From Now On, I'm sticking to the story that Fred Wilpon bought me pizza

Reyes Tosses

I didn’t interview any players.  I was just awestruck and honored just being there up close, watching them prepare for a game.  Walked up to the edge of the grass, watching the Mets take infield practice, batting practice, play catch, and chat and joke with each other.  I could see the players, hear the players clearly, and make out individual blades of grass.  I saw Angel Pagan take throws from Ike Davis at second base.  I saw Albert Pujols swing at BP pitches.  I saw Tony LaRussa play first base. (yes I did!) I was within inches of Jose Reyes and other such players as they walked by me into the dugout.  It was a surreal and wonderful experience.

Cardinals first base depth chart is real weak

I met (or re-met) a lot of fellow bloggers, and that was also a very cool experience.  I had a beer with Rustyjr of The Real Dirty Mets Blog, and Kerel Cooper of On the Black at McFadden’s before we went in and I ate “dinner” with Kerel, Shannon of Mets Police and Joe Janish of Mets Today in the Caesar’s Club.  I had conversations with a half dozen other fellow bloggers and I don’t even remember them all!

Ed Coleman Interviews Jerry Manuel while bloggers mingle in the background

Watching the game next to and in front of half my Twitter feed was a lot of fun, even if I felt in the 20^th century for not having a data plan to tweet live as many of them were doing. Sometimes they were even tweeting back and forth to each other from five feet away.  Why yes, we’re all basically baseball nerds.  I just enjoyed the level of understanding and knowledge of the game going on around me, the discussions about bullpens and usage and over managing.  It’s nice to watch a game with people that truly understand what’s going on more than the average shouting half-drunk fan.  Although we did have plenty of that, as one rather vocal fan to the left of us wouldn’t shut up the entire game.  Anthony De Rosa of Hot Foot dubbed him Will Ferrell.

The game itself was a roller coaster.  It was fun to see the Mets fight back, and if they hadn’t been struggling and weren’t falling too far behind the Braves, it’s a game you’d shrug off as a tough loss but one with a lot of plusses.  We’re past “moral victories” at this point in the season however, I’ll take a “should’ve lost” game like the one in San Francisco over this any day at this point.

Full Album

The lack of Mets history in Citi Field was one of the biggest complaints about the place last year.  More so than even Pelfrey letting Jody Gerut hit the first home run in the place.  Even if you only go to a few games this year, this should be near the top of the list of options.  It’s honoring one of our greatest teams.  Great players who we enjoyed rooting for for many years and the leaders who helped get them there.   True Mets.   It doesn’t matter what they did off the field or later in their careers in lesser leagues.  They did something for Mets fans that can never be erased, and to miss out on that for petty reasons like inflation, personal feelings about current players or administrators, or the organization or park not being precisely how you like it is just sad.  It’s one thing if it doesn’t fit into your schedule, your personal finances, or you’re flat out busy that day, but it’s quite another to make a specific effort NOT to go.    If you’re going to stop celebrating the best parts of the Mets history, what are you going to celebrate?

If we’re getting poetic about it, I’m going to predict that the deciding runs of this game are scored via a grand slam home run by Carlos Beltran off of an Adam Wainwright curveball.

I hope it’s not, but if they fail it may mean the figurative end to their season.  The next two weeks are very critical, and the first order of business is just flat out winning games.  The Mets have played very well at home this year, and they’ve got three games against the tough Cardinals, and then three against the not so tough Diamondbacks.  There can be no excuses: They have to win games.  Omar’s job, provided he still has one, is to bring in reinforcements after that.  The trading deadline is next weekend, and the Mets are in need of some help.  No longer can they play waiting games or decide they don’t like the price.  When you drop as many games in the standings as the Mets did, you no longer have the luxury of pretending you’re not desperate for help.

After the Diamondbacks the Mets again head on the road.  It’s this road trip that could prove to be critical, as they face the Braves and the Phillies.  The Braves have been amazing lately, and the Mets have been making just about every other ballpark look to them like Turner Field did around the turn of the century.  By falling so far back, it’s become imperative that they make up ground by beating the competition in front of them.  Losing and falling further behind could very well be a death blow.

The Mets have been extremely streaky this year and they really are much better than they’ve shown lately.  If they take that streak and turn it into a hot stretch where they’re again a team that’s tough to beat, they could climb right back into this race.  There is still a lot of baseball to be played and August could be a good month for them.  After they play the division rivals on the road, they come home for the Rockies and the Phillies before going on a road trip that one would describe similarly to the Cleveland-Baltimore trip they took that they were successful on: they play the Astros and the Pirates.  Another home stretch with the Marlins and the Astros provides plenty of time to fight their way back into this race before facing the Braves again at the end of the month.

Can the Mets ace this next test and fight their way back into relevancy again?  I don’t know.  Neither answer would surprise me, but I’m certain they’re capable of it.  They often say you need to get hot at the right time and if the Mets can capitalize on that by beating up on the division rivals, as the Phillies did in 2007, they can certainly win this division.

This changeup defies its definition

And that seems to be the crux of the problem with Oliver Perez.  How is gameday classifying that pitch as a changeup?  I understand Oliver Perez mostly sucks this year.  It seems like pitch selections like this is the main reason, and I don’t see how they didn’t have him working on this while he was in rehab, or how they promoted him again without fixing it.

