Fueled by the avant-garde dance-off performance of the UCONN and USF men during an extended 2009 weather hiatus, the college baseball rain delay entertainment industry has taken off. Here are a few of our favorites from every level of college diamond competition.

USF/UCONN Danceoff (2009)
It garnered the attention of ESPN and set the wheels of rain delay shenanigans in motion. The train hasn’t stopped rolling since. This set includes the chicken dance, macarena, some Michael Jackson and even a little James Brown. Huge points for spontaneity and creativity across the board – in a Big East tourney game no less!

Western Kentucky/Florida Atlantic: Moshing and More (2010)
This one had the “roller coaster” and some of the now-old-standbys before they’d gone “mainstream.” We particularly liked the rock concert mosh pit and Shake Weight transformation circle. But the sniper in the stands could be the coup de grace.

Radford/High Point: The Joust (2011)
The boys from Radford and High Point stole the show during their rain delay in 2011. While the half-naked “Jump On  It!” exhibition was nice, it was the jousting match that captured the hearts and minds of Americans.

Clemson/Davidson: Leisure Sports (2011)
Perhaps inspired by their jousting counterparts, Clemson and Davidson took the play-acting dynamic to heights previously unknown. In this six-minute clip, you’ll live the magic that is created when two fun-lovin’ squads try to fill the dead time with popular leisure sports and other activities. The Tigers and Wildcats enjoyed bowling, hunting, golf, tennis and curling, along with some seven-on-seven football and a revolutionary war battle among other engagements. The play-by-play commentary from the booth helped make this an instant classic.

Edgewood/Rockford: On the Can (2012)
Edgewood and Rockford might not have the name recognition of some of the other bigger programs to grace this list. But they lack nothing in the enthusiasm and creativity departments. After dozens of imitators, it’s tough to bring something completely new to the table. The boys go down some familiar routes, but score extra points for moose hunting, the four-man bobsled and a squat rack session. It was the squatting of another kind that scored bonus points in our book, though, complete with reading material (see 6:15 mark or so).

He listens to a wide range of music, and shares what he likes with his followers, encouraging them to listen for themselves. He owns a Bugatti, but prefers his Smart Car. He’s consistently kind and generous to those that love him and those that loathe him. He invites fans of opposing teams to dinner while he’s in town, and picks up the check. He tells his followers his online gamer handle and encourages them to join him in whatever video game he’s about to play. He’s playful and encouraging, and no doubt enjoying the life he’s been blessed with.

However talented he may be, the man works hard. He does not drink, does not smoke, does not party irresponsibly and does not get arrested. His celebrations after touchdowns are light-hearted and in no way disrespectful to the other team. He’s a man having fun, living his life as he sees fit and encourages each and every one of his 3.4 million followers to do the same, everyday:

Some say that Chad Ochocinco’s work on Sundays may be heading into its final act, but he’s certainly not going to let that stop him from continuing to view the world as his stage. He has his news network, OCNN. He is a partner in Rocklive, an iPhone and iPad game application development company. He’s a huge international soccer fan, a fan and friend of the Professional Bullriders Association, and has joked about starting an online dating service.

However, there is one stage that he may want to leave to the professionals:

No matter. Nick Mangold remains the best center in football. He’s just a little cleaner this morning.

Back then, the echoes of “1940!” still hung in the air with far too much familiarity. A chance to fight for their first Stanley Cup in 54 years hung in the balance. It was game seven. The score was tied at a goal apiece. Double overtime. We gave 10 reasons the NHL Playoffs are phenomenal earlier this week. Well, this play hits on a few of those reasons. And it just happens to be one of the most famous calls in New York sports history.

Baseball plays this sick routinely make ESPN’s Top 10, however, you may never see another effort like this in women’s softball. Not that they don’t happen…they just don’t get the ink (or pixels). So here’s to you, Kayla Braud. Well done.

