Mets Monday - Opening Day 2015

I'm not going to be one of those Mets fans that gets too excited about the season before it begins and then inevitably ends up with a broken heart by the time summer hits. I will, however, admit to being cautiously excited this time around. The fact that one game into the season we already have half as many wins against the Nationals as we had all last season combined helps a bit. And so does having Matt Harvey back in the rotation.

Badass.

Yes, it sucks that Wheeler is down for the season, but having Harvey back makes up for it and then some. Plus, a rotation of Harvey, DeGrom, Niese, Gee, and Colon is pretty damn good... and the pitching bench is deep. So yeah, I'm excited. But I'll temper that excitement with a healthy dose of Mets fan pessimism until I see if we're still in contention at the All-Star Game.

After all, there are still a lot of question marks. Will someone step up and be a solid lead-off hitter? Is Captain Wright going to get right this season? What about shortstop? And will Granderson pay off now that he's had a full season to adjust to being an NL guy?

For a long time, we were told 2014 was going to be our year, the year to wait for. Then Harvey went down, and it wasn't. And even though it wasn't that bad a year, considering we were an over .500 team if you removed our 2-16 record against the Nationals, it was still another losing year. This year, they promise, will be the year. Like I said earlier, we're already halfway to better against the Nationals, but do I think this is the year we go all the way? I know you gotta believe, but I'm not there yet.

Ask, instead, do I think this is the year we take some steps? The year we finish over .500? The year we make the playoffs? Maybe I do. And sweet merciful Christ, I hope so. It's a beautiful game, and it could be a beautiful season.

But it's also a long season. So we'll wait and see.

Who knows. Maybe it'll be... amazin'.

Mets Monday: 2014 Subway Series Game 1

I realize it isn't technically Monday, but last night was Monday and I was at the game last night so I'm writing about it today and calling it Monday. Sue me. Last night's game kicked off the 2014 Subway Series between my beloved Mets and the time from across the city, the Yankees. It was a night of firsts for me: the first time I went to a Subway Series game; the first time I've caught a game at the new Yankee Stadium; and the first time my girlfriend and I have gone to a game together.

One of us has bad taste in headgear. Hint: it's the cute one on the right.

It was a fun night. As a little background to last night's game, in last year's entry into the ongoing rivalry between these two teams, the Mets won all four games in a split-stadium series sweep (can you tell how much I really love alliteration?). With that in mind, going into game-time last night, I was hoping for another win to continue the dominance, since the Yankees seem to be the only thing my beleaguered Metsies have been able to dominate in the last year or two, while my wonderful love was hoping for a little retribution.

Except for the right-field corner, great seats. Well, and except for the people sitting around us...

Unfortunately for her, my streak of never wanting to see my girlfriend sad came to an end last night, as I got to enjoy another Mets victory. It was a real back-and-forth game, with the Mets drawing blood first and the Yankees answering back with a demoralizing grand slam. The Metsies crawled back to tie the game, only to see the Yanks pull ahead again... and the the Mets slowly crawled back to take the lead yet again, a lead they came damn close to blowing in the bottom of the ninth before a spectacular defensive gem by Lucas Duda at first base led to a game-saving, game-ending double play.

Farnsworth, however, who couldn't find the strike zone if the umpire held up a big red friggin' target, shouldn't be allowed to celebrate.

As far as Yankee Stadium goes, I don't remember my few trips to the original to compare the new one, but I can say I like Citi Field much better. Citi Field felt roomier to me, with better sight lines and more things to enjoy, like a much larger food and drink selection.  As I said to my girlfriend, the two stadiums seem to be designed on different profit plans: Yankee Stadium is built around getting as many people into the ballpark as possible, while Citi Field seems designed more around getting your money through concessions and activities. Neither is right or wrong, and they both still end up costing you an arm and a leg. I will say this though: never in all the games I've gone to at Citi Field have I been sold sodas and waters well past the expiration dates on the bottles the way I was at Yankee Stadium last night, so that's some major points lost to Yankee Stadium.

Hell, even the awful vendors in the toilet bowl of baseball, Shea Stadium, never stooped that low.

But back to what's important. There are still three more games to go in this year's Subway Series.

Let's go Mets!

