No, it's not Oliver Perez.  It's Bernie Madoff.

The Mets' brass is meeting with the Commissioner about the team's finances, having already announced that a 25% interest in the team is for sale to raise cash.  The Wilpons are also fighting in bankruptcy court to keep sealed the lawsuit that the Madoff trustee filed against them, not wanting the details to go public.  The Mets were also suspiciously quiet in the offseason when it came to big-name free agents.  Translation:  they're short of cash.

Like the Dodgers, longterm moves by the Mets now appear to be dependent on lengthy litigation.  Both teams are somewhat hamstrung at the moment.

I feel very sorry for most of Madoff's victims.  But this is the Mets.  Bwhahaha.

They should fire Mr. Met & auction off his baseball head to raise $$$.

With the Rockies being 25-40 on the road, and posting these home/road lines (average, OPB, OPS):

Home:  .298/.369/.859

Road: .228/.302/.655

I thought it might be worthwhile to look at WHO is most responsible for the Jekyll/Hyde, Yankees/Pirates, Beauty/Beast (insert your own good/bad analogy here) home-road performance difference on offense.

Here are the culprits (minimum of 200 plate appearances), ranked by differential in batting average, but the OBP & OPS numbers mostly correspond:

Player                      Diff. in Avg                    Diff. in OBP                   Diff. in OPS

Olivo                         .174                               .117                                .440

Smith                       .115                               .110                                .369

Gonzales                .103                                .126                                .435

Fowler                     .094                                .109                                .339

Hawpe                    .089                                 .068                                .354

Mora                        .062                                .009                                 .075

Spilborghs             .030                                 .012                                 .115

Stewart                  .025                                 .054                                  [.036]

Barmes                  .015                                 .062                                  .074 

Tulo                         .011                                 .019                                 .061

Helton                     .010                                 .007                                  [.039]

I hesitate to draw too many conclusions from this, but a couple are tempting.  One is that Olivo and Smith should be given more time off in road games.  Another may be that Olivo's splits are so horrible that he should not be brought back to contribute to the Rockies' home-road differentials, which must be addressed if they are ever to be among the league's top teams.  And Smith may not really be an everyday player, if he's only a home player.  As for Cargo, his splits are troubling.   When The Lazor fires mostly at home, it leaves the Rockies very vulnerable on the road.

This isn't an easy problem to solve, but it has to be kept in mind.  The good teams aren't doormats on the road.  This year, the Rockies have been.

Source of stats:  www.baseball-reference.com

Following up on RoxGirl's Mon. Pebble Report (since there's not one for Tues. yet), the amazing Eliezer Mesa (aka "The Table") went 4 for 4 Mon. night for the Asheville Tourists.  Season stats (4 games)  13 for 18, for a .722 average.  OBP is .737 (why walk when you're hitting everything they throw at you?) and SLG of 1.444, reflecting the 7 doubles and 3 triples out of his 13 hits.  3 triples & 3 singles???  Go figure.   My biggest concern is that someone in the Rockies org. will not understand small sample size & that Mr. Table will get promoted to a higher league before Silverblood arrives in Asheville to give us reliable first-hand scouting reports.  Sure, it's only 4 games, but they've already named a city in Arizona after him.

This hilarious, but disturbing, article from the LA Times says that Jamie McCourt had plans to use her position with the Dodgers as a jumping-off point to run for mayor, governor and, yes, President of the United States:

http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-jamie-mccourt-20100316,0,631136.story

The possibilities are mind-boggling..  Manny Ramirez as Drug Czar.  Joe Torre as Secretary of State (after dealing with Manny R. & Steinbrenner, how tough could some Mideast talks be?).  Brad Ausmus (the perfect backup) as V-P.

Thank God she didn't marry the owner of the Giants.  Tim Lincecum as Secretary of Defense would really scare me.

Just want to say thanks to the Row for all the detailed coverage of the player draft.

Most of the draft is done during working hours, and I can neither post from work nor spend time searching through all the general draft material online.  The pick-by-pick analysis of the Rockies' selections (and quite a few by other teams) by people who really have studied the prospects was really informative and gave me a list of things to watch for that I'd otherwise have missed.

The Row can't be beat for keeping up with things Rox.