MICKEY’S MIXED MESSAGES

Mets manager still can’t get his story straight

When it comes to handling the media, Mickey Callaway is still learning. And that’s being

kind.

Inside the Valley of the Stupid, and in other media precincts, Brodie Van Wagenen, the man who assembled a cockeyed roster while telling the rest of the NL East to “come get us,” is still getting cushy treatment.

Callaway, who has no place to hide, is a target for micro-analysis on a daily basis. Some of the critiques are well-earned and legitimate.

Others, delivered by desperately-seeking-ratings VOS Gasbags are more superficial. Like making fun of his laugh and southern drawl.

Nonetheless, when it comes to the media, Callaway has a proclivity for stepping in his own mouse traps.

After a 7-1 loss to Arizona last Sunday, Callaway displayed a different side. Instead of his usual show of support after a loss, he scolded his team, saying it is too inconsistent. “I am kind of getting sick of saying, ‘We have to right this ship,’” Callaway said during the postgame press conference. “We have got to get it done.” The reaction to the manager suddenly showing what, for him, was a tough guy persona was mixed. Some analysts and commentators said it was refreshing and applauded. Other said it was so out of character, his players would never buy it.

On Tuesday night, Callaway reversed field, blaming himself for a 9-3 loss to the Giants after yanking Noah Syndergaard in the seventh with a runner on first. On SNY, viewers got a close look at Syndergaard mouthing a few expletives before asking Callaway to “let me finish” when the manager reached the mound. After the game, Callaway held a meeting with his players to apologize for the loss. He blamed himself again during the postgame media session.

So, in the space of a couple of days, Callaway stashed his suddenly found tough guy act for his usual role of Doctor Love. He not only took the blame for the loss, but told the Free World he had already apologized to Syndergaard and the rest of the players. This was inconsistency on Callaway’s part; a portrait of The Uncertain Manager.

Wednesday night on SNY, Keith Hernandez went a step further, putting some of the blame on the media wing of the Mets organization. He said they should have never allowed Callaway to tell notebooks and cameras about the team meeting.

“It was peculiar to me that he (Callaway) even called the meeting,” Hernandez said. “He would have been better off going oneon-one with Syndergaard. (Word about)Thatmeetingshouldhave never gotten out to the press.”

Before Wednesday’s game, Callaway showed how shook-up he was. In the middle of his paid appearance on WFAN, he actually asked Mike (Sports Pope) Francesa if he thinks it’s cool for Pete Alonzo to participate in the All-Star Home Run Derby. Even the Pope sounded surprised Callaway was soliciting his opinion. Could it be Callaway called Francesa before deciding to pull Syndergaard?

Seriously though, maybe Callaway was just trying to flatter a powerful media mouth. He made need a few more to decipher the mixed messages he’s sending out.

For good reasons Aaron Boone is a media darling, but that should not mean he’s above criticism.

The same baseball media types who love him, who built him up as a master communicator, looked the other way during this Clint Frazier fiasco. In case you forgot, Frazier blew off the media after playing Butcher Boy Sunday night in a loss to Boston. On Tuesday in Toronto, he told scribes he wasn’t sorry for his no-show and explained why, including some legit gripes about how he had been mistreated by the local media.

One conclusion that can be drawn is Frazier is in need of some guidance. And it stands to reason the much-hyped Yankees PR staff and Boone, the communications maven, has offered it. Why hasn’t Boone been able to get through to Frazier? It’s a legitimate question that hasn’t been asked or answered.

Has Boone given up, thinking that Frazier is a hopeless case when it comes to dealing with the media? Is it not an important to him?

Judging by the VOS talking point (“Ooh it’s hurting Frazier’s teammates who have to stand there and answer for him”) it should be?

Or maybe when you are having the kind of year Boone is, boss scribes are just more willing to cut him major slack when it comes to his role in this Frazier affair.

COURTING HEADLINES

The stunning development of the NBA Finals is that the noise and news being generated are all coming from off-the-court incidents, interviews, free agency speculation and draft rumors.

Hopefully this nonsense crested Thursday when the league sacked a Golden State investor for a year for contacting Raptors guard Kyle Lowry.

Give the NFL credit. Their game officials are rancid at times (e.g.NewOrleansNFCtitlegame pass interference non-call) but at least in the post-season the controversy surrounding the NFL is largely limited to on-field activity. The owners and players seem to get it.

Stay out of the headlines in January.

Wait until after you win the Super Bowl to get busted in a massage parlor sting.

OH, KAY!

Instead of going full wig, Michael Kay, the sensitive one, should take a deep breath, close his eyes, count to three, and move on to another topic.

This might have stopped him from sounding so off-the-wall paranoid Tuesday when ripping Neil Best, mild mannered reporter for a sleepy suburban newspaper, and someone who goes by the name of Funhouse, whose purpose in life is to monitor Mike (Sports Pope) Francesa on a daily basis. Kay claimed both Mr. Best and Mr. Funhouse are nothing more than Francesa flunkies, devoted to carrying the Pope’s water.

The facts don’t back Kay’s case. Best has a history of playing things down the middle and Funhouse’s entire existence is based on finding video of Francesa’s mistakes and misbloviations. Kay’s rant (at one point he wondered if Funhouse actually worked for WFAN) was about both cats’ take on Kay/Francesa’s simultaneous interviews with Pete Rose (Kay’s was pre-recorded, Pope went live).

Yet it was Big Head’s complaints about Best and Funhouse that overshadowed the Rose interviews. Still, on one count, Kay has a leg to stand on. He zoned in on the fact Funhouse works “anonymously” and is not subjected to the same crap those who put their name on their work are. Kay is right. It’s easy to take potshots when no one can fire back directly.