Pelf gets it done

Nice line: 7 IP, 7 H, 1 BB, 6 K, 2 R.

Beltran gets a big hit, and so does Tatis.

I meant. Now.

Pedro to start Tues., big decisions on tap

Who gets bumped from the rotation, Pelfrey or Vargas? It may well depend on Pelf's start today. You know the organization wants to give Pelf every chance.

Does Vargas or Pelf, whichever gets bumped, go to the pen? If so, which reliever gets displaced? Lot's of talk on the FAN this morning about sending Heilman down to "work out" his issues and restore some confidence. Muniz is low man on the totem poll, but has been effective through his short time in the bigs so far.

My preferred solution would be to shift Vargas to the pen as a long man and spot starter for DH'ers or whatever, and drop Heilman to AAA. Aaron's trade value is already in the tank anyway, and he needs some major retooling if he's ever going to get it together.

Delgado

Delgado's thoughts on possibly being platooned:

Willie Randolph can expect a visit from Carlos Delgado if Randolph decides to use the struggling first baseman in a platoon against right-handers.

Delgado, who started tonight against the Dodgers after being benched against lefties the final two games of the Florida series, made it obvious he would be unhappy if a platoon develops.

"We’re gonna have to talk," Delgado said when asked what would happen if Randolph platooned him. "Obviously, I would not talk to you [reporters] before I talk to him. I haven’t said anything, but I want to make it clear. I don’t want to sound like I’m challenging anybody, but it’s true, I would have to talk to him about that."

Look, I appreciate a player who is hungry enough to fight for his job, that's great. But this particular quote tells me a few things. First, it tells me that Willie has failed to establish himself as the leader. You wouldn't give that kind of quote unless you felt you were in a position of relatively good power compared to your boss. Willie needs to make it clear that HE is running the team, not the players. Next, it also says something about Delgado's personality. How about instead something along the lines of: "While I always want to play, I also want to do whatever is best for the team. If Willie deems that this is the best move for the team at this time, then I respect that but of course I'm going to play hard to try to win my position back."

Never before

...has one pitcher who is so good been so owned by one team as brad penny is by the mets.

Mets seem to be playing with a lot more life this week. Diving grabs by Delgado today, Beltran and Tatis last night are all great signs. Team definitely needed a swift kick; they looked lifeless like they were just going through the motions.

PIITB

Nice 11 inning win.

Three quick comments.

1. Fernando Tatis. Omar just knew it.

2. Great night for Duaner Sanchez. His fastball was popping. Tht had him at 93 a couple of times. A great sign. Amezega's shot was total fluke stuff. Inside black and he got lucky and turned on it. Plus, Duaner showed that fight we've been discussing. After almost getting drilled with the first pitch when he was up to sac bunt in the 10th (IIRC), he came back and layed down a PERFECT sac next pitch. Plus, he ran it out like he cared, and almost forced an errant throw.

3. Nice team-wide heart with a pair of comebacks in one game.

Say "Ray"

Following the lead of the gents over at MetsGeek, we have been temporarily re-named until the real Mets return from their year-long hibernation.

Congrats

Nice job Pelf. 95 pitches in 4 innings. Even for you that's a poor outing; you certainly picked a great time to regress.

Hopefully the Mets will keep Evans up long enough to ruin any shot he has of a good career in majors. Nothing like jumping from AA to majors in a tense situation.

Willie

Smart money says Willie's history tomorrow. I'd put it at 75%. This team is still clearly playing with no energy, scared of their own shadow. Blowing a 7-game lead with 17 games left last season was a monumental, inexcusable collapse. The manager is at least partly responsible, and if you don't make wholesale changes to the team in the offseason (which of course they did not), then you have no choice but to replace the manager. Scapegoating or not, the fact is the team's psyche was crushed and you either must replace the players or the head; otherwise, the team will never bounce back mentally.

