NOTE: this is a guest post by Mike Steffanos of Mike’s Mets

While Sandy Alderson had to know the job he was taking on with the Mets would not be easy, I wonder if he understood completely just how difficult it might be.

He must have had some idea of the money problems. Fred Wilpon falling for a Ponzi scheme made the financial picture extremely murky going in. Still, add in a serious recession, poor team performances (with correspondingly disillusioned fans) and stadium debt contributing to a problematic bottom line, and the current Mets finances look downright disastrous.

Meanwhile, fans have been growing more dissatisfied with the Wilpons over the years as the poorly run Mets have become a joke around baseball. The hostility grows further with the perception of fans that the Wilpons’ troubled finances will preclude the team from seriously contending to keep the services of free-agent-to-be Jose Reyes.

Heading into the season the media was constantly promoting the idea that Reyes would be traded away by the deadline. The rationale primarily came down to these points:

NOTE: this is a post by Mike Steffanos of Mike’s Mets, a blog I’ve enjoyed thoroughly for its personal touch and candidness since 2005. Mike’s writing style and perspective is decidedly different from mine, which I hope you find to be an enjoyable change of pace (gotta mix things up once in a while, right?). Please direct your comments to him — and be nice, as I’d like him to write here again. Thanks – Joe

Since coming a whisker short of making it to the World Series in 2006, the Mets have had a way of failing to meet expectations. They collapsed historically in 2007, and then the bullpen imploded the following year. The 2009 season was lost to injuries, while last year’s campaign featured a maddeningly slow fade to irrelevance.

Losing has consequences. The fan base eroded as the casual and trend-following fans drifted away. Among the diehards who stayed,