Frayed Knot

And you can add another one to our 'We suck at bunting' tally.

We let Hand off the hook (which is different from giving early Mets pitcher Jay Hook a hand) by forcing him to throw 20+ pitches/inning but not being able to push anything across. Now we're going to have to score probably by seeing a new pitcher each inning or so. Letting Hechavarria on twice in a row leading off an inning without a hit (1 BB, 1 E) isn't a good idea either.

[fimg=400:1k3a568h]http://screenshadowsgroup.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/groucho-1-named-imposter.png[/fimg:1k3a568h] Tell me something good

We're going to be a higher and less annoying class of insect. Not sure that that 'CF' logo works too well.

The Mexican League was always independent and therefore is probably counted more as a separate league by many rather than as an official 'minor' league. There was also a stretch in time where they were considered an 'enemy' league for their refusal to play by the reserve clause rules set up by MLB and instead were offering more money to players to jump their US teams. Only when MLB threatened to [u:3ro9mvm3]permanently ban[/u:3ro9mvm3] players who jumped to the Mexican league did they manage to cut off the flow of players over the southern border and maintain their low wages through non-competition system.

A less strident/more analytical look on the same story here Couple observations: 1) I'm surprised anyone (besides us) noticed because I figured that once training camps opened that all Washington Post sports reporters were transferred over the the Redskins beat 2) The biggest off-season move that Rizzo made (aside from signing Scherzer) was dealing Clip-Art away for Yunel Escobar and allowing Rafael Soriano to walk. Both were good moves on the whole but they also knew it came at the expense of bullpen depth which getting Casey Janssen alone wasn't going to fix. 3) But then once you go out and get Papelbon there's no excuse not to use him and/or Storen at some point in those games - although Williams is hardly the only manager who makes a habit of 'saving' his back-end guys for the lead protecting inning that never comes.

Colon - 3.3 Conforto - 2.0 Cespedes - 2.5 Granderson - 1.1 d'Arnaud - 1.1

Well the Yanx & Cubs lost that night making it a Triple Happiness day, and 'TH' days tend to lead toward the throwing of objects.

Snakes hang on ... officially in 1st place I like that the margin of error almost came down to the seemingly meaningless run that Papelbon gave up in top 9

DBack closer Ziegler is in. Werth grounds out. 2 down, runner on 2nd Escobar batting as tying run.

Nymr83 wrote: SOLE POSSESSION of first place might be only a few innings away! It would be less than one inning away except that the Nats are mounting a comeback in their 9th inning. 6-2 now with a couple of runners on.

And speaking of bullpens, after two nights of saving his best relievers for save/hold spots that never appeared, Matt Williams tonight uses both Storen & Papelbon in late inning mop-up work. Papelbon serves up a HR to make it 6-0 Arizona.

I wonder what our 'bunt percentage' is? No such statistic exists of course, but more than just being able to see how many times we bunted into outs or K'd trying to bunt, I'd like to see a tally of how many individual pitches where a sac bunt was attempted and then how many of those were successful at moving a runner up. For example, in this inning, Bartolo took 3 shots at a Sac Bunt and failed at all of them so that would be an 0-fer-3. Then you'd want to compare it to league averages and such. Now you'd essentially need pitch by pitch analysis to keep track of it all so I don't expect a realistic answer here, but geez, it would have be in the single digits on this club.

Not sure that I buy all that - but it makes for a good story even if only partially accurate.

Fman99 wrote: That is one sad ass lineup. It's as bad as the shit the Mets were trotting out four weeks ago. Thing is, nobody in that group is really stinking it up in the way that say Mayberry & Campbell were when they were getting semi-regular starts. Shyeeet, we had a ton of games where we were trotting out several sub-.200 hitters per night there for a while. This current Marlins group doesn't have anyone that bad -- they're all hanging out in the mid-.200s range for the most part -- but no one all that good either. It's more like a collection of mediocrity that's now minus Stanton who, even though out for nearly six weeks now, still has more than 1/3 of the team's HRs for the season.