I remain convinced this team needs a real in-your-face, military-style leader. At a minimum they need that this season to break them out of last-season funk, and beyond that they may need it as long as Beltran / Delgado / Alou / are the vets, since none of them are vocal enough to really be a team leader.

Taking stock of the Mets, part 2

The Wilpons are going to have to do some hard thinking about the realities of this team, and decide whether Omar, Willie, or the players are mostly to blame. IMO, unless you are talking about a situation where you have a team with just one bad player or bad apple (e.g., Nomar, Bonilla, etc.), then it has to fall on the GM or manager. Either the GM assembled a team with overrated talent, declining talent, or poor attitudes, or the manager has failed to properly utilize and motivate that talent. When an entire team underperforms, I have to look squarely at management.

So for the Mets, which is it? Is it mostly on Omar or Willie? Not entirely clear-cut, IMO. Take Omar first. He has certainly made some very impressive moves as GM, including the trades for Santana and Church. I'll even throw bringing Pedro over here in there, since he was solid in '06. On the negative side, however, Omar has shown a propensity to pursue declining talent on the downside of their careers (Delgado, Green, Valentin, Castillo, Alou, El Duque, ...) Furthermore, I found his unwillingness to re-sign Bradford and Oliver as two of the most bone-headed moves of all time. Both of those players continue to perform very well to this day, and quite likely would have been the difference between a collapse in '07 and playoffs.

In addition, I think it's important to keep in mind that Omar hasn't exactly had the toughest job in the world: he has essentially been given the largest budget of any NL team over the past 4 years. It's not like he's been asked to assemble a WS-class team with the budget of the Rays or Marlins. Omar also apparently doesn't seem to understand the need for a few vocal leaders in the clubhouse, since he has assembled a team of veterans who do not want to lead.

On the other hand, I think you can easily make a case that despite all the injuries, there is no reason this team should not be in 1st place in NL East. The core of the team - Reyes, Wright, and Beltran - have all remained healthy. The collapse at the end of '07 was inexcusable, due in large part IMO to Willie's overuse of bullpen during regular season. I also think Willie needs to take a more pro-active stance in developing Reyes, whose talent is still very raw. I think Willie's unwillingness to show emotion during a game and argue with umps is also a problem. I especially don't like the way he manages the bullpen, pulls starters early, and juggles the lineup.

At the end of the day, I'm not sure whether more of the blame lies with Willie or Omar, but I can say that the present team is not responding well to Willie. I can also say that even if Wilpon replaces Willie, he ought to put Omar on notice that his job is also on the hot seat, and he needs to re-consider the type of players the team really needs going forward.

Willie about to get axed???

The deafening silence from Wilpon, and his unwillingness to answer Willie's call yesterday, imply yes. Especially since Willie and Wilpon apparently normally speak frequently. If so, it would be tough seeing Willie go out like this. I think his recent comments were ridiculous, but I think largely due to his frustration and it would be a shame if this were his parting image. I don't think Willie is a good tactical manager as I've said several times, but Omar is certainly largely to blame for assembling an aged team that relies on a 25-year-old to be their only vocal leader.

A memo to Pedro

Shut up already.

I am so sick and tired of hearing a real-time update of his retirement plans. WHO THE F CARES? First he's retiring, then he's not, then he is, now he's not again. This is an enormous distraction that the team and the fans don't need. Wilpon/Omar need to sit him down and tell him commenting on his injury, recovery, ailing father, etc. are all fine and well. But as far as his retirement goes, his premature and waffling "announcements" just make him and the team look foolish.

Pelf

Through 2 innings so far Pelf definitely has some filthy stuff. This is what is frustrating about him: he clearly has good pitches with solid movement, and should be further along than he is so far. He just needs more confidence in himself.

Nice to see wright pick up reyes for the RBI.. That's been sorely lacking from this team all year.

BTW

The BlowSox have turned in four - that's right, count 'em 4 - no-hitters this century. That is, 4 in 8 years. The Mets have turned in 0 in 46 years.