Mets Monday: Opening Day 2014

Play ball! Baseball season is once again upon as as my beloved, beleaguered New York Mets kicked off their season with a game against the Washington Nationals. As in years past, I'm going to say now I hope to write more Monday blogs about the Mets throughout the course of the season. I'm not sure how successful I'll be at sticking with that; I have a nagging suspicion my success will be in no small way linked to just how successful the Metsies' own efforts are...

Today, however, rather than talking about that fairly disgusting loss we suffered today, I wanted to keep things simple and, aside from this introduction, just join my team in celebrating the life of our legendary broadcaster, Ralph Kiner. I got on him in recent years because let's be honest, legendary or not, the man should have been forced into retirement years ago, but that doesn't matter. What matters is that for decades he was the entertaining voice of the Mets, and for that he'll be loved and remembered.

So c'mon, Mets, let's see a few miracles this season.

For Ralph.

Mets Monday - Gone Fishin'

As this baseball season was ramping up, I think it's no secret that we Mets fans all knew we didn't have very much to look forward to. Sure, it's fun watching scrappy young players give it their all and fight to get better, and Matt Harvey has been an absolute delight (hopefully so too will Zack Wheeler be in a few days), but we had no real aspirations of greatness. But there was at least one thing we could be happy about:

And it's a comforting thought. See, the Marlins are hands down the worst team in baseball. They've won a whopping eighteen games out of sixty-two. They are, in fact, on pace to have one of, if not the, worst seasons in baseball history. So it's definitely comforting to be doing better than them. Until you do the math, and realize that out of those eighteen games the Marlins have won, eight of them have been against the Mets.


Yeah. The Mets have been responsible for almost half the Marlins total wins, losing eight out of eleven games to them. And getting swept twice!

Twice!!

Pretty pitiful, huh?

You may ask yourself, oh beleaguered Mets fans, if there's anything positive to take away from this. Take heart, for there is. Two things, actually. For one thing, we only actually have to play the Marlins seven more times this season, so the worst is hopefully behind us. And the second thing? When we hit home runs, we get the Mets Apple.

The Marlins get this.

Mets Monday - Just One

Happy Memorial Day, y'all. If you're an avid follower of my blog (and let's face it, you probably aren't), you'll notice this is only the second Mets Monday post I've done this season. It's something I try to do fairly often this season, but, well, the Mets kind of suck. And when I say kind of, I'm being generous.

This is cogent to my point because Bobby Bonilla is the Mets' highest-paid outfielder this year.

Right now the Mets are eleven games under .500. The games are painful to watch because the team can't hit worth a damn so even if the starters throw a shut-out, they still lose. And when they do manage to throw a shut-out and the team hits, the bullpen coughs it up. And yet, I still watch the games (most of the time; sometimes those Big Bang Theory marathons on TBS look so much better...) because I'm a Mets fan and I love this team and as such, I know not to ask too much of them. Generally speaking I ask for just one thing to look forward to, just one reason to watch.

And that's what they give me.

Pitch with a bloody nose? No problem. Here's a strikeout for you.

That one reason is Matt Harvey, a 24-year-old starting pitcher who is currently 5-0 with an ERA of 1.93, 74 strikeouts and just 17 walks over 70 innings pitched in ten starts. Oh, and he's only come within a hair of both a no-hitter and a perfect game this season. His starts are the reason to watch the Mets this year.

Which is a shame, because with the Subway Series starting tonight, he can only pitch just one game, and that's tomorrow night. I'm not really expecting the Mets to beat the Yankees, who are the exact opposite of the Mets at eleven games over .500 and really are just a better team at this point (yes, it kills me to say that, but let's be honest here, there aren't many teams that aren't better than my Metsies, so it isn't an accomplishment, Yankees fans). No, the Mets aren't going to win the series, although I'd love it if they did. Hell, I don't really expect them to even split the series, which would only take two wins. I feel like two wins in four days might just be beyond them at this point. All I ask them to give me is one win tomorrow night.

Just one.

