Frayed Knot

Sciatica! Sciatica!! [fimg=400:wbnz9wp2]http://www.latimes.com/media/photo/2010-01/51887798.jpg[/fimg:wbnz9wp2]

Updates from the Puma: * Carlyle - has had a sore hamstring but now adds "back spasms" to the mix after covering 1B last night. It's why Goeddel got the 8th inning after Buddy's final out in the 7th. Apparently, on this team anyway, hamstring problems lead to back problems. * d'Arnaud - cleared for baseball activities (except for hitting) and went down to PSL (with Gee) to workout. May begin hitting within a week and then go on a rehab assignment * Wright - receiving treatment but no activity yet. No schedule for return but "not in the next week" says John Ricco * Parnell - allowed 3 runs in an inning at PSL, having trouble with fastball command (described as 90-92) and is "bouncing breaking pitches" ... but other than that, Mrs Lincoln, how was the play?

Robles - 0.5 Gilmartin - 0.1 Goeddel - 0.3 Carlyle - 0.1 Duda - 2.0 Flores - 1.1 Plawecki - 1.0 Cuddyer - 0.6

I don't often say this, but I kind of like the idea of getting into a battle of bullpens tonight.

Do you suppose the reason why David Ross is the personal catcher for Jon Lester is that they look too much alike not to pair them up? Same round face, same balk head, similar beards. The only way I can tell them apart is that Ross is older and so his beard is graying.

I may be wrong about this, but when the other team hits more balls over the wall (2) in one inning than we hit out of the infield (0) over two innings, that's not a good thing, is it?

Mets � Willets Point wrote: 27 years later and I still find it wrong that this four game series features only one day game. A quick look shows the Cubs with 67 home games remaining, 29 of which are at night. Not sure if they're limited to a specific number that they can't exceed these days. When they first put in the lights they were capped at 18 - a number struck as a compromise to the neighborhood and traditionalists. But now it's obviously much higher than that and Theo has said it's only going higher. At this point most of their mid-week games are at night save for the occasional 'get-away' game at the tail end of a series (like our game Thursday). Where they keep the overall number of night games below other teams is by almost exclusively scheduling day games on weekends (except where national TV intervenes) including Fridays which I'm sure is a big thing for those who have jobs with 'summer hours'.

Art Fowler, Billy Martin's longtime pitching coach, would counsel his pitchers to put whatever foreign (or domestic) substance they were using on their crotch as no umpire was ever going to check them there.

Edgy MD wrote: Gorgeous game you Mothers Day revelers missed here. Aside from the first six innings taking about 1-1/2 hours and then the next three taking about the same ... but that's nitpicking. Losing the Harvey start was disappointing but for about a week there we won nothing but Harvey starts so best not to depend on him too much. And it's still 2-of-3 which keeps pace with the surging Nats who were doing to same to the Braves, and at worst the same with the Marlins who are playing their rubber game at SF, and of course put more ground between us and the Braves and Phils. And now it's a trip away from the Eastern time zone for the first time all season.

Monell: Two ABs / involved in two DPs ... but also 2 RBIs so that helps to balance the scales.

And it's partly my fault for misinterpreting DGW's original post as to why we should fear Wrigley as a debut spot for Synderella. Further thought on Wrigley's rep (deserved, overblown, or somewhere in between) as a hitting haven: I wonder if its slide down the ranks of ballpark rankings is due, not just to better hitters parks in Denver, Philly, and maybe Phoenix, but also as the percentage of day games has decreased? It started, of course, at zero, was originally capped at 18 per/year, is probably around and even day/night split these days and is heading higher.

But he survives the inning, however ugly it was. And he kept the lead which hopefully keeps the Phils two hard-throwers, Giles & Papelbon, safely ensconced in the pen.

IIRC, Howie's daughter was the one who was afraid of Mr. Met back a bunch of years ago.

Edgy MD wrote: Lagares has to cut down on his hits in the air. I think he's liking too many of those up-in-his-eyes pitches. Lagares to FK: maybe not. --- Edit: I do agree, though. More line drives please. I don't know. I was thinking Laggy might be the one to crack Harangatang (Met #966) Too many fly balls in this park will catch up to you. And he's strong and gets on top of high pitches. Nice that he was able to get on top of that one following three sky-high flies prior to it-- but the overall problem remains that he produces far too many pop-ups and lazy flies in exchange for too few HRs. I think he's got power potential, but if the results aren't going to show it* then I'd prefer he just hit some more on the ground and start running. * 9 HRs in nearly 900 ML PAs and just 31 in over 2,500 PAs in the minors.

8th inning, Bags-Loaded, 1-out GiDPs are on a 2-fer-1 special in Philly tonight. Buy one, get one.

