The Phillies/Mets rivalry just got better. As if the two teams didn’t hate each other enough, Phillies’ World Series MVP pitcher/God Cole Hamels went on WFAN NY radio on Wednesday and labeled the New York Mets “choke artists.”
Why was he doing an interview with NY sports radio? He was pimping the Phillies World Series DVD that just came out. Mets fans must have been thrilled.
To be fair, people are taking bits and pieces out of context to make it seem worse than it really was. Did he refer to the Mets as choke artists? Yes. Was that term used in the question that was posed to him? Yes again. Should he have stirred the pot? Absolutely not. I am of the firm belief that no good comes from comments like this.
However, it does seem that the more you look into it, the more the Mets royally piss the rest of the league off. They are known as show boaters who go over the top with on-field celebrations. This is a big reason why Phillies players don’t hesitate to take shots at them when all logic says they should just shut up. In other words, the Mets irritate the Phillies and other teams to the point where they just want the world to know how much they hate them.
Hamels even made a reference to his teammate Shane Victorino, who tends to behave like the Mets do as far as celebration.
“I’m hoping I don’t hurt too many people right here with this,” Hamels said. ” … When Jose Reyes hits home runs, he points his finger up like he won the game. And he might have hit in only in the first inning or the third inning. Well, when Shane did it, he did the same exact thing. So we were [saying], ‘Hey, Shane, this doesn’t win the game. We still have a lot of game to play. Ya know, why are you trying to be like Jose Reyes?’
“And so that was kind of where it came from. … Even though you hit the big home run, you don’t need to pimp it. You just need to run around the bases and just kind of get the game started.”
Hamels was then asked by hosts Evan Roberts and Joe Benigno if he thinks the Mets are “choke artists.”
“Last year and this year, I think we did believe that,” said Hamels. “Three years ago, we didn’t, because they smoked everybody. I really thought that was the year they were going to the World Series. Unfortunately, it didn’t happen.
“That’s kind of what we believe. … I think we’re always going to believe it ’til they prove us wrong.”
The hosts stopped him and asked him to repeat whether or not he thought the Mets were choke artists.
“Yeah,” he replied. “For the past two years, they’ve been choke artists.”
Leave a Reply