I’m no Pitch F/X expert, but I know that Perez should be throwing this pitch slower.  He throws his fastball around 88-89, which you hope would build up over time, but regardless, you have to throw the changeup no higher than 80mph if this is the case.  He does have a slider that’s in the 70s for the offspeed part of his game, but he’s stopped throwing the curve entirely this year.

Oliver’s biggest problem does not seem to be his velocity, although you would like that to be higher.  His mechanics have never been good, which accounts for a lot of fluctuation at times in his pitches and may be the cause of that missing 2mph on his fastball.  Still, the biggest issue here seems to be pitch selection and game plan.  We know he’s billed as a head case, but I’m sure those accounts are exaggerated.  What he should’ve been working on is selecting his pitches better and setting up hitters.  If he’s capable of throwing so many pitches, slider, curveball, fastball, 4-seam fastball, changeup, and cutter, he’s capable of setting up hitters to look foolish.  He’s got enough command of those pitches that he can keep batters from sitting on the 88mph fastball.

It’s not enough to just say he’s a lost cause and dismiss him.  You can’t excuse Dan Warthen or Rod Barajas because Ollie’s a head case.  He’s had success before, and coaching/selection is their job.  How is Oliver Perez still doing things like throwing a fastball and changeup at the same speed to the same batter?  Am I missing something?  If you’ve got some advanced knowledge of pitching/pitches that you can share, please pass it along.  I find it hard to believe that gameday/fangraphs is just guessing at what pitches he’s throwing or that he’s throwing them by accident.

“Write it down, the Yankees are going to go out and get Roy Oswalt.  After seeing Hughes take a step back last night, and Pettitte on the DL, there is no way, NO WAY bro, that the Yankees don’t get this guy.  And what will the Mets do? Nothing.  What a pathetic game last night.  I don’t care what the numbers say, Beltran needs to sit down until he’s up to speed.  They made a mistake bringing this guy back so fast.  I know Francoeur isn’t hitting but he’s too valuable as a leader to mess with the chemistry.  And no one else is hitting anyway!  At least Francoeur you know you’re getting good defense out there.  I really think the Mets made a mistake bringing Castillo and Oliver Perez, and don’t get me started on this bum who should be pitching for Japan right now or something.  All we heard about was how good the chemistry was on this team and then you throw these malcontents back into the mix and look what happens!   And what is Omar doing?  Will you make a trade Omar? What are you waiting for?!”

It’s easy to overreact to slumps and scoring droughts, but the Mets have the talent to make the playoffs this year.   There is a lot of time left, including plenty of games left against the division leading Braves.  Destiny is in their own hands.  Beltran is getting up to speed, Jose Reyes is supposedly just about recovered, and Luis Castillo is set to return by next weekend.  Johan’s a second half pitcher, more help may be on the way, and Ike Davis may rebound from his first major slump a better player.  The second half of the season is going to be very exciting, and I can’t wait.

How about THIS for a bullpen? *drools*

I went to the All-Star Game, on a whim, in 2006.  It really changed how I felt about the game in general.  I had a blast, and I can’t wait to get back to another one, or for it to hopefully be at Citi Field in 2013.   It was like being at a party devoted to baseball.

Here’s the article I wrote about it, in 2007.  Mid-Summer Excitement

If the Mets win this series they will be respected throughout the league as contenders.  They’ll be brought up in all trade talks for big acquisitions.  When analysts adjust their season predictions, the Mets will make it onto a lot of their lists.  David Wright will again be recognized as one of the best players in the game, people will stop taking as many pot shots at the Mets, their minor league system, their medical staff and their decision making.

If they lose and fall four or more games back from the division lead things won’t be as rosy during the break.  Analysts will find a way to justify their decision in the winter that the Mets have too many holes to make the playoffs.  They’ll talk up Bobby Cox, they’ll talk about the Phillies having a good second half.  Jose Reyes will be described as injury prone.  Carlos Beltran will be portrayed as an 80 year old grandma that can’t walk, much less play CF.  They’ll question Jerry Manuel and Omar Minaya and their ability to do their job.

All off the results of one series.  If a sweep happens either way, the reactions will be even more extreme.

The series is really not that big a deal.  It’s an important series to try to win and not let the Braves get too far ahead, but even if they’re four games out going into the break, that’s hardly insurmountable given how many games they still play against each other.    Still, it’s a chance for the Mets to put the first half to rest on a positive note, take a deep breath, and soar into the second half with the addition of Carlos Beltran.

If you’re headed out to Citi Field for any of these games, the Mets are having a fan appreciation weekend.  They’re doing a lot of seat upgrades, signed giveaways, and handing out gift cards.  On Sunday 25 lucky fans will receive game-worn jerseys.  Enjoy!

Is this really any different than an NFL coach throwing a challenge flag? It does have a lot of similiarities, butthe game last night lacked one big part of what the NFL does: They didn’t go look at video replays. Some of the very valid arguments against instant replay, and ones I agree with, are with delay of game issues and freezing action on the game to correct the call. There are a lot of things that would need to be worked out to get any sort of instant replay to be effective and accepted.

All of those problems were still evident last night, but without the benefit of technology to verify that the call was correct. We got all of the drawbacks without any of the benefit. Umpires either need to stand by the calls as they are made, with the possible exception of a different umpire being 100% certain that the call was wrong because the original umpire that made the call was blocked or didn’t see it, or use instant replay to get it correct. Standing around and discussing it and guessing at what happened is not benefiting anyone.