The StatMan  

Only 48 hours remain before the Trading Deadline, and one day has already passed since Blue Jay GM J.P. Ricciardi's self-imposed deadline, and Roy Halladay is still in Toronto. In fact, he is slated to pitch tonight (Wednesday). Ricciardi flew open the flood gates and proclaimed that Halladay was available. Now, the pundits are saying he misread the market badly and stands to have the whole thing blow up in his face.

I am going to take the other position because, well, somebody has to.

Ricciardi knew Halladay is going to be out of Toronto after 2010 and the team will not be in a greatly different situation at this time next year. So, before he is perceived as a "rental", he knew he wanted to deal Halladay by this year's Trading Deadline on Friday in order to maximize his return. After all, 45 starts are better than 12. When Ricciardi declared that all phone lines were open and operators were standing by, the proposals came in. Ricciardi counter-proposed and asked for the moon. With so many suitors, demand greatly outweighed supply.

Kudos to Mark Shapiro, Cleveland GM, who sensed an opportunity and swooped in to unload Cliff Lee to one of those suitors, bagging four prospects in return. However, the main chips in the rumored wish list from Toronto is still intact with the Phillies. Ricciardi might come down from his initial wishes because Shapiro increased the supply, however briefly. But, Ricciardi is still well in line with bringing back more than if he enlisted a closed-bidding process for Doc's services.

Perhaps the Phillies are no longer in the Halladay Sweepstakes, though they might be able to get him for slightly less than rumored earlier (Kyle Drabek, J.A. Happ, Dominic Brown). But, the Red Sox, Dodgers, Yankees, and Angels are all interested and there is plenty of suitors to coax Ricciardi to give Halladay up. The Blue Jays will turn out better for this, maybe not short-term, but for 2011. Blue Jay fans are upset because the team crashed and burned after a hot start and Ricciardi has basically written off the 2010 campaign. But, Ricciardi's intent all along was maximizing his return for a player that would walk after 2010 anyway.

And, for that, Ricciardi can still get the job done with a fluorish.

Finally. Mets GM Omar Minaya had a busy weekend and, in the end, he came to the conclusion that the rest of the Mets constituents already knew in their heart: Tony Bernazard was a stain on the Mets franchise that had to be removed immediately.

Minaya's credibility and his relationships -- both with the media and ownership -- took a hit this week. He has always been a good baseball man, but then again, so was Bernazard. Minaya has made some good moves and he has left the organization woefully thin in other areas.

The clock is ticking for Minaya to get on the ball here or he might be gone before his extension kicks in next year. If he can pull off a deal to help the Mets now and in the future before the deadline, especially under all of this duress, most of it caused by himself, that will be a feather in his cap and the first step on a long road back to personal respectability.

But, let's shine the microscope on the whistleblower for a second: Adam Rubin. Rubin is a product of the New York Media and helps perpetuate the stereotype. If he is not tough on the Mets when he has to be, no one will read him and readers will choose from several other reporters who is willing to "tell it like it is". And, that is all Rubin did here.

This is not an indictment on Mets beat reporters or print media versus visual media. The indictment is all around us. The Media would rather be negative than positive because it sells more papers. "If it bleeds, it leads", remember?

In New York, just as in any city, the Media is the product of its readers. New Yorkers are tough, gruff, and they don't take any guff. They expect nothing else from their reporters. Anything less would make Rubin irrelevant.

Since the incident at the Monday press conference, Mets COO Jeff Wilpon, the future heir to the majority ownership stake in the Mets franchise, has spoken to quell the pen-wielding Dobermans and has also reached out to Rubin in an effort to mend fences. The New York Daily News has stated Rubin will continue to be the reporter on the Mets beat, but probably after a nice long vacation and at least a few of those aforementioned fences are mended.

Now, the clock is ticking for Minaya to get back to his job. His future, and the future of the Mets, are in the balance. Never mind how the franchise is perceived in the papers. If the reporters affected the standings, the Mets would be dead last, a mile away from the steps leading out of the cellar. But, Minaya can bail out ownership and salvage what he can from this situation by making the right move in the next couple of days.

The Mets might not be "buyers" or "sellers" this week, but Minaya is always looking for a move to improve the team now and in the future. He did this with the acquisition of Jeff Francoeur. He can do it again and the Mets players can continue to do their job by climbing back into relevance.

Sports With The StatMan - No. 17 - MLB: Trading Deadline Team Needs/Buyers/Sellers (featuring Mets, Red Sox, Yankees, Phillies) - We will take a look at team needs and the latest rumblings of who might move both from the local teams, as well as around the league.

Sports With The StatMan - No. 16 - MLB: Baseball Talk (featuring Mets, Red Sox, Yankees, Phillies); NHL: Winter Classic, Free Agency

I love the day the NHL Schedule is released.  In the middle of summer, my thoughts suddenly turn to crisp autumn evenings, the Holiday season, and the only way to get through the cold winter: the hockey season.  But, this is better than football's mini-camps and baseball's Winter Meetings.

If the first day of the NHL free agency signing period is Hockey Christmas, the day the NHL schedule is released is Hockey New Year.  The schedule was released after some long-since leaked news was made official by Commissioner Gary Bettman: the Winter Classic, the yearly NHL outdoor showcase, will be played in Boston's Fenway Park and feature the Bruins against the Philadelphia Flyers.

When the schedule is released, the 1,230-game schedule for the new season is like a clean sheet of ice, untouched and undisturbed.  For those of us with season tickets to an NHL franchise, the schedule acts as a day planner with 41 dates filled in.  Road trips are planned and lives are negotiated through 26 weeks (actually, 28 weeks because of the Olympic Break).

