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Upcoming Expections For The Mets

I understand the season has been hurtful so far.  I also understand that even the worst teams in baseball don’t play this badly, and that they will win more games.  So how do we shake this feeling of doom?

YaGottaBelieveSign

I’m pretty confident in Pelfrey throwing a good game tonight.  I think what he worked on this Spring is going to help a lot, he’s getting less distracted on the mound, and has that cocky confidence that this team needs. 

You never know with Perez, and I worry that the stupid tinkering that Warthen did with Maine was also a failure for Perez, but I think the Mets will have a chance to win the game tomorrow when he pitches. 

Santana is due to bounce back and win one on Saturday.  He’s Johan Santana after all.

Then Maine, who I think gets a huge boost being out from under Warthen’s shackles.  Doesn’t mean he’ll be successful though, especially the first time going back to what’s worked for him, but the numbers are there if you choose to believe. (those numbers being a 4-1 2.75 ERA May last year before surgery in June.  Those numbers being that he was hitting 93 last year, and was 91-92 in the return from surgery in September)  I’m hoping being able to be comfortable will be like a weight off his shoulder and he’ll do just fine.  I’m certainly not ready to believe Maine’s career is over.

Maybe they drop one of those, which would put them at 5-7.  Then they go home for a 10 game home stand where if they go 6-4 they’re back at .500 and go to Philadelphia, a park the Mets love to hit in with hopefully the offense finally clicking, and knock the ball, and 2009, out of the park.

That’s the formula to shake these bad feelings away.  If the Mets can get to Philadelphia near .500 and play well there against an injured Phillies team and assert, even if it’s just for one series, that they’re the better team it will go a long way to returning the confidence to this team, and to it’s fans.

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More Pressure For a Quick Start

ike davisIt’s not just Jerry Manuel and Omar Minaya that have to worry about fast starts to the season or their jobs being in jeopardy.  The same case could be made for Jeff Francoeur,perez Daniel Murphy, and Rod Barajas.  The way Ike Davis, Fernando Martinez, and Josh Thole have been playing in a way this spring that makes you suspect they’ll be knocking at the door to Citi Field sooner rather than later.

With Reyes possibly being out some, or all, of April the pressure on the starting pitching has just doubled.  The most recent report on April suggests that he may be back closer to mid April, but that’s still a rough estimate.

We’ve known for a while that the season was going to hinge on the starting pitching.  The offense was projected to be one of the top in the league, and surely would’ve won some games on it’s own even when the pitching struggled.  With Reyes and Beltran out, they may not have that cushion for a while, but this doesn’t mean the Mets are doomed to a 9-13 type record to start the season.

The fast start is more important than ever, and if Maine, Perez, and Pelfrey can have a good month of April the Mets will still win games.  We all know they’re each capable of pitching good games.  It was expected before the season that they could definitely pitch competitively and keep us in games, but now they may be pressured to actually win the games.  Instead of quality start performances and limiting the opponents to three runs over six innings, stepping up and going seven innings and occasionally limiting the other teams to merely one or two runs becomes important to the Mets early success.

This isn’t to say the Mets lineup is useless, and that they won’t occasionally put up a crooked number, but Jose Reyes and Carlos Beltran are two of the most irreplaceable players in the game today.  The season is never won and lost in April, but if the pitching can step up and win more games than they lose, not only will it minimize the damage caused by losing Reyes and Beltran, it will set them up nicely once they return.

This post, and vibrant discussion about it, also featured on The Real Dirty Mets Blog.

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Reyes Wants You

From MetsStuff

Jose Reyes wants me to cut work on Wednesday to go to the Mets game in the afternoon. Now, he must not realize by how much he’s seen me in the stands that I’m currently unemployed, but I feel obliged to obey; I’ll be at the game Wednesday afternoon. And who wouldn’t want to be given how the Mets are playing? The last five games they won, they won at home, and against Pennsylvania. Winning front and center in front of Mets fans has, and will, go a long way towards making Citi Field home, and making these fans fall back in love with this team.

I was at the game at Saturday, and it was nice and comfortable being at what amounted to a laugher. I was more amused than annoyed at Maholm’s home run 20 feet to my right. I debated things like leaving Ken in to hit and pitch three innings so he could get the save, or if they should finally get Stokes some work (as they did), instead of if they should waste outs bunting or try to steal a base to try to get the lead. It was utterly enjoyable.

Also enjoyable were our seats. Section 103, row 4, seats 1-5. The seats were not completely unreasonable at $40 face value. They turned out to be (as seats 1-8 are behind the camera well in right field) front row seats by the right field foul pole. There were negatives, as we couldn’t really see the scoreboard behind the Pepsi Porch above us, and seats 1,2 and 3 had to contend with the foul pole in front of them, which led to a lot of leaning back and forth the whole game. However, there were plenty of plusses from the perspective. A couple of people in our section started really getting on the RF Brandon Moss. We had a really good view of all plays in RF, including Wright’s triple that Moss missed, and Sheffield’s sliding catch. We also had a very good view of plays at first base. We got to see all the flies to RF arc towards us, and got to judge fair or foul, see them bounce, see the RF range over to make the catch, or miss it.