Edgy MD wrote: Dee Gordon has played like an MVP against the Mets this season (against everybody, mostly, but particularly against the Mets). .439 / .429 / .488 // .916 Has somehow managed an OBP 10 points below his batting average, but still, that's a lot of hittin' in 43 plate appearance. Fortunately, it's mostly singles. Singles that he more than occasionally turns into doubles with his 34 steals (although his success rate is barely over a 70%). If this guy could ever learn to walk he'd be real dangerous, only 13 on the year with 400 PAs (a .022 walk rate)

There's nothing Mushnick loves more than catching Francesa (or Fran-Say-So as he often calls him) in loud pronouncements seemingly born of insider authority that turn out to be unfounded.

Mets Guy in Michigan wrote: I thought Matz was only supposed to be gone three weeks. Where is he? They stated that he wasn't going to throw for three weeks, and then would be evaluated from there.

Plunked knee + bad form + an adjustment by pitchers to a total diet of off-speed stuff + mental problems caused by any and all of the above is probably as good an explanation as we could come up with. But geez the change in him was like a switch that now has come back on just as quickly as it once shut off, and once it was off the slump lasted so long that you started to question whether he would ever come back.

Giancarlo Stanton fun fact: He last played on June 26th yet still led the NL in HRs until passed by Bryce Harper last Wednesday and is still tied for 2nd with Todd Frazier.

We haven't seen these guys since the tail end of May when we lost 2 of 3 at our place, barely sneaking out the lone win in the final game. But they weren't a good team then, they aren't one now (had a losing record each month this season), and now they're dealing with their usual post-July sell-off so this would be a bad time for a let-down. Gone from the club via trades in the last week are (P) Dan Haren, (1B) Michael Morse, (1B) Jeff Baker, (RP) Sam Dyson, (P) Mat Latos, (RP) Steve Cishek Gone for the list of familiar names for other reasons include OFs Giancarlo Stanton (wrist injury, not healing as fast as they hoped), Marcel Ozuna (sent to minors), Jordan Valdespin (minors). Pitcher Henderson Alvarez (DL) Star hurler Jose Fernandez is back (and better than ever: 4-0, 2.13) since that series in May, but pitched on Sunday so we'll miss him (although I won't). Monday 7:10 -- Colon vs Koehler. Koehler has decent stats this year [8-7, 3.38, 1.20] though not against us as we've drop-kicked him off the mound in the 4th inning in both starts (1 loss, 1 ND). Plus we all know about his inferior education Tuesday 7:10 -- Niese vs TBD This was supposed to be Dan Haren's start but he was just traded to ... oh who cares (Cubs actually) so it'll be someone else instead and I know we've had trouble with TDB over the years. Wednesday 7:10 -- Harvey vs David Phelps Good evening Mr. Phelps. This will be the 4th time we're seeing your ex-Yank butt this season as the Mets won 2 of the previous 3. Phelps wound up with an 'ND' in each despite an overall decent stat line: 16.2 IP, 6 Runs (5 ER), 12 Hits. Probable lineup: C - J.T. Realmuto/Jeff Mathis 1B - Justin Bour/Casey McGehee 2B - Dee Gordon 3B - Martin Prado/Casey McGehee SS - Adeiny Hechavarria LF - Derek Diethrich CF - Christian Yelich RF - Ichiro Suzuki

He�s still a far cry from the 300/400/500 level he was at early in the year � that�s what happens when you hit .187 in June and then .178 in July. But after bottoming out at 237/340/414 on July 23 he�s now upped his season slash numbers to 249/348/489 - and raising your slugging average 75 points in less than 2 weeks after 400+ PAs ain�t easy What a streaky freaking season he's having. Both the mid-season downturn and then this recent revival occurred for no obvious reason.

Sydergaard - 4.5 Granderson - 1.7 Murphy - 1.7 Duda - 1.7 Clippard - 0.4

Edgy MD wrote: Keep in mind, this home stand opened with John Mayberry, Jr. batting cleanup and the Mets roundly mocked. And Lucas mired in a ridiculous and seemingly never-ending slump.

Got some dirt on my floor here, what should I do to it?