Thursday, April 21, 2005
On a Leiter note: Mets & Pedro enjoy laugher
aloquacious leiter had to have been speechless and shellshocked after getting bombarded by the big mets machine tonight in miami. in short, leiter had zippo as he imploded and was torched 8 er in 3 painful innings. it was leiter at his worst, tossing 82 pitches, yielding 5 walks and 6 hits. the biggest blow was dougie mientkiewicz's grand salami in the 7 run 2nd inning.
on the flipside, the mets brand new real ace, pedro martinez was sterling once again. pedro cruised for 7 innings, giving up only 1 er on 3 hits, 0 walks and striking out 8. pedro is now 2-0 with a 2.17 era.
the sadass tablesetters did contribute tonight. jose reyes raised his avg/obp to .278 with a couple clutch hits, scoring a run and driving in 2. clearly, his aggressive hack-at-will plate aggression is better suited when he can come to the plate in possible rally situations, and not as a bases empty firestarter. kaz matsui reached safely 3 times, via hit, walk and hit by pitch. anyway you can, kaz, is appreciated.
carlos beltran has been in a mini-slump. he's striking out on a pretty horrific pace and the avg is starting to fall. he got off the snide with a 3 run dinger tonight that'll hopefully get him going. of course, having 2 regular outs batting in front of you doesn't help things, but that's no excuse for making it 3 regular outs in a row.
the good:
- the mets drew 9 walks tonight, only striking out 3 times
- mike dejean and heath bell each got a scoreless inning in. not clean innings, but why quibble?
- cliffy floyd dipped into the flaxseed elixir and pulled 2 stolen bases out of the miracle bag. now he only trails jose reyes by one.
- amazing vic diaz has suddenly transformed into the most patient player in the lineup. maybe hanging with wright and dougie at the bottom of the lineup is rubbing off good stuff. vic drew 3 more walks in the game. wright and dougie drew 2 each.
- in the fundamental hitting dept: beltran had a sac fly and pedro had a successful sac bunt.
the bad:
- not much, except pedro won't be starting the next four games.
the ugly:
- aloquacious leiter, but that's not our problem anymore.
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
Mets Flaccid The Night After
change your arm angle all you want, aaron. it ain't working.
guru peterson telling heilman he'll write recommendations for him for his graduate school applications. piazza says he'll write a couple, too.
worries of the mets blowing their wad last night against the phillies turned out legitimate. last night, they crushed a team record 7 homeruns in the williamsport, pennsylvania little league stadium. they returned to a major league park in miami tonight and could only scratch out 2 runs and 4 hits, falling to the marlins 9-2.
pitching-wise, it was the return match-up of "flowers for algernon" heilman and josh beckett. could heilman pull another one-hit wonder? c'mon, this isn't fairytale land. heilman returned back to the form we know so well -- as the sucky guy we dread rolling out there for the automatic loss. four innings, 11 hits and 7 er later, heilman returned to the clubhouse to continue studying for his graduate school entrance exams.
josh beckett rolled through 7 innings, allowing 2 er. the bullpen mopped it up, and that's was all she wrote.
pitching-wise, it was the return match-up of "flowers for algernon" heilman and josh beckett. could heilman pull another one-hit wonder? c'mon, this isn't fairytale land. heilman returned back to the form we know so well -- as the sucky guy we dread rolling out there for the automatic loss. four innings, 11 hits and 7 er later, heilman returned to the clubhouse to continue studying for his graduate school entrance exams.
josh beckett rolled through 7 innings, allowing 2 er. the bullpen mopped it up, and that's was all she wrote.
mets highlights:
- vic diaz went 1-3 with an rbi triple and run scored.
- david wright went 1-2 with a bb and run scored.
- roberto hernandez pitched out of trouble in a scoreless 8th, keeping his era at 0.00 through 6 innings.
- manny ay caramba and poopy pooper also notched scoreless innings for their tiny collections
mets woelights:
- jose reyes lowered his avg/obp to .269. reyes now has 0 bb/14 k in 15 games.
- kazu "o for 4" matsui got his "0 for 4"
- "flowers for algernon" heilman (see above)
- mike matthews inexplicably still remains in the major leagues
- mike matthews inexplicably remains a new york met
- mike matthews is still inexplicably seeing action for the mets
Tuesday, April 19, 2005
No smoking, just en fuego.
sweet jesus alou! a new pope was elected earlier today and in celebration, the mets may have performed a mini-miracle. the slumbering lumber woke up. the deadwood came to life like pinocchio. the mets busted out the whupping sticks in a 16-4 victory over philly.
