Disgruntled Mets Fan

Dear Johan,

We need you tonight.  We know you’re pitching against a dangerous line up in Milwaukee.  We know that you haven’t been your Ace-self in the last few starts.  We know you’re not going to get anything resembling run support.  We know the team will probably make an error or two behind you.  You know it too.  Here’s the thing Johan, we still need you to win tonight.

You are the stopper.  You are the one that puts an end to a four game skid, and gets the team back to .500 so we can again say we have a better record than teams like the Reds.  It’s embarrassing to the organization and the fans to have a record below .500 in the worst division in baseball.  That’s right, the worst.  The Phillies have the worst record of any first place team, and the Nationals have the worst record period.  Please help the team get back on track.

While you’re at it, give Jose a deep tissue massage in his hamstring, put a bandaid on Carlos’s knee, and check to make sure David is putting the right contact lenses in.

Always,
Disgruntled Mets fan.

Carlos Beltran is seeing a specialist in Colorado today to reevaluate his knee injury.  The Internet is abuzz with talks of season ending/career threatening micro-fracture surgery.  Beltran’s knees have given him a good amount of discomfort for as long as I can remember.  Is it a ridiculous idea to explore something like surgery in the off season?  Why wait until things have gotten so bad?

John Maine has pitched well at times, but is on the DL with what is being called arm fatigue.  He missed his last scheduled rehab start, still suffering with some inflammation in his shoulder.  He’s not ready.  Why was the decision made to make rehab starts when his shoulder is obviously still fatigued?  Now he’s dealing with a setback that will make his return before the All Star Break an impossibility.

Jose Reyes sat for a weeks worth of games with what was originally being called tendinitis in his calf.  Now he’s on the DL for an undetermined amount of time with a tear in his hamstring.  It’s not even the same body part!  How did that happen?

Oliver Perez has a bad knee?  I can’t say I believed that one from the beginning.  Oliver has a fat wallet and a knuckle head and he’s mailed it in.  Screw you Ollie.

JJ Putz’s elbow was something anyone watching the games could see coming.  A hard throwing pitcher with a bad elbow can get ineffective pretty quickly.  Why wait so long before surgery?  He had already lost his job to then overachieving Bobby Parnell due to ineffectiveness.  Something was obviously wrong.

Now it’s easy for me to say all these things in hindsight, but I’m not a medical professional.  I’m just an observer.  I can’t remember watching a season where this many people got hurt, but more importantly were mis-diagnosed.  Can Omar trade Ray Ramirez?  The Mets look like they’re short on sunflower seeds.  Maybe Ray for some seeds and a few AAA batteries?  Anyone interested?

In honor of Ramirez’s stellar performance so far this season, I’m offering this quality t-shirt.

You’re losing the fans Omar.  The “Let’s Go Yankees” chants rang loudly throughout Citi Field last night.  A team that gets outscored 33-3 in a series against a hated cross town rival in what can only be classified as an embarrassment, and the fans start to feel it.  The text messages from all the Yankee fans clogging up my phone, the lost bets.  It all went wrong.  The icing on the cake, was Frankie Rodriguez walking Mariano Rivera with the bases loaded.

The Mets are now a .500 team.  They certainly looked the part over the weekend.  Instead of complaining about the Mets not being able to get a timely hit, or a hit with runners in scoring position, we can complain about them not being able to get a hit period.  The double plays are getting ridiculous.  The mental errors, although made by players playing out of position (see Daniel Murphy), are getting more frequent.  What is this team supposed to do?  The Phillies won’t keep losing the way they have been.  Why?  because the Phillies are too good to lose at that rate.  They were kind enough to keep us in it so far, but unless the Mets start winning games, they’re going to find themselves way out without the time needed to catch up.

I was dejected sitting at the stadium yesterday, just like I was dejected watching the game with a bunch of Yankee fans on Friday night, and listening to the game on the radio Saturday night.  These were all ugly losses, all games where you never really felt the Mets had a chance at winning.  To the Yankees credit, they took advantage of every Mets mistake.  Their starting pitching was impressive.  They were able to go deep in all three starts.  Getting to the Yankee bullpen early is the key to beating them, and the Mets batters couldn’t make it happen.  They looked over matched at the plate no matter who was pitching.

