Frayed Knot

WHAT A BUCKIN' IDIOT!!

WE JUAN A HIT ... WE JUAN A HIT!

Dear John Buck, Right now would be a good time for your first fair ball of the night -

Might as well review it ... we're already over the 3-1/2 hour mark anyway in a 3-2 game so an extra few minutes won't make a difference.

And once again it's going to come down to John Buck.

Well, this seems to answer the closer question: looks like it'll be Bell to set-up and the just returned Putz to close. In the meantime it's on Satin not to leave us in an impossible situation ... depending on John Buck with two outs.

Met hitters: hit worse with RiSP Met pitchers: pitch worse with RiSP

ARod, it was announced today, is set to begin rehab starts. It's a good thing that Cashman was so adamant that ARod "Shut the Fuck Up" last week otherwise the news that his rehab was to begin might have become public knowledge several days too early and if that happened the terrorist would be winning ... or something like that.

Keith is so funny when he's not listening to anyone else. Gary: "Chavez was a terrific player before back problems limited him." Keith (maybe seven seconds later): "And he had some back problems too, right?" Gary: "You don't have to look any further at the advantages of swinging at the first pitch than Miguel Cabrera" Keith: "And Cabrera out in Detroit does that a lot too"

Ashie62 wrote: Miley looks a civil war reenactor person.. Well, today is the 150th anniversary of the first shots at Gettysburg. Maybe he was doing some reenacting prior to the game and just hasn't taken off the makeup yet.

Gee - 3.6 Torres - 0.8 Hawkins - 0.4 Murphy - 2.0 Nieuwenhuis - 0.7 Buck - 0.7 Byrd - 0.7 Quintanilla - 1.1

Harvey - 4.6 Rice - 0.2 Satin - 2.2 Wright - 1.4 Byrd - 1.0

Putz is fresh off the DL. Prior to that (like back in April) he was closing while Heath Bell set-up. Well, "closing" is maybe one thing you can call it when you blow the save four times in nine tries. Then when Putz went down the Snakes handed the closing duties to Bell who saved 13 games in 15 opps so it'll be interesting to see who they go to now that they're both (presumably) healthy. Not a kind east coast trip so for the Arizonans: Lost two of three in Washington with their only win coming in extras, then got swept during a three-gamer in Atlanta. Outscored 33-17 over that time.

4th place following tonight's loss to Baltimore -- and, yes, one more HR for Chris Davis (31) and another double for Manny Machado (38 -- ML record is 67) And just as I was complaining about the back end of the Mets lineup, compared to what's going on in the Bronx, ours suddenly doesn't look so bad. On account of the number of relievers they feel they need to carry, the Yanx bench currently consists of only three guys. Tonight that meant: Vernon Wells: .185/.206/.275 since May 1st backup catcher Austin Romine: .145/.159/.194 and IF Alberto Gonzalez: .143/.143/.143 (21 ABs)

Today obviously sucked (I should have napped for 7 innings and watched 2 instead of the other way around) but, unlike Friday, it's easy to get over games like this. The adage I often use is that if your starter is going to suck and the pen is going to suck and the bats are going to suck then they might as well all suck at the same time. The close ones hurt more and our prior five losses involved three walk-offs plus Friday which was essentially the home field equivalent of a walk-off. Today was the first of our last eight losses that was by more than 2 runs - and even that one was a 6-3 loss to Chicago where they got three in the 8th inning. It was really the only blowout since StL nearly three weeks ago. As long as you're keeping those to a minimum then things aren't too bad. That Wheeler got smacked around is disappointing (although remember that they usually don't come out of the box like Harvey) as is the increasing realization that the back half of the lineup of Buck, Lagares/Nieuwenhuis, Qunitanilla, Pitcher, is black hole of major proportions. I think the only strategic move Davey had to make all weekend was early in Friday's game when, following the Byrd base-running blunder and a bad AB by Buck*, he IW'd Lagares to load the bases but force Q (against a lefty) then Harvey to drive in the runs (they didn't). * and, btw, nice clutch HR in today's 9th there JB First guy gone from the pen should be Lyon. His decent start to the season, .200 BAA and 4.5/1 K/BB in April, has crashed to .313 & 2.67/1 in May, and .356 & .83/1 in June (and those June numbers don't even include today's results)