Playoff Beards

Lovely growth

Sure, it’s now been exploited by every team, the NHL and all appropriate brand marketers. Doesn’t matter. It’s a fabulous tradition. Who cares that you can’t even explain why? Grizzled men are manly men. Playoff hockey is the epitome of manliness. It just works.

Fever Pitch Fans

The regular season? Sure, you get some nice crowds. The big markets fill up. The Garden for the Devils. The Blackhawks and Red Wings. The playoffs, though? Fuggedaboutit. Packed houses with splitting decibel levels wherever you go. Throw in some towels, and you’ve got yourself a full-fledged ice party. It makes for enhanced viewing of an already tremendous product – whether live or on television.

Goaltending

In many sports, they say defense wins championships. It doesn’t hurt in hockey either. And the defense’s backbone is the man donning the custom mask manning the nets. Nobody stands more prominently in the spotlight’s bright glare than the goaltender. Each save seems magnified. Every mistake is unforgivable. But when your team is desperately holding onto that one-goal lead with the minutes and seconds refusing to move any swifter, it’s your goalie who holds the keys to your heart like no other.

King Henrik

The Power Play

You can get away with sub-par special teams  during the regular season. Not so much come Cup time. What’s more, games shift on, well a shift, once someone heads to the box. It could mean the difference in the game. A prolonged kill, short-handed score or just a run-of-the-mill power play gooooal can often turn the tide of a series.

Shot Blocking

There may be no greater indication of the elevated meaning of playoff hockey then the number of guys hitting the ice to sacrifice their bodies and stop the puck by any means – and with any body parts – necessary. Alongside the kickoff return in football, hockey shot-blocking ranks right up there in my pantheon of scary-as-sh*t plays in professional sports.

Bad Blood Boils Quickly

A cheap hit during the regular season? At times, retaliation might take weeks if not months. Or the beef will simply die. Not in the playoffs. Memories are sharp and the time between games is too short for any score to go unsettled. What’s best is when those storylines then weave their way into the fabric of the series.

Overtime

As a Rangers fan, I could do without the number of sudden death experiences through two rounds. That said, can anything get better than OT in a playoff game…

Game 7

OK, yes. If you answered, “OT in a game seven” you would be correct. Even those settled-in-regulation game sevens offer more than enough stop-your-heart on every shift drama.

Line ‘em Up

And when it’s all over after each series, the tradition stands tall. One of the more telling moments for me was at the conclusion of the Rangers-Senators series. Following the final whistle, Ottawa goalie Craig Anderson skated directly to the tunnel…before realizing that the handshake trumps any momentary emotions…and headed back to make his way through the line.

It is the way it has always been, it is tradition

The Cup

This year’s ad campaign states in fairly simply. Because it’s the Cup. It’s the best trophy in all of sports. Read Big Daddy’s Drew’s short take on why. We could go on for days. But the best case for its importance might be the notion that players often have no words once it’s been held in their hands.

The EPL champions brought the noise in the most dramatic fashion today

I just witnessed the most enthralling, mind-boggling, insane, improbable, jaw dropping, and every similar adjective you can imagine, sporting contest I’ve ever seen.  And it was a mother bleeping English soccer match. Long suffering Manchester City scored two goals in extra time to swipe the Premier League title from cross-town rivals Manchester United who have overshadowed, beat down, and thumbed their noses at City for years.

You might ask how a Yank from Erie, PA, who has never crossed the pond, got involved in this sort of business. It was video games and law school, in that order. Back in my 20′s, I fell into a FIFA soccer addiction on the ole Playstation 2. Anyone who has played the FIFA video games can surely understand. My favorite was using Manager Mode to take a middling squad to Premiership glory. That middling squad was Manchester City, who always seemed to have a number of veterans on the downside of their career that I could quickly jettison for younger, cheaper talent to develop. The video game period got me to a point where I’d occasionally check the EPL standings to see City constantly mired in the middle of the pack (this was before City were bought by an Abu Dhabi billionaire who changed everything) . Things progressed to all out fandom while I was in law school as I started watching tons of Premier League games as a form of much needed stress relief and much less needed procrastination. Law school does weird things to people, merely getting hooked on English soccer makes me feel like I got off easy.

