Rooting for Chris Young won't be hard

The news that the Mets are just a physical away from signing Chris Young has me smiling. It's just that I think he's a good signing in this offseason of frugal living -- a low-cost starting pitcher who has the ability, when healthy, to be a solid starter -- but he's a good person, the kind of guy you can't help but root for.

I know this from personal experience. Back in 2002, Young was a top prospect in the Pirates' organization. (Sadly, another one that got away from Pittsburgh ... and from Montreal and, with Adrian Gonzalez, from Texas, Young's hometown team. And none of the deals yielded much of anything for the team that dealt away Young.) When the Bucs' Hickory Crawdads affiliate came through Lakewood, I talked to Young about his Princeton days and making the transition from college life to pro ball while finishing up his final semester. It's one thing to earn a Princeton degree; it's quite another to do so while spending March in spring training, then riding buses across the Southeast though April and May.

As if to reward Young for his hard work, the fates lined up the Crawdads' schedule perfectly in June 2002. Hickory found itself in Lakewood, N.J., during the first weekend of June, playing the final game on Sunday -- guess who was scheduled to start -- and having a day off on Monday. Princeton's graduation was that Tuesday. So Young made that Sunday start in the series finale, then stayed behind in New Jersey while his teammates took the bus back to North Carolina. The Pirates gave Young permission to miss the Crawdads' game that Tuesday night so he could attend his graduation.

After coming across a 2007 column by Jeff Bradley -- brother of the former Major Leaguer and Princeton coach Scott Bradley, as well as Team USA soccer coach Bob Bradley (a New Jersey sports family dynasty) -- I also recalled that Young spent that 2002 spring training and the first month or so of the season completing his senior thesis. The subject, in the simplest terms, was race relations in the United States in 1947, using Jackie Robinson's Major League debut as the crux of his hypothesis. The title of the 61-page paper was The Integration of Professional Baseball and Racial Attitudes in America: A Study in Stereotype Change, according to the database on the Princeton library's website. As The New York Times suggested a couple of weeks ago, Young could lead the Mets' pitching staff's philosophical discussions this spring.

So I went into my files and dug up the story -- the lead to my weekly minor league notebook, it turns out -- that I wrote nearly nine years ago. Just reading "Young said yesterday at FirstEnergy Park" reminded me that we sat in the stands talking baseball and Princeton on a warm, sunny Saturday afternoon, before the gates opened and the fans started streaming in for batting practice. Our paths met again just three weeks later, when the BlueClaws hosted the South Atlantic League All-Star Game. Young was the winning pitcher in the North Division's 5-2 victory, but there's a bit more to that story.

Rather than rehash those stories in bits and pieces, I put the scanner to use and converted the clippings to electronic archives. (That's something I should really try to do for all my clippings.) Not mentioned in the all-star game story: the fact that the South Division's David Wright went 0-for-2, coming on in the seventh as the designated hitter.

June 2, 2002

Things working out well for ex-Tiger star Young
Faces BlueClaws today, graduates Princeton Tuesday

LAKEWOOD

Chris Young left the Princeton basketball team after his sophomore year to turn pro. No, not as a 6-foot-10 center banging Shaquille O'Neal beneath the basket, but as a hard-throwing right-handed pitcher in the Pittsburgh Pirates' farm system. Oh, and he stayed in school too. At Princeton.

"After I signed, I stayed in school most of my junior year," Young said yesterday at FirstEnergy Park before the Hickory Crawdads played the BlueClaws. "Got a late start in baseball last year because I stayed in school. This year, went back to school in the fall, left school in the middle of the second semester in March to go to spring training and started playing full time."

But every day after baseball, Young returned to his room to study and complete his assignments. His diligence will pay off Tuesday, when he joins his graduating class at Princeton's commencement exercises.

"I e-mailed my work back to my professors along with my senior thesis," said Young, who earned a degree in political science. "I wrote it on racial attitudes and stereotypes and how they were affected with the integration of baseball by Jackie Robinson in 1947. I had to relate it to baseball, or else I would've lost interest.

"So for a couple months there, it was some tough times. I'm sure I wasn't the typical baseball player, going back to my room and studying during spring training, but it was worth it. I graduated in four years, so the way things turned out couldn't be better."