Frankly, I’m a little tired of this team right now.  I need an infusion of life just as much as the line up does.  Does it mean it’s time to sell the farm and pick up someone new?  No.  Bobby Parnell folks, is not the farm.  He’s in the Stokes house right now, not getting into a crucial situation.  It seems that Jerry has lost faith in him, and with good reason.  Parnell can’t seem to get anyone out anymore.  While he still has some value, trade him away for a bat.  We need a bat in a bad way.  It’s depressing watching this line up.  I’m not talking about some utility player to fill a hole.  I’m talking about a clean up hitter.  I’m talking about Adam Dunn.  Let’s get someone that’s going to hit some no doubt home runs.  Let’s name the bridge after him since he’ll be hitting it a few times a season.  I WANT ADAM DUNN NOW!  Go get him Omar.

The Mets finished off the Cardinals yesterday afternoon to take three out of four for the series against a team that may well be their biggest competition come September if the Mets find themselves chasing the Wild Card spot.  The Wild Card seems like a back up plan right now, as the Mets are only a half a game out of first place behind the ever slumping Phillies.  The Mets used a combination of effective pitching and timely hitting in the series, something they had been lacking of late.

Nick Evans has done a tremendous job in his two starts since being called up.  He’s 3-6 with two runs scored, a homer, and four RBI.  Jerry Manuel seems sold on Evans, saying he’ll continue to play if he continues to hit.  That’s good news for everyone.  I always liked Evans last season.  He can play the outfield well, and will probably end up in the platoon of players playing every position out there.  He can also fill in at first base when needed.  A utility guy like Evans is a great thing to have when your team members are dropping like flies around you.

Johan Santana picked up his ninth win of the season in an effort that I’d call shaky at times.  The thing that separates Santana from a “regular pitcher” is the fact that when he’s shaky at times, he still gives you a shot to win.  He threw seven innings when at times it didn’t seem like he’d get through five.  He is an ace in every sense of the word.  It looked like the team was off to the usual type of performance they put in behind Johan, as they gave up an unearned run in the first inning, and were held hitless through three, but they turned things around in the fourth scoring all three of their runs to build a lead that they would hold for the rest of the game.

Pedro Feliciano came in to pitch the eighth.  He gave up one hit, a leadoff single, but retired the side in order after that.  Frankie Rodriguez picked up his twentieth save of the year, again walking the tight rope as he seems to do a lot.  He retired the first two batters in order, but gave up back to back walks to Albert Pujols and Ryan Ludwick on eight pitches to put the tying run on second base.  Yadier Molina came up to the plate, much to the chagrin of Mets fans everywhere, but he lined out harmlessly to left field to end the game.

Now that the Mets are done with the Cardinals, it’s time for the Yankees.  I was hoping John Maine would come back this week, and the Mets could plug him in for yesterday’s start, leaving Johan to face off against CC Sabathia in the opener tonight.  Unfortunately things didn’t work out, but I like the way Mike Pelfrey has been pitching lately, so we should see a great game tonight.

I hope things work out so Brian Bruney for some reason needs to take an at bat during the series.  I’d love to see a fastball send a clear cut message to that moustached jackass.  It probably won’t happen, but it would be fun to see.

My prediction for the series,
The Mets take two out of three to split the season series the same way they always do.  What do you think will happen?

The Mets line up last night may have been the worst, on paper, of the season.  That make shift line up produced eleven runs on sixteen hits in the Mets best offensive performance of the season so far.  The win put the Mets in line to win their first series in a while as Johan Santana tries to out-ACE Chris Carpenter in the finale this afternoon.

The night belonged to Fernando Nieve.  He was great again, solidifying his place in the rotation throwing six scoreless innings on a night where he didn’t have his best stuff.  Jerry Manuel said after the game that Nieve’s ball seems to jump on the hitters, and that he can’t take him out of the rotation when he’s throwing so well.  I think that’s good news for Mets fans everywhere, although I don’t think Nieve can keep up these types of performances all season.  He’s sure to fall back down to earth at some point.  Hopefully John Maine and Oliver Perez will be ready to fill in when that happens.

