Blog Archives

As I wrote to Tom Boorstein tonight…if you have no talent, play like a bunch of morons and get poor decisions by your manager, you won’t win many games.  That’s pretty much what the Mets are suffering through right now.  They have absolutely nothing going in their favor.

Just a number of idiotic things tonight.  Mike Pelfrey not only walks Rafael Furcal with two outs to force bases loaded with Orlando Hudson up, he then walks Hudson as well who hits in front of Manny Ramirez.  Before you could even blink, it was 3-0.  How does that happen!?  The Mets pitchers give up more dumb walks than any team in baseball.  It’s amazing.

The offense was terrible again tonight.  They manage four hits, two double plays and an out on the bases.  That seems to be the norm.  Even though they rarely get anyone on, the times they actually do get erased with stupid base running or routine double plays.  God forbid anyone ever try to break up a double play though.

And I really hope this is the last year of the Luis Castillo failed experiment.  After jogging his way into an out at third base, he makes another error on a routine grounder that costs his team a run.  If you’re not going to hustle or play defense, then you better do something well.  Castillo does nothing well.  He can’t even hit the ball out of the infield.  Oh and Hudson was practically begging the Mets to sign him this offseason.  Nice thinking Omar.

Ted and I are were kind of wondering if the team had given up on this season.  Ted says they haven’t, but I’m not as convinced.  The funny thing is imagine if Ted is right.  Imagine if this team really is giving it their all for now.  How much worse will they be once they collectively throw in the towel, which could happen by month’s end at the latest.  Will they go from five dumb plays a game to 10?  The possibilities are endless.  At least we won’t have to get sucked in for five and a half months just to see the team choke away the last two weeks of the season.  Our year ended a few months earlier this time around.

Check out Ted’s latest article that pretty much sums up what we talked about last night.  The team more or less has to make a decision about this season right now.  Whether they go for it and add a guy or two or even three or they just say this season’s basically over and then play the young guys from here on out.  What they’re doing right now is the worst possible thing.  They’re mixing and matching and playing guys that have no business being in the majors and losing consistently.  If you have no shot of winning, then play the young guys every single day.  If you think your core guys will be back soon, then go out and pick up some help so you have a shot at playing close to .500 until the core gets back.  You will not win with Fernando Tatis batting cleanup and Argenis Reyes as an offensive option off the bench.

I e-mailed my dad at 3:33 right when J.C. Romero came out of the game saying this “With Tatis coming up…I’m guaranteeing a double play.”  I also said the game was over after the first pitch of the bottom of the first inning.  It’s not even a bold prediction at this point…that’s how pathetic this team is.

And it’s one thing to suffer through injuries and just lack enough talent to compete, but the Mets are playing like a bunch of morons who don’t give a damn.  Today was my breaking point.  I will not watch this team until something is done.

I don’t care what it is.  Firing Jerry Manuel, firing your pitching and hitting coach, trading away a couple of guys.  They can’t continue to put this team out there.  It’s embarrassing to watch.  I think during next year’s season of 24, Jack Bauer is going to torture people by making them watch the Mets.  I can’t think of anything that would make you suffer more.

And as I’m watching the Mets post game, Bobby Ojeda seems to agree with me if I heard him right.  They need to make a change just for the sake of making a change and telling this overpriced premaddonas that this is unacceptable.

It seems to me like the players have just given up on themselves with all these injuries.  They figure they have no shot with everyone out.

I mean let’s be honest…anyone that has called the Mets resilient over the past few years is fooling themselves.  They choked at the end of the last two seasons and got off to a poor start this year.  To say these guys play with confidence and swagger would be a lie.

So something has to be done.  There is absolutely no way this team can survive the way it’s currently constructed.  And if Omar Minaya doesn’t want to mortgage the future, he needs to come out and say OK, I’m giving up on this season so come back when the calendar turns to 2010.  Maybe if he says something like that, it will motivate the players.  It certainly didn’t hurt when he said they lack an edge.

