Month: May 2016

Series Preview: Chase Utley; Blood or Mercy?

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Blood or Mercy?: This is a series Mets fans have been waiting for since Chase Utley did his best scumbag impression in the NLDS. The fans have not forgotten. The masses want blood. They are screaming for it like the Roman citizens at the Coliseum. Kill! Kill! Kill! The unwritten rules of the game tell us that Chase Utley is going to get a baseball thrown at his back, his butt, his arm or his leg. The rules set by our baseball forefathers say he must be rocked in the fleshy part of his body. That is the price for his sin. Will we see it? I do not know. On the record, Terry will say that nothing is going to happen. But can he control his pitching staff? Can he control Noah Syndergaard? Thor has already shown us that he can be a wildcard. His World Series opening pitch head hunting move undoubtedly put the league on notice. So what will it be? Blood or mercy?

My vote is for mercy. I hate to give the Royals credit, but they had it right. We won the war when we beat the Dodgers in the NLDS. From my perspective the slate has been wiped clean, and this season is a whole new war. Also, if I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a thousand times, injury can derail our season. One bad hit by pitch, and we could be completely screwed. If we start a bean ball war, the next thing you know Yoenis Cespedes could take a ball off the hand or Curtis Granderson could take one off the wrist. No. We simply cannot risk it. We won the series, the rules have been changed, and Utley is a grey beard potentially in his final season. He’s not worth wasting any more thought or energy on. I just hope that Thor and the other Mets pitchers agree.

Pitching Matchups:

Game 1: Steven Matz vs. Scott Kazmir

Scott Kazmir is off to a rough start. He’s 2-2 with a 5.68 ERA. He’s only gone 6+ innings in 3 of his 6 starts. He’s given up 4+ runs in 4 of his 6 starts. His last start against Tampa Bay he went 6.2 innings with 9 Ks despite giving up 4 runs. Asdrubal Cabrera is 2 for 17 against Kazmir, Yoenis Cespedes is 0 for 6, Lucas Duda is 1 for 5, Curtis Granderson is 3 for 11 with a home run, Rene Rivera is 2 for 7, David Wright is 2 for 5, and Alejandro De Aza is 3 for 5. Matz’s second career start was in LA last July, and he went 6 shutout innings with 8 strikeouts. In the playoffs last year, Matz took the loss in Game 4 of the NLDS going 5 innings and giving up 3 runs.

Game 2: Jacob deGrom vs. Alex Wood

Alex Wood is also off to a terrible start. He’s 1-3 with a 5.18 ERA. We crushed him in relief in the NLDS. Asdrubal Cabrera is 2 for 3 against Wood, Wilmer Flores is 3 for 10 with a home run, Lucas Duda is 2 for 10, Curtis Granderson is 1 for 8 with a home run, Neil Walker is 2 for 7, and David Wright is 3 for 7. Last July, Jacob deGrom shut out the Dodgers in New York over 7.2 innings with 8 Ks. And he beat them twice in the NLDS. God he was amazing in the NLDS.

Game 3: Noah Syndergaard vs. Kenta Maeda

Kenta Maeda has come over from Japan and been absolutely dominant. He’s 3-1 with a 1.66 ERA. He’s striking out people left and right. He went 6 innings, gave up 2 runs, and had 7 Ks against the Blue Jays last time out. Thor tossed a quality start in LA last regular season. And he took the loss in the Utley slide game in LA despite his 6.1 innings pitched, 3 runs, and 9 strikeouts. His dominant relief inning in game 5 was legendary. It should be an exciting matchup between Thor and Maeda.

Game 4: Bartolo Colon vs. Clayton Kershaw

Kershaw is just doing his Cy Young thing again. He’s 4-1 with a 2.04 ERA. He’s striking out everyone and walking nobody. I’m not exaggerating by the way. He has 64 strikeouts and 3 walks through 53 innings pitched. Yeah he’s pretty good. Wilmer Flores is 3 for 6 against Kershaw. The rest of the Mets have had very little success. David Wright is 3 for 14 and Lucas Duda and Grandy are a combined 2 for 20. In July at Citi Field, Bartolo dominated the Dodgers over 8 innings surrendering only one run. He was pitching when dirt bag Utley slid his way into the history books. He also had some big relief innings in Games 3 and 4 of the NLDS.

Things To Look For:

Walk Him Yo: Cespedes is tops in the NL in RBIs with 30 and tops in slugging percentage at .701. Yesterday, the Cubs swept the Nationals, and they walked Bryce Harper 6 times. After the game Tanner Roark accused the Cubs of playing “scared baseball”. I really hope that’s what Dusty Baker is teaching the Nats. To foolishly give a team’s best hitter pitches to mash. Obviously the Cubs strategy is a no brainer, and I applaud the Cubs for using it. I have to believe at some point NL teams will try and adopt this strategy with Yo right? I’m not trying to say that Yoenis Cespedes is as tough an out as Bryce Harper, but he’s the guy in our lineup that can burn you. And he’s burning everybody lately. I do think our lineup is deeper than Washington’s so it may be more challenging to employ such a strategy with Yo. But at some point teams may put him on base and choose to challenge the Streakmaster General Lucas Duda.

