Meet The Mess
"The future ain't what it used to be." --Yogi Berra

The optimists are hanging on by their fingernails. One by one, the rational mind can no longer rationalize the possibilities of World Championships, inching into wildcard berths or even a .500 season. The rational mind must begin to realize that this fiasco of a baseball team should, in all truth and clarity, be renamed. Ladies and gentlemen, meet your 2003 New York Mess.

The Mess can't hit and can't field. They are hitting a collective .218 and average nearly an error a game. The Mess closer is a whining head case who can't close games (0-2 with a 7.36 ERA and three blown saves in six tries.) And the Mess franchise player is hitting .148 with zero homers and zero rbis while remaining a defensive liability behind the plate.

Back in October as Fred Wilpon and boy blunder GM Steve Phillips announced the signing of Hula Howe as the second coming and tried in vain to get us to forget the fact they'd settled for second best and had failed to get the manager everyone knew we needed in Lou Piniella, even then, we knew where this season was headed. Hula Howe has had the Mess laid back alright. They're so laid back they fell asleep.

While the Mess fester and flounder in these opening weeks, losing 5 straight to the likes of the Florida Marlins and the Montreal Expos, one can't help but look at the AA-calibre Tampa Bay Devil Rays managed by the manager who could have been, Lou Piniella. The Devil Rays defeated the Yankees yesterday in a 2-1 nail-biter and at 5-7, are not only respectable despite themselves, but are not mired in last place like the Mess asking each other collectively what is going wrong as the season goes careening out of control towards disaster.

Following yesterday's defeat of the Yankees, Lou Piniella noted

"What do you do when people tell you your team is a loser, accept it? I don't accept that. I believe if a team executes and learns how not to beat itself, you don't have to have the best talent to win."

Meanwhile, prior to yesterday's Groundhog Day movie-like repeat of the day before's disasterous finish, Hula Howe held a "closed door" meeting. What went on in that "closed door" meeting? Did Hula Howe scream and yell, piss and moan, break furniture, remind people like Fat Mo and Roberto Alomar and Mike Piazza that they get paid enormous sums of money to hit and field like professionals, not make poor effort after poor effort and scratch their heads as though playing baseball were a great cosmic mystery to them? Or did he pass out pacifiers and blankets so they could have a peaceful nap time lest they get too anxious about their bush league beginning? We don't know what Hula Howe did but whatever it was, it had no effect on the Mess.

You know the season's in the tank when within the first two weeks of the season the team's alleged stars are spouting loser clichés like Alomar's "if this goes longer, then we're going to go nowhere.", or Mike Stanton's weak "this is gut-check time or even Hula Howe's hopeful wail that "it's only April.

Only April? What does that mean? We don't have to really start playing until June or July? Somehow its difficult to imagine Lou Piniella sitting back and telling his players it doesn't matter, it's only April.

There's one young guy on the Mess who stands out on a team of aging, stale and uninspired baseball and that's the one guy the Mess spent the most of the off season trying to replace: Ty Wigginton. While out of his natural position and learning third base as he plays, despite an uneven fielding performance he is hitting .342 and just a few nights ago, bowled over a catcher to score a run. It takes a spectacular leap of imagination to see Fat Mo, who was almost thrown out at first base on a single the other night, or Mike Piazza, who spends more time styling his facial hair than he does getting on base, or even Roberto Alomar, knocking over a catcher to score a run in the middle of a game. For one reason or another, these guys play with the passion of players who have already retired. These are supposed to be the team leaders.

While it's true the season isn't over yet, and while it's true that the National League East is the weakest division in the National League, perhaps in the Majors, if Hula Howe can do nothing more than offer meaningless bromides about what month of the year it is while his team flubs one game after another in the same dystopian fashion, there won't be much to look forward to other than the countdown to the dismissal of GM Steve Phillips and the sad reality that many Mess fans already knew from the day Valentine was named the scapegoat for last season's performance: owner Fred Wilpon doesn't have a clue about what he is doing.

Until then, one can only hope that Hula Howe learns to manage a little more like Lou Piniella and accept losing with a little less serenity.

*****

It has been a bad week for three of the game's most prolific starting pitchers. Within a span of four days, Atlanta's Greg Maddux, Arizona's Randy Johnson and now Pedro Martinez -- with 12 Cy Young Awards among them -- have all suffered 10-run beatings. (Maddux, however, was charged with
only seven earned runs.) And until Maddux's victory yesterday, all three had been winless nearly two weeks into the season.

Meanwhile, Runelvys Hernandez and Jeremy Affeldt, two young pitchers out of the Kansas City system, had both pitched so well in the spring that Royals manager Tony Pena was unable to choose between them for opening day and opted to flip a coin. Affeldt called heads, making Hernandez the winner with tails, and the 24-year-old right-hander from the Dominican Republic has set the example for his streaking team, going 3-0 while giving up only one run in 20 innings while Affeldt has yet to lose, despite a rather chubby 5.71 ERA.

The Royals were first team since the 1990 Cincinnati Reds to open the season with nine straight wins, and the Reds of that year won 91 games under Lou Piniella and swept the heavily-favored Oakland A's in the World Series. The Royals, who lost 197 games in the last two seasons, haven't won more than 77 since 1993 and haven't been above fourth in the American League Central in the last four years. Before anyone starts believing the Royals, with a three game lead, have sewn up the AL Central, let's just remember last season in that division when the Cleveland Indians started off 11-1 before revealing their truer selves later in the season.

Perhaps just in the nick of time, the Toronto Blue Jays designated catcher Ken Huckaby for assignment and purchased the contract of outfielder Reed Johnson from triple-A Syracuse Saturday. Toronto opens a series in Yankee Stadium tonight and Huckaby of course is the guy who dislodged Jeter's shoulder from its socket and while there was nothing cheap about how Jeter got injured, don't expect the rocket scientists who fill Yankee Stadium every night to recognize that. Huckaby would have been ducking batteries all night and he should be happy to be safe in Syracuse tonight.

Remember how the Tampa Buccaneers couldn't win a football game if the temperature was less than 40 degrees? So far this season, the Montreal Expos are 0-4 in games when the temperature is less than 40 degrees when the game starts, and 7-0 when the temperature is above 40 at the start. If the franchise was moved to San Juan, the Expos would win the World Championship.

Cubs starter Mark Prior struck out 12 Expos batters in pitching his first major-league shutout Wednesday. He now has double-digit strikeouts in seven on his 21 career starts.

*****

For those of you who missed it, the USA Today wrote about stadium food. Apparently peanuts and cracker jacks are no longer the rage. Take me out to the ball game: Buy me some arepas, raw vegetables and baguettes, I don't care if I ever get back...? Bratwurst and beer remains for me, the only stadium fare of any consequence. I should have been a Cubs fan.

*****

When the Baseball Hall of Fame holds it's next President For a Day contest, make sure you enter and make sure to leave cynical and short-sighted political opportunism out of your reasoning for why baseball is still America's National Pastime. Media Whores Online has a nice collection of anti-Petrosky fan mail to read and if you haven't heard already, author Roger Kahn, whose "Boys of Summer" is considered among the best baseball books ever, has called off his August appearance to speak at the Hall in protest.

If you would like to complain, the Baseball Hall of Fame has a Toll-free number — (888) HALL-OF-FAME or 888.425.5633 --