Allow me to briefly indulge a high-school football memory:
It was the fourth quarter of the homecoming game my senior year, and we held a comfortable lead over the cupcake West Hempstead team we scheduled for homecoming every season. Nevermind that it was due to be our first win of the season and only the fourth in the three years I had been playing varsity football; I was having the time of my life.
Our coach swapped in a new defensive end, a pothead who didn’t play much. He was supposed to bring the defensive playcall with him, but that was apparently too much for his memory to bear.
While the huddle gathered, I jogged to greet him.
“What’s the play?” I asked.
“Oh, s@#$,” he said, looking bewildered. “But yo, Wurst is having a party.”
I chuckled and approached the huddle.
“Forty-two, outside, Cover 2, red dog,” I said, improvising. “And guys — there’s a party at Wurst’s house tonight.”
What a leader I was that day! And what a fun-loving gang of hooligans we were! Just laughing and partying and keeping it loose. That was a team with chemistry.
Of course, the next week, while losing by double-digits, I got into a fistfight with our starting runningback on the sidelines. And after the game, instead of partying with my teammates, I went to the movies with my parents. I was ashamed to be seen in public after the stomping we took.
In the coming days, lots and lots of people are going to talk about A.J. Burnett and his whipped-cream pies and how the Yankees succeeded because they were able to stay loose in the clubhouse.
But that’s not really it.
When teams play well, the players have fun. Almost always. Baseball players become professional baseball players in part because they really, really enjoy playing baseball (even Carlos Beltran!). And to win consistently at the Major League level must be an unimaginable thrill.
So of course the Yankees nailed each other in the face with pies after games. And of course they appeared to be enjoying it. They were enjoying it, and they deserved to. They were that good.
But they were enjoying it because they were good, they were not good because they were enjoying it. Does that make sense?
The Yankees had a team full of All-Stars that were lucky enough to stay healthy. They replaced Jason Giambi with Mark Teixeira and revamped their rotation. That’s why they won, and so that’s why they had so much fun.
No one gets pied after losses.
Look: I’m not dismissing the element of team chemistry altogether. I’ve worked in groups, and obviously I recognize that it’s a much more pleasant experience while everyone’s getting along.
But is there a way to construct a group to ensure that everyone gets along? I doubt it. In fact, I’d bet the best way to secure the best possible clubhouse would be to put together the best possible team.
That’s what the Mets need to do this offseason. They must put together the best possible team for 2010 that does not prevent them from winning in 2011 and beyond.
And that’s all. There’s no need to go out and acquire good clubhouse guys or team leaders or pie-throwers. If the team wins games, there’ll always be someone to throw pies.
Tedquarters 
Thank. You.
Not sure how many times you can work the same “it’s the players, not the clubhouse” theme into a different article, but it works everytime.
Who cares if the players in the clubhouse are beating the crap out of each other or blowing lines off each others wives lower backs…hit some dingers and pitch a shutout and your team will win–end of story.
No signs of stopping until more people get it.
To me this arguement is on par with the ‘grit’ and ‘tough’ arguemnet. Funny how when a team is losing game, or not performing well many jump to the conclusion that they “have no heart” or “don’t really want it” or “are going through the motions” or “they have no life”.
As if it were just that easy, as if all the team had to do was care more, and they’d win games, regardless of talent.
This has always been the right argument. As much as everyone thinks 25 David Ecksteins would win a World Series . . . yeah not so much.
So, you’re saying Omar Minaya SHOULDN’T sign the pothead defensive end to play catcher because he only cares about parties at Wurst’s parent’s house or that we SHOULD so that when the Mets win, we’ll know to go to the party at Wurst’s parent’s house?
Probably the latter. It was a pretty awesome party.
The most shocking item is that scrawny little uber-blogger Ted Berg was his high school’s varsity QB. My Long Island high school’s QB (Garden City) was a 6-3, 200lb uber-jock. Then again, we were state champs, won the Rutgers Cup, etc.
Ha! I played center and linebacker actually — that was the defensive huddle I was calling. Though for what it’s worth, when four of our first five QBs got hurt, I became the de facto backup quarterback because no one else could remember the plays. Thankfully, I never got in.