As a die-hard Mets fan, I've been getting a lot of text messages and IMs along the lines of "go Mets", "Mets all the way!" and of course, "Yankees suck!" It follows that as a die-hard Mets fan, I'm far from confident - I remember Orel Hershiser in '88 and Mariano Rivera in 2000 much more vividly than Ray Knight or Lenny Dykstra in '86.
The Mets have a nice team, but quite frankly it's hard to see them beating the Yanks or the A's in the World Series. I'm not sure if it's hard because those teams are juggernauts and the Mets don't have a second basemen, a third starting pitcher or a healthy Pedro, or if it's hard because I've seen the Mets lose much more than I've seen them win.
But the real story this year is not the Miracle Mets, but the Miracle Marlins. Despite the public disputes between the manager and the owner, the lack of one true All-Star this side of Miguel Cabrera, and a combined payroll less than Derek Jeter, the Marlins have a fair shot at joining the Mets, Yankees, and others in the playoffs. From The Baseball Prospectus:
This isn’t just a case of the people at BP or ESPN missing on their analysis as the season began. Short of Nostradamus or the diehard delusional Marlin fan I dare say few saw this type of performance by the Marlins coming.
To place this in perspective, consider the following: 53 of the 59 players who showed up for the Marlins Spring Training camp this season had played at least part of last season in the minors. The Marlins dropped their Opening Day payroll $45,410,334, from $60,408,834 in 2005 to $14,998,500 in 2006; that's a 75.17% drop. The Yankees' Opening Day payroll of $194,663,079 was 1298% higher than the player payroll for Marlins on Opening Day. The last time the Marlins had an Open Day payroll close to this low was 1999, when it was $14,650,000. The Devil Rays had the second-lowest Opening Day payroll at the start of this season at $35,417,967, which is still 236% higher than the Fish.
There is a flip side to this tale. The reason the Marlins' payroll is so low is that the owner is notorious for dumping salary, to pad his own profits or to make a power play for a new stadium. It's also sick that the Yankee's payroll, which has grown to over 200 million dollars this season, is as high as it is. And of course, there's a good chance the Marlins won't make the playoffs.
Despite the fantastic story of the Marlins, I'm rooting for the Giants and Dodgers to join the Mets and the Yankees in the playoffs - it would be the first time all four New York teams have ever made it at once.
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