They help the Mets sometimes and I like that. I am all about GB. As long as the Mets don't lose ground in the division I don't get down.
Dickey gets a crack at the Orioles, who lead the majors in Ks (starring Chris Davis and Mark Reynolds).
Ho hum, another one-hitter for Dickey, with 2 walks and 13 Ks. He's up to 42 2/3 consecutive innings without giving up an earned run, and is the first pitcher in 24 years (and first NL pitcher in 68 years) to have consecutive complete game starts giving up 1 hit or less. His ERA for the season is 2.00 and his WHIP is 0.909.
How can this continue? It's like unreal. If he can do this against the Yankees, all of baseball will start to pay attention, if they aren't already.
http://www.cbssports.com/mlb/gametracker/recap/MLB_20120618_BAL@NYM NEW YORK -- R.A. Dickey became the first major league pitcher in 24 years to throw consecutive one-hitters and Ike Davis hit a grand slam to lead the New York Mets past the Baltimore Orioles 5-0 on Monday night. Coming off a one-hit gem at Tampa Bay last Wednesday, the knuckleballer struck out a career-high 13 and allowed only Wilson Betemit's clean single in the fifth inning. The previous pitcher to throw consecutive one-hitters was Dave Stieb for Toronto in September 1988, according to STATS LLC. The Mets said the last to do it in the National League was Jim Tobin with the Boston Braves in 1944, according to research by the Elias Sports Bureau. The 37-year-old Dickey (11-1) walked two and became the first 11-game winner in the majors, baffling Baltimore with knucklers that ranged from 66-81 mph in a game that took just 2 hours, 7 minutes. He fanned his final two hitters, topping his previous career best of 12 strikeouts set Wednesday against the Rays. Dickey has won nine straight decisions and six consecutive starts. It was his fourth game this season with double-digit strikeouts and the fifth of his career. The right-hander has an incredible 71 strikeouts and six walks in his last seven starts, lowering his ERA to 2.00. Betemit's two-out single in the fifth ended Dickey's streak of 13 hitless innings going back to Wednesday. The only blemish in that game was B.J. Upton's infield single with two outs in the first, a high bouncer that third baseman David Wright tried to field with his bare hand. After the game, the Mets appealed the official scoring decision to Major League Baseball, asking the commissioner's office to review the play and consider whether Wright should be charged with an error, thus giving Dickey the team's second no-hitter this month. The appeal was denied and Dickey said he was relieved, explaining that there would have been "an asterisk by it bigger than the no-hitter itself." One thing not in dispute is that Dickey has been one of baseball's most dominant pitchers all season. And one of the people he can thank for that is Orioles manager Buck Showalter, who was instrumental in persuading Dickey to remake himself into a knuckleballer when both were in Texas. "He had every attribute of a major league pitcher except the arm," Showalter said, his thoughts then turning to the fact that his team was about to face Dickey. "I wish it hadn't happened." Betemit's line drive to right-center brought an ovation from the crowd of 29,014, which had started chanting "R.A. Dickey!" in the fifth.
The penultimate one was knee high, so it was a good strike call in my opinion. I'm not one to argue balls and strikes, though. I am pretty darn consistent with this- the only time I ever really had a problem with a ball vs strike call was a game against the Pirates at the end of a season (1999 or 2000 I guess) where Frank Fucko got a favorable call to strike out a batter and end a game. I had an issue with it even though it benefited the Mets!
Chris Davis : Ball, Foul, Strike swinging, Ball, Davis struck out swinging. Mark Reynolds : Strike looking, Strike swinging, Reynolds struck out swinging. Chris Davis : Foul, Strike looking, Ball, Davis struck out swinging. Chris Davis : Strike swinging, Strike looking, Foul, Ball, Foul, Davis struck out looking. Matt Wieters went 0/3 with three Ks. 30 batters faced by Dickey, with two walks. No Oriole got to 2nd.
This was thrown out in my fantasy league tonight, somebody picked him up 6 starts ago, in those 6 starts this is Dickey's stat line 48.2 IP 6 Wins 63 K 0.18 ERA!!!! I seriously can't ever think of a pitcher at least in modern times having a run of dominance like this. Stat? Cappy? His next start is going to be huge for the Mets. It's like two immovable objects slamming into each other, the Yankees who are the hottest team in baseball and Dickey who is the best pitcher.. who will win?
Don't forget also Dickey's 0.555 WHIP over that stretch, which is just mind-boggling. It's hard to quantify such things, but there have been other pitchers who have been exceptionally dominant, some even over longer stretches: Justin Verlander, 5/29-7/10, 2011: 9 starts, 8-1, 72 IP, 74 Ks, 0.819 WHIP, 0.75 ERA Randy Johnson, 9/4-9/26, 2002: 5 starts, 5-0, 41 IP, 49 Ks, 0.805 WHIP, 0.66 ERA Orel Hershiser, 9/5-9/28, 1988: 6 starts, 5-0, 55 IP, 34 Ks, 0.790 WHIP, 0.00 ERA (5 complete game shutouts and a 10 inning start giving up no runs) Dwight Gooden, 9/6-9/26, 1985: 5 starts, 3-0, 44 IP, 39 Ks, 0.750 WHIP, 0.00 ERA Tom Seaver, 8/6-9/11, 1971: 8 starts, 7-0, 73 IP, 75 Ks, 0.808 WHIP, 0.62 ERA (7 of these starts were complete games, and in the one that wasn't he pitched 10 shutout innings) Bob Gibson, 6/6-7/30, 1968: 11 starts, 11-0, 99 IP, 83 Ks, 0.727 WHIP, 0.27 ERA (yes, 99/11=9; every start was a complete game and 8 were shutouts). This was, of course, the year of the pitcher. Don Drysdale, 5/14-6/4, 1968: 6 starts, 6-0, 54 IP, 42 Ks, 0.704 WHIP, 0.00 ERA (6 straight complete game shutouts, once again in the year of the pitcher) Sandy Koufax can also get honorable mention. From 9/5-10/2, 1965, he had 7 starts and 1 relief appearance. He had one terrible 2-inning start on 9/22, but in the other 7 appearances he had a WHIP of 0.558, 61 Ks in 52 IP, and a 0.35 ERA. The remarkable thing about Dickey, of course, is that he is a 37-year-old knuckleballer doing this. All of the guys listed above other than Hershiser were fastball pitchers, where you expect that this kind of dominance can occur. Taking into account everything (IP per start, Ks, WHIP, ERA), it seems to me that you can make a reasonable case that Dickey has been on a better run than anyone in the modern era, especially if you omit 1968 from consideration.
I was thinking Drysdale may have had a better 6-start stretch but he did not have more strikeouts than innings pitched, so fuck him. I wonder about the best 6-start stretches from Grove and Hubbell
Dickmania is running wild !!!!!! TBH this is starting to build up though, I wont be suprised if Dickey gets as big as linsanity did. ALOT of people all over the country are talking about him now.