Cold Front Coming In: Speaking of Mr. Streak, Lucas Duda is hitting .200 in his last seven games, but he does have 3 home runs. Curtis Granderson is on a real cold streak right now with a .107 average in his last seven games. Wilmer Flores continues his season of ice going 0 for 5 yesterday and he’s hitting .159 on the season.

Lefty Love: The Mets will face three left-handed pitchers in this series (Kazmir, Wood, Kershaw). We have not had much success against lefties so far this season. Fingers crossed that we turn that around against LA. 

Home Sweet Home?: The Dodgers are 5-8 at home this season? Maybe it’s a sample size thing, but if they are struggling at home for some actual reason I hope we exploit it.

Dodger Ranks: The Dodgers are in first place in the NL West, so they have been successful to start the season. But they are 13th in runs scored, 22nd in OPS, and 29th in home runs. They are 10th in ERA, 19th in bullpen ERA (4.16), and their run differential is +12 which is good for 10th in baseball. The robot computers knew the Cubs were going to be elite this season, but they also felt the Dodgers were going to be very successful. The robots liked the team Andrew Friedman assembled. So far they’ve done fine in the wins/losses department, but the offense has underwhelmed to date.

Hot Dodgers: Chase Utley leads the team with a .298 batting average. We may need to wait to see him until we throw our right-handers. Adrian Gonzalez is hitting .278 but only has 3 home runs to start the season. Joc Pederson is hitting .275 and leads the team with 6 home runs. Rookie Corey Seager is hitting .266 to start the season. Yasiel Puig got off to a hot start but has fizzled lately and his average is at .243.

Today: This series kicks off tonight at 10:10 eastern time. Honestly this west coast trip is killing me like they always do. I was up until 1:30 last night because my body is in west coast baseball mode. It’s going to be a rough week, but let’s hope some wins negate the lost sleep. 

Here’s Harvey: Mets Take Finale and Split In San Diego

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Final Score: Mets 4, Padres 3

This was not a pretty win. This was not a pretty series at all. The Mets had chances to score runs in the first inning, fifth inning, and eighth inning but failed to capitalize due to rally killing double plays off the bats of Yoenis Cespedes, Wilmer Flores, and Curtis Granderson. They had twelve hits and left eleven men on base including two in the ninth inning. A good team probably beats us in this game. Thank goodness we were playing the Padres.

All that being said, the Mets were able to get a rally going in the second inning due to some unlikely heroes. Kevin Plawecki hit a two out double and Eric Campbell drove him in with a single. Then Matt Harvey singled, Curtis Granderson walked, and Asdrubal drove in Harvey to make it 2-0. Yoenis Cespedes hit a solo shot in the third inning to make it 3-0. In the 6th inning, Harvey hit a one out double and with two outs Asdrubal drove in Harvey to give the Mets their fourth run.

Saved By The Bastard: In the 8th inning, with the score 4-3, Jerry Blevins and Addison Reed nearly blew the lead. Jerry gave up a leadoff single to Jon Jay. Then Addison Reed came in and gave up singles to Wil Myers and Matt Kemp. Terry then brought in Antonio Bastardo with the bases loaded and no outs. And The Bastard of Citi struck out Derek Norris, got an infield pop up from Melvin Upton Jr., and then struck out Alexei Ramirez. Bastardo saved the Mets asses today. Period. He threw all fastballs and managed to overpower the Padres in every way. It was a huge moment from Antonio in the early part of this season.

Fire Is Back: Matt Harvey only made a few bad pitches today. The most notable bad pitch was the one to Christian Bethancourt that resulted in a two run home run in the fifth inning. Other than that he really pitched a promising game. His velocity was back at 96-97 MPH. He had 10 strikeouts and gave up only 4 hits in 6 innings.

Lucky Break: In the fifth inning, after Harvey gave up the two run home run, he actually got a really lucky break. He struck out pitcher Andrew Cashner with two outs, but Plawecki couldn’t stop the ball and Cashner got to first base. It was ruled a wild pitch. Anyway Harvey proceeded to give up a double to Jon Jay (who killed us all series). Cashner was sent home and the play at the plate was ruled an out. Cashner was without a doubt safe but on replay review they upheld the bad call. Harvey lucked out, but the real embarrassment here is the umpiring crew. I really don’t understand how they get these calls wrong. I genuinely don’t get it. If the fans can all see the right call on replay, then how the hell do the mooks at headquarters continue to blow it? And what makes it even worse is that Gary Cohen, Ron Darling and the Mets booth consistently embarrass themselves. I love the Mets booth. I really do. But every time they speak out against replay they sound like absolute morons. They ripped into replay multiple times during this game. They talked about how it’s unnecessary and how it takes the fun out of the game. Shut up!!!!!!! Shut the hell up. Replay is a necessity. Hire robot umpires!! Get the calls right. But most of all stop calling for the league to go backwards and eliminate replay. Who wants to live in a world where we watch games and live with bad calls? That’s insanity.

Broadway Yo: Cespedes hit another home run. God he is so elite. We should sign more superstars. This Cespedes experience should eliminate any hesitation to give out big contracts ever again.

Asdrubal Is So Good: Speaking of great contracts, Asdrubal had two more hits and two more RBIs today. He’s such a professional at the plate, in the field, and in the clubhouse.

