Frayed Knot

Zvon wrote: I think Shorty caught a break there. I thought they would say he took too long to come out. Nice. I think that kind of reversal is freakin' ridiculous regardless of when he challenged it. Whenever replay rules are proposed the selling point is always that it'll only be used to correct the obviously blown calls. But, inevitably, it winds up getting used for micro-dissecting plays that nobody thinks were wrong in the first place.

It's inning #6 and 'Operation Shutdown' is well underway.

d'Arnaud tried to keep our streak of dumb base-running moves alive, but Simmons at SS wouldn't let him.

Braves � 44-38 and in 1st place by 1/2 game although have a dead-even RS/RA total and all of their winning record is due to a 17-8 April. They�ve been below .500 team since May 1, even while riding a 4-game sweep of the Phillies. Series is 3-3 so far this season Monday 7:10 Wheeler vs Alex Wood [19 games/8 starts - 6-6; 3.07; 1.22] Tuesday 7:10 � Matsuzaka vs Mike Minor [11 starts; 2-5; 4.50; 1.49] Wednesday 7:10 � deGrom vs Julio Teheran [17 starts; 7-5; 2.34; 0.95] -- (deGrom-v-Teheran breaks the all-alliterative theme we had going here) We�re missing Aaron Harang & Ervin Santana in the rotation this time around. Wood was relieving while off-season signee Gavin Floyd was pitching, but Floyd has just re-re-injured himself (we didn�t see him in either of the first two series either) and will miss the rest of the season. So what else is new with the Braves since we last saw them? - Most notably, Tommy LaStella (LA STELLLLLLLLAAAAAAH) at 2B. As far as I can tell, LaStella is Italian for 'The Stella' Called up on 5/28, the 25 y/o, 2011 8th round draft pick out of Coastal Carolina U has played 2B virtually every game since, shoving Dan Uggla (.164/.239/.234) to a PH role (Uggla started just twice and had only 15 PAs in June). LaStella is a completely different animal than Uggla, almost none of the power so far (29 hits / 23 singles) but also not nearly the K-rate either (<10% of PAs vs nearly 30% for Uggla). Defense is supposedly not much, but he�s described as �an advanced hitter� with a .276/.342/.343 over his first 100+ ABs. Probably the kind of player where the phrase 'High Floor / Low Ceiling' applies. Other than that, all the rest of their position players have played virtually every day all season: 1B-Freeman, SS-Simmons, 3B-Johnson, OF-Upton^2 + Heyward, all having 73+ starts each out of 82 games and none have missed more than 2 games in a row. Main catcher Evan Gattis has missed the last three games with back issues. Gerald Laird and newly called up Panamanian Christian Bethancout are filling in.

Mets Guy in Michigan wrote: When we start dumping guys just because they are approaching arbitration years, I start to get really worried. If we are going to start trading, I think it would be better to start dealing from our strengths, which would be young pitching, to get power hitters. Which is why I'm stressing that I don't see dealing Murphy as related to his arbitration status but rather his upcoming FA years. At some point, and maybe as soon as this coming month, Sandy and his lieutenants are going to have to look into their crystal ball and decide whether Muffy is someone you want to pay FA dollars to and, more importantly, commit to for five or more years starting at age 31 (by Opening Day 2016) And while I'm not saying that you CAN'T just sign him for 2015 and have this discussion again a year from now, I suspect that they'd prefer to decide on one extreme or the other. If you do deal him you're either looking for existing help at another position where we're weaker - say a serious upgrade at SS, or you're looking to flip him to some team in the hunt for in-season help in exchange for a hot and nearly ready prospect. The former of those trades tend to be more common during the winter while the latter is more likely to be an in-season deal, but certainly there are exceptions. The Yanx, for instance, currently just 1.5 games out with ancient and .230-hitting Brian Roberts manning 2B, would be a prime candidate to want him if offered. Of course they don't have anything we'd want that I know of, but if Sandy can identify teams in that type of position (contending and needing a 2B/3B/1B with a lefty bat) he'd be silly not to listen to what they offer particularly with the cushion of not needing to deal him in order to drive the hard bargain as JCL suggests.

And if they had just kept it close by scoring once or twice in the early innings those late runs w/could have tied it up or put us ahead, and maybe even more so, the hits would have made Hurdle and/or his relievers soil their pants a few batters earlier and then who knows what happens. The nothing early then runs late strategy winds up being the opposite of our usual MO

Pirates, meanwhile, bunched 7 of their (now) 8 hits all in two innings, and went out 1-2-3 four times.