I’m not going to tell you that you must watch the EPL. It has more drama than the WWE, and can produce amazing peaks and valleys of emotion, but if you don’t like soccer you will simply not enjoy it. Probably nothing will ever change that. I happened to grow up playing soccer so I appreciate the game. But I totally understand if you think that soccer is just seldom scoring, boring rubbish that you’d only watch if the other channels solely carried ice dancing.

Manchester United's Manager, Sir Alex Ferguson

However, today’s action highlighted all that makes the EPL compelling. You need to know a little back-story to fully appreciate the insanity that went down. Manchester United is the EPL version of the New York Yankees. You are probably a soulless bastard if you cheer for them and you’re not from Manchester or you don’t have a family member who played for them. Man. U owns 19 league titles, 11 FA Cup titles, 3 Champions League titles, and a variety of other accolades. The are led by a smug, knighted Scotsman who always seems to come out on top while constantly throwing barbs and playing mind games with the rest of the league. City, on the other hand, are a star-crossed bunch who continually find new ways to break their fans’ hearts and disappoint. At their best they come close and fail, at their worst they embarrass themselves. ESPN’s club description says it  all. “Manchester City’s history can be summed up by one statistic: they are the only English champions to be relegated the following season. It is an apt reflection of a club who have lurched violently between the sublime and the ridiculous, and who have often seemed to have tragicomedy in their genes.” Until today, City hadn’t taken the league championship for 44 years.

When teams from the same city meet in English soccer, it is called a Derby match. These Derby rivalries have all the hate and bitterness of Bama/Auburn, OSU/Michigan, Stanford/Cal, Red Sox/Yankees, ect. Man. U traditionally plays the role of ass-kicker and City are the red headed step child.

In 2008, City were bought by billionaire and Abu Dhabi royal family member Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan. He promptly poured hundreds of millions of dollars into the club collecting the best talent money could buy. The club overpaid for its players, most of whom make outrageous weekly salaries. The club has been roundly criticized for their free spending ways, even though all the top rated European Clubs such as Barcelona, Real Madrid, Man. U., and Chelsea, and the like have equally as ridiculous payrolls.

One of the things that makes the EPL great is that the millionaire players are complete rockstars over there and often act like bratty teenagers on a good day and like raving madmen on a bad one. A tabloid-eske atmosphere surrounds every match. Outrageous behaviour is the norm, and in a land of madness, Man. City manage to stand out as some of the craziest s.o.b.’s around.

Mario Balotelli, oodles of fun in a crazy as hell sort of way

City are lead by Roberto Mancini, a disciplinarian coach who soccer writers love to hate. They think his tactics are “negative,” which in laymen’s terms means he likes to win 1-0 and tries to clog things up on d, and he lacks the stones to encourage an aesthetically pleasing style of play. Of course, all that Mancini’s men did this year was go out and lead the EPL in goals scored. Last season, Mancini led City to their first trophy in over 30 years by guiding the club to FA Cup victory, yet he was still attacked from all sides.  City also have a fellow named Mario Balotelli who is so insane you should probably just go to his Wiki page and check it out for yourself. His most famous act of lunacy this year was burning down half of his house with fireworks (he claims his friends actually did the deed) the night before the first Manchester Derby match at around 3:00 AM. Of course City went on to whip their neighbors 6-1 at Old Trafford, spearheaded by Balotelli’s brace (soccer term for scoring two goals) and the foul he drew that led to a red card on the Red Devils’ fullback Jonny Evans.   As Mancini says, “the problem is because of his age, he can make some mistakes. He’s Mario. He’s crazy – but I love him because he’s a good guy.”

