I originally thought that your #BlameBeltran hashtag was just a sort of joke you were doing, and that there weren’t actual Mets fans with brains and thoughts that were under the impression the team was not winning because Carlos Beltran had ruined the team’s chemistry.

Then I went on Facebook and saw a friend of a friend of mine who watches the team on a consistent and regular basis blaming Beltran, Ollie and Castillo for ruining the team’s chemistry…

I was wondering if you had any ideas where this line of reasoning comes from? Have there been any reports that the players on the team don’t like Beltran?

– Aaron, via email.

The ellipses replace a long Facebook argument between Aaron and his friend covering all-too-familiar territory. You know the one: Jeff Francoeur plays with hunger and fire, the Mets were playing better before Beltran returned, and thus, obviously, Beltran ruined the team’s chemistry.

The friend’s argument assumes a lot, most notably: A) What happens in the clubhouse contributes to what happens on the field and does not merely reflect what has recently happened on the field. B) Carlos Beltran (as well as Ollie Perez and Luis Castillo) is a bad guy in the clubhouse.

To answer Aaron’s questions: No, I don’t think I’ve ever read anything to suggest that players on the Mets don’t like Beltran. I’ve seen columnists cite anonymous “team sources” and the like to suggest that Beltran is soft, but I can’t remember anything suggesting he is less than an ideal teammate. In fact, much has been made about the way he helped Angel Pagan this offseason.

If I had to guess, I would assume the perception that Beltran is a negative or divisive figure in the clubhouse stems from the fact that he is a Puerto Rican guy named Carlos and so has always been linked by many fans with fellow Puerto-Rican-guy-named-Carlos, Carlos Delgado.

I don’t spend nearly as much time around the team as the beat writers do and so a lot of this is speculation, but Delgado got a lot of heat in the media for being a bit outspoken and sometimes abrasive. Billy Wagner’s “f***ing shocker” outburst, I’m pretty sure, was aimed at Delgado.

And I think fans read negative items about Delgado — who, I should mention, was himself praised by many of his teammates as a great leader — and extrapolate them to Beltran. But ask the Mets’ beat writers or the guys in the SNY booth, and they’ll say nothing but good things about Beltran’s attitude and work ethic.

For whatever reason, many Mets fans don’t like Beltran, and so I think they just subconsciously assume the players on the team feel the same way. The best example of this, I think, is Castillo.

Scour the Internet for a negative report from inside the clubhouse about Castillo’s work ethic, attitude, qualities as a teammate, anything. I’m almost certain you won’t find one.

We, the fans, don’t like Luis Castillo because he absorbs a significant portion of the Mets’ payroll without showing much for it. So we guess David Wright doesn’t like Castillo either, because we like David Wright and he must feel the same way we do about the Mets’ second baseman. The Internet is rife with assumptions about Luis Castillo being a negative force in the Mets’ clubhouse only from people who have never been anywhere near the Mets’ clubhouse.

And I don’t mean to appeal to any sort of authority I might earn by being credentialed. I attend maybe half the Mets’ home games, tops, and I don’t have the type of relationships with any of the players that guys on the beat develop.

But I read a whole, whole lot about the team, and I spend a lot of time tracking how and where these rumors get started. I just don’t think there’s any strong evidence to believe that Beltran is in any way a negative presence in the clubhouse, nor that it would mean much if he were, if he were producing.

For what it’s worth, a few survey responders asked for more weekend posts. That’s a good idea and something I hope to figure out. I try my best to avoid spending too much time in front of the computer on weekends for the sake of my back and, mostly, my sanity. But I’ll come up with something.

As for the Mets? Not good. I maintain that they’ll hit sooner than later, but man do they look terrible.

A few things:

Jerry Manuel took a lot of heat on Twitter and elsewhere for pulling R.A. Dickey out of Sunday’s game. In the heat of the moment, I wished he would have left Dickey in, but in retrospect I think Manuel made the right call there. Dickey has been great, pitchers need their legs, and no reason to risk losing him for any stretch of time. Obviously he maintained he was fine, but lots of players do that, and he didn’t look good on the plays in the infield. Yes, the Mets needed innings after using up their bullpen on Saturday, but there are better reasons to get on Manuel’s case.

Like, for example, allowing Pedro Feliciano to face so many right-handers in a 0-0 tie. Especially — especially — once one of them got on base. It’s amazing how frequently Manuel overlooks glaring platoon splits considering how often he makes decisions based on ones that don’t exist. With the team stumbling and the offense inept, you really can’t have Feliciano facing righties there.

There’s been some talk of a shakeup, either on the roster or in the coaching staff. Good. I don’t know if it will make a difference but as long as the Mets don’t do anything stupid, it probably can’t hurt. I’m not sure the sudden offensive implosion has anything to do with Howard Johnson — I’m skeptical of how much impact a hitting coach really has — but it’s certainly not good for his resume.

I’m not certain the extent of Rod Barajas’ injury, but if he’s going to be out for more than a few days, he should be put on the disabled list. The Mets’ roster is already handicapped by the presence of three catchers who can’t play other positions so it’s not like playing man-down will affect them too much, but giving Barajas a couple weeks to rest his oblique will give the club time to assess whether Josh Thole can take over the catching job on a more permanent basis. At the very least, having Thole in the lineup could help jumpstart the offense, plus having an extra bench player will give Jerry Manuel a little more flexibility.

Also — and I really am just talking out my ass here — the team should probably take a close look at whatever oblique stretches the players are doing. Maybe three separate oblique injuries in the course of a month is a coincidence, but, you know, can’t hurt to examine that.

Oh, and as for the Dan Haren trade? Unbelievable. I’ll say that the kids Patrick Corbin and Tyler Skaggs that the D-backs will get back are both very young and have good peripherals in A-ball, but Joe Saunders just isn’t very good. It’s easy to say, “the Mets should have been able to match this deal,” but most teams in the Majors should have been able to match this deal. I don’t really get it. Some have argued it has to do with the money remaining on Haren’s contract, but that’s ridiculous. A pitcher of his caliber is a steal at $29 mil over the next two seasons.

Should the Mets make a move now? I don’t know. My gut says no, but it’s awful hard to read the market after Cliff Lee went for a huge haul and Haren, a pitcher ultimately more valuable than Lee thanks to his reasonable contract, went for pennies on the dollar. If the Mets can pick up someone as a straight salary dump, then yeah, do it. If they’ve got to move prospects of even marginal value in the name of saving this particular season, I’d hold off.