I heard that with Wright and Ike Davis out of the lineup and Jason Bay still in freefall, Terry Collins actually went to Beltran recently and told the switch-hitter to get greedy in RBI situations. The Mets manager liberated Beltran to essentially become an RBI whore.

– Joel Sherman, N.Y. Post.

What does that even mean?

People ask me “Is poker luck?” and “Is investing luck?”

The answer is, not at all. But sample sizes matter. On any given day a good investor or a good poker player can lose money. Any stock investment can turn out to be a loser no matter how large the edge appears. Same for a poker hand. One poker tournament isn’t very different from a coin-flipping contest and neither is six months of investment results.

On that basis luck plays a role. But over time — over thousands of hands against a variety of players and over hundreds of investments in a variety of market environments — skill wins out.

– David Einhorn, Speech at the Value Investing Congress.

<3.

I for one welcome our new hedge-fund overlords.

Via Patrick Flood.

Justin Berg, no relation, threw 12 pitches against the Mets last night. All of them were balls. Big League Stew puts the performance in historical context.

And I suppose this was inevitable:

If you’re new around these parts, that’s a reference to this.

Francisco Rodriguez’s $17.5 million vesting option, activated for 2012 if the closer finishes 55 games this year, is commonly seen as an albatross, a major drag on his trade value. But for a variety of reasons, the clause is not as problematic as it seems, and Rodriguez might be far easier to move than conventional wisdom suggests.

The closer’s open-mindedness will help: Although Rodriguez has a clause blocking trades to 10 undisclosed teams, a source close to him said that he will consider any potential deal that is presented to him. Rodriguez is also open to waiving the vesting option in the event an acquiring team wants to negotiate a multi-year extension, the source said.

– Andy Martino, N.Y. Daily News.

This ray of sunshine got lost in the Einhorn news this morning. And the language here means this might not really be news — he’ll consider waiving his no-trade clause, and he’s “open to waiving the vesting option in the event an acquiring team wants to negotiate a multi-year extension.”

So Rodriguez is open to being overpaid for the next several years instead of just being overpaid next year. That seems to make sense. I am also open to that.

Regardless, it’s good news that Rodriguez would waive his no-trade clause at all. And if — as the executive quoted in Martino’s story suggests — the Mets could get something of value in return for Rodriguez, they should look to deal their closer regardless of where they are in the standings come the trade deadline.

I bring this up a bunch, but as a reminder: The whole “buyer vs. seller” thing is silly. Those are labels. At the trade deadline and all other times, an MLB front office should work to improve its club by considering all possible deals.

If the Mets can find a way to get out from Rodriguez’s 2012 option and get something of real value in return, it shouldn’t matter if they’re within a few games of the Wild Card. Teams desperate for relief help tend to overpay for it at the deadline, and the Mets can find someone to close out games — perhaps not as effectively as Rodriguez, but you’re talking about 25-30 innings tops over the rest of the season.

Well-run teams can find ways to put together good bullpens on the cheap, allowing them to allocate payroll elsewhere. If the Mets can find a way to spin Rodriguez into a useful young player, they can replace him with a less expensive pitcher and reinvest his salary in a position more difficult to fill. Like, I don’t know, say, shortstop.