this team that seemingly can only score against the opponent's bullpen from the 7th inning on, took a group pre-game drink from the flaxseed oil elixir punchbowl, and bombarded the phillies for 16 runs in the first 6 innings. in fact, the mets scored in every inning, first through sixth. jose reyes hit two solo jacks. vic diaz smacked two 2-run dingers. david wright hit a grand slam. mike piazza hit a solo bomb that's still going, and dougie mientkiewiez whacked a 2-run smack. that's a team record 7 homeruns.
the mets offense was in full attack. even victor zamboozled had a 2-run triple. and speaking of zamboozled, while the mets were kicking vicente padilla and gavin floyd like rented mules, zammy was controlling chaos. if the mets weren't making a mockery of the game, zamboozled's performance on the mound would be more in the spotlight. it wasn't good. the phillies got 4 runs in the first 3 innings, and zammy had to wiggle out of bases loaded jams in the 1st and 3rd to escape real serious damage.
other game notes:
this team that seemingly can only score against the opponent's bullpen from the 7th inning on, took a group pre-game drink from the flaxseed oil elixir punchbowl, and bombarded the phillies for 16 runs in the first 6 innings. in fact, the mets scored in every inning, first through sixth. jose reyes hit two solo jacks. vic diaz smacked two 2-run dingers. david wright hit a grand slam. mike piazza hit a solo bomb that's still going, and dougie mientkiewiez whacked a 2-run smack. that's a team record 7 homeruns.
the mets offense was in full attack. even victor zamboozled had a 2-run triple. and speaking of zamboozled, while the mets were kicking vicente padilla and gavin floyd like rented mules, zammy was controlling chaos. if the mets weren't making a mockery of the game, zamboozled's performance on the mound would be more in the spotlight. it wasn't good. the phillies got 4 runs in the first 3 innings, and zammy had to wiggle out of bases loaded jams in the 1st and 3rd to escape real serious damage.
other game notes:
- this new phillies stadium doesn't have the dimensions of the williamsport little league ballpark, but the ball jumps out of there just as fast.
- the mets struck out 9 times, but they drew an impressive 6 walks.
- victor diaz is making cammy look like wally pipp. diaz's glove is atrocious, but can the the mets really take his bat out of the lineup?
- speaking of wally pipp, felix heredia was placed on the 15 day DL with a banged up thumb. heath bell was called up and pitched a scoreless 9th inning tonight. can the mets really bring heredia back?
- coup d'etat and manny ay caramba each pitched a scoreless inning and have now pitched in every single game this year. ok, that's not true. but it seems like it.
- the mets are now 7-7. the entire nl east is within 1 game of each other.
Monday, April 18, 2005
Ishii ishiity as the Mets drop another
i'm not going to say the "pedro and four days of prayers" rotation looks to be kicking into full gear now, but there are signs to be concerned about.kaz "the girl with a twirl" ishii was very, very bad tonight. the plate was moving on him from the get-go, and the usual recipe for a mets loss was established:
1) the mets were buried immediately in the 1st inning (down a quick 2-0).
2) the opposing starter (randy wolf) kept the mets bats in slumber.
3) ishii burned through his pitches in 5 innings, giving up the requisite 5 earned runs (on 6 hits and 6 walks) before hitting the showers.
4) wolf pitched deep into the game, not letting the mets tee off against the phils bullpen until it was too late.
the phils tried to nail the coffin shut by letting wolf complete the 9th, but the comeback mets eventually did get to him to make it interesting. the big shot came once wolf was finally knocked out of the game. cliffy floyd decided to play tonight and hit a 3-run homer off todd worrell to get the mets within 1 run, 5-4. that's how it ended.
so where are we?
- the mets record fell to 6-7.
- jose reyes continues to show he is not a major league leadoff hitter. his obp is now down to .276. he is now walkless in 58 at bats.
- the entire team struck out 7 times vs. 0 walks tonight. the season's totals so far is 100 k's/35 bb's. the mets obp is .312. they are batting 34 points higher as a team than their opponents, but are getting on base at a lower clip. they have 18 more hits and 26 more total bases, but have scored 3 less runs.
- kaz matsui and mike piazza both went 2-4 to raise their averages a bit. cliffy leads the team in ribbies with 9. carlos beltran added one tonight to raise his season total to 8.
- felix heredia hurt his hand again and left the game.