No No NO

Why do the Mets insist on making the same mistakes over and over? First, the offense has not done well when Castillo is in the 2-hole. I don't care how much Willie "loves Castillo as a two hitter", it doesn't matter. As of right now, this year, the team does not bat well for whatever reason with Castillo in two-hole. Keep him in 7 or 8 for now.

Second, WHY do you pull Maine? I'm sorry, but this team has a brutal stretch ahead of it, with 21 games in 20 days. That's right, we don't have an off day for 20 more days. YOU MUST PRESERVE THE BULLPEN at all costs. Maine has only thrown 99 pitches after 4 innings. Too bad that he put the first two guys on in the bottom of the 5th; so long as he is below 120 pitches THAT'S HIS MESS TO CLEAN UP. Period.

The Ted

Well, we'll have a chance with this 4-game series against the braves to see if the yankees series really was the start of the Mets turning things around, or just the result of playing a last-place team. You'd like to see Maine and Johan get wins, and then either pelf or vargas also pick one up. With 3 of 4 we can start to put some distance between us and the braves.

Well, I guess we know who to point the finger at...

...for the botched call last night. Kudos to the ump for fessing up. Luckily for all parties involved, it didn't change the outcome of the game.

Wags

Looks like Wags' ass-tearing might be paying dividends. Since he called out the pitchers a few weeks ago (Perez in particular), Ollie's had two good starts. And of course after his tirade on Thursday the Mets just whipped the Yanks. Also nice to see the Mets have let Perez and Maine start to live in the 110 pitch-count area, where they should be.

I also liked seeing Manuel get tossed, it's about time someone on that coaching staff had some fire during a game.

Pelf

Despite the vomit-inducing performance of the offense against the Nats the last few games, yesterday's performance by Pelf needs to be highlighted.

Taking the long view, when you see a young pitcher starting to turn the corner and mature, you have to view that as big positive.

I read an article a few starts back where Pelf said he was abandoning his 2 seam "bowling ball" fastball and going for a 4 seamer. Less movement. More control. He said he was tired of falling behind hitters. Apparently, it was a good idea. He's had a couple of strong outings in a row. While I didn't see yesterday's, sounds like it was borderline-dominant.

Jeter v. Ordonez

I'd still take Ordonez, but in the interest of fair disclosure, here's exhibit 78 that Jeter turned out to be a fair big-league SS.

This season, with RISP:

.455

This season, with RISP and two outs:

.462

Exactly

Wags agrees with me that it is ridiculous that big-name players on the Mets keep dodging the media while Wright is hung out to dry.

"You should be talking to the guys over there," he snapped to reporters in the clubhouse.

He apparently, according to The New York Times, then gestured toward the lockers of Carlos Beltran, Luis Castillo and, especially, Carlos Delgado.

"Oh, they're not there. Big shock," he said.

"David Wright is always there, the same guys are always there. But there needs to be other guys that are accountable. It gets a little old when the same people keep getting interviewed even when they don't participate."

Taking stock of the Mets

The Mets are presently an uninspiring 20-18, 3rd place in NL East and middle of the road or worse in pretty much all statistical categories. The question is, are they a solid team that is simply in a funk, or is this about all we can expect from this team?

The short (and bad news) answer is that this may not be a funk. Here are some interesting records:

2006 1st half: 53-36
2006 2nd half: 44-29
2007 1st half: 48-39
2007 2nd half: 40-35
2008: 20-18

While 20-18 is underwhelming, it is unfortunately the exact same winning percentage the Mets put up for the entire 2nd half of '07. Thus, they have been playing to the same level of mediocrity for 4 straight months now. To me, that is enough data to represent a solid baseline, not a fluke that they can just "shake off".

What's different from '06? It doesn't seem to be BA or OBP: .258 and .341 in '08 vs. .264 and .334 in '06. It's not SO or BB either: we're on track to have exact same # of Ks with more BBs. Fielding is about the same: 112 E in '06 vs. target of 119 in '08.

