A few people have alerted to Bob Klapisch’s piece for Fox Sports last week, weighing in on confident statements from David Wright and Johan Santana suggesting that the Mets expect to win the World Series in 2010.

I appreciate the tips; I’m certainly not above taking writers to the mat when I feel the need arises and I reserve the right to call out members of the media for fallacious things they write in the future, but I’m having trouble mustering up enough to get too upset over this one.

There are plenty of fundamental arguments in the column I disagree with — most notably that no team in the league has “the guts” to take down the Phillies in 2010 and that Carlos Beltran is “hardly Winston Churchill” — but outside of the headline, there’s not much in Klapisch’s piece that’s too incendiary.

Wright and Santana said exactly what anyone should expect them to say. They’re professional athletes and they set their goals high. Sure, it might sound a little crazy given the way things went for the Mets in 2009, but “we expect to win the World Series” is a much more reasonable thing for a ballplayer to say than, “yeah, we suck. We’ll be lucky to win 80 games.”

Klapisch must realize that, and it actually comes out in his piece. He concludes by writing, “So Wright and Santana can be forgiven for the over-heated imagery. Call it the audacity of hope.”

Besides, it’s hard to kill the guy for killing the Mets because, frankly, who isn’t killing the Mets right now? Whether the front office could not or simply stubbornly chose not to overhaul the 2009 roster, they did not. The Mets return much the same team they trotted out last year, with all the same warts and without an additional starting pitcher.

Do I think there’s a chance they’ll be a whole lot better than they were last season? Of course. I have to be optimistic because I’m a Mets fan. And half the team was injured in 2009, anyway.

But for better or worse, the Mets did nothing to change the dialogue around their club this offseason and so, for the time being, they’re stuck with it. Rex Ryan has not walked through that door. This is the bed that they’ve made. They’ll lie in it until the season starts. If they win some games, the talk will change. If they lose some, it will grow louder.

The truth is, I imagine Klapisch was writing on deadline — from Tampa, no less, as per his dateline — and there wasn’t much else to write about. Until the games start up and the positional battles become a bit more clear, the only storylines to go on are these nebulous ones: leadership, confidence, delusion.

Players express confidence, columnists express doubt, and the wheels keep turning. Until the things that matter start happening, all we’ve got is talk: idle words and speculation and bandwidth.

It’s gray in New York today, cold and rainy and gloomy, and the best we’ve got to get us through our workdays are hazy columns about cloudy concepts. But things will clear up soon. We’ll have a sharper picture of what’s happening in Port St. Lucie and, in short time, a better sense of where to direct the thunder of our rage.

The big talk in Mets camp today is that Jason Bay showed up. Adam Rubin has a full recap of the outfielder’s Q&A with reporters. Some highlights:

What happened to the Canadian hockey team?

“I knew that was coming. That stung a little bit. They beat us. We were almost kind of out-hearted a little bit. I mean that last goal, that empty-netter by Kessler, kind of proved it right there. Outshot, what, 45 to 19 or 20 or something like that? If this were a medal game we were talking about, I’d probably hang my head a little lower. Being as we have a pretty good shot to get in tonight, I’d still take our chances.”

But you became a U.S. citizen. Root for USA?

“No way. I can’t do that. And I’d never be able to go back home. I’m still a Canadian through and through.”

You have MEDIUM EST NUNTIUS written on your T-shirt. What’s that mean?

“I have no idea. I bought it at Nordstrom’s before I came. I needed some T-shirts for the spring.”

You’re really into curling?

“I played a couple of years when I was in high school. They needed an extra guy. I wasn’t any good. It’s more of an excuse to go out on the ice and sweep around for a couple of hours and get a little exercise, and then drink a couple of beers afterward. I don’t have high school baseball where I’m at.”

OK, so let’s recap: A bunch of hockey info teeming with optimism, followed by the very redundant “I’m a Canadian through and through” quote, and then, of course, the admission that in high school he liked to “go out on the ice and sweep around” then “drink a couple of beers” afterward. Molsons, I assume.

My favorite part, buried among all the righteous Canucking, is the note about his t-shirt. Jason Bay had to buy a bunch of t-shirts right before Spring Training, presumably because his lumberjack wear was inappropriate for the Florida humidity.

Anyway, the Internet tells me that “MEDIUM EST NUNTIUS” actually is Latin for “the common good is the message,” which sounds a bit socialist to me. Even when haphazardly picking out t-shirts, Jason Bay is drawn to vaguely Canadian ideals.

Jason Bay: He’s your guy, buddy.

I apologize to any Canadians who may be offended by this post. I actually love Canada. It’s beautiful and fun and the people are pleasant, and often themselves beautiful. And I’m sure curling is a fantastic sport if you understand the rules.

(Jason Bay image courtesy Patrick Flood.)