It may be strictly coincidental, but that doesn't make it any less interesting. About the same time the New York Mets were spending millions on the closer they so desperately need this week, the owner of the team was facing possible losses of millions of his own as the victim of a fraud scheme even more audacious than the one baseball pulls on its fans.
No one but Fred Wilpon knows how much he lost by investing with Bernard Madoff, and even he may not yet know the full hit in a scheme that may have taken investors for a mind-boggling $50 billion. The Mets, though, were concerned enough to put out a statement saying it will not affect the day-to-day operations and long-term plans of the team.
Just what those plans are, it's hard to say. The grand scheme of the Mets for years has been simply to throw money at the latest big free agent and hope he produces enough to get them into the playoffs.