Errors and Balks: We made a bunch of awful plays in this game. Wilmer let a ball eat him up at second base in the late innings and almost blew a couple throws to Lucas Duda at first base. He was lucky none of these blunders resulted in errors. Jim Henderson also balked in a run. Again, he’s lucky that it didn’t cost us the game but please clean it the hell up.

Injury Night Terrors: Neil Walker fouled a ball off his shin yesterday. Asdrubal Cabrera fouled a ball off his foot in this game. Lucas Duda was hit by a pitch on his hamstring. We have been really lucky so far. But I’m worried about our depth. Wilmer Flores has not inspired any confidence this season (he went 0 for 5 in this game). Eric Campbell deserves a pat on the back today for his 2 hits, his RBI, and his great play to end the game. But he’s Eric “Soup” Campbell. I do not like the idea of seeing him for any stretch whatsoever.

The Sex Heard Round the World: I’m still not over the Bartolo Colon home run. A split against San Diego is not ideal, but a split where Bartolo hit a home run and Harvey had a dominant quality start ain’t so bad when it’s all said and done.

Tomorrow: The Cubs swept the Nationals. Jesus Christ the Cubs are good. But that means first place for the Mets! Hooray! Now we have a four game set in Dodgertown starting tomorrow. Steven Matz vs. Scott Kazmir. Mets young lefty stud vs. former young Mets lefty stud. Also Utleygate finally comes to a head. Do we show him mercy or do we draw blood? Series preview coming soon.

Tolo Home Run: The Sexiest Moment In Baseball History

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Final Score: Mets 6, Padres 3

Bartolo Colon hit a two run home run. The stadium, the players, the announcers and every person on earth completely lost their minds when the bat touched the ball. As Gary Cohen said, “the impossible has happened”. In the end, those two runs represented the game winning runs. If the Mets needed a west coast B12 shot this had to be it. Obviously I’ve watched the replay a million times. I watched it with my girlfriend. I watched it with my friends. I’m going to gather around the TV today and watch it with my mother and my family. That’s what Bartolo and his sexiness is all about. It’s about bringing families together.

There’s Only One Thing Sexier: I honestly think this is going to be the regular season highlight in the sport. I can’t imagine it being topped. It’s the 2016 highlight reel leadoff hitter. The only thing sexier now? Colon getting a World Series W, leaping on a dog pile of Mets as they celebrate a championship, and hopefully not killing them.

Dinger Percentage Confirmed: I said a week or so ago that the Mets had to have one of the top three percentages of runs scored via the home run. Well it’s officially confirmed that we have the highest percentage of runs scored via the home run in the league. 55% of our runs come from home runs. And that was before last night’s game. We scored all six runs via the home run. Yoenis Cespedes hit a two run shot in the first inning. Big Sexy hit his two run blast in the second inning. And in the 9th inning, David Wright and Michael Conforto hit solo shots to make it 6-3.

Next Question: James Shields was so embarrassed about giving up the Bartolo home run that he didn’t want to answer questions about it postgame. That’s okay. He’ll have plenty of time to answer questions about it for the rest of his natural born life.

D’Arnaud Dunzo: Lost in the happiness of last night’s game was that Travis d’Arnaud decided to try tossing a baseball yesterday and immediately re-injured his shoulder. Umm we seriously need to consider him dunzo. Maybe give him another two weeks to see if the Krazy Glue they put in his rotator cuff will dry, but honestly we better start drawing up the contingency plan. Sandy needs to start getting a feel for the trade market ASAP.

Today: I can’t believe it’s hard to look forward to #HarveyDay now. It’s not even just that he stinks so far this year. I also stained my Matt Harvey T-shirt. The laundromat spilled a little bleach on it, and now it’s got pink spots. Harvey needs to win this game today. We need to split this series. A Bartolo home run and Harvey quality start could make this one of the best splits we’ve had in years. But if Harvey lays another egg, he’ll wipe the smile off my face real quick.

Mets Can’t Score and Lose; Teufel Makes Bonehead Decision

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Final Score: Padres 2, Mets 0

There’s not much to recap in this game. Once again the Mets couldn’t score. Screw the west coast. Every single time the Mets head out there, the team plays like crap.

Thor-cap: Noah Syndergaard looked fine again last night. When your starter pitches 6 innings and gives up 2 runs, it’s a must win game. Period. In the bottom of the first inning, Jon Jay doubled, advanced on a groundout, and then scored on a Matt Kemp sac fly. In the bottom of the 5th, Jemile Weeks walked, stole, and scored on a Jon Jay single. That was it. Two runs was all the Padres needed to beat our lifeless lineup.

Holding Runners On: Thor made an effort to hold runners on base in this game. But once again he got burned. The Jemile Weeks stolen base literally led to a run. I’d like to complain about that, but again we didn’t score a damn thing. He should keep working on things I suppose.

All Fastballs: I didn’t love the game Rene Rivera called with Thor. I felt he threw a lot of hittable two strike fastballs. Yeah I know he throws 100 MPH but nobody should be throwing hittable 0-2 and 1-2 fastballs. Rivera seemed to mix up the calls a little better later in the game.