Tomorrow’s an off day but it could be the biggest day of the season.  If Omar does nothing, I won’t be watching on Tuesday and the results will stay the same.  We’ll see what happens.

What a wild game!  Wow!  I was watching most of it on gameday and once I saw the Mets were down 5-0 I figured this game was over.  But this team actually showed some heart and came from behind and won…barely.

The offense decided to make an appearance and came up big today…especially Ryan Church.  For the second straight game, Church delivered a huge game-winning hit with two outs.  He was so bad for so long, but he’s come up big lately.  His BA is up to .292 and the Mets need his hot bat with the rest of the team so weak.

Tim Redding was awful today.  The guy is so up and down.  You have to figure when Ollie Perez and John Maine come back, Redding is the first guy out of the rotation.  Redding really is so much better than a replacement player.  I’m being sarcastic of course.

Frankie Rodriguez has been shaky lately.  Not good.  He did finish strong in the 10th, but he likely will not be available for the Phillies tomorrow night.

Big two games though as this season looked like it was falling apart.  A nice weekend and all of a sudden they could be back in first place.  As bad as they’ve looked, it’s pretty amazing that’s even possible.

After a nice series against the Cardinals, reality has set back in for Mets fans.  This team just isn’t very good right now.  The Yankees have put on a clinic the past two days and the Mets haven’t been able to even put up a fight.

Tonight was pretty brutal to watch.  I know A.J. Burnett was good, but he wasn’t one-hit good.  It’s really not even worth watching them right now.  They probably have the worst lineup in baseball.

Tomorrow is a pretty huge game…and here’s my bold prediction.  If the Mets offense continues to falter tomorrow, Omar Minaya will get another bat before next week’s Phillies series.  I think it’s become apparent the Mets cannot hold down the fort until their guys come back.  They just don’t have any firepower at all.  Omar has made some moves after the Mets have finished up with the Yankees, most recently firing Rick Down as the hitting coach a couple of seasons ago.  I guess we can just sit and wait.

PROGRAMMING NOTE: I will be in Dallas tomorrow through Wednesday night and won’t have internet access so there will be no posts, shows or e-mail replies until at least Thursday night.  And then I might be away 4th of July weekend so it could be a little bit of a delay until then.  I will try to get a recap post in on Thursday night or Friday morning though before I leave.

What a nice change of pace for tonight.  Not only did the Mets win, but it was a laugher.  There’s only been a handful of those all season.  The story of tonight has to be Fernando Nieve.

I know it’s only three starts, but this guy has been absolutely awesome.  His stuff is great and he looks unhittable at times.  And he’s doing it against some of the best offenses in baseball.  I like to think this isn’t a fluke.  After all the bad stuff that’s happened to this team, imagine if they discovered something out of nowhere in Nieve.  What a huge lift that would be.  And he’s only 26 too.  So maybe something finally clicked with him.  It’s happened in the past with other players although you have to suspect a lot of that might have been steroids.  It’s not probable, but it’s certainly possible that Nieve could turn out to be one of those hidden gems that comes along every once in a while.

On the offensive side, you see 11 runs and wonder why can’t they do this every night!?  I know the Cardinals gifted the Mets some of those runs, but they did hit the ball hard all night.  You don’t get 16 fluke hits in a game.

Have to give props to David Wright for a four-hit game but bonus points to Ryan Church and Brian Schneider.  I’ve killed both guys this season but they looked awesome tonight.  Church was hitting with power to left field and Schneider continues to drive the ball on mistakes from the pitcher.

I’ve been negative in the past few weeks and rightfully so.  This team blows games, they don’t hustle and frankly they just aren’t very good.  But tomorrow’s game is so enormous.  First of all Johan Santana is on the mound and he’s been shaky lately.  They could use a great start for him.  Second, they’re up against Chris Carpenter so if you beat him you get some extra confidence.  But most importantly, you finally win a series during this tough stretch and your record in this time goes to 7-9.  All things considered, that wouldn’t be terrible.  But first, you have to win the series.

Joel Pineiro was brilliant against the Mets again.  It was eerily similar to his dominant outing back in late September during the 2007 season.  Last night’s performance was an omen of things to come though.

