotten and 1 playoff win does not cut it I take ELI over all those guys. Here is why in a nutshell, and I will credit Mike Lupica for citing this in his column today in regards to JOhnny Damon with a quote by Knicks GM Donnie Walsh and I am paraphrasing here. Sometimes a guys value to your team, is not what his value would be to others, what his makeup is for your city, what he does under the scrutiny and how he handles the whole package. Very telling statement IMO and why I take ELI over those other guys. Again not to say any of those other guys are not great qbs for their teams and cities. Its just that at this time, in this town based on what I know and what I have seen I would take ELI. Again cant go wrong with the others either way.

Know when ELI stepped up as a leader? Dec 13th against the Eagles. With first place on the line all ELI did was single handedly keep his team in that game and actually take the lead after falling behind 14 points. It was not ELIS fault that his defense game after game after game shit the bed when he did his part, that night in particular he was outstanding and that at the time was thebiggest game of the year. Why are we still debating ELI Manning, what more does he have to do? Maybe throw for 4000 yards and 28 tds with 1st 2nd and 3rd year Wrs? ...oh wait nevermind

Going down this road again if we must.....ahh well. Eli simply managed the game in the 2007 playoffs? Here are some instances from that post season where he did a tad more than "manage" the game, a la Trent Dilfer. Divisional Round, down 14-7 to the Cowboys, after a close to 10 minute 18 play TD drive by the Cowboys, Eli and his offense get the ball back with 47 seconds left on the clock. What does Manning and his offense "manage" to do? They drive right down the field aided by some clutch passes to Steve Smith, Kevin Boss and a TD strike to Amani Toomer. Totally changed the games momentum. Hardly managing a game. A conservative approach with a QB "managing" games would have been to be content to be down 7 at the half. Championship game, freezing cold, Lambeu. What did ELI do to "manage" this game. Threw the ball 40 times and put on an absolute clinic of abuse on AL Harris with Plaxico Burress. Giants did not run the ball exceptionally well that day and ELI had plenty of drops on a cold night by his Wr's, but managed to lead the offense with his arm. Again not the gameplan of a team with a QB simply "managing" things. Super Bowl. Did something that at the time only 2(now 3 with Ben last year) qbs had ever done. Led their team down the field for a go ahead touchdown in the final 3 minutes of a SUper Bowl. The other was this guy named Joe Montana in 1988 vs the Bengals. We will not go over the particulars of the drive, or the type of game he played, been there we know it. When you are one of only 2(now3) qbs to do what he did you are hardly simply a game manager. Eli Manning is not a problem for the Giants. He is a cool customer under pressure. Has proven it on the biggest of stages and has something that is worth its weight in gold, does not let the NY media bother him one bit. He took steps this year and put up numbers that many felt he never would playing in the northeast with a roster of novice WR's. In fact all I hear about is how well Peyton did with his two young WRS in Collie and Garcon. Eli did pretty well with his young WRS too. Eli's defense sabotaged a terrific season for him. In fact this is 2 years in a row now where he is plus 10 or more td/int ratio.

I read today that if the Jets beat the Bengals this week and advance to the divisional round against the Colts that the league is going to ask the Colts to play blindfolded to help the Jets out again. j/k. Good for the Jets, 2 weeks ago most of the fanbase I converse was all like "same old Jets", but hey they did what they had to do and won their games. More than the Giants can say(although the Giants actually got no help anyway so 10 wins would be out anyway) As for the fans, this is what bothers me. Today ones I spoke to made it about the Giants. I heard things like "at least we know how to close out a building" and "we would have beaten the Colts anyway". My response was "well you certainly do not know how to bring a championship home to the building" and "we DID beat the Pats".... its all in fun, but some of their fanbase makes it very difficult to pull for them. Maybe cause I am a Met fan and I know for every failure the Yankees have the last 30 years the Mets have 300 of them. I understand that my teams miniscule success dwarfs the Yankees, sadly I do not think many Jet fans get this fact and become asses about it. Anyway Jets 16 Bengals 10

If you like football, you like more games. Simple as that. I am not happy that there is not a game next week and maybe they would have gotten their doors blown off, but then again maybe they would not have. Stranger things have happened just look at these things from the past 4 years. In 2006 the Colts were unable to stop the run on any level. Made the playoffs as a 3 seed, played week 1 of WC weekend against the KC Chiefs and what was the best run game in the league. What did the Colts do? Held Larry Johnson to some ridiculouos number, first time all year they held a team under 100 let alone the number they did and used that momentum to continue to dominate in run defense to a SB title. In 2008 the Arizona Cardinals were 9-7 in arguably the worst division in football and had their doors blown off all season by the likes of the Giants, Jets, Eagles, Patriots etc. What do they do? Almost win SB. You always want to get in. By the way the 2007 Giants were a more talented team then the GB Packers. The Packers benefitted from playing in a weaker division and its debateable if they were less talented then the Cowboys.

whats he supposed to say "I am overmatched, I relied to heavily on matchups as opposed to our scheme and I tried to reinvent the wheel when I should have let the train just carry itself"? Hes a goner. Here is what is weird, Spags wanted him as his DC in St Louis. Wonder if Spags would want him as anything but a position coach anymore?

I know this....you stated you are no longer a Giant fan based on some bad sequences of events. I assume that when the Yankees were god fucking awful in the late 80's and early 90's and were only fortunate enough that Steinbrenner was banned and Gene Michael cleaned that awful situation up you were not a fan of that team either. Nobody who off a few bad games that would abondon a team would have rooted for that shitshow. The bandwagon only started back up around 95 96....i you say you rooted for the Yankees at those times then so be it. I just find it hard to believe.

booyah was a cited member in the above mentioned team critique In all honesty teams just dont make the playoffs every year. Now that our streak is done I think in the NFC its a 3 team tie between Zona, Minny and the Eagles for consecutive playoff berths with a whopping 2 in a row. We went 4 straight years. They did not even go 4 straight years in the Parcells years of 83-90 Kind of puts it in perspective. Sadly NY is now littered with too many "modern" Yankee fans who think this is devine right year to year and failt to recognize the competitive balance of the NFL.

Stop making sense Blu, hes not a Yankee, only Yankees viewed through the eyes are front running band wagon fans get the nod of greatness. For the record I do not like Molina either, but they could do worse and something tells me by the end of the year he is sharing at bats with Thole anyway.

Yes terrible. The Yankees? No. terrible? Hardly. YOu have proven yourself to be nothing but a bandwagon fan and I bet somewhere back around 1989 or 90 you wanted as much to do with the Yankees as you do now with the Giants. Fan attitudes like that do not just "pop up".

I think what we missed a bit was Mike Matthews. Darcy Johnson was not the blocker that Matthews was. Anyway Hedgecock is not someone that has to stay. If there are better options I say yes. Its a shame that beckum cannot block yet. We need the blocking of Hedgecock and the hands of Beckum to create one FB that can do both...we shall call him Beckcock

I'm not rooting for them anymore until all these players are gone, Bay, Molina included