Mets Monday - More Important Than Baseball

Now that the 2013 baseball season is in full swing, I was all set to blog about a few of the things surrounding my much beloved, much maligned New York Mets. I wanted to talk about what a beast Matt Harvey is. I wanted to talk about how if you only win games when two of your starters are pitching you aren't going to have a very good record. I wanted to talk about how freeing it is to not have any real expectations, how fun it is to just watch baseball when winning is a bonus instead of a goal.  I was going to talk about how unproductive a trip to places like Minnesota and Colorado can be in April. Two games in a row snowed out? Really?

Seriously, that just isn't baseball weather.

But sometimes things happen and baseball just doesn't seem that important. Sometimes tragedies strike, like what happened at the Boston Marathon today, and a day of celebration turns into a dark day filled with pain and suffering. The kind of day it seems like we have way too many of lately. It's days like these when we have to remember all the things that are more important than baseball. On a day like today we aren't Mets fans, or Yankees fans, or Red Sox fans. No, to paraphrase my favorite captain, Malcolm Reynolds, on a day like today, we're all just folks.

The thing about all of us being just folks is, for every one evil person with a bomb out there who wants to blow something up into a horrifying mess of smoke and fire, there are hundreds, thousands, millions of folks who will, without a second thought, run into that mess of smoke and fire to help anyone who needs it. For every one of these dark days caused by just one soulless degenerate, there are hundreds of good days filled with those good people.

And here's the thing that's really more important than baseball, folks... more important than anything else. Us. We are. And all we have to do to make sure the good days outnumber the bad ones is to just be good. Be loving. Be there for each other. We don't all have to be the people who will run into the smoke and fire... not everyone has that in them. But we can all do something. We can all do something good.

In the end, that's all we can do. And all we have to.

Mets Monday - It's That Time of Year Again

No, it's not THAT time of year again, meaning one of the three big holidays: Christmas, Halloween, and my birthday (trust me, if you're around the week of my birthday, you know it's a holiday). It is, however, that time of year that every Mets fan dreads from the beginning of the season... hell, from the beginning of Spring Training, even. It comes at different times every year; for a few seasons there, it didn't come until the last game of the season. Recently, it's come earlier, like in August, or in this case, July. Yes, Mets fans, it's that time: the time when we know the season is, for all intents and purposes, over.

Of course, mathematically, nothing is over, but let's look at a few things. This is a team that has lost thirteen out of sixteen games since the All-Star Break. A team that has dropped to four games under .500, 12.5 games out of first place in their division, and 8.5 games out of the wild card race. A team that has lost two of its starting pitchers to the DL in the last two weeks (for a total of three of the starters from the season being on the DL right now), and has sent one of its bright young stars, Lucas Duda, down to the minors due to lack of production.

Yet it's a team that still keeps Jason Bay around, something I will never understand. He's never done anything for the Mets but suck.

But he sucks for a lot more money, so it must be okay...

No, nothing is mathematically over, but we Mets fans know better. We know we got much more from this team in the first half than we had any right to expect. We got our first no-hitter. We watched R.A. Dickey be positively Herculean. We saw David Wright find himself again. We watched a bunch of young kids play their asses off, even when they screwed up. It was great fun... but we knew it wouldn't last. Still, we can enjoy the rest of the season, as ugly as it might get, for the glimpses of the future it holds. This season might be on its last legs, but the Mets are on the right path.

As the oldest truism in baseball goes, "there's always next year."

Mets Monday - At the All-Star Break

Expectations are a funny thing. Among some of my friends, we have a saying: "Lower your expectations accordingly and you'll never be disappointed." For example, are you one of the people who complained that the Transformers movies had weak plots? They're Michael Bay movies about giant robots; lower your expectations. Complaining that Strike Back, the Cinemax original series, has too much sex and nudity mixed into the action and isn't as highbrow as what you might see on HBO? It's produced by the show whose nickname is Skinemax; lower your expectations.

With that lesson in mind, I went into the 2012 Major League Baseball season with significantly lowered expectations for my beloved Mets. Honestly, I expected them to win around 60 games for the season and lose the other 102. So you can imagine my delightful surprise when, at the All-Star break right now, they have a record of 46-40 and are in third place in their division, only 4.5 games out first. That's right, a team I thought would just be losing all over the place is right in the middle of things. Lowered expectations, folks, means nothing but good news.