One answer seems to be clutch hitting: we were getting an extra RBI every 2-3 games in '06. What about pitching? ERA in '08 is actually slightly lower, while Ks are the same but BBs are up in '08 by 23%. Another answer might be luck: we won 6 more games than our pythagorean expected based on runs scored/given up.

My guess is this "luck" had more to do with a solid bullpen preserving leads. At the end of the day I think the reason we won slightly more games than expected in '06 and we're not doing it in '08 (or end of '07) is due to Darren Oliver, Duaner Sanchez, Guillermo Mota, Chad Bradford, Heilman, Feliciano, and Roberto Hernandez. Those guys were all lights out, and except for Feliciano they are no longer with us or not doing well this year.

So, the upshot is that if Omar wants to squeeze more wins out of this team, he better focus on bolstering the bullpen with some in-season acquisitions or trades.

Roster Moves

Mets demoted Sosa and Figueroa, and are trying to trade Sosa (who would want him?). Pagan is hurt and sent to the DL. Wise, Vargas, and TATIS! are back with the big league club. F Tat will make us forget about Gotay yet--you just wait and see.

I'm soooooo very pleased that Omar dropped the loony story he was floating to the league that he was going to drop Joe Smith to the minors once Wise came back--I'm sure that was just to avoid letting on that Sosa was a minor league player now, and taking any chance of a trade off the table.

And by the way, what's with the velocity of our releivers? Sanchez is topping out at 88, and Wise was topping out at 83 tonight. That ain't gonna get it done. Scho and Smith continue to get the job done. I feel like I haven't seen Feliciano pitch in a month. What is that guy in witness protection or something? And Wagner continues to be lights out, despite the roughh outing the other night brought on by the olde fielding error.

Wright slumping

Bart Hubbuch has an interesting column on Wright's recent 9-for-58 (.155) skid in the Post:

...the weight of his recent rough stretch - and the Mets' hitting woes overall - is starting to wear on the third baseman.

"I can't do what I've been doing, which is to ride that emotional roller coaster where I'm living and dying with every at-bat," said Wright, a career .309 hitter who is batting just .262 this season. "I know there are going to be streaks."

...No one is taking Wright's drought harder than the 25-year-old himself. He was one of the first Mets to show up four hours before a game at Dodger Stadium this week to take extra batting practice, and he continues to work constantly with hitting coach Howard Johnson to find a solution.

"He's just been over-swinging," Johnson said. "That's going to happen in the course of a year. We'll keep making adjustments. He's going to get back to going off the way he used to do. I'm convinced of that."

Glad to hear that he takes his job seriously and is showing up early for B.P., but does self-flagellation help in this situation?

It makes me (and most fans) feel better, but is the player who sleeps well at night whether he hits for the cycle or takes an o-fer more likely to rebound from a slump than one who is "living and dying with each AB"?

Just wondering...

Guess who?

Guess who's #1 in NL with 34 RBIs right now?

A: The x-man, xavier nady. He's also got the 5th best BA in NL.

Pretty surprising, considering how bad the pirates are.

And so it continues..

Good stuff

Take 2 of 3 from D-backs, wagner is throwing some filthy stuff, and church absolutely had a gun from foul territory to throw burke out at 3rd on that overthrow error by feliciano.

Chip caray...

...is by far the most annoying announcer in all of sports. Besides the fact that he is a complete tool and knows nothing about baseball, he is just downright irritating. Stupid statements like "there goes the no-hit bid" when johan gives up a single in the first inning are typical of his mind-numbingly dumb commentary. I always hated having to listen to him call mets-braves games on TBS.

Back in action

Hey there Mets fans, I'm back in action (unlike the sun here apparently).

That was a huge Braves series for Mets last weekend, with the Mets picking up the wins against Hudson and Smoltz. Those are big wins for down the stretch, especially since we beat their #1 and 2 even without matching up against our #1 and 2. Definitely a nice effort.

