Adam Rubin of the NY Daily News was a recent guest on WFAN this past week. Rubin has made a name for himself as a New York Mets beat writer. Most notably, he was accused of instigating the firing of former Mets VP of Player Development Tony Bernazard. In contrast to what Mets GM Omar Minaya strongly believed at the time, Rubin wanted to make it known that he had no specific agenda heading into this upcoming season. However, he did mention that that particular chapter in his career still wasn’t sitting well.
“I have a range of emotions about it…to question my integrity,” Rubin said. “It still bothers me.”
Many baseball writers according to Rubin see Minaya as a dead man walking a general manager whose job is on the line if his team is unable to put a winning product on the field this season.
“Maybe a GM vacancy soon,” Rubin said jokingly along with host Steve Somers.
It’s no secret that those that make their living covering the Mets have their doubts in the current structure of the Mets front office. Aside from signing free-agent Jason Bay this off-season, Minaya has made more headlines defending his autonomy than acting on it.
With assistant GM John Ricco and former Cincinnati Reds general manager Wayne Krivsky sitting on the back-burner, even the passing Mets fan can see the writing’s on the wall.
Rubin goes on to blatantly say that “the Mets are a joke” and predicts that they will end up being closer to five hundred than to the Phillies. Feeling somewhat “neutered” by all of Omar’s allegations, Rubin seems to put forth a challenge to Mets fans by sternly saying, “I don’t care,” when questioned for not having regard for the current Mets starting lineup.
In my opinion, Rubin may have lost some of his edge since being scolded by Minaya during that infamous press conference. However, any disrespect he has gained since then was brought on by his own doing. His tone now replicates that of other young baseball journalists who spend too much time criticizing how things are run instead of watching the players run.
Maybe it stems from most of them, the writers, having grown up witnessing the game of baseball suffocated by enormous payrolls and the stain that remains from the use of performance-enhancing drugs.
In closing, Rubin ends off the interview in fitting fashion. “There’ll be shorter lines at the Shake Shack this season.”
No comments:
Post a Comment