After last night’s loss, Alex Cora got quite upset about some laughter in the clubhouse.
Here is the link to David Lennon’s Twitter Post:
http://twitter.com/lenno212/status/19051351500
While none of us were in the clubhouse to fully know what was the joke or why Cora in particular got so offended, there is a concern that the Mets players will be labeled as “playing for the paycheck instead of the win”.
The laughter may have had nothing to do with the game they just lost, it could have been about Ollie Perez being activated or something completely unrelated to baseball.
On one hand, its a game, no sense crying over a loss, go get the win tomorrow, but on the other hand, losing is not something to be laughed off.
Baseball players get paid a lot of money and fans expect to see them take it seriously, so news of this kind will always draw ire from a fanbase.
The Mets players are going to take their cue from the leaders, both management, coaches and veterans.
Jerry Manuel has been known to laugh and joke about everything, and proven team leaders like David Wright, Jason Bay, Jeff Francoeur and Carlos Beltran did not openly confront the jokesters.
Wright, Bay and Beltran did not play a good game, but that is not the full reason they lost, it takes a 25 man team to win and it takes a 25 man team to lose. Francoeur only had a pinch hit appearance. If anyone had reason to be angry it had to be either RA Dickey, Angel Pagan or Josh Thole, as they did very well, but only Cora seemed upset.
As the team’s de-facto Captain, Wright will always be expected to intervene in the clubhouse. A lot of fans may be asking “where was Wright in this?”, truth is he could have been on the trainers table icing down his bruised knee, working out in the weight room or even in the showers when this occurred and found out about it after the fact.
Alex Cora has the utility, off the bench role so part of his anger may have been frustration at not getting a chance to play.
Time will tell if Cora’s anger got through to his teammates, but I am sure it had an impact in the clubhouse last night.
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