Edgy MD

Fman99 wrote: This just in: Eric O'Flaherty, bad at baseball. Votto be pretty good too.

Rockin' Doc wrote: I'm following the game online so I can't actually see the game. Does it appear possible that Uribe's chest pain is related to his diving stop at second base a few nights ago? He appeared to hurt his chest with his diving faceplant and subsequently came out of the game following the inning. Absolutely a re-aggravation of the same injury.

To get him to 100 pitches, I imagine.

Keep pumping, Mets.

Uh, Juan. Get better. Chest pain is scary.

FWOW!! We have a battle to see who's going to be the 2015 Mets home run leader.

Lookie that. He's holding a Synderbat and wearing a Synderhelmet in the dugout. He intends to bat.

So, when they pull the 'Gaard, which they presumably will, do they go to somebody who needs the work, like O'Flaherty or Parnell, or do they feel an obligation to go with somebody more likely to preserve the shutout?

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: Anyway it's believed Dombrowski will hire Frank Wren as GM A month later, Wren becomes the VP of Baseball Ops. Good for him for falling upstairs. I don't get how the Braves tore down his castle so quickly.

I imagine that's it for Synderfun. Maybe one more inning.

Off a hard-throwing lefty too. Nobody I'd prefer to see getting locked in.

A Cody Asche homer and the Phils are up by 8-2.

I think the ball went off the glove. My question is whether a player taking cover is in the right (or the Wright) when his bat hits the catcher's glove as he hit's the deck.

Meanwhile, Angel Hernandez in the middle of a review call.

Granderson ties Doug Flynn!

Wheels coming off is the final insult.

Sorry. It was just the imitation sub-series, that was letting me down. I'm rooting for Steph to keep this gig going as long as I can, so I'm sensitive to any mis-steps. I don't know the Croissanwich Guy and Steaking-You Guy. I'm nonetheless certain you're correct, and they make less appealing in-between-inning company than Flo.

We have the 1-2 ranked rookie NL pitchers with regard to fWAR in this game. There could be a Topps trophy at stake here!

Other Active Mets ... 18. Bud Harrelson: 123 T19. Todd Hundley: 118 T19. Lucas Duda: 118 21. Rey Ord��ez: 115 ... 29. Carlos Delgado: 99 T30. Jeff Kent: 98 T30. Bobby Bonilla: 98 T30. Ruben Tejada: 98 T33. Gregg Jefferies: 96 T33. Hubie Brooks: 96 ... T57. Butch Huskey: 62 T57. Rafael Santana: 62 T59. Juan Lagares: 61 T59. Timo Perez: 61 61. Joe Christopher: 59 T62. Doug Flynn: 58 T62. Mackey Sasser: 58 66. Curtis Granderson: 57 67. Ron Hodges: 56 ... T87. Ramon Castro: 41 T87. Fernando Tatis: 41 T87. Josh Thole: 41 T87. Roberto Alomar: 41 T87. Jason Bay: 41 T87. Lance Johnson: 41 T93. Keith Miller: 40 T93. Wilmer Flores: 40 T93. Ray Knight: 40 T96. Shawn Green: 39 T96. Endy Chavez: 39 T98. Frank Thomas: 38 T98. Travis d'Arnaud: 38 T98. Lenny Randle: 38 101. Joe Orsulak: 37 T102. Ted Martinez: 36 T102. Roy McMillan: 36 T102. Kirk Nieuwenhuis: 36 T102. Jeff Francoeur: 36 ... T125. Joe Torre: 29 T125. Luis Lopez: 29 T125. Vance Wilson: 29 T125. Don Hahn: 29 T129. Nick Evans: 28 T129. Eric Young: 28 131. Ron Gardenhire 27 132. Desi Relaford 27 ... T170. Eric Valent: 18 T170. Miguel Cairo: 18 T170. Roy Staiger: 18 T170. Lenny Harris: 18 T170. Dick Schofield: 18 T170. Josh Satin: 18 T176. Felix Mantilla: 17 T176. Anthony Recker: 17 T176. Alex Cora: 17 T176. Andr�s Torres: 17 T176. Michael Cuddyer: 17 T176. Eric Campbell: 17 T176. Kelvin Chapman: 17 T176. Tom Seaver: 17 T184. Lastings Milledge: 16 T184. Damion Easley: 16 T184. Mike Phillips: 16 T184. Claudell Washington: 16 � T216. Kevin Bass: 12 T216. Matt den Dekker: 12 T216. Marv Throneberry: 12 T216. Chris Young: 12 T216. Tom Herr: 12 T216. Jordany Valdespin: 12 T216. Jos� Oquendo: 12 T216. Joe Foy: 12 T216. Larry Stahl: 12 T216. Ruben Gotay: 12 T216. Jerry Koosman: 12 T227. Matt Lawton: 11 T227. Willie Randolph: 11 T227. Tony Phillips: 11 T227. Willie Harris: 11 T227. Johan Santana: 11 T227. Michael Conforto: 11 T227. Richard Hidalgo: 11 T227. John Buck: 11 T227. Jason Pridie: 11 T227. Gary Rajsich: 11 T227. Rod Barajas: 11 T227. Ronny Cede�o: 11 T239. Mark Johnson: 10 T239. Shane Spencer: 10 T239. Greg Goossen: 10 T239. Kevin Baez: 10 T239. Al Luplow: 10 T239. Julio Franco: 10 T239. Gerald Williams: 10 T239. Elio Chacon: 10

