Toldja!: Jonathan Papelbon continues to be Cinco Dopo.

What can make me cackle and rub my hands together in glee? Why, it's seeing Jonathan Papelbon getting heat for doing something really stupid! And choking Washington Nationals teammate Bryce Harper, only the best player on the team and an MVP candidate, was mind-numbingly idiotic, even for Papelbon..

In yesterday's game, Cinco Dopo yelled at Harper for not running a ball out. There was already some bad blood between the two of them, after Papelbon threw at Baltimore Oriole Manny Machado's head -- twice -- the other night, pitches that got him a three-game suspension from MLB. Harper told the media then that he expected to be hit in retaliation, and made it clear he wasn't happy about what his teammate did.

As for yesterday's fight, here's how Thomas Boswell of the Washington Post described it:

On Sunday, Papelbon yelled at Harper, accusing him of not running out a ball even though Harper had reached first base and was actually playing in a day-after-elimination game — when many 150-game-plus regulars rest — for the sake of the fans. Papelbon followed Harper, yelling, essentially giving him little choice, until Harper said (according to lip readers), “Let’s [expletive] go.” So they went.

Click here to see clips from the fight.

I think running out every ball is overrated, anyway. Conserve your energy for the plays that matter, Given Harper's injury history, he doesn't need to get hurt on a meaningless play. But at any rate, Harper did get to first on the play. Just not as fast as Papelbon demanded.

Cinco Dopo was clearly out of line here. But Matt Williams, the team's manager, was out of line as well in keeping Papelbon in the game after his closer just choked his best player! Meanwhile, Harper was taken out of the game for the ninth inning, even though it was a tie game. At any rate, Papelbon blew the game and the Nationals lost.

Williams claimed he didn't know how bad the fight was at the time. If that is the case, he ought to be fired just for that (not to mention this team's historic collapse this season!) Here's why. I asked Chris, a Nationals fan who belongs to the same Facebook baseball group that I do, what he saw when he attended the game yesterday. Here's what he said:

I had moved toward the back to visit some friends, and saw it on the TV monitors they have in the back attached to the overhang. They must have played it 2 or 3 times & each time a whole new section saw it & let out an involuntary gasp. It really was that stunning.

So basically, many of the fans in the park saw what was going on via TV screens, but nobody around Williams could get word to him how bad the fight was? Not to mention all of the teammates and coaches who were right there when Papelbon choked Harper! And Williams didn't even bother to watch the clip before meeting with reporters after the game! Williams ought to lose his job just for being so ignorant.

You know, yesterday was Fan Appreciation Day for the Nationals, and they have a giveaway where lucky fans literally get the jerseys that each player wore in the game. Whoever got the Papelbon or Harper jerseys just hit the jackpot!

And Papelbon is just the worst. First, he dissed Red Sox fans in favor of Philly fans when he left town. Not exactly a classy move to insult those who paid your salary. Then there was his incessant crotch-grabbing as a Philly, capped by years of complaints about the Philadelphia fans, and the team itself. In fact, he basically whined his way out of town -- and then dissed the Phillies some more after leaving town.

So what happens? As Squawker Jon noted, the Nationals were in first place over his Mets by three games when they traded for Papelbon and displaced closer Drew Storen. If you remember at the time, a lot of fans thought this was a bad move, and would screw up Storen -- and team chemistry. And sure enough, that's exactly what happened. Storen busted up his thumb punching his locker in frustration. The Nationals, who were projected to win the World Series this year, blew their division lead, and the Mets ended up winning the division.

Now the Nationals have another year of Papelbon -- they picked up the option in his contract to pay him $11M next season in exchange for him agreeing to the trade. How's that going to go? Papelbon is a loose cannon, to say the least. Who's going to trade for him?

Wait a minute. Uh-oh. He's a former Red Sox, something that is catnip to Brian Cashman. Please oh please don't let Cashman trade for Papelbon! Good grief.