Sunday, April 17, 2005
Tin Man Glavine = Stopper
call him tommy boy, the torch, or the tin man. he's also the stopper in the mets rotation. tommy has his eyes on 200 career losses. i don't know if he has enough time left, but he's certainly been doing his best to get there as a met. it was another vintage first inning disaster for tommy. he buried the mets early and this time, aj burnett wasn't going to let the mets crawl back out.
the florida marlins finally figured out how to beat the mets: never yank your starter. as has been the trend, the mets bats went to sleep against the starter. what differed in this game from the usual winning recipe was the mets never got to face the bullpen late in the game. burnett went the distance, downing the mets 5-2, only allowing 2 runs on 5 hits.
the mets offensive hero was victor diaz who hit a solo homer (1st of the year).
jose and kaz took 0'fers and are shaping up as the worst 1-2 tablesetters in baseball. blind kazuo is also getting a major case of the clanky glove that dogged him at SS last year. the guy just cannot field. being blind doesn't help matters, i guess. mikey sat out his usual sunday afternoon. not that his dead bat and sad defense was missed much. cliffy has gone from day-to-day to "let's just pretend i don't exist" mode. david wright is looking as if he's trying to replicate mike schmidt's 2nd year in the majors. i could go on and on. why am i such a wet blanket?
hey, the mets are boxcars. 6-6. that's awesome. they've had a great homestand. it's time to regroup, head out on the road and get another winning streak started.
the florida marlins finally figured out how to beat the mets: never yank your starter. as has been the trend, the mets bats went to sleep against the starter. what differed in this game from the usual winning recipe was the mets never got to face the bullpen late in the game. burnett went the distance, downing the mets 5-2, only allowing 2 runs on 5 hits.
the mets offensive hero was victor diaz who hit a solo homer (1st of the year).
jose and kaz took 0'fers and are shaping up as the worst 1-2 tablesetters in baseball. blind kazuo is also getting a major case of the clanky glove that dogged him at SS last year. the guy just cannot field. being blind doesn't help matters, i guess. mikey sat out his usual sunday afternoon. not that his dead bat and sad defense was missed much. cliffy has gone from day-to-day to "let's just pretend i don't exist" mode. david wright is looking as if he's trying to replicate mike schmidt's 2nd year in the majors. i could go on and on. why am i such a wet blanket?
hey, the mets are boxcars. 6-6. that's awesome. they've had a great homestand. it's time to regroup, head out on the road and get another winning streak started.
Breakup the Mets?
last weekend, i figured the mets would be in good shape if they hung tough and somehow battled back to .500 by the end of april. that would've been a good goal in light of the disasterous opening to the season. if they could just stop the bleeding, get everyone on the same page again, maintain the health of the everyday lineup... get back cammy, get back benson, get willie to master the double switch, get mikey some flaxseed oil elixir, start getting some wins under the belt, then perhaps everything would smooth out and the team could start anew around .500 in may.
things have gone a bit differently, as the mets have put the losing in the rearview mirror and reeled off a very impressive winning streak. they are now amazingly 6-5 and a crow's hop behind the top of the division.
they've had an amazing week, and the real incredible part of it is the team has been playing broken, so no need to break up what's already busted. the starting perma-damaged RFer hasn't played a game yet, and now our perma-damaged LFer has been out. our rotation is missing 2 starters. our perma-blind 2B has been out with a bad eye. the closer is poopy pooper. manny ay caramba pitches in every game. the leadoff hitter has a .300 obp with zero walks and is averaging 1 k/game. the cleanup hitting HOF catcher has degraded into the 2nd coming of junior ortiz offensively. the phenom young 3B stud has shown an amazing knack of killing potential rallies.
how's the team winning?
pitching. the starters have had a tremendous run from pedro to pedro. six effective starts in a row. as a team the past 7 days, the pitchers have a 1.77 era and .165 oba. they allowed 11 runs in 56 ip. toss out ay caramba and the #s get really mind boggling.
late clutch hitting. the team's not getting much done against the opponent's starters, but bring in the bullpen, and the mets bats wake up. they've scored 27 runs overall the past week, and 18 runs have come from the 7th inning on.
things have gone a bit differently, as the mets have put the losing in the rearview mirror and reeled off a very impressive winning streak. they are now amazingly 6-5 and a crow's hop behind the top of the division.
they've had an amazing week, and the real incredible part of it is the team has been playing broken, so no need to break up what's already busted. the starting perma-damaged RFer hasn't played a game yet, and now our perma-damaged LFer has been out. our rotation is missing 2 starters. our perma-blind 2B has been out with a bad eye. the closer is poopy pooper. manny ay caramba pitches in every game. the leadoff hitter has a .300 obp with zero walks and is averaging 1 k/game. the cleanup hitting HOF catcher has degraded into the 2nd coming of junior ortiz offensively. the phenom young 3B stud has shown an amazing knack of killing potential rallies.
how's the team winning?
pitching. the starters have had a tremendous run from pedro to pedro. six effective starts in a row. as a team the past 7 days, the pitchers have a 1.77 era and .165 oba. they allowed 11 runs in 56 ip. toss out ay caramba and the #s get really mind boggling.
late clutch hitting. the team's not getting much done against the opponent's starters, but bring in the bullpen, and the mets bats wake up. they've scored 27 runs overall the past week, and 18 runs have come from the 7th inning on.
