The day Baseball Maverick came out I bought it. Anyone that knows my writing knows how much of a critic I am of Sandy Alderson. My first article ever published on this site was discussing Omar Minaya’s contributions to the 2015 Mets. I bought it to critique it. I finished it today and a lot of thoughts crossed through my head throughout the book.
First things first, Zack Wheeler is not Clayton Kershaw, or Madison Bumgarner. From the preface to the epilogue Zack Wheeler is talked about as if he is the messiah who will win multiple Cy Young awards. Fact is he is an 18-16 lifetime pitcher who, granted was projected to have a breakout season, but will obviously not. Alderson’s ability to steal Wheeler from the Giants is talked about like it was the Mark Mccwire trade in 1997 (Alderson was on the short end of that one, described in the book).
Don’t get me wrong it was a great trade but it was definitely brought up way too many times.
Another problem I have with this book is the title. How Sandy Alderson Revolutionized Baseball and Revived the Mets. Sandy Alderson did no such things, yet. This book was clearly written in hopes that 2014, the year were it was all suppose to click, was a success. It wasn’t, but throughout the book Steve Kettman talks about 2014 as the year, until it’s 2014 and it isn’t the year. Obviously the Harvey injury took a major toll but does any Mets fan truly think that with Harvey last year and the same lineup the playoffs were within reach? Now the clear rebuttal to all my past and future comments is, “well it’s his biography what do you want them to say?” How about nothing. The Marines is cool, his success with the A’s is nice too, but he deserves nothing to be written about his tenure with the Mets.
The last 200 pages of the 330 page biography is based on three main events that happened as Mets GM. The first is the Zack Wheeler trade. Second is the R.A Dickey trade, in which the mets got Travis d’Arnaud and Noah Syndergaard among others. The third is a more broad topic, which starts with the “Madoff Mess” and doesn’t stop. It is pages and pages of excuses why he has yet to win 80 games in his for four years as general manager. He constantly has sly rips on the GM to have any success of Queens. It mentions the failures a lot more than all of the success. Jason Bay is mentioned more than Matt Harvey. He is complimented for not signing Stephen Drew because he failed in a horrible situation last year there was no way he could succeed last year.
Back to ZacK Wheeler, at some points you feel like your reading his biography. Going through each start on 2014 like he’s having an MVP season, meanwhile he’s 2-7 on June 14. There is a chapter talking about how they have to win 90 games in 2014 is there a reason they put that in? Does Kettman know they didn’t get to 80? Everything is exaggerated to a point where a quality home stand in mid June of 2014 is the turning point, problem is it wasn’t. All in all my point is clear this book had no reason to be published and although it might have been well written and the first two parts about both Sandy’s life and his tenure with the A’s is nice, as a Mets fan this is just a big joke of what Alderson thinks of his tenure here.