This weekend couldn't be better. The Crawdads finish up a seven-game road trip with today's game, and Young is the starting pitcher. They have a day off tomorrow, and Young will miss Tuesday night's game in Hickory, N.C., to attend graduation.

"This series has worked out unbelievably," said Young, who will have dozens of friends and family members in attendance today. "I get to commute back and forth during the day to be able to see some of the stuff that's going on on campus right now. I'll have all day Monday to hang out at school. Throwing the last game here
won't affect my rotation. Things couldn't work out any better."

Young, who received a $1.65 million signing bonus, is rated by. Baseball America as the 10th best prospect in the Pirates' organization. After going 5-3 with a 4.13 ERA in 12 starts in 2001, Young is 6-3 with a 2.57 ERA this year. He ranks second in wins, just one off the lead; is tied for eighth in ERA with Lakewood's Seung Lee, and is fourth with 65 strikeouts in 56 innings. Now he can really concentrate on baseball.

"I enjoyed school, but it's nice to have it behind me," Young said. "I'm not going to miss school. I'll miss the fun, the social part -- friends. But in terms of the school work, I'm not going to miss that too much. It's nice to have that behind me and I can concentrate 100 percent on baseball. It's a big relief."

June 19, 2002

TREY MAGNIFIQUE

Salinas

wins game

with homer

NORTH 5

SOUTH 2

LAKEWOOD -- Trey Salinas does not need a pregame home run derby trophy. He got a bigger award. Salinas, a catcher and designated hitter for the Delmarva Shorebirds, drilled a three-run homer with two outs in the eighth last night to send the Northern Division to a 5-2 victory over the South in the South Atlantic League All-Star Game -- a one-hitter by the North to boot.

After losing to Macon's Andy Marte in the final of the pregame power show, Salinas helped the North take the bigger prize and end the South's four-game all-star winning streak in the process. Naturally, he was named the game's most valuable player.

"That's something you dream about, hitting the game-winning home run in an all-star game," said Salinas, who has eight home runs for the Shorebirds this year. "That was awesome."

With the exception of Salinas' home run onto the berm in left field, the game was a pitchers duel -- emphasis on "pitchers," with a total of 17 used in the contest. Eight North pitchers carried a no-hitter into the eighth, when Macon's Greg Miller lined a clean single to right-center off Hickory's Chris Young, scoring Jay Bourgeois to tie the game 2-2.

Young ended up the winning pitcher, with the help of Salinas.

"I was so mad about losing the no-hitter, I didn't even think about (getting the win) until my teammates told me," Young said.

The North, now 9-14 in this format of the all-star game, struck first with a run in the second off starter Justin Hampson of Asheville. Lexington's Charlton Jimerson doubled to left and came around on a double by Mike Snyder of Charleston. It was Snyder, the designated hitter, whom Salinas replaced when he entered the game in the seventh.

The South evened the score in the third when Miller -- who earned most valuable player honors for his team -- was hit by a pitch from Kannapolis' Chris Honel, stole second and reached third on a wild pitch. He came home on another wild pitch, one that Honel lost in mid-motion and tossed toward the third-base dugout.

Delmarva's Benjamin Knapp was the most impressive of the nine North pitchers who threw an inning each. The right-hander struck out the side in order in the second, needing just 11 pitches to do it. The feat earned the 6-7 right-hander -- who is usually a starter -- recognition as the Northern Division's most valuable pitcher.

"It was overwhelming, I can say that," Knapp said. "As a starter, you try to get through the first few innings on just one pitch. But when you're only throwing one inning, you can throw everything out there. Everything was working for me tonight."

Augusta's Phil, Dumatrait picked up the most valuable pitcher award for the South. The lefty hit Hickory's Vic Buttler leading off the sixth, then gave up an opposite-field double to Lakewood's Ryan Howard off the wall, missing a home run by a few feet.

"I thought it might have had a chance to get out," Howard said. "But then I saw it bounce, and the left fielder threw it back in, so apparently it didn't."

With Buttler on third -- he had to hold up to make sure Howard's drive wasn't caught -- and Howard on second, Dumatrait then struck out the side to keep the game tied 1-1.