Tonight’s a big game, not for the Mets necessarily, but for Omar. The chatter is all going to be about how he failed to get Derek Lowe by giving him extra money/years that probably weren’t wise. Oliver Perez struggled, and Lowe succeeded. If the Mets rough up Lowe, it won’t look as lopsided a decision, whereas if they lose, it’ll be all about how Minaya made a mistake. Luckily, Johan Santana is on the mound, and no one doubts that he’s better than either of ’em. Here’s hoping for 8 in a row.

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Big Week Coming Up

Who would’ve predicted a split this weekend? The Philadelphia Phillies played pretty badly, but the Mets had just enough mistakes to lose the game Saturday. That’s pretty much been the Phillies M.O. The past three years; play average-good baseball, and wait for the Mets to cough it up.

The real story is the continuing struggle of Oliver Perez. I really thought this guy would figure it out after a rough spring spent not doing what he should’ve been doing. Maybe it’s going to take more than that, or maybe Dan Warthen just doesn’t know what to do. It looks like he’ll find himself into the minor leagues in some capacity, and hopefully some working on fundamentals, and just working, will help him. He hasn’t even been to ‘bad Ollie’ form, which leads me to believe it’s something else. I expect him to get right and return and have a killer second half. In the meantime…Tim Redding?

I’d like to see the Mets go out tonight and beat on the Braves, getting ready to take down the Phillies at home at Citi Field on Wednesday and Thursday. I look forward to seeing Mike Pelfrey further improve in person on Thursday. It’ll be a big week for the Mets.

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Manuel’s ‘ultimatum’

Manuel’s ‘ultimatum’ to the pitching staff is basically a case of buying low.

He knows they are better than this, and he also knows Redding could be pretty close to coming back and taking Livan’s spot anyway. So he makes this statement about one more time through the rotation and then there will be changes, but he’s really just stating the obvious. He’s taking a bet that the pitching will be better and/or Omar will make a change with the 5th starter. If the pitching gets better, he looks like he got them going, and if they don’t, likely a change will be happening anyway, and he can take credit for it. This is how he’s been winning people over since he’s been in charge.

Anyone watching these games can clearly see that the starting rotation is struggling, but also that they’re like to get better. Perez was reported to have not done what he was supposed to do in Spring Training while at the World Baseball Classic. So he wasn’t quite ‘ready’ when the season came. It’s now three starts later. He hasn’t looked real good, but there have been small signs between a raise in velocity to a couple of key strikeouts that could give you hope if you’re looking for it.

Maine was coming off an injury. I thought it would take him a couple of starts to get going, given the longer layoff from pitching in real games. He’s had some bad moments, but some good ones too. I suspect he’ll start giving some worthwhile performances soon.

Pelfrey is probably what I’d call the least worrisome. He had some tendinitis so they skipped a start, so he’s had even less. He really stepped it up last year, and It’ll probably take him a little while to start getting back to that point, and to adjust to any scouting adjustments made to him. He’s always shown promise, and I see no reason to think he won’t have a good year.

Livan however, might be more of an issue. Besides that Manuel routinely comes out and basically says he has no confidence in him, he doesn’t seem to have much left. He pitched well in the spring, but it looks like he’s getting by on a lot of trickery and smarts. Batters figure him out and he seems to crumble as he gets through the order a couple of times. Hopefully he can give us one more reasonable start, against the Marlins, and then maybe Redding will be available to get us a couple of good starts at least.

Another thing to note is Sheffield; he still appears to be done. We talked about how it was a win-win situation for the Mets, but it really isn’t. It took at-bats away from Church when he was hot. It’s taking at-bats away from Castillo when he’s hot by way of Tatis not having any fill-in time in the outfield and having to find him a place to play. Barring a sudden turn around, I think the Sheffield experiment should be terminated. However, Manuel is playing him again today. A day after getting swept, sitting Murphy another day. Who’s more likely to get a hit? Who’s more likely to score runs for Santana? Who’s more likely to benefit from a day in LF and will be here all year? Hint: It’s not Gary Sheffield.

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First Thoughts

Thoughts after the first series.

 

I like how this team looks, even if Oliver Perez seems to still be three weeks behind and in Spring Training mode. They really lit him up by the second time through the lineup. I’m not worried though, I just think he really did get behind by pitching in the WBC without the oversight to stay in shape. Give him another three weeks with the Mets and I think we’ll see a pretty impressive post-April record for Perez.