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Congratulations to Squawker Jon and our many Met fan friends for their team winning the NL East division title and making it into the postseason. For whatever reason, I actually have more Met fan friends than Yankee fan friends. Especially in the blogging community. I hope a Subway Series is in the cards for this year!

Mets have champagne; Nationals have Papelbon

Sunday night was the first supermoon eclipse since 1982. It only felt like it was that long since the Mets had meaningful games in October. Finally, the Mets are back in the poststeason!

The Mets won their first World Series the year of the first moon landing. The Mets won their second World Series the last time Halley's Comet was in the vicinity of Earth. Could the stars align a third time in the year of the supermoon eclipse?

With the Mets' starting pitching, anything is possible, especially now that Matt Harvey appears to have rediscovered his willingness to put the team first, which is great news. As much as I enjoy seeing celestial events light up the evening sky, the event I really enjoyed seeing was 97 pitches of a Dark Knight. 

Of course, what I enjoyed seeing most of all was the extensive coverage of the postgame celebration on SNY. A year and a half ago, Daniel Murphy received some foolish sniping over his taking three days of paternity leave. After the game, Murphy celebrated on the field with his young son. The Mets even came back on the field to celebrate with Met fans who had made the trip to Cincinnati.

Inside the clubhouse, some Mets smoked celebratory cigars. When SNY finally cut to a commercial, it was fortunately not one of those grisly anti-smoking spots.

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The Mets trailed the Nationals by three games at the trade deadline just two months ago. Then the Mets capped off their midseason moves by trading for Yoenis Cespedes. The Nationals had recently completed their own move, supposedly bolstering their bullpen with the acquisition of Jonathan Papelbon. 

Five years ago, Mets' star closer Francisco Rodriguez allegedly assaulted his girlfriend's father at the ballpark. Sunday, Nationals' star closer Jonathan Papelbon tried to attack teammate Bryce Harper in the Nationals' dugout. Harper is only the front-runner for NL MVP. Maybe it's just a coincidence that the Nationals' collapse began when they acquired Papelbon, but considering that the move also sent demoted closer Drew Storen into a tailspin culminating with Storen breaking his thumb in frustration. At least Storen did so while slamming a locker door, not trying to slam a teammate.

Another parallel with the Mets and Nationals is that the Nationals had their own issue with innings limits for a pitcher coming back from Tommy John surgery who was represented by Scott Boras. In 2012, the 98-win Nationals shut down Stephen Strasburg in September, only to lose in the first round the following month. When the Mets face the Dodgers in the NLDS, they will continue to have Harvey's services.

But the Nationals figure to come back strong next year, especially if they have better luck with injuries and get a new manager and closer. So congratulations to the Mets for seizing their opportunity this year and capturing the NL East crown. Ya gotta believe! 

Miracle Mets turn Nationals into Walking Dead

On July 30, the Mets were ahead, 7-1, in the seventh inning, but went on to blow the game. The next day, they acquired Yoenis Cespedes. Last night, they trailed, 7-1, in the seventh inning, and went on to beat the Nationals and seriously damage Washington's chances of catching the Mets. Ya gotta believe!

My friend David and I were admittedly not believing when we left the bar where we were watching the game after the Nationals went up by six runs.Matt Harvey had gone from being the Dark Knight to giving his disgruntled fans a dark night. As I walked home, I pondered over which trade destination would be most unpleasant for him. Texas? Milwaukee? What about Colorado? Perhaps a Met ace from an earlier time could fill him in on the school system. But at least Mike Hampton helped the Mets get to a World Series. Of course, to do that, you need to pitch in October. Not that I'm bitter.

By the time I got home, the Mets were starting to rally, but it was still only 7-2. The bases were loaded, but there were two outs. Then Curtis Granderson walked to force in a run, and it was 7-3.

And Cespedes was coming up with the bases loaded.

