I’m disgruntled, not delusional. I understand that the Mets make shift lineup makes things difficult. I understand that there are pieces missing that are very important to the success of the team. What I don’t understand, is where the good baseball being played last week has disappeared to? The only difference between last week and this week, is the absence of Alex Cora.
Jerry Manuel said in a post game interview that the loss of Cora might be more difficult to deal with than the loss of Carlos Delgado. Cora was a guy you could plug into multiple positions and get a serviceable performance. He had also taken over a leadership role filling the void left by Delgado’s absence. All those things aside, he was also on fire at the plate, hitting .400 in 12 games in May with an OBP of .500. His quality at bats, and quality fill in role in the infield have been sorely missed.
The Mets dropped their 3rd straight in the night cap last night, making another night of straining to stay awake to watch the game disappointing. John Maine pitched a strong 5 innings only to have the wheels come off in the 6th with the Mets up 3-2. Maine got Russel Martin swinging to start the inning before giving up consecutive singles to James Loney and Matt Kemp. Casey Blake gave the Dodgers the lead with one swing of the bat blasting a 3-run home run over the left field fence on a hanging slider that looked like a pitch I could have hit out of the park. To add insult to injury, Chad Billingsly, the opposing pitcher, came up next and singled to right on the last pitch of Maine’s night. Ken Takahashi took over for Maine and after giving up the 5th consecutive hit of the inning, a single to Juan Pierre, Takahashi got Rafael Furcal to ground into an inning ending double play.
The Mets offense could only muster up 6 hits and 3 runs last night, 2 coming on a John Maine single in the 2nd inning and the last coming on a David Wright single in the 3rd. The early offense had me believing the Mets were en route to a big victory, picking up where they left off offensively scoring early and often. Unfortunately thy reverted back to their old ways, not scoring any runs after the 3rd inning. The good news is they only made 1 error on the night, a dropped line drive by hopefully starting at 1B for a few days, Daniel Murphy.
Matt Cerone at Metsblog.com summed it up best
Murphy may or may not be a better defensive first baseman than Reed. Who knows? What I do know is that Reed is significantly better than Murphy on defense in left field. So, by putting Reed at first and Murphy in left, Manuel is weakening his defense in two spots. Whereas Murphy at first, and either Reed or Angel Pagan in left, he’s only weakening his defense in one spot, while keeping Murphy’s bat and attitude in the lineup.
I know Jerry Manuel loves to shuffle his lineup, keeping his bench players fresh, but there needs to be some stability on this team. I understand that platooning due to injury may be necessary, but he’s doing too much.
If Murphy is capable of playing 1B, let him play. The plan was for him to be a starter this year, and the lack of playing time is effecting his hitting. Let Sheffield play LF if you think you need a big home run threat in the lineup (the Mets have not hit a HR in a week). Let him play every day until he needs a day off. Ryan Church has shown signs that he can be one of the better hitters on the team. These mental mistakes and struggles at the plate may be caused by him not playing every day as he did at the beginning of the season, and last year before his injuries. Jeremy Reed and Fernando Tatis are bench guys, let them come off the bench. If someone needs a day off, you can plug either of them into first, left, or right. Angel Pagan adds an interesting wrinkle to the mix since he’s been successful at the plate so far, but there’s really no room for him on this team right now unless he replaces Reed or Tatis. Ramon Martinez needs to go. He’s old, he can’t hit, and he clearly can’t play SS if Reyes’ calf starts to become a recurring problem. Why not bring back Argenis Reyes? He is a liability at the plate, but seemed to have very good chemestry with childhood friend Jose Reyes in the middle of the infield, and can play either position.
Anyway…
Losing streaks tend to leave a lot of room for complaining. Hopefully the Mets can take one away tonight and get some much needed rest tomorrow before the start of the series Friday at Fenway.