All I have to say is Fernando Tatis is hitting cleanup.  The same Tatis who got four pitches in three at-bats last night.  This is a guy with a .364 slugging percentage.  And he’s hitting cleanup.  I don’t think he’d be batting fourth for any other team in baseball right now.  I like Tatis because he hustles and occasionally shows some power, but he’s a guy who should be hitting seventh on a contending team.

And like I wrote before, Jerry Manuel and Omar Minaya have to be counting their blessings that so many guys have gotten hurt.  They’re avoiding a lot of the blame that should be placed their way.  The team is lazy and has no fundamentals…that’s on both of them.

But let’s talk about Omar a little.  In the offseason, I guaranteed my buddy in the front office that the Mets would not have enough offense this season.  They needed another bat.  Now he’s using injuries as an excuse.  But I even said in the offseason there’s no way Reyes, Delgado, Beltran and Wright are all healthy the entire year.  They got so lucky last year and the offense still wasn’t good enough.  There was no depth, just as I said, and now the Mets have a journeyman hitting cleanup.

Sometimes I wonder if any intelligent fan could be a GM or a manager of their favorite team and do just as good of a job.  This year, I honestly feel like I would have been better and definitely not much worse.  I wouldn’t allow guys to jog around the bases and I certainly wouldn’t bunt everytime someone gets on base.  And in the offseason when there were so many guys willing to take next to nothing to play, I would have signed a few for insurance purposes.

What would have been a better investment?  Orlando Hudson (3.36 million), who’s hitting .309 with 5 homers and 38 RBI and plays an awesome second base.  He doesn’t drop easy pop-ups to lose games.  Or would you rather have Tim Redding (2.25 million), with a 1-2 record and 6.08 ERA.  You could have gotten someone of Redding’s caliber for the league minimum.  The same cannot be said for Hudson.  Now the Mets are going to wind up giving up prospects and overpaying for a bat they could have had on the cheap in the offseason.

Omar did a good job of fixing last year’s problem.  The bullpen was terrible and he improved it.  I would have signed K-Rod and traded for Putz.  I know he’s a disaster this year, but I don’t fault Omar for that.  He took a chance and I’m fine with that.  But he didn’t plan for what might be a problem this year.  What if one or two of the core guys misses significant time?  What if Daniel Murphy isn’t the next Pete Rose like we think he will be?  What if Fernando Tatis doesn’t produce like he did in 2008?  And what if Ryan Church doesn’t go back to being the player he was pre-concussion last year?  How do you not plan ahead and think about these things!?  No one thought those what ifs would all go against the team but you have to consider the possibility that they might.

Now the Mets are suffering because the lack of forward-thinking by their front office and we have to watch essentially a AAA team go up against the best in the league.  The team is 5-9 so far in this 32-game stretch and I don’t see it getting much better.  Not when Fernando Tatis is hitting cleanup.

The New York Bisons squeaked by the Cardinals tonight by a score of 6-4.  Wait…that wasn’t the Bisons out there?  It sure looked like it.  With Carlos Beltran on the DL, David Wright is the only legitimate Major League starter left and the Mets finally held on to a game for a big win.

Let’s face it at this point…the Mets just don’t have much talent left.  Their only chance to make something of this season is to get out to early leads and then hold on for dear life.  You can’t expect them to come from behind with the lineup they’re putting out there now.

Omir Santos continues to deliver big hits for this team.  Like I wrote yesterday, the Mets are getting incredible production out of the catcher spot.  In fact, that spot has driven in more runs than any other position for the Mets.  That’s simply amazing.  Who would have guessed that before the season?

Tim Redding did as well as he could have tonight.  He isn’t very good, so to expect anything better than 7+ and four runs is unfair.  You have to take that from him every single time.

And in a huge twist of fortune, Jon Switzer didn’t give up any runs.  It was amazing.  He got one out and gave up one hit.  He’s now gone two straight games without surrendering any runs.