Never mind that Cespedes' error in the previous inning turned a single into a Little League grand slam. Never mind that he is a lot closer than Harvey is to likely be leaving the Mets for a huge free-agent deal elsewhere.  Right now, he's a Met, and his OPS since joining the team is 1.014.  Sure enough, a bases-clearing double. Now the Mets are within 7-6, and now the Mets are going to win.

Yes it's nice that the Nationals bullpen turned into the Walking Dead, walking three more batters to force in the tying run, giving them six walks for the inning. But what makes this a magical year is that the game-winning homer was hit by a guy who wasn't even supposed to be on the team, just like Wilmer Flores. Kirk Nieuwenhuis was DFA'd, joined the Angels, released, rejoined the Mets, and hit the game-winning homer off of Jonathan Papelbon, acquired by the then first-place Nationals at the trade deadline to help them get to the World Series. Instead, with their postseason in jeopardy, the desperate Nats used Papelbon in the eighth inning, and he blew the game.

Met fans know all too well that a six-game lead is not necessarily safe, but this Mets team is special and the Nationals are a mess. Ya gotta believe!

No! Why did it have to be Ryan Zimmerman (again!) with a walkoff against the Yankees?

Here is today's edition of "Behind the Squawkers," and it relates to last night's horror show against the Nationals. Cue flashback music. It was way back in June 2006, the first year of this blog. Squawker Jon and I had gone to Washington, D.C. to visit my brother, who lived in Arlington, Virginia then, and to watch the Yankees play the Nationals. The weekend was a bit of a nightmare, as it always has been for me whenever I have driven in the D.C. area. Between towed cars, broken-down cars, and getting horribly lost, I have had all sorts of "adventures" on the road to Washington. Finally, the last few times I visited, I gave up driving there! But I digress.

That weekend was a mess. First of all, we got lost driving in from New York that Saturday morning and trying to find RFK Stadium. We stopped at a gas station to ask for directions, but the knucklehead there never even heard of the stadium! As it turns out, we were only a few blocks away, but this was in the days before GPS on smartphones (I was still rocking a flip phone back then!) So we ended up driving to Union Station, spending $$ on parking there, and taking the Metro to the stadium.

Of course, we were late to the game. But we did get to see Johnny Damon, Alex Rodriguez, and Jorge Posada all hit homers in the fifth inning, giving the Yanks a 9-2 lead. We also saw Shawn Chacon get taken out of the game in the bottom of the fifth, after having been very shaky. I remember that Joe Torre seemed extremely disgusted with Chacon. I was, too!

The Nationals kept on chipping at the lead, and ended up beating the great Mariano Rivera, who made a rare eighth-inning appearance, to win the game 11-9. What a nightmare.

The Sunday Yankees-Nationals game was even worse. Chien-Ming Wang was dealing, and it at first looked good for the Yankees. They were leading, 2-1, in the bottom of the ninth. But for some reason, Joe Torre decided to keep Wang in the game, even though Wang was tiring by then. I remember being positively irate that he was keeping Wang in, when it was a disaster unfolding before our eyes. And some Nationals rookie by the name of Ryan Zimmerman hit a walkoff homer in the bottom of the ninth to beat the Yankees, 3-2. And Squawker Jon gloated, of course, the whole ride back to New York. Good grief.

Back to 2015. Last night, Zimmerman hit the 10th walkoff homer of his career to beat up Andrew Miller and the Yankees in extra innings, 8-6. Not only was it nauseating to see the Zimmerman and the Nationals kill the Yankees again, but the sight of Zimmerman being drenched in chocolate syrup was pretty disgusting, too. I am not a neat freak by any means, but that really creeped me out. Zimmerman had to have smelled like something out of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory after having chocolate poured onto his hair. Ick! Disgusting.