Let's look at some of the highlights from this season so far: Santana throws the first no-hitter in Mets history and Dickey has one of the most dominant first halves for a pitcher that I've ever seen, getting him put on the All-Star Team (and as I've just read he isn't starting the game, my long-held theory that Tony LaRussa is an utter assclown is proven true) as the Mets easily have one of the top starting rotations in the National League. David Wright is having an MVP-caliber season both at the plate and on the field, making the All-Star team again (and not starting, proving that the whole fan-voting system might not be the best idea in the world). Maybe better than all that, though, is that this is a team predominantly filled with homegrown young players who might fuck up sometimes but play hard all the time, play to the last out all the time, and are just flat-out fun to watch.

So what do the Mets need as they go into the second half of the season? The starting rotation is fine, but they do need help in the bullpen... although I think a trade for an arm is unlikely since there are some hot prospects in the minors who should be able to help. What the Mets, as a predominantly left-handed hitting team, need a dangerous right-handed hitter. A lot of people think Jason Bay will provide that when he comes off the DL; when you consider how he's played for the first two-and-a-half years he's been with us, well, here was Terry Collins' reaction to the idea of Bay helping the team out:

"That's a good one. No, really, we need a right-handed hitter. Seriously."

What this team really needs, though, is just for their young players to grow into the game. Right now they're having the problem most young players in their first year or two: they struggle with consistency. Sometimes they play like a championship caliber team... and other times they're completely lifeless. That's why, even after such a great first half where they might have been the most surprising team in baseball*, I'm still keeping my expectations lowered as we go into the second half: I'm not expecting the championship, just a few more months of fun and exciting baseball.

Still, lowered expectations or not... you gotta believe.



*Perennial lame-duck team the Pittsburgh Pirates, at eleven games over .500 and in first place in their division, are probably an even bigger surprise. This one goes out to the inimitable Jabba the Black, a.k.a. Chris: "Go Pittsburgh!"

Mets Monday - Golly, I Wonder What This Will Be About?

No, this isn't about what you think it's going to be about. At least, not yet. There are a few things I want to point out first. Since the blog I wrote two weeks ago wherein I expressed my doubts about them, the Mets have won nine games out of thirteen, have improved to eight games over .500 with a record of 31-23, and, as I write this, are now tied for first place in the National League East. All this comes with the Mets having played their fifty-fourth game of the season last night, which means we are now officially a third of the way through the season. If they keep this up, they're on pace to win ninety-three games... which is a guaranteed playoff spot and most likely a division championship as well. Not too shabby, huh?

Now, let's be honest. No one expects them to keep this up forever and win ninety-three games (and even if I did, I'd keep on doubting them, because look how well they've done since the first time I doubted them, right?) but any way you look at it, it's shaping up to be a much, much more exciting season than anyone ever thought it would be for the good ol' Metropolitans.

Speaking of much more exciting...

Unless you live in Turtles' Lair in the sewer somewhere, you already know Johan Santana threw the first no-hitter in Mets history last night. There's not much more I can say about it that hasn't been said, except to say that watching those last six outs in a bar... okay, damn near standing ON the bar, I was so excited... was magical.  And that catch by the kid from Queens, lifelong Mets fan Mike Baxter:

In a season that's already felt improbable, or charmed, or whatever other word you want to use... well, it sure does start to feel like anything is possible this season, right, Mets fans?

After all, anything is always possible.

You just gotta believe.

Memorial Mets Monday - Wherein I Eat My Words

It's Memorial Day and I had a very busy, very fun weekend, and am very, very tired, so I'm going to keep this brief. Last week I wrote about how I thought the shine was off the apple when it came to the Mets season. Since then, they've played eight games and won five of them, and are back up to five games over .500... so it looks like I have to eat my words here.

Delicious AND nutritious!

There are still injury problems... we've lost two shortstops since then, which would explain why David Wright, arguably the best third baseman in Mets history, was playing shortstop today... but clearly I spoke too soon about the season starting to go downhill.

Hopefully I'll be eating these words well into October!

Mets Monday - Is the Shine Off the Apple?

It's a ridiculously rainy Monday in New York, which seems to me to be a perfect time to write a little bit about the Mets.

Just be happy they aren't playing at home tonight...

