Mets reward manager Mickey Callaway's calm approach to maddening stretch

Tom Gatto

Mets reward manager Mickey Callaway's calm approach to maddening stretch image

Mets fans are hopping mad (or just feeling fatalistic, as they do) about the team's most recent failures and injuries. First-year manager Mickey Callaway is intent on gently lifting his players off the "rock bottom" he says they've hit rather than pounding them deeper into the ground.

“If we all start being negative and having a bad attitude and throwing things, that would not be productive,” he told reporters before Wednesday's game in Atlanta, per The Associated Press. “Now it makes you feel better sometimes, but it’s the worst thing you can possibly do, in my opinion.

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"I'm sure the fans would love to see people throwing stuff, and we’re not happy with what’s going on. Just because we try to approach it the right way doesn’t mean we’re accepting it.”

Hours after Callaway spoke, the Mets played a crisp game and beat the Braves 4-1. They salvaged a split of the four-game series and finished an eight-game road trip with a 3-5 record. A bullpen that had melted down four times in the previous five games allowed just a run over four innings in relief of starter Jason Vargas.

People were throwing things (and flinging expletives) after the 'pen squandered a four-run lead and, eventually, the game Tuesday.

They watched in frustration as the Braves' Johan Camargo hit a walkoff home run in the bottom of the ninth off rookie Gerson Bautista.

Including the win Wednesday, New York is 16-25 in its last 41 games after an 11-1 start. No wonder Callaway told reporters he hasn't been able to sleep for a week or longer. 

This week he decided to deliver a gentle wakeup call to his club rather than get in the players' faces.

Tom Gatto

Tom Gatto Photo

Tom Gatto joined The Sporting News as a senior editor in 2000 after 12 years at The Herald-News in Passaic, N.J., where he served in a variety of roles including sports editor, and a brief spell at APBNews.com in New York, where he worked as a syndication editor. He is a 1986 graduate of the University of South Carolina.