you are entitled to your optimism, but when the team stops playing like total crap I will start expecting different from them, or at least be surprised when they do.
I dont think me expecting them to not play like complete crap should be considered overly optimistic. Not once did i say i expected them to turn their season around tonight.
Smith has been just as good Bradford in the same role and is making 1/10 of the salary. Schoeneweis has been aweful so far and Omar overpayed for him. The sudden lack of control is surprising and disapointing, but he is a lefty specialist and his OPS vs lefties is .604. Also maybe I'm trying to look on the bright side with this one, but he has gone five straight outings without allowing an earned run. If he pitches with the control he's shown throughout the rest of his career, he'll be fine and an asset vs lefties. I know Mota's an easy target, but I'm not going to write him off after 12 innings. He still throws in the mid-90s, so I don't think he was a fluke b/c of roids. After missing all of spring training and the first six weeks of the year, was it realisitic for him to be sharp and have good command right away? He did look very good tonight (albiet in a blowout). Yes, Aaron Sele sucks, but let's be honest here, you're talking about the 12th pitcher. What were you really going to expect. I know Oliver was excellent last year, but it was a fluke (6.20 ERA this year) and Omar made the right move letting him walk. Burgos when he was up here, pitched very well. I like his stuff and potential. Hopefully the arm issues in New Orleans aren't too serious. Honestly the big difference IMO between this year's pen and last year (besides for the fluke that was Darren Oliver) is Sanchez. Let's be honest, Duaner before the injury, was a top 5 setup man in baseball and you couldn't truly replace him. Sure you can make the pen deeper, but you couldn't get a lights out stopper for the 8th inning. Heilman's inconsistency (how is that Omar's fault) makes Duaner's loss that much more glaring. Yet, despite all the criticisms of the pen, they are still 6th in the NL in relief ERA and they were in the top 3 before the last two weeks.
not overly optimistic, no, but optimnistic none-the-less considering they have played like complete crap for a while now.
So apparently Bert Blyleven told Johan Santana before yesterday's game that if he (Santana) threw a shutout, he (Blyleven) would shave his head. I hope they show a shot of that on the broadcast tonight.
I can't envision him being a better player for the Mets than he is with the Reds. Are Heilman, Schoeneweis, and Mota still on the Mets? If so, what the fuck is the problem?
I don't need to see excuses made for Mota. He pitched with the Zephyrs while serving his suspension. He certainly had more than enough time to get his mechanics right.
This is an excellent point - it's not like Mota hadn't pitched a real baseball game since last October. Until he shows that he can pitch the way he did for the Mets last year, and not the way he's pitched for everyone else since mid-2004, the suspicions related to what kind of pitcher he "really" is have to be front and center.
I hope you dont mind if a Yanks fans joins the game thread until the Yanks play tonight. I dont hate the Mets i.e. my avatar
Three mental mistakes so far - Perez not covering first, Beltran not knowing how many outs there were, Perez not paying attention to the runner on second. Four errors yesterday. These things have nothing to do with a slump, they have to do with not being prepared to play.
This game should really be interesting - the only games the Mets have won in June were when they got dominating performances from their starters, and Ollie is not dominating tonight. Can they win if he is just okay, rather than great?
3 runs, 2 on walks. Not a surprise. As I said before, can the Mets win when their starter isn't necessarily awful, but isn't great? Can they score 4+ runs when it counts?