And if nothing else, he should help our Noffense out a bit: he's a .270/. 357/.405 career hitter in the minors (47 PAs)

In that case let's just hope that the temperature is not in the mid-40s

Lagares has to cut down on his hits in the air. I think he's liking too many of those up-in-his-eyes pitches.

dgwphotography wrote: Gwreck wrote: Pitching this Tuesday at Wrigley. Gee to DL I can't be the only one who's nervous about a pitching prospect making his MLB debut in Wrigley, can I? Eh ... Wrigley's actually a much better pitching park than it's rep suggests. That rep exists because on those days when it is good for hitters -- those infamous wind-blowing-out days -- it's REALLY GOOD. But, even though those days get all the headlines, they're decidedly in the minority, especially early in the season like this when you're more likely to get the opposite or a neutral kind of day. If this were a day game in August I'd be more apt to be chewing fingernails with you.

d'Kong76 wrote: Missed most of this, and haven't looked at stuff. Was Harv off his harvelessness? Mostly the bats were less than harvelous. That's 3 runs scored or fewer in 8 of the last 10 -- not going to win a lot with those numbers. Other stuff - didn't like Harvey bunting w/runner on 2nd and a 3-2 count. Swing away and maybe you'll get the runner over anyway and you might even get a hit by accident. If he could hit OR bunt like he did in his first couple years he might have been in this game - what's with Plawecki's throws? ... it's like he's not putting a whole lot of oomph behind them. It's almost looks like he's unwilling to let it fly more than just unable to. - Nieuwenhuis & Mayberry!! Man I thought those guys as OFs 4A & 4B (in whatever order you want to put them) were going to be a useful weapon this year. They're now 5/48 so far with the only positive note being that three of those hits are a double (Kirk), plus a triple and HR (JMJ).

As the ancient Chinese proverb says: May you root for the Mets during interesting times.

He got a reasonable reception in his own dugout plus a curtain call from the home fans. Not sure if a tainted #661 deserves a whole lot more than that. He's also on the verge of both 3K hits (needs 38) and 2K RBIs (needs 13). He'd be only the 4th ever in that latter category (3rd since 1900) and will leap NYY legend Gehrig along the way. Mmmmm, more milestones for MFY mgmt to ignore. On the player side things actually seem to be sailing along all right with him for now. His teammates don't care about the contract disputes (and would probably be on his side if they did) and now that he's keeping his mouth shut (for once) and letting the legal process play out they aren't forced to comment on it every other day like they would be if he was still traveling from talk show to talk show (and lawyer to lawyer) with a band of hired protesters in tow raising a ruckus to anyone that would listen. And might I dare surmise that maybe part of the smoother sailing is due to youknowwho no longer being in the dugout ready with a stern glare and a threatened ban forever from the cool kids' lunch table to anyone who makes the mistake of associating with little Alex?

Bad stuff 'bout the Phillies in 2015: - have hit just 15 HRs this season (hell, even the Mets have 19) with 1/3 of them by Ryan Howard. - Chase Utley [.103/.182/.207] (no, those aren't typos) has 3 HRs, two of them against the Mets in one game (off Harvey and Gilmartin). - Jeff Francoeur is an everyday player - Darin Ruf (it's like his family was trying to conserve letters or something) platoons (and plays some OF) with the .220 hitting Ryan Howard ... but is hitting even less (.214) than Howard - for all their high payroll guys (team = $145 mil) their best offensive player this season has been the still pre-arb Freddie Galvis (making essentially ML minimum) and their best pitcher (by far!!) the $5 mil Aaron Harang (who we'll see Saturday) - their starting CF Odubel Herrera is a rookie who played just a dozen games in the OF in the minors and only 2 in CF - and yet has pushed Ben Revere into playing mostly LF - Carlos Ruiz has just 16 hits on the year and 15 have been singles (+ 1 2B) [.232/.321/.246] - there are three guys on their roster who have a blank year or multiple blank years on their resume: Grady Sizemore (didn't play at all in 2012-2013), pitcher Jerome Williams (gone from the game from 2008-2010) and pitcher Chad Billingsley, who we'll see on Sunday, was out all last year following an eight-year stretch with the Dodgers.

From 2011: Dearth of walkoffs Ahh, I probably shouldn't be surprised that this topic has been tackled before. I saw an interview where Mookie named that homer as his greatest baseball memory. I assume he was being contrarian, or wanted to give them a non-post-season answer. Or maybe it just feels really awesome to hit walkoff homers. Considering it was his first full year (full-ish year anyway seeing as how it was the strike year) in the majors and only his 3rd ever HR, that a come-from-behind (Mets had given up 1 in top-9) game winner against the division rival/1st place Cardinals gets tagged as a favorite probably isn't all that odd. I wonder what Keith thought as Mookie flew by him at 1B: 'Hey, who's this chucker?'. Because of the strike, game #91 didn't come until Sept 20 and the Mets wound up with only 3 w-o wins that season: Mookie's game, then the very next night, and then nine days later with just 5 games left in the season. Cardinals wound up with the best winning pct in the NL East that year but won neither 'half' and so didn't advance to the expanded playoffs that year. They lost the 2nd half to Montreal by 1/2 game. Way to spoil a party Mookster!

Turns out that this is already the [u:gkd9fbdk]4th longest[/u:gkd9fbdk] into a season without a game ending in a walk-off. In 1977 they waited until their 42nd game (a loss, Pittsburgh's Richie Hebner HR'd off Skip Lockwood) and their 51st game to win one that way (Milner scores on a wild pitch). In 1981 it was game #29 (we'll match that tomorrow) also a loss. That year took until game #91 until we won one (Mookie HR's off Bruce Sutter!!) which was the latest walk-off win in any season. But to find the deepest into a season the Mets have ever gone without a walk-off either way you need to go all the way back to 2011 when Dale Thayer gave up a run in Milwaukee in the bottom of the 9th in the 61st game of the year. 13 games later they got their first w-o win (Justin Turner gets HBP w/bags loaded by Oakland's Brad Ziegler). More often than not the first walk-off of the season occurs in the first 10 games of the season (34 times in 54 years) including seven times on opening day [3 wins, 4 losses].