Even more nauseating was the injury Jacoby Ellsbury suffered last night. His going on the DL with a right knee sprain is not exactly a shock. I have been pleasantly surprised that he has stayed healthy in his 1 1/4  seasons as a Yankee, but he is an injury-prone player. He is also one of the players the Yankees really cannot afford to lose. Ellsbury leads the Yankees in batting average (.324), on-base percentage (.412), hits (48), runs (29), and stolen bases (14).  He is arguably the Yankees's best all-around player this season, and has the 3rd best OBP and 10th best BA in the American League this year. So losing him, even if may only be for a few weeks, is pretty devastating.

The Yankees have already lost six of their last seven games, and things have to look even more bleak. And last night's win meant that they are now tied for first place with Tampa Bay. Meanwhile, Washington now gets to share first place with...drum roll please...Squawker Jon's New York Mets. At least there is one silver lining! Heh.

More on the Jorge Posada game-calling story, and my thoughts on the Nationals series

The story on whether Yankee pitchers pitch better without Jorge Posada behind the plate is gaining momentum.

Tyler Kepner wrote an article in today's New York Times about it, noting that the Yankee pitchers' ERA when Posada is catching 6.31, while the combined ERA of Kevin Cash, Francisco Cervelli, and Jose Molina is 3.81. If you take out Chien-Ming Wang's horrendous starts, Posada's CERA is still 5.47. That's still very significant.

Tyner asked Brian Cashman about the numbers:

“Jorge is obviously that rare combination of being a catcher and an offensive player,” Cashman said Monday. “Cervelli and Molina are more one-sided, to the defensive side. I can’t really say why there’s a difference. It could be sample size. It could be that the other guys are just better defensive players.”

Squawker reader The Emperor noted that John Flaherty talked about the situation on Brandon Tierney's ESPN radio show today. So I listened to the podcast.

While the Yankee broadcaster seemed to think the controversy was overblown and "unfair," he also said Posada calls the game based on "what he would look for as a hitter," rather than basing it "exactly on scouting reports." Michael Kay also said similar things in his radio show.

If that is indeed the case, no wonder the Red Sox have the Yankees' number. They don't need to do any scouting on pitchers; all they have to do is just figure out what Jorge would be looking for!

Flaherty suggested a meeting with the pitchers and Posada to work out any issues they might have. Good idea.

Squawker friend J-Boogie of Baseball and the Boogie Down broke down the numbers of the Yankee catchers, and came to the conclusion that Cervelli should get more playing time. Here are two very interesting statistics he noted:

Won/Loss Record With Each Catcher
Jorge Posada: 15-11 (.577)
Jose Molina: 5-8 (.385)
Kevin Cash: 5-2 (.714)
Francisco Cervelli: 11-6 (.647)

Won/Loss Record on Which Pitcher Got Win
Jorge Posada: 9-10 rotation/6-1 bullpen
Jose Molina: 3-3 rotation/2-5 bullpen
Kevin Cash: 3-2 rotation/2-0 bullpen
Francisco Cervelli: 7-1 rotation/4-5 bullpen

J-Boogie uses more numbers and data to make his case here.

Posada will be catching CC Sabathia tonight. If CC has a bad game, I would expect this story to gain even more momentum.

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One other note - I am not as confident as some other Yankee fans that the Bombers will kill the Washington Nationals this week. Yes, the Nats are the worst team in baseball. But they have three pitchers the Yankees don't know, and they have a bunch of guys, like Adam Dunn and Ryan Zimmerman, who could very well hit an awful lot of homers in the new Yankee Stadium.

Besides, three years ago, I went down to Washington, D.C. for the Saturday and Sunday Nationals/Yankees games, only to see the Nationals have two walkoff wins in a row against the Yanks! (Squawker reader Uncle Mike was also at the series!)

So, I wouldn't be surprised to see the Yanks lose a game or two (or, heaven forbid, three!) to the Nationals. Well, they probably won't lose three. But two isn't out of the realm of possibility.

What do you think? Leave us a comment!