We all know the Mets have been doing much better than anyone expected them to do since the season started. They've been above .500 all season so far, with a high-watermark of five games over and a current record of 22-19. David Wright is arguably the hottest hitter in baseball, leading in most of the important offensive categories except home runs, and showing some of the most solid defense in his entire career. The starting rotation has been pitching better than expected, especially Santana and Dickey... although the injury to Pelfrey hurt pretty bad, because of how awful Chris Schwinden was for two starts. As fun as the team has been to watch for the most part this season, the last week or so has me really wondering if the shine is starting to come off of the apple that is the Mets season.

Mentioning the rotation brings us to one of the problems the team has been having lately. The starters need to be almost perfect because the bullpen has been coughing games up left and right. Combine that with the fact that the Mets offense is really only good enough for three to four runs a game usually, and it puts a whole lot of pressure on the starters to be as perfect as possible. Just look at Santana: after 8 starts and 43.2 innings, he's only allowed 14 earned runs, he's racked up 46 strikeouts and has an earned run average of 2.89... and he's only 1-2 on the season. The bullpen needs to step it's game up big time.

Another problem has been the injuries. There's the aforementioned Pelfrey, out for the season. They've been playing without Tejada and Thole, as well as Jason Bay... but let's be honest, we're probably better off without him. And don't get me started on the flu bug that's been getting passed around the clubhouse more often than a call girl in D.C.

Like I said, whether it's the bullpen, some sloppy play, the injuries, or the flu, it's seemed to me like the shine is starting to come off the apple. Or maybe it's more simple than any of those reasons. Maybe it's just a team that started off playing hotter than anyone thought possible coming down to earth. After all, no one can over-achieve forever. Or maybe it's just a bad week or two and my natural pessimism is getting the best of me.

Let's all root for that last one, Mets fans.

The Return of the Return of Mets Monday!

Okay, I know what you're thinking: what the hell is up with that title? Back on Myspace, I used to do a blog called "Mets Monday" about the Mets every... you guessed it, Monday. I brought the tradition over with me when I started doing this blog, and the first post was then called "The Return of Mets Monday." Eventually that fell off midway through 2010 because the Mets were so bad that writing about them just increased my already boiling suicidal tendencies to a really dangerous level.

Now, with a little time between me and that period of loathing, I've decided to bring the tradition back again; hence, the title. I will, however, not be forcing myself to write something about them every Monday. I'll be limiting it to only when I actually have something to good to write about... like the way I went to my first Mets game since 2010 last Wednesday, which was also the anniversary of the first Mets game ever.

The view from the Pepsi Porch. I do love Citi Field... now with less walls!

Joined by a few friends, I took in the game from the Pepsi Porch out in right field. Like most areas of Citi Field, the seats were nice and the view was decent. The game, however, billed as a pitchers duel between Johan Santana and the Nationals' Stephen Strasburg, was neither nice or decent. The Mets lost 4-0, which I can live with. There's an old baseball saying that goes something like, "Every team is going to win 54 games, and every team is going to lose 54 games. It's what happens in the remaining 54 games that matters." What annoyed me is that, out of the four runs the Nationals scored, two came from walks with the bases loaded, one came from a wild pitch, and one happened when a double play wasn't turned properly. I don't mind losing, I just hate sloppy play.

A couple of other notes from the game that day:

- As loud as it sounds like Jason Bay is getting booed when you watch the game on TV, it sounds even worse in person. And, sadly, he deserves it.

- When Ike Davis got his first hit of the season, judging by the ovation he got, you'd have thought he just hit a game winning grand slam.

-People really hate Jayson Werth. When he got beaned, there was damn near a standing ovation. The people sitting in the new Party City Party Deck in center field were on him all game, so much so that he spent half the game looking back at them. Then, when he got moved over to right field, it was our turn. One particular fan, who may or may not have been inebriated, loudly expressed his wishes that Weirdbeard would just die, and then yelled at him, "Hey, Werthless, what was your average last year? Your beard is bigger than that!"

Gotta love Mets fans. Whether or not the team manages to remain the most surprising thing in baseball  or (perhaps inevitably) falls apart any day now, I would love to take in some more games this season.

And then, you know, write about them.