City also endured a Carlos Tevez soap opera this year. Tevez is a supremely talented striker, but surprise surprise, also an incorrigible headcase. Tevez refused to warm up and come off the bench for City’s Champions’ League match against Bayern Munich in September. This lead to a multiple month pissing contest and golf vacation (full of hearings, suspensions, and drama) for Tevez who refused to show up in England to deal with the issue. The dude was MIA in South America when all the proceedings were going on. Tevez eventually returned to the starting line-up in late March and helped steady the club in the waning days of the title race.

City came out of the gates like world beaters this season, trouncing the likes of Man. U and Tottenham Hotspur. The league championship seemed inevitable by mid-season. However, in typical City fashion, they completely fell apart in the 2nd half and trailed Untied by 8 points with 6 games to play. Improbably, United stumbled while City came on, and City led the league by virtue of goal differential with two games to play after a 1-0 victory over United in the Derby rematch.

All of this set up today’s action. The last day in the Premier League highlights two of my favorite things that the EPL does. All the final days’ matches are played at the same time so nobody gets a strategic advantage. More importantly, all the bottom feeders have to work their asses of to avoid relegation to the minors. The bottom 3 teams each season suffer the humiliation of going down a level. We need this in American sports. It says to the crappiest teams, “you are an embarrassment and you’re not even worthy of playing in this league.” I love it.

Manchester City faced the Queen’s Park Rangers who had just been promoted this season, and who could only assure themselves of avoiding relegation with a victory today. QPR are led by the manager who held Mancini’s post immediately before the Italian came aboard, Mark Hughes. Hughes has not hid his bitterness over his sacking at all. QPR also features 3 former City players who would have loved to stymie their old club.

City came out and dominated the action early. By my unofficial count, they held 96.9% of the possession. City broke through on Pablo Zabeleta’s first goal of the campaign in the 39th minute. Since City was in complete control it looked like it would be a walk in the park from there…..but come on, this is Manchester City we’re talking about. In the second half, QPR managed counterattacks that led to goals in the 48th and 69th minutes. The goals were “against the run of play” as the soccer announcers would say. Despite the fact that hot-headed, Grade A Asshole Joey Barton (one of the former City players on the pitch) was red carded for elbowing Tevez in the head in the 55th minute, leaving QPR to battle on with 10 men, City appeared headed down the road of colossal failure one again. Barton, btw, proceeded to kick City striker Sergio “Kun” Aguero in the lower-mid section and attempted to fight half the City squad after he was red carded, before he made his way to the locker room. Can’t make this shit up. The Argentine super-striker would get the last laugh on this day.

As the game wore on, Mancini paced around the sidelines desperately trying to get something to go right. City star midfielder (often aptly described as a mountain of a man) Yaya Toure had already been forced off the pitch due to a first half injury. On a team filled with all-stars, Toure is the man who always bails City out in the biggest moments. Mancini put in the aforementioned Balotelli and tallish Bosnian striker Edin Dzeko (who bears a striking resemblance to my buddy Big Country) in an effort to jumpstart his offense. Nothing worked. City held all of the possession, but their efforts bounced harmlessly off of QPR players, all of whom spent most of the second half packed inside the box. When City’s efforts did make it through the QPR bulwark of bodies, goalie Patrick Kenny was always up to task.

By the time the 90 minute mark rolled around, it was clear that United was not going to relinquish its 1-0 lead over Sunderland, and thus the championship would again elude Manchester City. It always does. City needed two goals in extra time to claim the title. The cameramen panned around the stadium where the fans were crying, peering through their fingers because they couldn’t bear to watch another City collapse, and looking like the most dejected group of people I have ever seen. Manchester police must have been lining up to guard the city’s bridges.

