Gwreck

Omar was hanging around the dugout pregame - the first sighting of him I've seen this trip. Don't know if there's anything to read into that but he team obviously needs some sort of kick on the ass. Not much worth saying about the game but everybody already knows that. Off to live it up/drown sorrows on the Sunset Strip.

We didn't have the front row bit that was our section and when the annoying Dbacks fans left after the 11th, it was my duty to take those empty front-row seats. Spotted during this debacle: Chris Carter, on the top step for all of the last 6 innings, clutching David's bat, and cheering each improbable out recorded by Oliver. Jose Reyes taking special effort to congratate Oliver completing the 12th. The Mets at least taking this personally. There were a lot of four letter words used after the numerous bad plate appearances.

C'mon, we all know Jerry isn't putting Frankie in until we have a lead and/or are out of pitchers.

Make all the jokes you want but I think their bullpen actually gets worse after Heilman. Lots of Mets fans here making noise. I have a bad feeling about this one, though.

I thought Aaron Heilman was closing games for them (and he did warm in the 'pen tonight) but they had another guy, Juan Gutierrez, who came on for the save tonight. Apparently Kris Benson is also their property. Joel Youngblood is the third base coach. Ex-Dbacks on the Mets: Barajas.

From the free game program handed out at the park: "...the most exciting day of my baseball career was he day I got traded to the Mets, because it was my childhood team growing up, and my second-favorite day was when I got traded away, partly because I didn't have such a good second year."

What a load of crap. I didn't see any techs hurriedly running around when the technical difficulties hit but I do recall GKR joking about their equiptment truck not having any AC. Was 113 here today so that might've done it. I agree that this we the best lineup we've had on the field all year and had we actually broken through in the first I think we would have won. It didn't strike me as the usual type of disaster-game but regardless, this losing has got to stop. In other trivial news, Pelfrey and Barajas were yuking it up during BP and Barajas was wearing Pelfrey's jersey. I didn't think they had much to be laughing about, personally. It looks like they still haven't broken in the new knuckleball catching mitt yet - it was still being broken in during warmups. I did appreciate that Barajas throws knuckleballs to the other catchers during practice.

Game was a total mess from the 9th inning on. I was sure that Ishikawa was safe at home but he way Cuzzi was calling things it was as if he was giving a make-up call. It seems to me that he's not usuly mentioned with the Angel Hernandez-CB Bucknor-Joe West troika but perhaps he should. In addition to the terrible calls, he twice provoked confrontations with the Mets, first early in the game with Razor Shines re: whether a Giants player's foot was outside the batter's box, and then again in the 9th with Francisco.

I really wanted Thole to pinch hit for Blanco there. I have no doubt that Jerry was able to hear me suggest same.

I really did like the park quite a bit, but on the "was it as nice as Pittsburgh?" "Was it as nice as Seattle?" it doesn't quite surpass those (Although I do disagree with bmfc1 about the food -- I liked that quite a bit). I do agree though that there were a LOT of really, really obnoxious Giants fans. And this wasn't Philly or the Bronx where there is usually a pretty high percentage of Mets fans behaving badly while on the road. There might've been 5% Mets in the house but after my own experience, plus what bmfc1 reported along with another Mets fan I caught up with in attendance, and the reports all being similar I don't think it was just a small sample of people. I don't really get it either -- we're not the freaking Dodgers (or Athletics) fans. As for the game itself, I saw JCL mention that Carlos' pursuit of deep fly balls wasn't exactly Beltran-like and I'd have to agree. The triple was very encouraging for the running but one of my favorite parts of the Carlos Beltran experience is that every fly ball seems to get caught, and that certainly wasn't the case. at this game. Hopefully this is just an adjustment period because if we want to win anything this year he's going to need to be very sharp at Citi Field. I also thought using Rodriguez in the meaningless 8th inning was stupid.

No Mets BP today. Field was occupied by the Giants' family softball game. Your CPF well repesented at this game - hat tip to bmfc1 for stopping by to say hi. Cha-cha bowl and garlic fries both very much lived up to expectations.