Buttler gave the North a short-lived 2-1 lead with a two-out single in the seventh, scoring Kannapolis' Chris Amador, who had reached on a two-out error.

Lakewood shortstop Danny Gonzalez and Howard played the entire game for the North, along with Buttler. BlueClaws catcher Ben Margalski was 0-for-1 in his three innings behind the plate. Miller, Bourgeois and Capital City center fielder Angel Pagan played the whole game for the South.

"It was very exciting, very special," said Gonzalez, the only player with two hits, including the first one of the game in the first "I didn't expect to get a hit in my first at-bat. It just happened."

For Maine, right may be wrong

The All-Star Game selection show on TBS yesterday had the feel of CBS' annual NCAA basketball tournament selection show. TBS did its best to drag out the blasted thing, revealing the American League starters, then "breaking it down" with Cal Ripken and Tony Gwynn, then moving on to the AL pitchers (and breaking it down), then finally giving us the AL reserves. And of course there were commercial breaks in there.

When they finally made it around to the NL pitchers could I start discussing with a friend of mine how idiotic it was that John Maine was left off the team -- and not even a Final Vote candidate! -- while Cole Hamels was on the staff despite having better numbers than Maine in only two categories. And then, perhaps because of the NCAA feel to the process, I brought up the head-to-head factor: Maine and the Mets beat Hamels and the Phillies on Friday night.

But let me illustrate it for you:

Remember the Maine
	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	ERA	WHIP	BAA	OPS	K/9	H/9	BB/9	W	L
Maine	102	79	32	31	38	84	2.74	1.15	.215	.635	7.41	6.97	3.35	9	4
Hamels	111.2	107	51	48	29	116	3.87	1.22	.254	.758	9.35	8.62	2.34	9	4

Maine wins the head-to-head comparison pretty handily. In one less start, the Mets right-hander has 9 2/3 fewer innings, but the rest of his numbers far surpass those of Hamels. The only advantage Hamels has are in strikeouts and walks. The former is by a somewhat significant margin, but is more than balanced out by Maine's superior numbers in hits and runs allowed and the related batting average against and OPS figures. And the walks difference is only nine.

Obviously, neither pitcher was needed to fill the quota for his respective team, since both the Mets and Phillies had starters selected by the fans. The only possible explanation I can find is that Hamels is just one of three left-handers on Tony La Russa's NL squad. So maybe the micromanager felt he needed one more southpaw to neutralize the AL's lefties.

Maine's last hope lies in one of the current pitchers bowing out to rest a nagging injury or rendering himself unavailable because the game on July 10 comes too close to a Saturday or Sunday start. Sunday's starters, which would be the same as Tuesday's if rotations hold, show no pitchers currently on the NL team, though Carlos Zambrano and Roy Oswalt are up for the Final Vote. (Mine, incidentally, is going to San Diego's Chris Young.) Looking at tonight's starters -- and therefore Saturday's -- gives us only Brandon Webb, also a Final Vote candidate, and John Smoltz. So the "I'm unavailable because I pitched two days ago" route doesn't look like an option.

For the most part, this year's rosters don't seem to be too idiotic. There aren't too many players to argue over; instead, the arguments should be over whether every team should be given a representative (they shouldn't) and whether pitchers should hit (they shouldn't). Who wants to see Josh Beckett come to the plate with two outs in the first and the bases loaded? Instead, the designated hitter should be used for the game -- it is an exhibition, after all -- no matter where it is played. Vote for the AL DHs as DHs and have the NL's starting DH determined by the positional runner-up with the most overall votes.

Let's hope Maine gets his due before next Tuesday.

All is Wright with the Mets

Four years ago, I covered the South Atlantic League All-Star Game in New Jersey, and that's when I met David Wright. The Mets' affiliate in the league was in Columbia, South Carolina, at the time, a team in the league's southern division that had not -- and did not over the rest of the season, if I recall -- visit Lakewood that season. As a Mets fan, I looked at the rosters to see what prospects the organization had, and I was intrigued by a name I had not heard before.

Wright wasn't voted a starter, but he essentially put himself on the minor-league map with that selection. He had been a supplemental first-round draft pick, but until that point, I hadn't read much about him; after that, I knew the name and noticed when it appeared in print.