Lords of the Flies: The Mets only had three hits in this damn game. But they had opportunities with men on base, and they had a bunch of hard hit fly balls. Once again the Padres were either perfectly positioned or hustled to make all the plays. They had a leadoff walk by Curtis Granderson in the first inning. Nothing to show for it. Leadoff walk by Rene Rivera in the third inning. Nothing to show for it. In the top of the 4th, Yoenis Cespedes drew a one out walk. Asdrubal Cabrera then singled with 2 outs to get Yo to third base, and Wilmer Flores couldn’t do anything with runners at the corners.

The Controversial Play: In the top of the 7th with one out, Asdrubal Cabrera roped his second hit and the Mets second hit of the game. Then Wilmer Flores hit a double down the line, and Tim Teufel sent Cabrera home. He was out by a goddamn mile. Let’s just get right into it. Terrible terrible terrible call. You don’t hand teams outs on a silver goddamn platter. Never. People were saying that the Padres catcher Derek Norris lost the ball on the exchange, and therefore Asdrubal Cabrera should have been safe. First of all, Cabrera didn’t even bother to touch home plate. You have to finish the play. Replay exists. Adjust and finish the freaking plays. That being said, I saw the replay and he was out. Even if he touched home plate, Norris tagged him and held the ball long enough. Let it go. This was a mistake by Teufel. I’ll give him a pass because he’s actually been a great third base coach for us. You know how I know? Because I’m never complaining about him. He sent Cabrera because the team hadn’t scored at all, and he tried to get something going. He was hoping the Padres would make a mistake. He knew Rene Rivera was up next and sucks. But you don’t give away outs. You don’t try and force teams to make mistakes unless they have a history of doing so. And we had Michael Conforto on the damn bench. You pinch hit Conforto for Rivera, you bring Plawecki in the game, and you cross your fingers with Soup as the emergency backup. Whatever. It’s over and we couldn’t score at all last night anyway.

Bunting Coach: Can we hire a goddamn bunting coach? We hear about Kevin Long and his voodoo hitting magic all the time. But it feels like our pitchers haven’t been able to bunt for a decade. Noah Syndergaard failed to bunt Rene Rivera over in the third inning of this game. It was pathetic. Matt Harvey failed recently too. Practice! Hire a specialist! Figure it out!

Blood of the Raptor: So I just watched Jurassic World. Yeah I’m a little late to the party, I know. Anyway I thought it was great. Super entertaining. But as I watched I kind of realized that in addition to Chris Bosh, I think Melvin Upton Jr. and Alexei Ramirez have the blood of the raptor. Something about their faces are raptor-esque. It’s possible they’ve all been created in a lab by B.D.Wong.


Today: Bartolo Colon goes in tonight’s game. The Cubs are beating the Nats and we can’t take advantage. Jesus Christ let’s try and split this series.

Shifty Padres Take Series Opener From Sleepy Mets

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Final Score: Padres 5, Mets 3

The story of last night was Colin Rea absolutely dominating a Mets lineup that just travelled across the country. Rea took a no hitter into the 7th and pitched into the 9th. Prior to the 9th inning, the Mets squared up on some balls, but they were laced right at Padres who were perfectly positioned due to defensive shifts. Luckily Yoenis Cespedes took advantage of the shift in the 7th inning by hitting a ball in a newly created hole at second base and broke up the no hit bid. The Padres also made some stellar plays in this game including Jon Jay robbing Curtis Granderson of an extra base hit early on. There’s nothing you can do but tip your cap to the pitcher and hope some solid hotel shut eye gets the Mets ready for tonight.

Make Baseball Fun Again: The Padres (like all teams at this point) used defensive shifts a bunch last night. I completely forgot that a few weeks ago Joe Girardi came out and said if he was the Commissioner he would fully ban defensive shifts. What an idiot. I can’t believe there are people in all facets of life that just take the “no change” stance.  When I saw Donald Trump’s “I love Hispanics” Facebook post yesterday, I imagined Goose Gossage shamelessly pandering to the “Make Baseball Fun Again” contingent by tweeting out of a photo of himself playing wiffle ball in his front yard with a bunch of Spanish guys flipping their bats after every home run. “There’s nothing like playing some ball with my best friends Pedro and Juan. They do the best home run celebrations. I love Mexican bat flips!”

Our Studs Weren’t Studly: Jacob deGrom was bleh tonight. His velocity sat at 93 MPH again. Harvey has been bleh. These guys are not performing at the level we’ve grown accustomed to seeing. Forget jet lag, this is obvious playoff lag. 

In the bottom of the first inning Wil Myers hit a solo dinger. In the bottom of the second, deGrom gave up an RBI single to Colin Rea the damn pitcher. In the bottom of the third, Alexei Ramirez hit a little BS dunker down the leftfield line with two men on base and it scored a run. Luckily moron Melvin Upton Jr. got caught in between 3rd base and home and Jacob deGrom got out of the jam with the score 3-0.

Terry pulled deGrom after 5 innings which I was fine with because overall he looked pretty crappy. He gave up 3 runs on 8 hits. Anyway, Logan Verrett came into the game and promptly had his first crummy appearance of the year. He gave up 2 runs in the 6th and every ball the Padres hit off of him was seemingly rocked. Wil Myers and Matt Kemp both crushed long fly outs that just stayed in play.

