PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. (AP) – Mets fans can buy a few jerseys featuring names of players in the team’s instructional league.
Cespedes jerseys, they’re big sellers.
Cone jerseys, available as throwbacks.
Of course, those are for Yoenis Cespedes and David Cone, and not the instructional leaguers – Ricardo Cespedes and Gene Cone. No, the only of the 58 players getting a spotlight in this camp with the Mets is Tim Tebow, the quarterback-turned-baseball-hopeful whose No. 15 jersey is already a hot seller even though he has yet to take one professional at-bat.
The Mets are cashing in already, and Tebow has a book coming out next month. Yet both the team and its new star-of-sorts insist this is no publicity stunt, even though the odds seem stacked very high against a 29-year-old former football player finding his way to the major leagues.