Mets Monday, Vol. 13

This is going to be crazy short because I'm tired, I just wrote a blog for Heckling, and, more importantly, Holy Jesus Humphrey do the Mets suck. After the awful road trip I mentioned in my last blog, they only managed to have a 3-3 homestand, which didn't help them in the standing at all. Tonight, they started a road trip that, with only 56 games left to play, could very well be the make-or-break trip of the season... three games with Atlanta followed by three with the Phillies, and they started the trip off with Santana on the mound, and they lost. I really hate to say it, but, unless they win four of the remaining five games on the trip, if not all five, this season could be over by this time next week.

Mets Monday, Vol. 12

So I've missed a couple of weeks here. First, I took a Monday off for the All-Star Break because, well, if everyone else was, why couldn't I? Then I missed a week because of new job stuff and whatnot. I almost missed today as well, but that was because I don't have the stomach to write about the Mets right now, that's how pathetic they've been since the second half of the season. All I can say right now is that the Mets really do stink, and if it doesn't change in a hurry, their season is going to end a lot sooner than it ends, if you know what I mean...

Mets Monday, Vol. 11

I'm keeping this one short because, well, I'm still counting today as part of the holiday weekend, I have a blog I still have to write for Heckling later tonight, and I'm just plain tired.

It was a rough week for the Mets, going 3-4 on a road trip against the Marlins and the Nationals, two teams it seems like they can just never beat, which is annoying. It didn't help, I'm sure, that Reyes has missed something like five games in a row now, and although he's back now, Pagan missed a few games in that road trip as well. Still, 3-4 is probably the second-best road trip we've had all season (try not to dwell on that idea), so it's not all bad.

Big home stand starting... well, technically it started fifteen minutes ago, with three games against the Cardinals and three against the Braves, both first place teams. Which is good, because for however many seasons in a row this is, the Mets seem to play to the level of the competition. Should be a fun week to watch.

And before I go, let's congratulate the Mets All-Stars: David Wright, who deserves every bit of it for the way he's been playing for the last six or seven weeks or so; and Jose Reyes, who might have only made the team because of an injury to someone else, but he's been playing up a storm as well.

Mets Monday, Vol. 10

It was another good week for the boys from Queens, going 4-2 against two good American League teams. Right now, the Mets are just half a game out of first place in the division, and still have the lead in the wild card race.

Is it just me, or has John Niese become a damn good pitcher since coming back from the disabled list? They've won every game he's started since he's been back! He's been a great counter-point to Johan Santana, who has kind of been a mess lately. Less strikeouts per nine innings than ever before, more walks, shorter outings. I don't know if this whole mess about him having an affair or rape or whatever it was is bothering him or not. Now, obviously, I don't condone rape, but I don't think it was rape, since nobody heard of it for how long since it happened, and the case was closed anyway. If it was him having an affair, that's none of my business and I honestly don't give a shit as long as he pitches the way we pay him to pitch, which he hasn't been. That whole mess needs to get sorted out.

Luckily, between Niese and the rest of the starting rotation, the team seems to have it covered. The offense has been on fire lately, and that's been with Pagan sitting out the last four games or so, and even yesterday, with Reyes having an 0-fer. This team is fun as hell to watch, and if they can keep going like this, it's going to be a fun summer...

Mets Monday, Vol. 9

Normally, I'd be a lot more upset after losing a series to the Yankees, two games to one, but this time, I'm not. For one thing, we split the year series with them, three games apiece. For another, those two loses came after an eight game winning streak, seven of which came on the road and included two sweeps. Obviously, the Mets read this blog last week and decided I was right about them needing to win on the road, because they improved their road record from 8-18 to 15-20, which really is a drastic improvement. Also, the Mets are only a 2.5 games behind Atlanta for first place, and, if the season were to end today, would be in the playoffs in the wild card spot. So right now, things are looking pretty damn good.

Today is the last of three Mondays off in a row before starting a homestand tomorrow, where they're facing two tough AL teams in the form of the Tigers and the Twins. I have faith, though, that with such a dominant home record (24-10), the Mets are in good shape. Really, as long as the offense wakes up from the hiatus it's been on since the third inning or so of Saturday's game, everything should come up roses.