Two Dingers: Curtis Granderson got Rea out of the game in the 9th inning with a solo home run. Then David Wright walked and with one out Yoenis Cespedes launched a two run jack. But ultimately the power show was too little too late. Two home runs? Pathetic for team ding dong.

Rodney To The Rescue: In the 9th after the Grandy solo blast, the Padres pulled Rea. After the Cespedes home run, the Padres went to their closer Fernando Rodney who was able to finish the Mets off. I kind of forgot that he was still hanging around in the league at 39. I always lumped Rodney in that group of closers that love to dance and celebrate every save. So it reminded me of when the Mets brought in the super eccentric Jose Valverde a couple years ago for like a month. He really sucked.

Cubs Beat Nats: The Cubs took the opener of their series against the Nationals. I can’t believe the super computers were right and the Cubs are going to win like 100 billion games.

Today: The Mets play the Padres late again tonight. Hopefully Noah Syndergaard can right the ship in this west coast road trip kickoff mulligan.

Series Preview: Friars Honoring Their Vow To Silently Suck

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The Accidental Tank: I ranted about this in my NL West season preview, but let me reiterate that Padres GM A.J. Preller is an idiot in my book. He got hired and immediately went ahead and traded the entire Padres farm system during the 2014/15 offseason for Craig Kimbrel, Matt Kemp, Derek Norris, Wil Myers, and Justin Upton. He even signed James Shields for the rotation. They went for it in 2015. And…they were mediocre. It was a complete failure. And after the season he traded Kimbrel to re-stock the farm system and let Justin Upton walk in free agency. But he didn’t do anything to improve the club. Now the Padres are among the worst teams in the league, and they seemingly have no clear direction from the top. We hear all about these teams that are intentionally “tanking” like the Braves, Reds and Phillies. But A.J. Preller doesn’t seem to get an ounce of criticism for accidentally tanking in 2016.

Padres Lately: The Padres have a crummy record at 11-17. The Padres are 24th in runs scored, 29th in OPS, and 28th in home runs. The “blame the ballpark” excuse can only be used for so long, especially considering the Padres already moved the fences in at Petco a couple years ago. It didn’t help much. The Padres were supposed to be built on rock solid pitching. But their team ERA is 4.23 and ranks at 19th in the league.

Now despite all those negative stats on the season, they just finished winning consecutive series against the Dodgers and the Rockies. Those series wins say more about the struggling Dodgers and inconsistent Rockies than they do about the quality of the Padres team. That being said, the Padres pitching staff has performed much better lately.

Pitching Matchups:

Game 1: Jacob deGrom vs. Colin Rea

Rea is a 25 year old righty pitcher with 11 career starts. He tossed a quality start and got the win against LA last week, but overall this year he’s been mediocre with a 4.61 ERA in 5 starts.

Last June, Jacob deGrom pitched 8 scoreless 2 hit innings with 8 K against the Padres at Petco. He was decent last time out against the Giants giving up zero earned runs over 6 innings, but he did let up 4 walks.

Game 2: Noah Syndergaard vs. Drew Pomeranz

Drew Pomeranz was once a highly touted prospect, but has never lived up to the hype. He spent the last two seasons in Oakland, so the Mets have limited experience against him. He is off to a nice start to the season with a 2-3 record and a stellar 2.48 ERA. He took a hard luck loss in LA last time out going 7 innings and giving up just one run. He also struck out 10 Pirates in April over 6.2 scoreless innings. He’s a lefty, so we shall see which of our lefty sluggers Terry decides to rest.

Thor faced the Padres twice during his rookie season going 1-1. He got rocked at Petco. Despite his 10 Ks in that game he gave up 7 runs and 10 hits over 4 innings. But in New York, he went 8 scoreless 3 hit innings and struck out 9 Padres.

I’m Watching You: Hopefully between starts the Mets have worked with Syndergaard on holding runners on base. The Reds and the Giants ran all over Thor in his last two starts. The Padres are a team that will run and use speed as a weapon. That being said, Thor’s issue has less to do with the teams he’s been facing and more to do with his inability to hold people on base. He should probably just strike everyone out so this won’t continue to be a problem.

Game 3: Bartolo Colon vs. James Shields

Bartolo had his shortest and most horrendous outing of 2015 at Citi Field against the Padres. He got yanked after 2.1 innings, 10 hits, and 6 runs. That being said, he’s been the Mets most consistent pitcher so far this season. He’s matching the early season success he had last year. It doesn’t matter much because the game is in San Diego, but Bartolo needs to adopt “I’m Too Sexy” as his warmup song. It’s possible he already has, but if not he needs to do it immediately.

James Shields may be 1-4 so far this season, but his 3.23 ERA is great. He’s had 5 quality starts and he’s gone 6+ innings in all 6 starts. He went 1-1 against the Mets in 2015, but he went 7 innings and gave up 3 or fewer runs both times. The current Mets have historically had very little success against James Shields. Curtis Granderson has by far the most experience against Shields. He’s 8 for 64 with 2 home runs. Asdrubal Cabrera is 6 for 24 with a home run and Duda is 2 for 6 with a home run. Yoenis Cespedes, Michael Conforto, David Wright, and Neil Walker are a combined 1 for 19 against Shields.