NHL.com earmarked a slew of league-wide dates to "circle" on your day planners.

But, here are some important dates to wet your whistle:

DIVISIONAL HOME-AND-HOMES
ATLANTIC DIVISION (5)
* November 28: NY Rangers @ Pittsburgh; November 30: Pittsburgh @ NY Rangers
* December 15: Philadelphia @ Pittsburgh; December 17: Pittsburgh @ Philadelphia
* December 16: NY Islanders @ NY Rangers; December 17: NY Rangers @ NY Islanders
* February 8: Devils @ Flyers; February 10: Flyers @ Devils
* April 9: Philadelphia @ NY Rangers; April 10: NY Rangers @ Philadelphia

NORTHEAST DIVISION (0)
* NONE (!)

SOUTHEAST DIVISION (5)
* November 6: Washington @ Florida; November 7: Florida @ Washington
* December 18: Carolina @ Florida; December 19: Florida @ Carolina
* January 14: Florida @ Tampa Bay; January 16: Tampa Bay @ Florida
* March 27: Atlanta @ Carolina; March 29: Carolina @ Atlanta
* April 10: Florida @ Tampa Bay; April 11: Tampa Bay @ Florida

CENTRAL DIVISION (5)
* October 2: Detroit @ St. Louis; October 3: St. Louis @ Detroit (1st 2 games for both clubs)
* December 26: Chicago @ Nashville; December 27: Nashville @ Chicago
* December 26: Columbus @ Detroit; December 28: Detroit @ Columbus
* April 7: Columbus @ Detroit; April 9: Detroit @ Columbus
* January 14: Columbus @ Chicago; January 16: Chicago @ Columbus

NORTHWEST DIVISION (1)
* November 27: Colorado @ Minnesota; November 28: Minnesota @ Colorado

PACIFIC DIVISION (1)
* April 3: Anaheim @ Los Angeles; April 6: Los Angeles @ Anaheim

HOLIDAYS & MATINEES
* Columbus Day Matinees: Colorado @ Boston (1pm ET), Los Angeles @ NY Islanders (2pm ET)
* Thanksgiving Day Games: Columbus @ Ottawa (7:30pm ET), Los Angeles @ Vancouver (10pm ET)
* 7 teams have Thanksgiving Eve and Day After Thanksgiving home games (Anaheim, Detroit, Edmonton, Florida, Minnesota, NY Islanders, Tampa Bay)
* 6 teams have home games that bookend the Christmas break (December 23 & 26) (Carolina, Detroit, Minnesota, Phoenix, Tampa Bay, Washington)
* New Year's Eve has 11 games.  The earliest is in Florida, where everyone in and around Sunrise, Florida, goes to bed before 9pm.  The game there starts at 5pm.  Local teams in action have the Islanders in Ottawa (7pm ET), the Rangers in Carolina (8pm ET), and the Devils in Chicago (8:30pm ET).  The latest game to start is Edmonton @ Calgary, which starts when Southern Floridians go to sleep (9pm ET).
* New Year's Day Games: Philadelphia @ Boston (1pm ET at Fenway), Atlanta @ Buffalo (7:30pm ET)
* Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Matinees: There are two this year, as Boston hosts Ottawa at 1pm and the Islanders welcome the Devils at 2pm.
* Valentine's Day: My wife will kill me.  The Islanders have a home game at 5pm against Ottawa on the last day of play before the Olympic Break.  There are 6 games in all, so hockey-hating spouses in Long Island, New York, Pittsburgh, Minnesota, Columbus, and Edmonton will be upset, though I cannot imagine too many hockey-hating spouses in Minnesota or Edmonton.  And, women just love Crosby...but I digress.
* Easter Sunday falls on April 4th, one week before the last day of the season.  There are 4 games on Easter - Detroit @ Philadelphia (3pm ET), Calgary @ Chicago (3pm ET), San Jose @ Colorado (8pm ET), Minnesota @ Vancouver (10pm ET).

FIRST CONTACT AGAINST OLD MATES (not covered in the NHL.com article)
* Francois Beauchemin TOR (October 26 at Anaheim)
* Jay Bouwmeester CGY (February 5 at Florida)
* Mike Cammalleri MTL (October 6 at Calgary)
* Brian Gionta MTL (December 16 at New Jersey)
* Nikolai Khabibulin EDM (October 14 at Chicago)
* Mike Komisarek TOR (October 1 vs Montreal - first visit to Montreal, October 31)
* John Madden CHI (December 31 vs New Jersey - first visit to New Jersey, April 2)
* Paul Mara MTL (October 24 vs NY Rangers - first visit to the Rangers, January 17)
* Mattias Ohlund TBY (February 9 vs Vancouver - no visits to Vancouver in 2009-10)
* Colton Orr TOR (October 12 at NY Rangers)
* Mike Rupp PIT (October 24 vs New Jersey - first visit to New Jersey, December 30)
* Rob Scuderi LAK (November 5 vs Pittsburgh - no visits to Pittsburgh in 2009-10)

The last team to have its home opener is: Montreal (October 15 vs. Colorado)
The first teams to play its last home game is: Buffalo and Toronto (April 6)

To see the full NHL schedule, click here.

Our next show (#16) is this Saturday night, July 18th, at 11pm ET. We'll be talking baseball, but we'll also touch on the NHL schedule and the Winter Classic.  Also, follow me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/gstatman.

Sports With The StatMan - No. 15 - MLB: All-Star Analysis and Snubs, Pennant Races at the All-Star Break, Baseball's Best in June; NHL: Free Agency Signings