In all seriousness though, you have to give props to Brian Stokes for getting Albert Pujols to hit into an inning-ending double play in the eighth.  I really thought the Cards were at least tying the game in that at-bat.  But Stokes proved my pessimism wrong by getting a weak comebacker.

Finally, I love an aggressive third base coach.  In fact, I’ve been saying for years that third base coaches need to be aggressive because throwing a guy out at home plate is so hard to do.  But Razor Shines is starting to take it to the extreme.  Two guys could have easily been toast at home if not for some poor plays by Yadier Molina.  He’s just sending guys with a reckless abandon for outs.  Although this is what I wrote about in the past.  That even if a perfect throw is made, the catcher still needs to catch the ball and apply the tag.  So I can’t kill him too much.

What’s funny is Jerry Manuel is the exacty opposite as far as taking chances.  I’ve never seen a manager order up more bunts.  It’s getting absurd and it needs to stop.  Let the guys hit Jerry.  With everyone but David Wright injured, you need to play for big innings every once in a while.  You can’t be happy getting a run here and a run there.

So the Mets win another first game of a series.  It’s happened a lot this year and then the Mets usually lose the next two.  Sometimes they win the middle game, but rarely do they win the third or fourth.  Hopefully we can get another W tomorrow and at worst get a split with the Cards.  We shall see what another day brings.

You have to give the Mets credit.  Each day they find a fun new way to blow a game.  Whether it’s not touching third base, dropping a routine pop up, not being able to get any clutch hits, the starter giving it up in the fifth or an absolute bullpen meltdown, the Mets are mixing it up on their way to mediocrity.

The only player who gets a gold star today is Brian Schneider.  Nice to see two homers from him this series.  It’s amazing the level of production the Mets have gotten from their catchers this season.  Keep it up Brian and Omir.

And that’s when the story gets sour.  Mike Pelfrey continued his mid-game meltdown routine.  He cruised through the first four innings only to give up four runs in the fifth inning.  Is he getting tired, nervous, good luck early on?  I don’t get it.  But isn’t that why they pay the coaches?  They should be figuring this stuff out.

It’s been so frustrating watching this team so far in the crucial 32-game stretch.  They’re 4-8 but should be 8-4.  Their only saving grace is the Phillies have been even worse.  The Mets are just two games out of first place, but there’s absolutely no reason why they shouldn’t be in first.  I find this stat amazing.  Of the eight games they’ve lost in this stretch, the Mets have either been tied or in the lead at some point from 6th inning on in seven of those games.  So seven of these eight losses, the Mets had a great chance to win late in the game.  Only a team that masters in the art of losing can pull that off.

I thought injuries are supposed to make a team resilient.  When guys go down, teammates are supposed to pick each other up and kick it into another gear.  Well the Mets are doing the opposite right now.  They’re folding…and eventually the Phils will start winning again.  Who knows?  Maybe a series with the 2006 World Series Champs, the Cardinals, will light a fire under this team.  But then again, why should I believe it will happen now if it hasn’t already?

Nice bounceback win for the Mets tonight.  The story of the game has to be Fernando Nieve.  He looks awesome!  Not only is he 2-0 with an ERA under 2.00, but he’s done it against two of the best offenses in baseball.  He isn’t beating up on the Padres and Astros.  These are a legit two wins.  You have to love his stuff and wonder if he can keep this up.  If so, the Mets have themselves a real gem.

Brian Schneider finally did something productive for the Mets.  He has been a lot better since returning off the DL so you have to give the guy some props.

Bobby Parnell is starting to worry me.  He’s been brutal lately.  They need him to pick it back up with J.J. Putz out a while longer.  Come on Bobby P!

Just a nice bounceback win after a disastrous series against the Orioles.  Luckily, I knew nothing about the game last night until getting home from Orlando tonight.  What a ridiculously bad nine-game stretch.  The Mets went 3-6 and could have easily won five of the six.  And the one game they had no shot they lost 15-0 in a rubber match against the Yankees.

Let’s at least clinch the series tomorrow.  It’s been a while since the Mets won a series.  I forgot what it feels like.