Game 4: Matt Harvey vs. Andrew Cashner

Cashner is 2-2 with an ugly 4.85 ERA this season. He tossed a quality start against the Rockies last time out. Lucas Duda is 2 for 8 against him, Grandy is 2 for 9 with a home run, Wright is 1 for 7 with a home run.

Matt Harvey did not face the Padres in 2015. At this point we’re nearing broken record status, but maybe this will be the week where he starts to turn his season around.

Things To Look For:

Hot Padres: Matt Kemp is batting .299 with 8 home runs. Maybe he’s rediscovering some of the magic from his 39 home run 2011 campaign? It’s more likely he’s having one good month. Wil Myers is hitting .304 with 5 home runs. I wouldn’t say Melvin Upton (The Lesser Upton) is “hot”. But he’s hitting .244, and he’s hit a few doubles and a couple dingers. He’s certainly been better than the piece of garbage we all got used to over the past few years.

Early Spring Shopping List: So after a month of baseball, I’m already preparing my in season Mets roster shopping list. I definitely think this roster could use another big time reliever, a right handed hitting bench bat that plays 1B/OF and a major league catcher. You may notice I didn’t specify major league starting catcher or backup. The Mets really need Travis d’Arnaud to come back and stay healthy. I want him to play on the Mets, and I want him to be the impact player that we’ve all seen. And even if we wanted to trade him and go in a different direction, right now his trade value is at an all time low. It’s hard to imagine the Mets pursuing a starting caliber catcher like Jonathan Lucroy, Carlos Ruiz, or even the Padres Derek Norris mid-season. But if d’Arnaud is actually out forever and Kevin Plawecki continues to do nothing at the plate, the thought needs to be entertained.

Speaking of trades, so far this season Jonathan Papelbon has sucked for the Nats and the Yankees have sucked. If the Yankees keep stinking, how terrible is it going to be when they flip the Mets off and ship Aroldis Chapman to the Nationals at the deadline? Pretty pretty pretttty terrible.

Young and Hungry, Old and Tired: I was thinking this morning how it’s funny that the young guns Noah Syndergaard and Steven Matz are absolutely dealing to start the season and the slightly more experienced Jacob deGrom/Matt Harvey have battled injuries, diminished velocity and some command issues. I’m not sure what to conclude from that other than the youngest guys have a lot to prove and seemingly have come out of the gate super hungry. Jacob deGrom and Matt Harvey have a little more mileage, they blasted to all time high inning levels last season, and also they have the experience of surviving a full season. So maybe they are both starting slow due to the wear and tear combined with a conscious effort to conserve their energy for the long haul. With Harvey, it’s clearly more about the wear and tear. But deGrom is really smart, and I’m sure we will see him kick it into a higher gear as we move later in the season. I hope all four of them are performing at the highest level down the stretch when it matters most.

Tonight: The Nationals kickoff a series against the Cubs tonight. Hopefully the Cubs can remind the Nationals that they play in the NL Least and send them into a tailspin. Tonight, we kick off this 4 game set and an 11 game road trip. I don’t envy the Mets and their inevitable jet lag. For Christ’s sake I commute 30 minutes, and I battle subway lag daily. But I’m sure they’ll all just grab coffee/amphetamines and get this series started on the right foot.

Big Apple Jacks: Mets/Matz Take Series Against Braves

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big apple

Final Score: Mets 8, Braves 0

The Mets took 2 out of 3 against the Braves at home. Pats on the back all around for the Mets doing what they needed to do and beating another bad team. The Mets have won six series in a row for the first time since 2006. I’d like to get excited, but the Nationals are in absolute cruise control atop the NL East right now.

Steven Matz was absolutely brilliant today with 7.2 innings of 2 hit ball and 8 Ks. It’s nice to see him, as a rookie, picking up some of this unexpected Matt Harvey slack.

Home Run Count: Rene Rivera hit a two run bomb in the 2nd inning. Asdrubal Cabrera hit a two run jack in the 3rd inning after Curtis Granderson walked to leadoff the inning. Then in the same inning, Yoenis Cespedes singled and Lucas Duda hit a two run homer. Lucas Duda added a solo home run in the 5th inning making it 7-0. You think Lucas is enjoying Cespedes in our lineup? Michael Conforto definitely is, and we all know Murph enjoyed him last season almost as much as he’s enjoying Bryce Harper now. Wilmer Flores also had a nice day with 2 hits including an RBI double that made it 8-0.

Ding Ding Ding, This Is A Thing: Well the sample size debate is officially over. I’m calling it. The Mets lead the league with 40 home runs. We are officially team ding dong. Home run or bust. Live by the dinger, die by the dinger. At least we can start preemptively drafting the epitaph for the Mets 2016 headstone. “Here lies the 2016 Mets season. Victim of the great September home run drought.”

I Stink Therefore I Am (The Starter?): Rene “Descartes” Rivera hit a two run bomb today. As I said yesterday, Kevin Plawecki has been terrible. Terry is fed up with Plawecki’s lack of hitting. Travis d’Arnaud is in Florida somewhere soaking in a human size test tube full of formaldehyde for the next two months. Rene Rivera and his career .200 average may just find it’s his way into the everyday lineup. Dear god no.