Segio Aguero's clutch goal saved the day for 2012 EPL champs, Manchester City. Photo courtesy of: http://www.guardian.co.uk

Miracles were needed, and the first came from a Dzeko header off of City’s 19th corner kick in the 92nd minute. The 6′-4″ youngster has a tendency to make a meal of easy chances, but  he managed to power this one into the back of the net. City then benefited from the 5 minutes of added time that resulted from Barton’s despicable antics. They needed every second, but with the hour glass clinging to its last few grains of sand, Aguero (this year’s super signing for City, and Diego Maradona’s son-in-law) took control of the ball deep in the box, and ripped a shot past Parker just before the final whistle. Moments after the resulting kickoff, the ref blew his whistle and the noisy neighbors were EPL champions.

Minutes before, the British version of the evil empire were celebrating their 20th league title. Now it went to the other side of Manchester for the first time in 44 years. Wow. I think the distinguished announcers Ian Darke and Steve McManaman were so shocked they started headbutting each other because they didn’t know what else to do. Me? I promptly started writing a rambling blog post that might double as a novella. Good times indeed.

Derek Zoolander knows how Erie's Scribe feels

I don’t know if it is the Mayan Apocalypse, or if the constant losing and disappointment of my favorite sports teams is taking a toll, or if I’m starting to listen to people more often, or if I’m becoming sensitive (shudder), or what, but it seems like cheap potshots from the peanut gallery, directed at the beloved Browns, Indians, and Cavs are piling up at an alarming rate these days. Not too mention a noticeable extra sneer and disdain for the no-impact sports teams of the institutions of higher learning I’ve attended (Tulane, Cornell, and Akron). Media windbags, draft analysts,  (who coincidentally moonlight as media windbags), my shit talking friends, random chicks, everybody is piling on. For example, I (like any Browns fan worth a salt) watched an hour or so  of Trent Richardson highlights the other day. I posted to my Facebook how impressed I was with what appears to be an extreme degree of difficulty tackling that Beast-man. Pretty innocuous stuff. Next thing I know, the Browns and Cleveland sports in general are getting beaten like a red headed stepchild on my Facebook page, too fast and too furious for me to even keep up with. Out of the damn blue.

What the hell? Enough! Let me tell you pud-wackers a few things. And pud-wacking assclowns in general, really. In no particular order (although I will say that any persons or group of persons mentioned below has probably pissed me off intentionally with barbs or unintentionally because you are fudge-ing morons in the past 2 weeks)….

@ Redskins fan – Your team is mediocrity personified. You just mortgaged your future for RGIII, but who cares about not having a first round pick until 2015? It’s not like high draft picks have been made more valuable by the NFL since the new rookie pay scale eliminates the risk of paying a hack a superstar salary before he’s played a down in the NFL. While RGIII is pretty awesome, you still have no offensive line, you overpaid for a WR who has a penchant for dropping the ball and whose stats may have been padded by having some Peyton Manning fellow throwing the rock to him his entire career, meanwhile your best receiver is a 32 year old 5′-2″ man, your head coach went terrible and started acting all crazy a few years ago (he’s compiled a 26-38 record since 2007 and made infinity head scratching decisions),  your defense has some pieces but will be repeatedly ruined by your all out blitz happy defensive coordinator, and as the ultimate topper….your owner is Daniel Snyder.

@ Baseball Tonight — I guess I can’t blame you for being preempted by SEC softball last night, that’s just your arrogant network’s fault. I do blame you for your recap of the Indians/Red Sox clash, though. After the Tribe’s 8-3 thrashing of the BoSox, your highlight package failed to mention, inter alia, the ageless Derek Lowe improving to 5-1 with a sparkling 2.47 ERA, or Micheal Brantley delivering a 4 hit night, or how the Tribe sits atop the AL Central, 2 games over the free spending, underachieving Tigers. All you clowns talked about was Josh Beckett sucking, Josh Beckett golfing, Josh Beckett’s presser after the game, and the Red Sox sucking. Even as the damn highlights were running you didn’t mention who was hitting the home runs that took the HOV lanes straight out of Fenway (that would be Action Jack Hannahan and Jason Kipnis).

