Mets Game 74: Win Over Brewers
Mets 2 Brewers 0
Who said the Mets couldn’t beat a bad baseball team? Never mind it took three tries — they CAN.
Further, they can not only score with a lineup featuring Ruben Tejada in the two-hole, they can score TWICE.
I don’t have any game notes as I was working at my real job. Please post your notes in the comments. Thank you.
By the way, I blinked and the Washington Nationals are seven games over .500. When and how did that happen? Interestingly enough, the Nats’ sudden surge was completely independent of the Mets’ recent 7-game slide. Meaning, one had nothing to do with the other. And yet, the two streaks are intrinsically intertwined. Kind of cool, huh?
Next Mets Game
Mets return home for a weekend series against the Cincinnati Reds. Friday night’s game features Noah Syndergaard facing Johnny Cueto. Game time is 7:10 PM.
DeGrom’s command was better than his previous start. His mechanics look back to where they were before that. Pretty locked in. Not quite as pinpoint as he had been, but he gave himself a nice margin for error by staying with hitters’ weak spots. Fastball had great late life/movement. Didn’t use his secondary stuff much, but didn’t have to. Threw a few nasty sliders that looked more like cutters — 91 mph, not much drop. Some bait curves that the Brewers didn’t bite on. No change-ups, unless it’s slower than it used to be and the TV thought it was a flat curve.
The one vulnerability deGrom showed was that he did seem to tire early. Command was wavering in the 7th inning after a tough AB took his pitch count from 80 to 90, and poor in the 8th inning. Leaving him in to throw 100 pitches: I’m torn.
On the plus side: helped win the game; good conditioning to eventually build up to higher pitch counts.
On the down side: pitching through fatigue is when most guys get hurt.
Re: pitcher workload in general, every time Sandy or Terry says something about “6-man rotation so no one has to get skipped”, I think, “That is the OPPOSITE of what you want. If injury through wear and tear is your concern, then giving a guy 10+ days off is a PERFECT counter-measure.”