Mets Monday, Vol. 3

It's been a so-so week for the Mets. Literally. After losing a series to the Reds 2-1 to end a disappointing 2-4 road trip, the team opened a home-stand with a series against the Giants, winning it 2-1. So over the week, they were 3-3. Not bad. Not good, either. Still, as the team with the best at-home record in baseball opens up a set with the Nationals, there's plenty of things to feel good about. There is, however, one thing in this humble blogger's opinion to not feel good about.

Oliver Perez.

I know at least one person who is going to come here and argue this with me, but the fact is that Olllie just isn't worth it. Sure, he's shown flashes of brilliance before; thing is, you get five flashes a season. The rest of the time, he's barely tolerable. Now I know, even the greatest pitchers have bad days. The thing is, when Ollie is bad, he's not even bad long enough for it to be considered a day! Take yesterday's game, for example. Ollie threw 98 pitches (only 44 of them for strikes, by the way), gave up 4 runs and 2 hits, struck out 2 batters, threw a wild pitch, walked 7 men, and beaned a guy, and all that only took him 3.1 innings! Granted, 2 hits is good. You could even stomach 4 runs, and some of the other numbers, if it had happened over, say, 6 or 7 innings... but this wasn't even 4! So aside from being horrible on a day when, against a guy like Lincecum, he needed to be brilliant, he also leaves early and leaves a ridiculous amount of work for a bullpen that is already used far too often. Perpetual Pedro and Nightly Nieve, indeed.

I think what irks me most about Ollie, though, are the excuses. It's always something with him. usually its, "There's something wrong with his mechanics." To that, I say, "You're in the big leagues. Figure it out, or you don't deserve to be here." Yesterday, the excuse was the weather, that is was too cold and windy to him. You know what I say to that?

Quit the bush league excuses and man the fuck up.

Seriously. I mean, yes, I know the weather is a factor, and cold and windy isn't helpful. But, you know, Lincecum was pitching in the exact same weather, and what was his day like? 2 runs allowed over 7 hits, only 2 walks, 8 strikeouts, and that was spread out over 6 innings. Now, I know Ollie's no Lincecum, but come on.

It probably wouldn't be so bad if it was still last season and the team was already fading into irrelevance, but it isn't. This is a team that has been getting consistently solid starts out of three of it's starters, with a fourth starter making strides back to consistency in his last two starts. It's a team with a pretty damn dependable bullpen and solid defense. Sure the offense isn't where you'd ideally like it to be, but it's an exciting club that has been able to stay in games up until the last at-bat with ridiculous frequency. Momentum is a powerful thing in baseball, and a team like this, with the right amount of momentum, could do great things. Problem is, momentum is hard to come by when you know you have a better-than-fifty-fifty chance of losing every fifth day. It really is time for Ollie to either shape up or get shipped the fuck out. No more excuses.

Unless he wants to blame things on his stupid facial hair...