Your Thursday morning dose of New York Mets and Major League Baseball news, notes, and links.
Meet the Mets
Construction on the Citi Field fences has begun. We don't yet know how far the new bullpen walls will be from home plate, but they'll be closer than they were last season.
The intrepid Uni-Watch has discovered another quirk involving the Mets logo. Earlier this season we learned that the team's colors were originally intended to be pink and black. Now it seems that the version of the logo we know today is a slightly tweaked version of the original artist's rendition.
Joel Sherman says that Nick Markakis is a good fit for the Mets, assuming the left-handed outfielder doesn't have his option picked up and then rejects a qualifying offer.
Rising Apple reviews the 2014 campaign of Dilson Herrera.
Lena Dunham says that her gynecologist used to play for the Mets, but Greg Prince isn't buying it.
Around the Majors
Just like the last time they qualified for the postseason, the Royals are headed to the World Series this season. Kansas City finished off a sweep of the Orioles with a 2-1 victory yesterday. Lorenzo Cain is your ALCS MVP.
Alex Gordon sacrificed his body to help the Royals hang on for the historic win.
Later last night, the Giants moved to within a win of their own World Series berth with a come-from-behind 6-4 victory over the Cardinals. Somehow, San Francisco has been scoring a lot of runs without a lot of hits.
With San Francisco leading the best-of-seven series 3-1, the team can punch its ticket to the Fall Classic tonight when Madison Bumgarner takes the hill opposite the suddenly strugglingAdam Wainwright.
Jonah Keri examines how the move of general manager Andrew Friedman from small market Tampa to large market Los Angeles will affect both clubs going forward.
Here's a long article by Craig Calcaterra about how baseball isn't dying.
Around the NL East
With another former front office member returning to the Braves, it appears that Frank Wren may have scared a lot of people off.
The Marlinscleared some space on their roster by optioning Jordany Valdespin to Triple-A and losing Ed Lucas on waivers.
The Good Phight says that the Philliesshould have hired Andrew Friedman. What a bummer.
Tigers GM Dave Dombrowski won't admit to getting ripped off in the Doug Fister deal. As a mediocre fantasy baseball GM, I feel like I know where he's coming from.
Yesterday at AA
James K handed out the Piazza for worst Mets position player and my irrational Chris Young love was revealed for all to see.
Michael Donato pointed out a couple of under-the-radar aspects that the Mets can improve in 2015.
On this date in 1969, the Mets won their first world championship.
Today at AA: Live chat with Mets pitching prospect Robert Gsellman at 5:00 PM EDT.