Thursday Bird Droppings

If it’s true, then we know what at least a good piece of the problem has been: the coaching staff has been mishandling the players (which we could have guessed before, I suppose) and that means that there’s a decent enough chance that a different voice (and not even necessarily a different tone of voice) will change things in the clubhouse and make this team a little more focused and disciplined.

I have a hard time saying this team doesn’t work hard and isn’t focused (even if they look that way) because I have no idea how hard they work, and I personally am talking here instead of working.

We all knew and expected many of the young players to have a guaranteed spot on the team. Most, if not all, of us welcomed this as the supposed cavalry coming to the rescue in the form of a bunch of inexperienced ballplayers in their early 20s. Some like Wieters and Jones have been hailed as premature saviors dating back a year or two at this point.

In hindsight it was little more than desperation from both the fans and organization alike. We had a team that was so shitty that we desperately wanted a big change. Well, we got it and guess what? Now the team is even shittier. It was almost to impossible to believe that they could go downhill given the half assed squads we put on the field in years past. But they did. This team is worse. Much worse.

Can some of these guys turn it around with new management? Christ I hope so. But let’s not fall into the trap again of counting our chickens way before they hatch like we did with this batch of developmentally challenged Baby Birds.

…are all part of the institution, so to speak. Narratives develop inside a press corps, a form of groupthink that the reporters go along with. The narrative during the last spring training was “Youth to the rescue!” That’s the story the fans and organization wanted and that’s what we got – along with a half-baked team.

There are a lot of things that reporters know that they don’t “know” in the sense that they can’t print anything about it if they’re adhering to the idea of journalism. They might get off-the-record grumbling and they don’t print anything because they feel like if they burn a source they won’t be able to do anything in the future.

When one enterprising person finally does get some on-the-record quote or confirmation of something that everyone knows, then they can all come out and say, “We’d heard X but couldn’t talk about it” or whatever.

Why wouldn’t players on the outs say things like that? Because then you’re burning bridges if you want to catch on with another organization – less likely to take a flier on someone who’s labeled themselves as that sort of malcontent. It’s one thing if you’re a miserable son of a bitch who dogs plays and nobody likes – but if you go to (gasp) the press, you are somehow worse.

Or if you take a guy like Nick, even when he finally kind of blew his top and called out the team’s approach in public, he still didn’t throw any guys under the bus because that isn’t “what you do”. You can say one thing to the press to keep up appearances while working behind the scenes to do something else. I think a fly on the wall when he met with Angelos would have probably heard about this issue, though.

this is nothing new. I was on my local swim team 25 years ago…and everyone got trophies at the end of the season. Look how bad we all turned out!

In individual meets, people who got 1st, 2nd, or 3rd got ribbons for their accomplishment. Did I miss something… have they stopped giving out ribbons for actual achievement??? I certainly valued my ribbons a lot more than I did my trophies. Also, individual record holders for our team were prominently displayed at the main entrance to the pool. If i were born two days later I would’ve been in a lower age group and made that board. arrgghhhh.

This whole thing just screams to me of Fogeyism. All that “when I was a kid…” is BS.

are any more based on performance than MLB, you’re sadly mistaken, as my daughter with the .513 AVG and .600 OBP can tell you. She’ll be watching her league’s All-Star Game from the bleachers tonight.

with him and Stoudemire, my Knicks might actually step up to being a mediocre franchise.

Because the Dolans are the source of all evil on this planet and enough bad things can’t happen to them.

Although for those with personal experience dealing with Comcast, your mileage may vary.

he isnt going to miami. no way he can share with wade. he won’t go to new york now either because he isnt guaranteed to win there either since miami could be just as good with wade and bosh. lebron is a joke.

Apple is coming out with a new LeBron James iPhone. One problem – it’s always on vibrate since there’s no ring.

using All-Star selections as a criteria to judge the farm system against is terrible.

no subject line with the GINORMOUS Girardi pic? You sadden me.

that man looks like Jar Jar Binks.

but not the Reds. I mean, I know it won’t happen, but the Reds are such a likable bunch who have obvious similarities to us.

they can knock themselves out. i’m sure its a fantastic and fool-proof plan.

of an old Kids in the Hall sketch, where they go to a restaurant specifically to try a dish called Shitty Soup. They know it’s terrible, yet they HAVE to try it. People know Atkins isn’t adept at things which makes one a good baseball player, but they try him out anyway, thinking how bad could it be? Then they find out. At least the similarity worked in my head.

Juan Samuel is a bigger moron than DT. Get Showalter in here ASAP!

That’s, um, something. Never quite seen anything like it. If it is real.

wow, i can’t believe that’s real. it is on the nba site so i guess it’s real. but what a juvenile letter.