According to the New York Times, the New York Mets have received yet another loan to help aid the Mets with their financial struggles. The Mets received a $40 million loan from Bank of America according to a person with knowledge of the situation. The Mets received a $25 million loan from Major League Baseball last year.

The Wilpons are in big trouble here. They are in big trouble because nobody who any financial sense what so ever would ever take minority stake of the team with no path to fully own the team. That pretty much eliminates every major player in the ownership game.

With a major player pumping new money into the Met organization, the Wilpons, the Katz’s are just bleeding cash. The loan the Mets took out was a bridge loan, which is meant to hold the Mets over until they can investors to buy into a minority stake of the team. While that sounds nice and easy, one thing to consider with bridge loans is that they usually have a higher interest rate than normal loans. That could scare some people off.

I know it’s hard to let go of something you consider you baby and clearly the Wilpons consider the Met organization their baby, but enough is enough. The Mets are losing money every day and their on the field product is really suffering.

Last year alone, the Mets lost $70 million according to GM Sandy Alderson and without Jose Reyes in 2012 and a team that is projected to finish towards the bottom of the National League East, Citi Field is going to be a ghost town. I could only imagine what their losses are going to be in 2012.

Here is what really bothers me about this situation. You almost get the sense that the Wilpons are oblivious to what their fans think of the team. I almost believe the Wilpons believe the Mets fans accept this nonsense.

Met fans are so disgusted with this team. It’s gotten to the point where the hatred for the team has outweighed the loyalty and that is what the Wilpons are missing. They give you the sense that having a mediocre product on the field is acceptable because Met fans are “loyal” fans.

In other cities that might work, but it doesn’t work in New York. Just look at the New York Islanders situation for an example of that. Bumbling ownership has destroyed that once proud franchise and bumbling ownership is doing the same in Flushing.

Say what you about New Yorkers and the city, but when you are surrounded by the best of everything, people expect the best. That is just a fact of life. And people expect the best from their sports teams as well.

New Yorkers will always support winners. St. Johns Basketball will sell out Madison Square Garden when they are playing well. Heck, even the WWE will sell out a venue for a regular house show. But New Yorkers won’t support a half-assed operation.

Why do you think there are only two Olive Garden’s in NYC? It’s because New York City offers some of the best Italian restaurants in the world. Why would I waste my time going to a chain restaurant to get mediocre Italian food, when I can go to 100 other places that offer authentic Italian food with better ingredients? Olive Garden can’t compete with those restaurants.

The Mets are becoming the Olive Garden of New York sports. Yeah, they might still attract some people from the outer boroughs and I am sure some tourists will stop by, but the people that the Mets want to attract, the real fans who know what the story is, they are spending their money somewhere else and watching the game at home or they will check out a New York Yankee game.

The longer this charade goes with the Wilpons, the more fans they will lose to the Yankees. And I am not talking about the seven-year-old kid, who doesn’t know any better so he follows the Yankees. I am talking about the 30 – 40 year old, who loved the Mets in 1986, but starting following the Yankees because they wanted to fit in when they were in their teens and 20′s.

People became Yankee fans in the 90′s because it was the “cool thing to do.” That’s a fact. Every hot chick in Long Island became a Yankee fan because they wanted to impress the guy wearing a wife beater and a Yankee cap to the side. Of course that guy couldn’t name one Yankee player prior to 1996 outside of Don Mattingly, but hey, that’s neither here nor there. The reality of that situation is those two were spending their discretionary income on the Yankees, not the Mets.

Now people are becoming Yankee fans because of their hatred for the Wilpons. That is a bad, bad sign.

I’ll never forget when Jeff Wilpon and Omar Minaya went on the Mike Francesa show a couple of years ago. Everyone who listened to that show that day came away with the same thought: They were actually asking Francesa for advice. It was comical.

Do you think Mark Cuban or Bob Kraft would ever ask a talk show host for advice on how to run their business? Not in a million years.

Whatever actions the Wilpons and Saul Katz are taking are just futile attempts to save their ownership of their baby. Every single one of us would do the same thing for something we consider our baby. But in this case, the Mets are fighting a battle they can’t win.

The Wilpons need to sell the Mets or risk Citi Field becoming the Olive Garden — a place where real fans just pass by on their way to something better.

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By The Baseball Index