Dear Jon, Get Off Jimmy's Nuts

Jon Heyman's aversion to rational inferences based on statistics is well documented at places like FJM, but his dislike of the Mets - or love of Jimmy Rollins - has never been that apparent to me. That is, until I read his latest contribution to SI:

The Mets may unseat the Phillies as NL East champions this year, but there's no sense in trying to beat NL MVP and trash talker extraordinaire Jimmy Rollins at his own game.

Quiet Mets star Carlos Beltran gave it a surprise shot when he got to camp, borrowing Rollins' exact line from last spring in declaring the Mets as "the team to beat." But as Phillies pitcher Brett Myers noted, "Sequels are never as good as the original.''

And then Rollins chimed in the next day, "Has anyone ever heard of plagiarism?''

Beltran, a nice, laconic, well-groomed fellow, stunned folks with his rare back-page fodder. But Rollins holds the patent. He gets all the credit, with only an assist from the Mets for their reaction last spring. "I thank the Mets,'' Rollins said. "They took it upon themselves to take it personally.

Beltran and other Mets types are understandably excited about the acquisition of ace pitcher Johan Santana. Yet the Mets should hold their tongues now for two very good reasons: 1) They had their chance last spring when Rollins spoke, but to a man, they were afraid to speak up, a reticence that was later reflected in the way they played -- scared; and 2) Philly beat the Mets to a pulp down the stretch, winning the last seven head-to-head games.

Beltran gave it a shot. But under the circumstances his words came off as a pale impersonation of the master.

Ok. Besides the excess verbiage (Laconic? Really Jon?), Heyman seems to imply that the Mets should have answered the challenge last spring when *The MVP* declared the Phillies "the team to beat." Jon Heyman, you're a moron. There, I said it.

I'll go out on a limb and say that the only people calling for any Met player to publicly answer Rollins statements were Vinny from Staten Island and Paulie from Bay Ridge - and they were both "first time, long time."

I can't remember a single person in the media that wanted a Met to answer Rollins. If I remember correctly, the opposite was true. Rollins was viewed as a trash talking SS on a historically losing franchise. Why waste breath in answering him? All anyone wanted the Mets to do was go out on the field and take care of business much like they did on Opening Day.

Now, after The Collapse®, Jon Heyman is talking shit about the Mets saying how they should have manned up and fired a shot back? Get the fuck out of here Heyman, you're embarrassing yourself.