Boras Shrugs, Promptly Asks For Bribe: Scott Boras today said “there’s something unknown we are looking at” in regards to Matt Harvey and his early season struggles. Boras then proceeded to extend his hand and added “maybe a couple of Andrew Jacksons could refresh my memory.”

Curse of Turner: I don’t know what the hell is screwing up Harvey, but I have a feeling Chipper Jones and John Smoltz have something to do with it. Those bastards had nothing but positive things to say about us last season and before this season started they praised our young pitchers. They praised Matt Harvey in particular. And now look at him. He’s mysteriously struggling to compete and nobody has any idea what’s going on. Well I blame Smoltz and Chipper. They put a voodoo hex on Harvey. A plague on them! A plague on both their houses!

Juice News: ESPN today said more steroid suspensions are coming down this week. Please pray that it’s nobody on the Mets. I hope nobody bought Jenrry Mejia‘s self published book “Juicing To The Test: 25 Ways To Get Caught Today.”

Murph Alert: Daniel Murphy went 4 for 5 for the Nationals today with a home run, double and 3 RBIs. He brought his average up to .398 for the season. The Nationals crushed the Royals 13-2 and took 2 out of 3 from them. It figures the Mets would field the best team they’ve assembled in 10 years, and the Nationals through April would field arguably the best team in the league with Daniel Murphy doing an impression of goddamn Ted Williams. I’m sure this will only be a one month fluke. Right? Nobody actually thinks the Nationals are going to win 105 games and Daniel Murphy will win the NL batting title right? Just a reminder, Vegas thought the Nationals were a 100 win team last year. I haven’t looked at the Borgata MLB playoff odds lately, but I’m guessing the Nats are trending up. Gulp.

Tomorrow: The Mets head off on a big west coast trip. First stop is San Diego followed by Dodgertown and then Colorado. These trips are always tough, but San Diego and Colorado are not good teams. The Mets are 8-3 on the road. Let’s hope our road fire carries over to the west.

Braves Beat Crappy 2016 Harvey Impersonator

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Final Score: Braves 3, Mets 0

Before we dive into the awful 2016 version of Matt Harvey that we’ve been seeing every fifth day, let’s acknowledge the reason we lost tonight. The Mets didn’t score a damn run. The Mets got one hit. They actually had a bunch of hard hit balls, but they were all launched directly at perfectly positioned Braves in the field.

Wisler’s A Good Mother: The Mets didn’t leave a bunch of men on base tonight. The Mets didn’t waste a bunch of opportunities. The Mets got straight up shut down by Matt Wisler. Sure Michael Conforto, David Wright, Yoenis Cespedes, and Asdrubal Cabrera rocked a bunch of balls. But they all found gloves and sometimes that’s going to happen. Credit must go to Wisler on his performance tonight.

Harvey and The Chocolate Factory: Speaking of this 2016 Matt Harvey impersonator, Harvey kind of looks like a young Gene Wilder. I never would have thought a month into the season that I’d be more jealous of Willy Wonka’s lifestyle than Matt Harvey’s. But at this point, the thought of being a Chocolate magnate living in an enormous magic factory seems more appealing than being a struggling pitcher living in the East Village. Harvey should consider reaching out to Wonka to see if he can whip up some chocolate based chewing tobacco replacement because his current dip routine isn’t working.

Harvey Mediocre Again: Matt Harvey gave up a single and a double to start the second inning. But the stinky Braves helped him get out of trouble when Matt Wisler hit a ball to David Wright who got the runner at third out in a pickle. Then Harvey got a groundout from Mallex Smith to end the inning.

The damage against him was done in the 5th and 6th inning. In the 5th, Harvey gave up an opposite field solo blast to Mallex Smith. In the 6th inning, he officially fell apart. Kelly Johnson singled and then stole second base on Harvey. Then A.J. Pierzynski doubled to drive him in. Pierzynski tagged up on a fly out by Reid Brignac, and then Harvey let him score on a wild pitch. That made it 3-0. After another walk and single Harvey got yanked.

Harvey’s Bad April: This April, Matt Harvey consistently tired in the 5th or 6th inning.

Timothy Finnegan at Amazin Avenue wrote a post about how Harvey’s slider velocity is down, the spin rate has diminished, he’s not locating it as effectively, and it’s being hit harder. His velocity in general has clearly been down all month. We can all see these things every time he takes the mound. The question is why is he having these problems?

Harvey’s Lying: Harvey says he’s completely fine. He says his struggles have nothing to do with a postseason hangover or injury. He said a few weeks ago that his struggles were due to mechanical issues that he fixed with Dan Warthen. Well that was obviously BS. Maybe he genuinely doesn’t know what the problem is. Terry Collins in his post game presser clearly had no idea what’s wrong with Harvey. The best players in the league have slumps. Even the best starting pitchers have bad weeks, bad months, and bad seasons. But the Harvey red flags are very clear. His velocity is down, he’s lacked command on all his pitches, and he’s temporarily lost his strikeout stuff. I’m attributing it to playoff fatigue and not a secret hidden injury. No matter what it is, we need Harvey to fight through it sooner rather than later. The Mets will have a very tough time recreating the success they had last season without Matt Harvey. That’s all there is to it.