Giants: Andres Torres CF Freddy Sanchez 2B Aubrey Huff LF Buster Posey C Pat Burrell LF Juan Uribe 3B Pablo Sandoval 1B Edgar Renteria SS Matt Cain P

Mets: Pagan Cora Wright Beltran Davis Bay Barajas Tejada Takahashi

Today is Tim Lincecum bobblehead day at AT&T Park. Lines are thousands deep over an hour before gates open. These people are insane.

Ceetar wrote: I just realized, is there no 200 level at Citi Field? The suites.

Wanted a better showing to start the second half but it was Lincecum, after all. With this game he earns what I beleive is his first-ever win over the Mets.

Off to the west coast to represent your CPF at the All Star game Mets/NL West tilts in SF, ARZ and LA. Thanks in advance for keeping my seat warm for me for when I return.

This Year Giants are 47-41, 4th place in the NL West but only 4 games behind San Diego. They�ve been up and down, and were hovering around .500 before sweeping 4 in Milwaukee and then taking 2 of 3 in Washington immediately prior to the break. The Mets used to do very poorly at AT&T (formerly SBC Park, formerly PacBell) Park which opened in 2000: they were 1-13 in their first 14 games (including playoffs) there. Recent times have been better and they�ve won the series in San Francisco each of the last 4 years. The Giants were in New York in early May: you may recall our catchers each hitting walkoff home runs to win the first two games. The third game, which went to the Giants, featured an Oliver Perez debacle, a gutty comeback, the bullpen blowing the game, and David getting ejected arguing balls and strikes with no position players left on the bench in what was one of the more frustrating losses of this year. Pitching Matchups Thursday: R.A. Dickey vs. Tim Lincecum ® � 10:15 PM EDT 9-4, 3.16 ERA is a bit of a down year for Lincecum coming off his Cy Young Awards each of the past two years. 131 Ks (leads NL) and 48 walks in his 117 innings so far. He was the Giants starter in the aforementioned rubber game earlier this year and was good but not great. Davis was 2-2 with a walk off him, including a big RBI single in the 6th that started the Mets� first rally of the game. It helped that we kept his pitch count up and he was out after 6 innings. Friday: Jon Niese v. Barry Zito (L) � 10:15 PM EDT Hard to believe it�s already the mid-point of Zito�s fourth year with the Giants and that this might be the first one where he finishes with an ERA under 4. He�s 7-4, 3.76 ERA. Not much change in the K or BB rates but the hits (and homers) allowed are down this year. There are still 3 (plus an option/buyout) more years on his contract. Zito last faced the Mets in August 2009; he lost 3-0 and was bested by Bobby Parnell in Parnell�s first major league start. Pagan nailed him with a leadoff homer. Saturday: Mike Pelfrey v. Matt Cain ® � 9:05 PM EDT Cain (6-8, 3.34 ERA) was arguably the Giants best pitcher for a while this year until a string of bad outings. He had run off 5 straight starts of 7+ innings, 1 or fewer earned runs before several tough outings right before the break, including getting knocked around by Houston and Washington. Fun fact: he�s the youngest member of the Giants� rotation despite having more ML experience than either Lincecum or Sanchez. Cain beat the Mets twice last year and nearly killed David Wright in the process. By all accounts he�s a nice guy but anything less than a full-fledged beatdown of him would be disappointing. Sunday: Johan Santana v. Jonathan Sanchez (L) � 4:05 PM EDT Sanchez (7-6, 3.47 ERA) strikes out a lot of batters but of course is occasionally prone to wildness and high pitch counts that take him out of games early. He faced the Mets in May and got a no-decision with a pretty good outing, giving up 3 runs (all solo homers � 2 for Ike and 1 for Barajas) in 7 innings. Giants Hitters Catcher-of-the-future Buster Posey ® was promoted on May 30, and given the starting job when Bengie Molina was traded to Texas. He�s off to an extremely hot start, .350/.389/.569, and 7 homers in 95 ABs. Was just named NL player of the week. Posey has also seen some time at first to keep his bat in the lineup when he�s not catching. 