1. I think it is an unfair criticism of Willie Randolph that he was using his main players too much; the glaring example was David Wright who never rested this season under Randolph. Essentially, Mets management put Randolph on a day-to-day contract this year and then complained when he treated every day as a Game 7. You want your executives to rise above their personal matters and do what is best for the organization. But how many people are really going to be able to do that? You were telling Randolph he must win and every day he had to decide: “I can use Wright or Fernando Tatis here in this ‘must’ win, what should I do?'” How many people in that situation are going to look at the big picture and use Tatis?

2. Let’s keep an eye on this: Alex Rodriguez now leads the AL with a .335 average, is tied for eighth in homers with 14 and is 18th in RBIs with 41. The homer and RBI totals are pretty darn impressive for a guy who missed three weeks. There was a lot of talk this year about Texas’ Josh Hamilton winning the AL Triple Crown, and his 19 homers and 74 RBIs still lead the AL. Will A-Rod catch Hamilton? That RBI gap just seems too much. But Rodriguez is playing in June 2008 like he did in April 2007 — like the best player on the planet. So the rest of the AL is on notice: A-Rod is stalking.

3. In 1998, at age 28, Mariano Rivera appeared in three World Series games against the Padres over five days, registered three saves and held San Diego to no runs on five hits over 4 1-3 innings with five strikeouts. A decade later, at age 38, Rivera just appeared in three games in three days against the Padres. And while this is obviously a far inferior Padre team to a decade ago, it is possible that Rivera — if anything — is better than ever. He faced 10 Padre hitters in those three games, allowed one hit, struck out seven, gave up no runs and registered three saves. Rivera is 20 for 20 in save tries and has a 0.79 ERA. You can take Tiger Woods as the greatest finisher in sports. I’ll take Mo.