If it was noted elsewhere in the Crane Pool, we failed to note it here. Daniel Murphy, in a single season, has gone from ninth to second in doubles by a Met. Sorry, Ed! Career Doubles by a Met David Wright Projected to the End of Season: 382.11 1. David Wright: 376 =#FF8000]David Wright at Start of Season: 382 Daniel Murphy Projected to the End of Season: 228.12 2. Daniel Murphy: 226 3. Ed Kranepool: 225 4. Jos� Reyes: 222 5. Howard Johnson: 214 6. Edgardo Alfonzo: 212 7. Carlos Beltran: 208 8. Mike Piazza: 193 =#FF8000]Daniel Murphy at Start of Season: 190 9. Darryl Strawberry: 187 10. Cleon Jones: 182 Not a bad total at all for a guy who hasn't yet reached free agency in his career.

Fifty is probably a stretch. Here's a good place to look at some of the numbers. They have Francisco Cervelli leading the league at 26.1. He was pulling in 1.47 calls per game in 2014 as a part-time with the Yankees, but upped that to 1.83 as a regular this year. That's a nice little improvement, but not random. And certainly, you can do different work with a different staff.

The thing is, the data certainly shows that catchers who tend to turn borderline balls into strikes and the catchers who tend to turn borderline strikes into balls are tend to repeat from year to year, which suggests that some guys are good at this and some guys are not.

Zvon wrote: I agree that making it a catcher's "tool" is stupid. But data does suggest that there is a class of catchers more effective at this than other catchers. Two of them play for the Mets.

I'm tossing out the goal of clinching before the Washington series. How about you Metsies clinching before the Philadelphia series?

On to Yogi the player for a minute: -- 7 consecutive seasons Top-4 in MVP. From 1950 at age 24: 3rd, 1st, 4th, 2nd, 1st, 1st, 2nd And, sure, the team he played on and his personality could have given him a leg up on other players who maybe were as deserving, but still -- 19 years, 414 career strike-outs (or, as it's known to some guys these days, about a season and a half). I know times and the game have changed and all, but that's an average of right around 28 for a 500 AB season and he topped out at just 38 (at age 34 in 472 ABs) I love those strikeout numbers. How he managed to accomplish that while maintaining a reputation as a bad-ball hitter is mind-boggling. I've met two reasonably informed adults over the last few days who thought the bear came first and the ballplayer second. Not only was Berra the original, but he had a lawsuit with Hanna-Barbera over the name. He eventually dropped it but most accounts say his case was strong and considering how long a tail the Yogi Bear character has, who knows how much he could have raked them for. Anyhow, I've really come to believe he really earned that nickname. The pitch up at the shoulders looks good, but it's one in fifty players that can make a living swinging at it. He's the guy you let off the leash, because he was so psychologically detached, he could never screw himself up. He refused to believe in slumps. He insisted that if you went hitless for a few games, it was just the numbers evening themselves out. Other players, of course, believed something had gone wrong in their approach. They'd make adjustments, and as often as not, something would go wrong in their approach. Yogi kept it cool, and so never beat himself. He said he once went 0-24. Asked how he got out of it, he said, "I hit a home run." The other cool thing is that Yankee recruits from the 30s to the 50s were typically lowballed — offered lower bonuses than other teams were perhaps offering, telling prospects, "Sure, you could sign with the Cubs or the Indians or the Browns, but we're the YANKEES. And anything you lose in your bonus will be small compared to what you get back in post-season money." Of course, they never mentioned that they were signing two more top prospects at the same position, and that reaching the post-season with the Yankees was hardly guaranteed. But the rap worked on most every player. But it didn't work on Yogi. He knew how much the Cardinals had offered Garagiola. He had grown up across the street from Garagiola, and knew he had been a better player since he was seven. And he wasn't going to sign with anybody until somebody offered him more. In and age when poor teenage boys didn't have agents, and bonuses across the country weren't reported, he didn't get bamboozled, because he knew enough to bank on a single comparable.