Well, at the (more or less) halfway mark, it looks like the '62 Mets record is safe. The two teams we were watching are both still in last place but safely enough above the .250 pace they'd need to match the modern ineptness record. The Astros sit at 30-52 and the Marlins at 29-51 or both at about a .362 win pct and a 59 win pace. So unless one of these squads is prepared to throw in something like a 10-70 second half, they won't even come close. What it might be time to start is a Pittsburgh Pirate watch. They just won via walk-off fashion in the 14th putting their record at an ML Best 51-30 in the quest to at least finish above .500 for the first time in more than two decades and, at best, hold on to their division lead and their 100+ win pace. As we all know, they looked like they were going to bust through at various points over the last couple of seasons as well before falling apart late. Last year they were 45-36 at this point before hitting a high of 16 games over on July 28th (58-42). Then an 11-17 August and a 7-21 September killed it for them. oe: btw, one cool thing about the Pirates run here (nine straight) is that it's being partially fueled by 3B Pedro Alvarez and recent call-up (RHP) Gerrit Cole - guys who were originally drafted by, but chose not to sign with, the Red Sox (Alvarez) and the Yanx (Cole)

Orioles hanging up a nine-spot on the Yanx. But don't worry, they're almost to the 4th inning.

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: Idiotic job over overdoing it by Terry, compounded by a shit effort from Lyon, spoiled everyone's night at the park and destroyed all the momentum this team had on a night everything else was going for them. Eff Terry and eff Lyon. Lyon's effort was obviously the biggest problem - but the worst part wasn't even the bases-clearing 2B to Zimmerman but the walk to Rendon in front of it. He seemed reluctant to pitch to him (a 2-2 curve and then a 3-2 curve) and I assume that's what Keith was mad at after the game with his "too many walks" comment. I stated at the time that I didn't have a problem with Terry's switches and I'm sticking with that. We needed one more out and he was giving them the best opportunity to do so. The problem was that EVERY reliever failed to some extent in the effort to reach Parnell and then Parnell failed. For all the complaints about the pen they've been quite good recently. Just not tonight. Byrd seemed to mis-read that ball right from the start. It looked to be just a fly to RF at the beginning so he understandably tagged up. Problem was that he never seemed to re-evaluate the situation and was caught tagging long past the time when it was apparent that the ball was headed for the corner. Still, with no outs that shouldn't have been such a problem, but once Buck failed in the next AB I knew we were in trouble with Q coming up vs a LHP and then Harvey. Buck Sucks but Recker is no better and, at this point, if we get d'Arnaud here for a September call up I think that's a sign that things are going well. Most likely we'll see him next April.

The bottom line here is that the entire bullpen -- Parnell included -- have given up more EXTRA BASE HITS than they've gotten outs. If the pen, which has actually been fine lately, is going to act like that there's not much Terry can do about it except for allowing Harvey to go 140 pitches (or more).

Fman99 wrote: Do you think Casey Stengel was pulling relievers immediately after they got an out? Or Ralph Houk? etc. Stengel is often credited with virtually inventing platooning.

Ashie62 wrote: LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: The thing is... Davey's done less. The Nationals got the best possible matchup possible Zimmerman with bags juiced. Yes, that's known as the lineup

Clippard's one of these relievers who throws a million pitches and takes half a minute between each.

Swan Swan H wrote: Ashie62 wrote: Edgy MD wrote: It ain't about Harvey, folks. Terry got outmanaged... Outmanaged? Davey hasn't done anything since he signed the lineup card. Well yeah he did, he brought in two PHers who both failed to get on, and one reliever who increased the Mets lead.

dinosaur jesus wrote: Frayed Knot wrote: Terry NOT over-playing the lefty/righty thing this inning (IMHO of course). All you want here is to get to Bobby P with as big a lead as possible. I'd kind of rather not see Parnell in a third straight game. Not sure who I would like to see, though. That's part of the problem in using him for the 3-run "cookie" save two nights ago ... but that's a whole 'nother story altogether.

Of course, if every single reliever is going to fail then it doesn't matter much what you do.