1B Recently, Travis Ishikawa (L) was in a semi-platoon with Pat Burrell ®; against righties, Ishikawa plays first with Aubrey Huff in the outfield; against lefties, Burrell gets some playing time with Huff at first. Ishikawa is very good defensively and has hit in limited time (.932 OPS in 65 ABs). Burrell was picked up on June 4 after Tampa cut him and has 5 homers in 91 ABs with the Giants (.849 OPS). 2B Freddy Sanchez ® came off the DL and has been hitting a lot of singles. .285/.348/.360 3B Pablo Sandoval (S) will really need to pick things up if the Giants are going to do anything this year. Has only 6 homers and a line of .263/.322/.382. SS Juan Uribe ®, with 12 homers and 50 RBI: .251/.320/.438. LF Aubrey Huff (L) has exceeded expectations to become the team�s best hitter this year: 39 XBHs, .295/.384/.544 CF Aaron Rowand ® still excellent with the glove but terrible (again) with the bat: .238/.281/.400. RF Nate Schierholtz, .685 OPS in 160 ABs. OF Andres Torres (S) is actually 4th on the team in ABs, with 263 and has a .281/.378/.483 and sees regular time at all 3 OF spots. Backup Catcher Eli Whiteside ® is nothing special .263/.327/.463 but had 2 good games against the Mets in May. Bullpen We saw closer Brian Wilson ® pitch the 8th inning on Tuesday in the ASG. He�s been very good this year, with 50 Ks in 37.2 innings, with only 16 walks and 1 homer allowed. He got a 5-out save (all Ks) in the rubber game earlier this year. Mets had no trouble last year with him, though including 2 games he lost and a blown save in a 3rd. If we should be so unfortunate to see Wilson save a game this series, he is going to make a series of hand gestures that are some sort of tribute to his father and his Christian beliefs but have also been mocked by the Dodgers. I�m sure his motives are pure but showboating is still showboating, Brian. Just ask our closer. Sergio Romo ® served up the Barajas and Blanco homers but has been pretty solid otherwise, with a 2.21 ERA, 37 Ks, 8 walks and 26 hits in 36.2 innings. Other key relievers: Chris Ray ®, recently acquired from Texas in the Bengie Molina deal. Combined stats: 21 K/18 BB/26 H in 38.1 IP, 3.05 ERA. Our old friend Guillermo Mota ®, 19 K/15 BB/31 H in 33.2 IP, 3.21 ERA Jeremy Affeldt (L), 28 K/20 BB/36 H in 31.2 IP, 4.5 ERA Denny Bautista ®, 35 K/23 BB/21 H in 28 IP, 2.89 ERA. Injuries Their top left reliever, Dan Runzler, dislocated his left kneecap in his first major league at-bat and is out another 6 weeks. 5th starter Todd Wellemeyer strained his right thigh after trying to beat out a double play in early June and hasn�t returned yet. Ex-Mets Mota Ex-Giants None Splash Hits Since the park opened, there have been 72 balls hit into McCovey Cove on the fly. 32 were by Bonds, 20 by other Giants players and 20 by visiting players. (Officially, only the ones hit by the Giants are considered �splash hits.�) Interestingly, despite not playing in San Francisco very often, the Mets lead all visiting teams with 4 (2 each from Floyd and Delgado). Here�s hoping Ike can help the Mets pad their lead.

TransMonk wrote: Was everyone required to wear those Cervelli helmets? I hate those. Makes everyone look like they have tiny heads. They weren't required but it was a deliberate attempt to get everyone to wear them. I believe David said "that's what they gave us." They look less stupid if everyone is wearing them and of course they offer much better protection...

Put it in the books!

Who would you rather have pitching here: Brian Wilson or Francisco Rodriguez?

They actually gave him a DOUBLE on that? Error, all the way.

Let's be thankful that Heath Bell has already been used and is out of the game. I guess Broxton is the NL Closer tonight.