Despite the emergence of crossdressing sensation Lastings Milledge, the Mets are reluctant to deal Cliff Floyd, currently in the last year of his NY contract, writes the Daily News’ Adam Rubin.

The Tigers recently inquired about the availability of Cliff Floyd, but were told the outfielder was not being traded, according to two baseball officials.

Floyd has been on the disabled list for three weeks with a sprained left ankle, but could return this weekend against the Yankees. After homering as a DH on Monday, he was scheduled to play the outfield last night for the first time with the Gulf Coast League Mets, but the game was rained out. GM Omar Minaya expected Floyd to at least miss the Red Sox series. “One game is not going to cut it,” Minaya said.

The Mets haven’t made a final determination about which player to demote when Floyd is activated, but the plan seems to remain returning Lastings Milledge to Triple-A Norfolk. The Mets finish a nine-game stretch with the DH this weekend at Yankee Stadium, and Minaya is committed to Floyd and Xavier Nady as his left and right fielders, respectively.

I’ll say as little about last night’s game at Fenway as possible other than Alay Soler was dreadful…and Jose Reyes might think twice in the future about challenging Manny Ramirez’ arm, green-light or not. Not that Reyes will have many opportunities to consider it, but for all of Manny’s ballyhooed concentration problems, he’s fairly adept at making such a routine play (ie. throwing out a baserunner who hasn’t even reached third by the time Ramirez has picked up the ball in shallow left).

The Globe’s Bob Ryan would like to see Pedro Martinez receive a warm welcome on his return to the mound at Fenway this evening.

A boo? Someone would be obtuse enough to boo Pedro Martínez when he returns to Fenway Park as a Mets starter tonight? Say it isn’t so.

“You can’t possibly want to boo this guy,” proclaims Gehrig38, a regular contributor to the Sons of Sam Horn website. “What you got a chance to see included three of the most dominating seasons in baseball history.”

“Gehrig38,” as many of you know, answers to the real-life name of Curt Schilling.

Boo Pedro Martínez? Why? Because he left town? Because he may have sworn allegiance to the Red Sox and the city of Boston before he discovered that, when push came to shove, the Mets offered him a much better contract? Anyone who is bothered by that needs to get over it. It’s the 21st century. Business happens.