 

The offense looks good, despite people trying to read into every failed opportunity with runners in scoring position. It’s going to be an awfully long season if you expect the Mets to hit .350 in those situations, every game. Sometimes it’ll be worse, and sometimes it’ll be better, but by the end of the season I suspect the numbers will be right around career averages and what not. Don’t worry about it right now, I’ve seen more good signs in this regard than bad ones.

 

The bullpen does in fact look revamped, and I’m happy for that. It’s still early though, and our bullpen was fairly decent in April last year too, behind Billy Wagner’s scoreless inning streak.

 

Since Manuel vocalizes every fleeting though, it’s necessary to analyze actions to try to get an understanding of how he feels about players. So far I get the feeling he doesn’t like Castillo much, because if it were me, I’d get Castillo as many at-bats and as many opportunities to succeed prior to coming home, not sit him yesterday. I think he buys into the Church can’t hit lefties thing, since he pinch hit for him yesterday when he was 2/3. I’m not sure if he likes Anderson too much, or is trying to give him every opportunity to come through and prove he could deserve to stay prior to his impending release. I just can’t believe they’d get rid of O’Day instead, because that just doesn’t make sense. Quality, or at least performing, relief help is a lot harder to come by than what Marlon brings to the table.

 

I’m happy with 2-1 for now, but I think it’s important they win this series from the Marlins and come home above .500 with the clubhouse smelling of wins, not of mediocrity.

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All or Nothing

Heres hoping the Mets are cooking tomorrow
Shea was great on Saturday. And hopefully it’ll be great on Sunday. Hopefully this isn’t actually the last game. Either way I’m going to take 6 zillion pictures. It’s going to be insane, and we won’t know the final of the Brewers game until the middle of the Shea Goodbye ceremony, which will make it all the more nerve wracking.

What Johan did was amazing. Oliver Perez never moved from his spot leaning on the railing in the front of the dug out, and was one of the first out to congratulate him. Here’s hoping he was taking notes.

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A Perez Idea

An Idea

This is just an idea I had yesterday while watching the game. Oliver Perez was obviously struggling, again, late in the game. I don’t really have a problem with Willie pulling him, although I would’ve left him in, but something needs to be done with this guy. I was thinking about this in the 5th, and here’s what I would’ve liked to see.

Just leave him in.

Let him give up 15 runs. Go to the mound, tell him Heilman and Sosa are sitting back and having a soda and he’s finishing six innings no matter what happens. Perez has strived in pressure situations right? So take away the ‘safety net’ so to speak. Let him learn something about himself, and figure out how to get himself out of these situations, because it’s an important lesson a good pitcher needs to learn.

Would this be an irreparable blow to his confidence if he did give up 15 runs? I don’t really buy into that irreparable stuff anyway, but Perez has already had those in Pittsburgh before coming to the Mets and he managed to bounce back. We know he has great stuff, the problem is it’s a coin flip on whether he’ll be able to throw those great pitches. What will make him take that step to a great pitcher is being able to climb back to that peak after he’s fallen out of stride during a game/inning/batter.

With Santana, Willie can prepare to use the best guys out of the bullpen and mentally prepare for which guys are going to come in that day, because Santana will pitch to within an inning or so of expectation nine out of ten times. Even John Maine usually can be expected to be pretty consistent, even if that consistency is a lower amount of reliable innings. However, with Perez there is still always that possibility that he walks 14 batters in the second inning and you need to piece together the rest of the game. If Willie leaves Perez in there last night, maybe he learns something. Or maybe we lose the game, which we did anyway, and the bullpen gets an extra inning of rest that it might need for tonight.

Getting Perez and most of the starters an extra inning or two I think could be the biggest key to this season. It would allow Willie to use his relievers that are struggling less, and able to go with the hot guys. It doesn’t matter what bullpen you have, if you have to use too many pitchers in one game, likely someone won’t be on his game that day.

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Ups and Downs

As harrowing as Tuesday’s game was, last night’s game was pleasant. It was basically against a minor league team, but it still counts. Oliver Perez still pitched well, and the offense still swung the bats well.

One thing it was good to see was runs in the top of the 9th to make it 13 to 0. There was no mailing it in, or signs that anyone thought ‘Hey, maybe we got enough tonight.’ Excepting Casanova, the rest of the bench and bullpen got their first appearances out of the way. Billy Wagner managed to come into a non-save situation and not pitch like me.

The news about Pedro is not good. Four to six weeks plus rehabilitation. The biggest impact this has is on Mike Pelfrey. If Pelfrey can figure out how to be consistent and pitch like he seems to be capable of, Pedro will barely be missed. We’ll see how that goes, against Glavine of all people, on Saturday. Maybe Pelfrey will make his case that it’s him that will replace Glavine’s innings from last year, and that Santana’s are just icing on the cake.

The baseball season is here, and it’s even been christened with it’s first wrinkle. You didn’t really think the entire season was going to be as easy as Monday did you?