@ Eagles Fan – I’d laugh at you, but you are the sort of joke that might appear in a colossal comedy failure like The Adventures of Pluto Nash.

@ NFL Draft Analysts — Can’t tell if you put the word Ass or the word Clown in assclown.  Let’s take as a for instance, the Browns draft. The Browns turned the number 4, 22, and 37 picks of this year’s draft into the best RB prospect in 5 years, a rocket armed starting QB, and a starting RT. They merely plugged 3 Mack Truck sized holes in their anemic offense. They gave up 3 crappy picks to move up and take Mr. Richardson, but you rarely mentioned the fact they had 13 picks to work with and still walked away from the draft with 11 players. You ignore the fact that as much as a crap shoot as the early rounds are, the crap shootedness of the draft jumps exponentially by round 3. So if you get a 3rd round DT who can immediately plug into a young, impressive, and overworked rotation, and WR in round 4 who has one elite talent (being fast as shit, which is great for an offense that is slow as molasses in January) that ain’t so bad. Mix in some other later round picks like a linebacker or two who will immediately be pressed into service due to Scott Fajita’s Bounty suspension, depth on the OL, an H-back who might have to fill in for the twice concussed starting FB, and a DT and a CB in Round 7 who you “experts” thought could go in Round 2 or 3, and it seems like a pretty successful draft to me. However, the draft analysts’ reports on the Browns draft were tepid at best. Go figure.

@ South Carolina Gamecocks Fan – You might win your first conference championship since 1969, if you move back to the ACC or even better yet, the Sun Belt Conference.

@ People Riled By Cole Hamels — The dude plunks a 19 year old super hyped, cocky-ass rookie in the buttocks to knock the kid down a few pegs. So what? He threw at the dude’s butt, signaling zero intent to injure. Then Hamels has the gall to say he did it on purpose. What would you rather have him do, lie to our face about how the pitch slipped out of his hand? When it was patently obvious the he jacked the kid up on purpose? Go play in traffic.

@ Texas A&M Aggies — You sport a career 52.8% winning percentage in the Big 12. You’ve been hovering between mediocrity and irrelevance since 1994. Now you are jumping to The dominant college football conference. If you can compete at the same level you did in the Big 12, facing a more difficult schedule, you will be right below Ole Miss, and right above South Carolina, Kentucky and Vandy. Also, your move destroyed an awesomely fierce rivalry (albeit one-sided for the other guys) with Texas that dated back to 1894. So, great job Aggie.

@ The Guy Who Wrote This Article: Come’on man. My Zips are perpetually down on their luck in football. Even though they’ve produced NFL legends Jason Taylor and Charlie Frye, they suck. As bad as they usually are, they’ve managed to get even worse over the past two seasons, going 2-22. Do we really need to go cover that? Don’t most people just accept that Akron blows at football, if they even know the Akron plays football? How are you going to stomp out my insane delusions that with Terry Bowden taking the reigns and Jim Tressel lurking somewhere in the wings as the Vice President of Strategic Engagement, things might actually turn around? And for Pete’s sake, how do you write an article chronicling the ugliness that is Akron zips football without mentioning the fact that Akron is a D-I soccer powerhouse? Mr. Grantland Writer man, I think Sergeant Hartman sums up my feelings best. “I bet you’re the kind of guy that would f*** a person in the ass and not even have the godd**** common courtesy to give him a reach-around.”

Beware the angry Sox fan

Josh Beckett got shelled last night. The Red Sox $17M/year man went two and a third and allowed seven earned on seven hits. This a day after he went golfing despite having missed his last start due to a sore lat. The performance led to a cacophony of boos from the Fenway Faithful and the media swarm around “Golfgate” has only intensified following Beckett’s flippant post-game comments. Still, there are few to have gone to the extremes of this masked Red Sox fan. Josh, you may want to watch your back.