For some reason, I made a point to talk to Wright. It wasn't too much of a stretch, once he came in second in the Southern Division in the pregame home run derby, but even before that outcome, I told myself to make a point to talk to the young third baseman who might be a Met someday. I had a better feeling about Wright than I did about reserve outfielder Angel Pagan or starting catcher Justin Huber and starting left fielder Jeff Duncan. Huber I had already talked to, at the previous night's welcome dinner, mainly because he had already been chosen to represent the Mets -- and Australia -- on the World Team in the Futures Game.

Wright was the runner-up to then-Atlanta farmhand Andy Marte, falling by a point in a scoring system created to account for the difficulty of hitting one out at Lakewood's FirstEnergy Park. Any fly ball that reached the warning track earned a point, hits off the wall garnered two points, and home runs were worth four. Wright's 28 points were one short of Marte's total. But I spoke to Wright because, at that time, neither my Spanish nor Marte's English were good enough to allow for an interview of the victor.

Even with the difficult surroundings, Wright hit six homers, one short of his season total at the time. The power was there, though we didn't see it after the derby; he pinch-hit and had two at-bats as the designated hitter, going 0-for-2.

"I just didn't want to embarrass myself," he told me then. "Going up there first, there's a lot of pressure."

Wright was just 19 at the time, and the thinking was that he and Marte might be facing off as division rivals not far in the future. It might have happened, had the Braves not traded Marte to the Red Sox this past winter.

"I knew he had a lot of power and it was going to be tough for mine to stand up," Wright said of his showdown with Marte. "Until that last swing, I was hoping."

Wright lost that battle, but he could be the first player from that South Atlantic League All-Star game to make the one at the top level. This week, he moved into first among National League third baseman in voting for this season's All-Star Game.

But he won't be alone. The Phillies' Ryan Howard -- a member of the hometown BlueClaws in that '02 SAL game -- and Padres starter Chris Young, then an Expos prospect and the game's winning pitcher, both have numbers that should warrant consideration from NL manager Phil Garner. Howard currently ranks third in the voting, behind the Majors' leading vote-getter, Albert Pujols, and the Mets' Carlos Delgado.

Wright has quickly gone from prospect to star, and he's on the verge of becoming a superstar. For the past few months -- mostly leading up to this season -- he's been called the Queens answer to the Yankee star power of Derek Jeter, the King of New York.

That might be a shared title now.

Not a good sign from those Mets

Something didn't sit well with me as we left Shea Stadium on Sunday. That wasn't a good way to end the homestand, not a good way to head out on a season-high 12-game road trip. The Mets went 6-6 on their longest stretch in Queens for the season, losing two of three to the woeful Astros and letting the rubber game against the first-place Angels of The O.C. slip away.

Winding down the ramps, I had the feeling that this was the beginning of the slide that they'll be talking about in September.

Of course, I hope I'm wrong, but Tuesday's lifeless start to the road trip (a 5-0 loss to a weak Oakland club and a starter, Joe Blanton, who was 1-6 with an ERA over 5.00 coming into the game) and last night's additional bullpen failure only strengthened my initial hypothesis. The Mets need Kris Benson to be a stopper this afternoon.

On June 16 last year, the Mets were 30-34, so their current 32-32 record is just two games better. They reached 43-40 on July 7, 2004, and 44-41 two days later, but they went into the All-Star break at 44-43 and emerged from it by losing four of six to fall to 46-47, and it spiraled from there.

These are games the Mets should be winning. Tom Glavine and Victor Zambrano have pitched well of late, while Blanton and Dan Haren have struggled. Why did the Yankees win 10 in a row in May after falling eight games below .500? Because they played 12 straight against Oakland and Seattle. The Mets should've taken two of three from both of those teams, but now to go 4-2 on this West Coast swing, they'll need to win the last four — one in Oakland and three in Seattle.

July 18 was the last time the Mets were above .500 in 2004; July 21 was the last time they were at the break-even mark. They're going to have to fix some things in order to surpass those marks this season.

* * *
Just twice in the past 50 years have two Ivy League players started for the same team. The second pair is the Rangers' Chris Young (Princeton) and Mark DeRosa (Penn).

Just found that interesting.