1. I endorse what the Mets did over the weekend in promoting Ruben Tejada and Fernando Martinez, and pledging to make them regular players. The Mets are not really contenders anymore and, even if they were, removing Luis Castillo and Jeff Francoeur from regular playing time is no big deal, especially because they should not be on the 2011 roster. At the least, Tejada and Martinez might be.

If the Mets are unable to trade Francoeur this month, they should non-tender him in the offseason. And if the Mets cannot find a bad-salary-for-bad-salary deal involving Castillo in the offseason then he should be waived before spring training.

So at least the Mets will be able to gain more information in determining if Tejada and/or Martinez could be helpful pieces for the 2011 Mets.

But in this move the Mets are also signaling their intentions moving forward. They are in the midst of taking a huge attendance hit this year, which will almost certainly lead to even a larger attendance hit next year. So that means the Mets almost certainly will be reducing their payroll again in 2011, dropping closer to the $100 million mark.

That is a number easier to reach with a bunch of young players making at or near the $400,000 minimum wage.

But this is about more than what the Mets will pay; it is what they are going to try to sell to their fans. They sent an e-mail to media that covers their team yesterday pointing out that their Sunday lineup contained seven homegrown players. That was the beginning of the sell: See we have a better farm system than we have been given credited for possessing. The 2010 season is not a complete loss because we have been able to integrate talented players from the system onto the roster.

Hey, I get it. If I ran the Mets that is probably what I would sell, as well. Try to tie hope to homegrown youth; hope that loyal Mets fans want to come see players developed by the organization, create bonds to this group. But a deeper look will show the Mets are not breaking in stars. Ike Davis, Jonathon Niese and Angel Pagan have the look of nice support players; so may Josh Thole and Bobby Parnell. But there is not even anything close to a David Wright in that group.

Also, the release the Mets sent out pointed out that it was the first time the Mets started seven homegrown players since July 22, 1990. But what was not said in the release is that the previous homegrown group did nothing for the future. Starting in 1991, the Mets suffered six straight losing seasons and had the worst winning percentage (.446) in the sport during that span.

That coincided with a period in which the Yanks broke in such homegrown players as Bernie Williams, Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera and Andy Pettitte and unleashed a dynasty.

The Mets are breaking in a nice group, but within the Mets’ own division the Braves are breaking in Jason Heyward, the Marlins Mike Stanton, the Phillies Domonic Brown and the Nationals Stephen Strasburg. The Mets are not breaking in a player of nearly that pedigree.

2. Last weekend the Rays played before full houses three consecutive games, took two out of three from the Yankees and looked like the AL East team ready to fly.

But now Tampa has lost five straight. Yesterday they were nearly no-hit for the third time this year, not getting a hit until there were two outs in the ninth. Brandon Morrow finished with a one-hitter, 17 strikeouts and a 1-0 victory.

So this weekend concludes with Toronto looking like a team no one wants to play. Recently, Yankees hitting coach Kevin Long told me he thought the Blue Jays had as good a pitching staff as any team in the division. They have the majors’ most homers. I not only think the Blue Jays would win the NL Central, I think they would win it easily.

Toronto cannot win the AL East or even make the playoffs. But the Jays are clearly playing hard and well, right now, and have the power arms/power bats combo that make them dangerous. They are clearly going to influence the AL East.

Twenty-four of Toronto’s final 51 games are against the Yankees (nine games), Red Sox (nine games) or Rays (six).

The likelihood is that Texas’ Ron Washington is on the way to winning AL Manager of the Year. But in what is probably his final season, Toronto’s Cito Gaston deserves mention on the ballot. Toronto lost A.J. Burnett and Roy Halladay from its rotation in consecutive seasons, but at this moment, the Red Sox are seven games behind the Yankees, but only 3 1-2 in front of the Blue Jays.

3. I love writing this kind of column, like I did about Dustin Moseley off of last night’s Red Sox-Yankees game. I have no idea if Moseley will ever pitch well again. But this was quite a nice moment for a journeyman who has dealt with a lot of physical issues in his recent past. It is that Casablanca moment: He will always have Sunday night, against the Red Sox, in the midst of a pennant race.

For my Sunday Hardball column, I had written about how the Yanks have difficulty convincing veteran utilitymen to sign with them in the offseason because those utilitymen simply do not see the opportunity to break into what is such a set Yankee lineup, especially in the infield. As a quick aside, I wrote in that piece that Eduardo Nunez was a switch-hitter. He was earlier in his minor league career, but not any longer – so I apologize for that mistake.

When it comes to getting long-shot pitchers to enlist with the team, the Yanks have a little more fortune than with utility infielders because in recent years they have definitely given those kind of players opportunity. Think Chad Gaudin last year, or Darrell Rasner and Dan Giese in 2008, or Sidney Ponson on a few occasions, or Aaron Small.

Moseley is the latest in that line to offer some unexpected help. Last August, Moseley had hip surgery similar to the type that Alex Rodriguez and Carlos Delgado and Mike Lowell underwent. He was still having difficulty running in January. The Yanks were the only organization willing to offer him a minor league contract and invite to major league camp without him auditioning with some bullpens.

That is because the Yanks had scouting reports they liked on Moseley stretching back to his amateur days. As recently as 2008, when Moseley was an Angel, the Yanks had positive reports from four different scouts: Pete Mackanin; Greg Orr; Kendall Carter and Bill Mele. The Yanks, like all teams, send their own scouts through their system, and those scouts liked what they saw from Moseley in Triple-A earlier this year, and the reports from Scranton manager Dave Miley and pitching coach Scott Aldred also were strong.

In July, the Yanks had their eyes really on just one starter: Cliff Lee. And when that collapsed, they found they did not like the prices on second-tier arms such as Ted Lilly and Jake Westbrook, even with Andy Pettitte on the DL. They decided the same last year when they walked away from the asking price on Seattle’s Jarrod Washburn, and ultimately turned to and got good work from Gaudin.

Moseley has ended up the fill-in for Pettitte. He made his third start last night in an emergency when A.J. Burnett could not go due to back problems. So Moseley is in the rotation because the Yanks could not finalize a deal for Lee and started last night because Burnett could not go. Lee, Burnett and Moseley are all from Arkansas and all represented by Darek Braunecker. As another aside, that should not mean the Yanks will be getting any kind of discount on Lee: Braunecker is known for getting his players top dollar; just check out what he got from the Yanks for Burnett.

Moseley has earned the two or three starts left before Pettitte’s likely return. Maybe there will be some more good moments for a championship-caliber team. If not, he will always have his Casablanca moment.