Terry Collins: I’ve read a lot, watched a lot and listened a lot. I am not a Terry Collins fan. Is he a passionate baseball man? Yes, I think that is abundantly clear. Is this a man who exhibits an ability to flourish in the NY market? To me, it looks like he would have trouble merely surviving. The traits of defensiveness, extreme emotion and a lack of flexibility outlined by writers and former players, do not bode well for this team or this city and its fans. I just don’t feel it. Completely unscientific. Gut. Wrong.

A week later, the team named Collins the skipper. Well, turns out I (and plenty of other “real” pundits) was dead wrong. I COULD NOT HAVE BEEN FURTHER OFF FROM WHAT HAS BEEN THE REAL TERRY COLLINS EXPERIENCE (CAPS for emphasis and to express my sincere apologies to TC). Terry Collins has been more than any Mets fan could have imagined, and he deserves a heckuva lot more attention than he’s received.

A season-plus into his tenure, Collins has steered the Mets to a 95-98 record. Those numbers may sound pedestrian. However, for anyone who’s followed this team for the past two years, those figures are downright staggering. At the mid-season mark in 2011, I wrote that Collins deserved Manager of the Year consideration. If the current campaign ended today, I’d say the same thing unequivocally. Collins has managed to get his team to play hard night in and night out. Well they haven’t always been as fundamentally sound as he clearly would like, their don’t-quit gene is more prevalent than in a number of its Mets predecessors. And you bet that’s a reflection on their manager.

Collins steered the 2011 Mets through a ridiculous string of injuries, plenty of trade rumors, star departures and a handful on minor leaguers trying to pass for pros. He kept them largely around the .500 mark until a virtually unavoidable late fade. This season he’s guided the Mets to five games over .500 after completing a sweep of the Phillies tonight (again, in comeback fashion). He’s doing it with one star (David Wright) and what is by and large a collection of scrap heap guys and an overwhelming number of players that have never even seen the better half of an MLB season.

Tejada. Nieuwenhuis. Torres. Duda. Valdespin. Nickeas. Baxter. Gee. Davis. Murphy. These are all guys that spent large chunks of last year either nursing injuries and/or playing for teams whose games weren’t even televised. Now, they are all adopting legitimate roles on an 18-13 ballclub. 18-13? Tonight, Rob Johnson started at catcher and Justin Turner at shortstop. Scott Hairston, Andres Torres and Vinny Rottino patrolled the outfield. THINK ABOUT THAT.

What’s even more impressive is that Collins has demonstrated the ideal personality and temperament to navigate this new reality. He’s a wonderfully likable balance of traits that seem so well-suited to the situation.  He’s fiery and focused. He’ demands a great deal of his players and defends them with an equal amount of vigor. He’s placed confidence in his guys and confided that his expectations are still high. He is an educator and an energizer. He is both builder and believer.

Collins also been a sound tactical manager, something that should not be understated. How do I judge that? By the always-scientific WTF index. In other words, there are relatively few moves that Terry makes where I think either aloud or in my inside voice “what the f%!k is he doing??!!” Sure, there are moments where I question decisions. But the motivation behind them is still clear, and it’s usually quite simple to determine what is driving the move. The WTF ratio was significantly higher with Bobby V. on account of his frequent Little League-inspired every-guy-has-to-play philosophy. Slick Willie also offered his fair share of bewildering head scratchers. For Jerry Manuel, the WTF index consistently ran at record highs. Some of those moves are mysteries that simply defy explanation.

Terry Collins has eradicated any of the early fears from fans and the media. His lack of “flexibility.” His time away from the Bigs. His age. His ability to relate to the players. Every misguided belief or assumption has been shot to sh*t. Collins has been a revelation. He’s been integral in creating a team that fans want to watch — and want to stay with to watch win. He deserves immense credit, as does Sandy Alderson who’s had our unwavering trust since day one. Things can always turn. No manager is right forever. Plus, these are the Mets. But, for these Mets…in these times…Collins has been the perfect pitch.