Granderson finishes up the series with an 0-for-Pitssburgh

1st inning Runner on 2nd -- Granderson flies out 2nd inning Runner on 1st -- Lagares Pop out, d'Arnaud fly out 3rd inning 1st & 3rd -- Murphy K's, Granderson Fly Out 4th inning Leadoff double -- GO, K, IW, K 5th inning Runner on 1st -- Granderson Fly Out 6th inning 1st & 2nd, none out -- Lagares Fly Out, d'Arnaud GiDP 7th inning Runner on 3rd/1-out -- Tejada K's, Murphy lines out So while maybe it's a stretch to say we should be leading this game, we should certainly at least be in it. Out-hitting the Bucs 9-7 thru 7

Yes, trading Murphy--either this July, next July, or somewhere in between--is certainly [u:3qaixlx7]AN[/u:3qaixlx7] option. But again, I don't think the ultimate answer to that question is dependent on his potential arbitration number and even less so on that of the rest of that crew.

We're doing a very good job today of the one to two hits per inning trick, but then none while they matter.

PLEASE REMEMBER TO INCLUDE THE FIRST INITIAL WHEN VOTING FOR NEIL OR LLOYD LINDSAY YOUNG Who were your 'Men of the Match'?

Ashie62 wrote: The Brooklyn Royal Giants look good! AAAAANNNNND they're undefeated in 2014

I'd REALLY like to end this prior to McCutcheon coming to bat

Once again trying to win a game while being shutout from inning 3 on.

Seems to me that Recker hasn't had a hit in a while ... be a nice time for it now.

Niese was the beneficiary of a couple of favorable ball/strike calls in that inning too otherwise things could have been worse. Of course he also got a bit UNlucky with some infield hits so maybe it all evened out.

EYJ hitting 'pre-leadoff' again 1. Curtis Granderson � RF 2. Ruben Tejada � SS 3. Daniel Murphy � 2B 4. Lucas Duda � 1B 5. Eric Campbell- 3B 6. Kirk Nieuwenhuis � CF 7. Anthony Recker � C 8. Jon Niese- RHP 9. Eric Young Jr, � LF

Of course money matters, I just find the exercise of trying to figure it out down to the last dollar what the roster will look like nine months from now to be so wildly speculative that it's not worth the trouble, particularly since none of us know how many dollars are available or how and if the fortunes (on or off the field) of the club will change in the next year. Hell, we don't know what the payroll limits are for THIS year and we're right in the middle of this year. Sandy has claimed he can get the go-ahead to spend for the right player but isn't going to do it just to do it (Stephen Drew for instance). Or maybe that's all bullshit and the Wilpon's do have a hard and fast cap but don't want that info public, I dunno. And if they do have one will they have one again next year, and will it be the same, ... yadda, yadda. But back to the original question -- The main question with Murphy, as discussed, is not what his salary will be next year but whether you want to invest in him long term. Him getting a $2mil bump from his current $5.7 mil contract or a $8 mil bump is relatively small potatoes compared to the fact that he can be a FA after 2015 Gee is a year behind Murph in his timeline with Tejada and Duda a year behind that. So if you want to start estimating salaries why not just peg Gee to make next year what Muffy is making this year and bump Tejada & Duda up to Gee's present level then plug that into your spreadsheet and see how it all looks. That leaves both Parnell who I suspect either won't be here or won't get much of a raise at all if he is, and then EYJ who's a part-timer if everyone else is healthy. Point is, neither one of them is going to tilt the books much whether they win, lose, or settle in arbitration. Then you just have to figure out how this is all going to shake out 250-300 days from now. Good luck.

deGrom - 3.0 Mejia - 1.5 Duda - 1.5 Murphy - 1.0 d'Arnaud - 1.5 Edgin - 0.2 Familia - 0.2

So now, after going out meekly in the top of the 11th, we can lose it in a more conventional fashion.

Well, if the Mets failed to score out of that situation we'd be saying 'Only the Mets' could pull off something like that. Not always my friends, not always.

This is starting to look like it could be a two-Houdini inning! One for Harrison, and one from Mejia.

Why do I think that a four run loss is at least as likely here as a one run loss?

Frayed Knot wrote: I don't know exactly how this one is going to end but, however it does, I don't think I'm going to like it.