Trade Wagner NOW!!!!

[Willets Point]

Needed to be said.

[Guest cooby]

I wish there was a way that Wagner would have to take that loss, sigh

[Guest old original jb]

Looper.

[smg58]

On one hand -- it's too early for that.

On the other hand -- he's screwed like Armando. Benitez didn't just blow two big leads in successive weekends, he blew them against the Braves. And Wagner didn't simply blow a four-run lead by refusing to throw strikes, he did it against the Yankees. He could spend the next four years being every bit the pitcher we paid for, but he won't be forgiven for this.

[TransMonk]

I blame Willie, can we trade him?

It's inexcusable to send your closer out in a non save situation. Especially after he pitched very well last night.

[Guest KC]

I said it in the IGT, why did Wags have to come in with a 4-0 lead after
pitching last night? Jeez, factor in it's day game after a night game and
it's even more whacky.

[smg58]

You could have second-guessed Valentine in both Benitez games too -- the first followed two straight games where Benitez entered the game in the eighth, and the second was a four run lead where Leiter was moving right along. But nobody dwells on that. And for the money Wagner makes, you ought to be able to count on him to at least find the strike zone the second day.

[Guest KC]

The money he makes? C'mon.

[Frayed Knot]

I simply never saw the point in removing Sanchez as he wasn't PH for and didn't throw a lot of pitches during his one inning. Changing in favor of Wagner reeks of switching just for the sake of switching. No reason for it.

But, having said all that, let's not act as if the situation determined the results. Bringing Wagner in at that point didn't make the resultant disaster any more likely to occur than it would have been with someone else in there, merely an unnecessary waste of rescources that blew up in our faces. The burden's all on Wagner here for the meltdown; totally inexplicable and unexcusable, especially since it was facing that soft underbelly of a patchwork lineup.
Yeah, Willie was one batter too slow in yanking him but getting out of it by then would have required a ton of tap-dancing no matter who was called.



I feel sick.

[Guest Edgy DC]

No point in removing Sanchez.

The money is irrelevant. The point is to win, not to get some kind of refund if they don't get as much as they pay for.

[Guest cleonjones11]

I was at this mess today...and Wagner is toast in NY...The Mets with little starting pitching... 81-81..new manager next year. No heart this team

Yes. Shea is still a windy cold dump that overserves beerdrinkers..not for families!

[G-Fafif]

Perspective deserts one after days like this...

http://faithandfear.blogharbor.com/blog/cmd=post_comment/article_id=1972523/parent_id=637268

Yes, trade Wagner. And throw in Randolph.

[Guest KC]

I doubt Fonz wears an XL jersey.

[G-Fafif]

Benefit of the doubt.

[Guest Johnny Dickshot]

If the 3, 4 and 5 hitters could manage to drive in Matsui from 2nd with no outs, we'd have been in Juliotown going into the 9th and may have Wiilieproofed the inning. That's what kills me.

[Guest Bret Sabermetric]

Never doubt Willie's ability to overcome Willieproofing. The man's an incorrigible clueless nincompoop.

He's hopeless. You know more about the menstrual cycle of the Yeti than he does about managing a baseball team.

Yesterday was the one of the high points of his long Yankee career.

He combines the self-righteousess of Jeff Torborg with the intellectual rigor of Art Howe.

He has Fredo Corleone's disciplined self-assurance, Captain Ahab's mental flexibility, Norman Bates' firm grasp of reality, and Travis Bickel's suave charm.

The man is a disaster. His days as a Met manager are numbered--the numbers are still high, but he's a dead man walking.

[MFS62]

If I'm Pedro (Poor Bastard) Martinez, and I see Billy Wagner coming in to "protect" another one of my leads, I'm gonna' do a Nancy Kerrigan on him.

Later

[Guest Hillbilly]

How long does it take for a guy to get a good night sleep again after doing something like that?

I hope Billy recovers in a hurry, because I'm sure his head hurts today.

[smg58]

KC wrote: The money he makes? C'mon.

My point was that while you can certainly debate whether Wagner needed to be brought in (I'd have stuck with Sanchez in case we needed Wagner today), there was no reason in advance to even entertain the possibility of the kind of implosion that he had. He pitched one easy inning on Friday, after sitting out the Cardinals series. If you need to be concerned about whether that constitutes overwork, he was a rather bad investment.

As far as leaving Wagner in too long, which manager doesn't leave their closer in too long in those situations? (Answer: only the ones already harboring doubts about which of their pitchers belongs in that role.) The fact that Willie took him out when the Mets still had the lead actually puts him ahead of a lot of managers in that situation. If Rivera comes in with a four run cushion and gets in that kind of trouble, would Torre pull him before Randolph pulled Wagner? Valentine didn't pull Benitez in the first Braves game until it was tied, and it wasn't any less obvious he needed to come out.