Mets Monday, Vol. 8

The Mets have finally broken that 4-2 per week streak they seemed to be on that I mentioned last week. They went 5-1 since last Monday, which is, well, pretty goddamn good. They took two out of three from the Padres, which is an accomplishment, and then swept the Orioles, which, well, isn't an accomplishment at all. But it kind of is, because they swept the O's in Baltimore. That's right, the Metsies swept a road series, something that hasn't happened since last May 2009, apparently.

That's a fact, by the way, that seemingly led Rod Barajas to tell Frenchie that they sucked last year... he was joking, but he seems to have caught a little static or something for it. I don't know why, it's not like he was wrong...

Anyway. The Mets pickup the road trip tomorrow night with three against the Indians, which, the way Cleveland's season has been going, should result in two out of three for the Mets, if not another sweep. That'll be followed by three games with the Yanks at Yankee Stadium... all told, this is a pretty big week coming up.

Lets look at the positives from this week. Starting pitching is definitely one; we got a nine-inning affair from Pelfrey before the game went into extra innings, and a complete game one-hit shutout from Niese. Takahashi pitched back to form after two shaky starts, and Dickey is still cruising. On the offensive side, Wright and Bay are both starting to come alive, and Reyes has been doing damn good as well.

How about negatives? Well, Santana's last start wasn't too great, and neither was Pelfrey's, but really, if that's the biggest negative we have, I have no problem at all. Even the best pitchers have off days now and then, and that's all it was. They'll be fine.

Like I said, big week coming up. Let's keep it going, boys.

Mets Monday, Vol. 7

The Mets have a lot to learn from these fellas. Once again, since my last entry, they've gone 4-2, which isn't bad at all. The problem is, it's all part of a disturbing trend. Out of those four wins, the last three of them came in a sweep of the Marlins at Citi Field. For the second time this season, the Mets have won eight games in a row at home, where they now have a 22-9 record. That's a .710 winning percentage, which is pretty damn spectacular. And yet, they're only three games over .500 for the season. How's that?

Simple. They're 8-18 on the road. So it's hard to capitalize on all those home wins when you've got an away percentage of .307. That's... well, it's pretty damn awful.

There's a pretty true saying in baseball that if you can win two out of three at home and just break even on the road, you've got a good chance of being a championship team. The Mets are doing better than two out of three at home. So, how well would they be doing if they were breaking even on the road? They'd be 35-22, thirteen games over .500, with a win percentage of .614. They'd be tied with the Yankees with the second-best record in baseball behind Tampa Bay, and would obviously then have the best record in the National League.

Why aren't they winning on the road? Beats the hell out of me, it's the same team with the same players as it is at home, where the offense is hitting, the runs are scoring, and the pitchers, for the most part, are doing their job. It doesn't make any sense.

Lucky for me, though, I don't need to make sense out of it. They do. Hopefully they figure it out soon.

Mets Monday, Vol. 6

As I said a few weeks ago, baseball is a funny game, and thing scan turn around quickly. For example, after playing just abysmally for the first half or so of this month, the Mets took two out of three from the Yankees last weekend, and since my last blog entry, have gone 4-2. Those four wins include a three-game sweep of the Phillies, a series in which the Phils didn't score a run in any of the three games. Granted, those two losses came after that Phillies series, to the lowly Brewers, but no one can be perfect. Let's look at some upsides.

R.A. Dickey has had three starts now, and has been fantastic, going six innings or more in each of his starts while he fills in for the injured John Maine. Likewise, Takahashi, taking the place of the continually useless Ollie Perez, is making his third start tonight and has been so fantastic so far that his place in the rotation should be secured. Big Mike Pelfrey has elevated his game to ace level, and you can be just as confidant when he starts as you are when Santana starts.

Other upsides? The offense seems to be coming around now, especially Reyes, who has just been lighting it up with multi-hit games left and right. Wright is still struggling with the Ks, but he's also getting the walks and RBIs, so he continues to be an enigma. Francoeur just had a 4-for-5 day, so hopefully he's coming around as well.

What the Mets really need to do now is figure out how to win on the road. While they're ten games over .500 at Citi, they're nine games under .500 away. Which is where they are, right now, wearing ugly white hats that don't actually match the gray road uniforms they're wearing.

Oh well. If they start fixing that road record tonight, it doesn't matter at all what they're wearing, right?