David Wright continued his mind boggling season last night, going 4-4 without driving in any runs.  Fernando Tatis grounded into another inning ending/rally killing double play in his first at bat, but was able to finally hit a few balls to the outfield, picking up two hits and three RBI on the night.  Ryan Church, hitting clean up for the first time this season, responded with three hits and two RBI.  Nick Evans, making his first start of the season after battling through an awful spring, hit a two run home run over the left field wall.  Even Argenis Reyes, in his first appearance with the team this season, legged out an infield hit.

The Cardinals were uncharacteristically ugly last night, making two errors in the seventh inning to allow the Mets to put the game out of reach.  Tony Larussa can’t be happy watching his team make blunders, and it didn’t seem like he was as the camera repeatedly cut to him in the inning.  Their offense was held in check by the Mets pitching staff, as they only picked up four hits on the night.

This series has shown the Mets weaknesses, as well as their potential playing with a line up made up like this one.  They can string together hits, and score a lot of runs, but they lack the instant offense provided by a few power hitters in the middle of the line up.  David Wright’s lack of power is not something I’m going to complain about.  He’s become the hitter I’ve always wanted him to be, except for the strike outs of course.  I used to complain incessantly about him seeming to swing for the fences every at bat, saying I wished he’d settle for singles and doubles while hitting the ball to all fields.  Well he’s doing it now, and I love it.

The Mets are back to a game and a half behind as the Phillies fell to the Rays last night.  I think we should all be grateful the Mets aren’t a lot farther back right now.  They played a stinker stretch of baseball but the Phillies played just a little worse.  Hopefully the team can make up some more ground tonight.

Let’s Go Mets!

Fernando Tatis has grounded into nine double plays so far this season in 147 plate appearances; two more than he had all of last year in over 300.  Having spent the last two nights at Citi Field watching him hit clean up while repeatedly grounding the ball softly to the right side of the infield was frustrating.  Three of those ground balls were for double plays.  Just the type of production you’d like to see from your number four hitter.

I didn’t understand at the beginning of each game why Tatis was hitting clean up to begin with.  He’s obviously in a horrid slump, and the the Cardinals have started a right handed pitcher for the last two games.  Plus putting Tatis behind the red hot David Wright means Wright will get nothing to hit in his at bats.  It’s shown as he has a few walks and a hit by pitch in the last two games.  Why not let Wright hit behind Tatis?  It would force the opposing pitcher to give Tatis some good pitches to hit, which he clearly isn’t seeing these days.  I think it’s also time for Gary Sheffield to get a few starts in a row.  The lack of a real threat behind David Wright is getting glaring, and may lead to him cooling off.

Another topic that came up yesterday that I forgot to address was the Mets horrific third base coach, Razor Shines.  On Monday night, Shines sent two runners home that should have been out by ten feet except for a bad throw and what seemed to be a bad call by the home plate ump.  It’s not the first time Shines has had someone thrown out at third or home this year.  It’s happened a lot.  I understand there are certain situations where you should take a chance by sending a runner home; with two outs in an inning, with your pitcher coming up next, but both times on Monday night did not fit those categories.  Is there any way to get Razor put on the DL?  Maybe HoJo could fill in for him temporarily?  Unfortunately, having a really cool name does nothing for your third base coaching skills.

Last night’s game was awful, except for the fact that it was over quickly, even with the short rain delay.  Possibly some of the loudest cheers of the night came for the grounds crew.  They had some serious issues getting the tarp down, having it dragged all the way across the infield except for the most important part, home plate.  The crew struggled for a few minutes as the rain poured down, finally deciding to pull it all the way back out to the outfield wall to do it over.  The best part of the affair was that by the time they were done, it really wasn’t raining anymore.

Fernando Nieve tries to catch lightning in a bottle again tonight as he goes after his third win in as many tries.  Nieve has been a pleasant surprise for the Mets in his fill in role for John Maine, but Maine is due back soon, so this may be Nieve’s last start for a while with the team.

Let’s Go Mets