Plawecki Stinkin’ Big Time: Remember when Travis d’Arnaud got hurt and we all hoped that Kevin Plawecki would claim the catching job by right of conquest? Well he’s flopping big time so far. He’s 3 for 17 since he took over the job. Yikes. Travis was terrible for most of April, so it’s not as if we’ve lost a ton of production with Plawecki in the lineup. But black holes in the lineup are terrible, and Plawecki has been a black hole during any stretch of playing time he’s received since his promotion last season. It would be nice if he’d show us all something.

Tomorrow: It goes without saying the Mets must take the rubber game tomorrow and win this series against the Braves. The Nationals are on the verge of winning 2 out of 3 against the Royals tonight. It’s looking more and more like all the success predicted for the 2015 Nats may be coming to fruition in 2016 now that Matt Williams is gone. The Mets just need to stay focused, keep winning series, and let mooks like me worry about scoreboard watching in May.

Update: Papelbon blew tonight’s game for the Nationals! He gave up 3 runs in the 9th. Hooray. Pap sucks. 

Big Sexy Takes Dump On Braves

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Final Score: Mets 4, Braves 1

The Mets did all of their scoring in the first inning of this game. Obviously it all came on long balls. David Wright hit a solo jack. Yoenis Cespedes hit a two run blast and then Lucas Duda followed that with a solo bomb. The Cespedes/Duda back to back jacks were the fifth time the Mets have done that in 2016, and it made it 4-0. I can’t remember a season where the Mets hit back to back jacks so frequently.

The first inning batting practice home run show was all Bartolo Colon needed tonight. He pitched 8 scoreless innings and struck out seven Braves. He took an absolute dump on this squad of jokers. Bartolo has faced more adversity during simulated games in Port St. Lucie. Colon passed Pedro to move into second place on the all time Dominican pitcher wins list with his 220th career victory.

Sexy Moment of the Night: Bartolo hit a foul ball with an exit velocity over 100 MPH. Sex machine status.

Put A Ring On It: Before tonight’s game, Jeff Wilpon stopped by the Braves clubhouse and gave Kelly Johnson and Eric O’Flaherty NL Championship rings. I completely understand Kelly Johnson getting an NL Championship ring. The guy was a major contributor after the trade deadline and in the playoffs. But Eric O’Flaherty got a goddamn ring? He doesn’t deserve a freaking orange and blue Ring Pop let alone a diamond studded NL Championship ring. The Mets would have been better off spending O’Flaherty’s ring money on extra Syndergaard Gnomes and appeasing some of the fans who showed up early and missed out on that giveaway. Instead, O’Flaherty is going to spend the next five years telling his Long Island Duck teammates about those 8 innings in the summer of 2015 when he consistently got rocked as a New York Met reliever.

Philly Ain’t Bad: It’s been obvious in the games we’ve played against them so far this season, but it’s worth stating again that Philly isn’t as bad as we all expected. Their pitching has surprised everyone. Through Sunday, the Phillies have won 6 in a row and 9 of their last 10. They are 15-10. Good thing the Braves are losing enough for the both of them.

Tomorrow: Matt Harvey goes tomorrow against the toilet Braves. Let em have it.

Mets Concede Series Finale To Giants With Dog Doo Lineup

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Final Score: Giants 6, Mets 1

The Mets dropped the series finale to the Giants in a game where Terry rested our top left-handed hitting sluggers against Madison Bumgarner. In the top of the 4th inning Matt Duffy singled and stole a base. Then Buster Posey singled, and Brandon Belt followed that with an RBI groundout. Hunter Pence capped the inning with a two run blast to make it 3-0.

Noah Syndergaard was not at his best on Sunday. He officially tired in the 6th inning and with 2 outs and 2 men on, Terry yanked him in favor of Hansel Robles. Robles gave up an RBI single to Hunter Pence which made it 4-0.

The Giants tacked on a couple runs late in the game, but the Mets never really made a legitimate push to win this one.

Credit Where It’s Due: Madison Bumgarner is elite and shut the Mets down when he had to on Sunday. The Mets had many opportunities against MadBum, and left a bunch of men on base. Ultimately they couldn’t get the big hit in the big spot and you have to give the Giants ace credit for pulling that off.

Terry’s Terrible Lineup: In a home finale where the Mets had a chance to go for the jugular and sweep the Giants, Terry fielded an absurd lineup. Lagares in RF? Never never never never never. Stop it!!! He’s a gold glove centerfielder. Wilmer stone hands was back out there again and this time at shortstop. He’s been awful. And here’s the problem. If we have no confidence in Curtis Granderson and Lucas Duda facing elite left-handed pitchers, then we need to get a right-handed bench bat that can actually play. Eric Campbell and Wilmer Flores have not cut the mustard so far this season.

Soupermetrics: Speaking of Soup, Eric Campbell puts his team leading “likeliness to start percentage” of 0.5% on the line in Sunday’s matinee. He actually got a hit to raise his average to .182 and he walked.

Mini Series Preview: The Mets open up a home series against the Braves tonight. Since we swept them at Turner Field, they have gone 2-4. There’s nothing to preview really. They’ve won 6 games on the season. They are the worst team in the league, and the Mets are arguably the hottest team. Sweep please.

Game 1: Bartolo Colon vs. Mike Foltynewicz

Game 2: Matt Harvey vs. Matt Wisler

Game 3: Steven Matz vs. Jhoulys Chacin