The bottom line is, Wagner failed the team spectacularly yesterday. It's one game, but it was against the Yankees, and everyone will remember it for as long as Wagner's a Met. Benitez dealt with more flak than he deserved, and I don't see how Wagner avoids the same fate.

[HahnSolo]

I really don't want to defend Billy after all that's happened this season, and I wasn't on line for the IGT to know if this has been mentioned, but I'll say a few things on his behalf about the ninth. I thought he was squeezed on both ARod and Cabrera, and believe either or both of them should have been punched out on strikes; and I think Reyes should have, at the very least, knocked down the ball that scored the first run of the inning.

But that said, it's May 21, and five times Wagner has not gotten the job done (if you include the Betemit HR in the extra inning win over Atlanta). That's hard to stomach.

[Guest KC]

You're basically right smg, I was a little steamed at 5:22 pm yesterday.

[Willets Point]

I think it's premature to suggest trading Wagner now. I mean everyone has a bad day and he's better than other options out there. Did you see him whiff those batters in the 9th tonight?

[Frayed Knot]

Willets Point wrote: I think it's premature to suggest trading Wagner now.

Well Willets, I don't think the dope that started this thread was all that serious about trading him anyway (although I could be wrong).
Besides, one of the reasons Wagner signed here was for those all important three words - say 'em with me folks: No. Trade. Clause.

[Willets Point]

Yea, that dope who started this thread is a total dick.

[Guest holychicken]

Yeah, last night really gave me confidence in him again. Sure, he gave up to hits, but one was a little looper to right and the other was a routine groundout to third (if the Wright had been in a regular position). Oh, and the best part is that HE DIDN'T WALK ANYONE!!!!

I freakin hate walks.

Don't trade him yet. Let me try to break a few more things when he pitches first.

[Elster88]

Bad call Willie.

[seawolf17]

This is something I will never, ever, ever, ever understand, and I blame Tony LaRussa and Dennis Eckersley for the downfall of baseball as we know it. So Willie brings Wagner in the game in a "non-save" situation. Hey, folks, guess what? He blew the fucking game. That's a blown save in my book. If you come in up eight runs and give up eight runs, then you blew the goddamn save.

It seems like these "closers" get it in their effing heads that they are so effing special that they can't come in unless it'll benefit the "SV" column on the back of their baseball card. Well, guess what, Billy? You created an effing save situation by walking the effing ballpark. So once you're in the effing save situation that you effing create, effing un-create it. Poor Pedro Feliciano comes into a practically unsaveable save situation and is tagged with a "BS" even though that's BS and you know it. You should petition the official scorer to have that BS removed from Pedro's record and slapped into your 2006 game log so the whole world can see it.

Argh.

[Elster88]

seawolf17 wrote: This is something I will never, ever, ever, ever understand, and I blame Tony LaRussa and Dennis Eckersley for the downfall of baseball as we know it. So Willie brings Wagner in the game in a "non-save" situation.

Willie made a bad call because he brought in Wagner right after he had pitched about 17 hours ago, when he should have just left a strong-looking Sanchez alone to finish the game. If Sanchez had also pitched the night before, I wouldn't have a problem with Willie's move.

Personally, I'm not saying he made a bad call just because he brought Wagner in for a non-save situation.

[Guest Edgy DC]

That's the real issue to me also.

Any time a pitcher enters a game, you take the chance that a guy who isn't on is entering a game. So it behooves you to make as few changes as possible.

You make changes when (a) the previous guy is pitching ineffectively, ( the previous guy has grown weary, © the previous guy is clearly overmatched.

That's 0-3 from my perspective. At the beginning of the season, it could be argued that © was true, but I don't think anybody would argue today that a Duaner Sanchez who has entered the game and established that he's on is categorically beneath a Billy Wagner who pitched the night before and whether or not he has his better stuff is unknown.

[nymr83]

Edgy DC wrote: That's the real issue to me also. Any time a pitcher enters a game, you take the chance that a guy who isn't on is entering a game. So it behooves you to make as few as possible. You make changes when (a) the previous guy is pitching ineffectively, ( the previous guy has grown weary, (c) the previous guy is clearly overmatched.

Amen. i hate taking out a pitcher who is cruising, you never so know what the next guy will have that night even if he's a better pitcher, and while i'm fine with taking out a bradford/feliciano/julio to give way to a sanchez/wagner theres no reason to take out Sanchez if he's just had an easy inning.