I'm glad Wags did what Willie should be doing - tearing Perez and the rest of the team. Granted, he probably should have kept it to a closed players-only meeting, rather than the press. But it is about time the starting rotation and the offense got a verbal kick in the ass. The predictability of this 5 IP, 100 pitches routine is absurd, and the anemic averages from Beltran and Delgado are killers.

Fredo made a point in an earlier comment that the starters are basically on a 100 pitch count, which is why they are pulled when they are. I agree, but I'd say it's time to push that count up to 120 for a few starts for Perez and Pelfrey and maybe even Maine. Force them to step up and know before a game they are going to have to find a way to pitch more effectively. Either these pitchers simply don't have an effective out pitch (in which case we are not going to win the WS with them), or they aren't staying focused (in which case Wags is dead on). The bullpen is right to complain that they can't be expected to pick up 4 innings of every game except when Johan starts. The only pitcher I'd excuse from this is Figueroa, because I don't expect a ton from a 5th starter (who is realistically our 7th or 8th starter on depth charts), and he has been above and beyond what I'd expect from him.

As for Perez specifically, he is staying true to form. He continues to have a very binomial distribution, although this year even his best outings haven't been good since they have never gone beyond 6th inning. He's probably managed to drop at least $5 M off the annual salary he will command as a FA with his performance so far. My guess is the Braves will show the most interest in him, since he's been pretty solid against them and they could use a younger arm in the rotation.

Willie to Wags: Zip it! (wink, wink)

If you were to read the words that Willie gave the press, you'd probably think he followed through on the public repudiation of Wags that I was expecting:

"[Wagner] can respond however he wants, but I just told him I thought it was something that should have been kept in-house," Randolph said. "That's how I do business."

But by mixing his messages and granting Wagner the right to trash his teammate, one can surmise that Willie was pretty happy that Wags spoke up, even if Willie can't say so publicly:

"I wouldn't go that route, but that's Billy," Randolph said. "Billy gets a little emotional at times. If he feels that way, that's fine."

Wagging His Tongue

So Wags wants to "stir the pot", eh? Those are his words, by the way.

Going public on the radio to trash a teammate--not his results, mind you, but his effort--is bound to stir the pot and roil the clubhouse.

Billy Wagner expanded on his blunt criticism of Oliver Perez Thursday during his weekly radio spot, saying the Mets will go nowhere this year if the enigmatic lefthander doesn't learn how to battle through his own troubles.

In his weekly interview with Michael Kay on 1050 ESPN Radio, Wagner said Perez has to hold himself accountable for lasting only 12/3 innings Wednesday when the team desperately needed length. "You have to be able to look at yourself and say, 'Is that the best I can do?"' he said.

Speaking before the Mets' chartered flight to Arizona, Wagner said he and others approached Perez before Wednesday's game and told him they needed length.

But what Wagner saw was a pitcher who didn't have his best stuff and didn't fight his way through it. "If he goes out there and battles and comes up short, you know what, we're not going to have a problem with that," he said. "But you have to battle. You have to go out there and find a way."

Wagner's statements may not have helped his clubhouse reputation as a talker -- "I'm probably the least favorite guy in the clubhouse," he said -- but he is not worried about any ramifications. He expected Mets manager Willie Randolph to request a private meeting before the flight, and he seemed more than willing to express the same sentiments to him.

"I want to win and I know everyone in that clubhouse wants to win," Wagner said, "but sometimes you've got to say something. You might have to stir the pot."

Now this is where I expect Willie to have very little flexibility. This kind of stuff is unacceptable. Wags can say whatever he wants to Perez, but keep it behind closed doors. Start a media circus and we'll get four months of the Flushing Zoo.

Wow

Perez managed to walk 5 in 1.2 IP.

So that's 3 dominant performances, and 3 disasters (with this most recent one the worst by a long way)

Q: Do we still need to lock him up NOW?