Mets Game 58: Win Over Giants
Mets 5 Giants 3
A nice win for the Mets, and a reassuring performance from John Maine.
The Mets jumped out to a three-run lead on Matt Cain in the initial inning, courtesy of a booming double by Carlos Beltran and an RBI single from Carlos Delgado that scored Jose Reyes, David Wright, and Beltran. They extended it to 5-1 in the fourth, when Cain walked John Maine with two outs and then allowed a tremendous homerun by Jose Reyes.
Meantime, Maine struggled, but got outs. As usual, his pitch count swelled with each inning, but he didn’t allow an earned run until the sixth. By the time he left the game, his line looked like this:
6 IP | 7 H | 2 R | 1 ER | 1 BB | 4 K | 107 pitches
Not a dominating outing, but certainly strong enough to win any day of the week.
Duaner Sanchez threw two innings of bridge relief, allowing one run, and Billy Wagner came on in the ninth to earn his 13th save.
Notes
While Carlos Delgado managed to swat an RBI single, his daily performance is making me ill. For one thing, the only reason he was able to get that single was because he was sitting on a fastball but was served a high change-up instead — and the difference in speed was a gift to Delgado’s slow bat. His effortless play in the field is so offensive that I’m dedicating an entire post on it, which will be published on Thursday morning.
Something glaring about Delgado: recently, he nearly always swings at the first pitch, regardless of the situation. If he doesn’t, then he definitely hacks at the second. Ted Williams used to say that first-ball hitters were usually .250 hitters. Well, maybe that’s what Delgado is gunning for (he’s currently around .230).
Jose Reyes let another ground ball go through his legs, but luckily made up for it with his two-run dinger. Still, his ten errors thus far this season is disconcerting.
Reyes was 3-for-4 on the offensive side, with a walk, two runs scored, two RBI, and his 19th stolen base. In other words, if he wasn’t in the lineup, the Mets probably lose this game.
Next Game
The Mets move on to San Diego to start a four-game series against the Padres. Mike Pelfrey goes against Josh Banks in a 10:05 pm EST start.
the BP then is hardly secure. Muniz’s 4R, 2 inning (after he was told he was gone) was not a happy moment….i still think alot of his potential value. bottomline we need a reliable arm.
45yr old El duque is NOT the answer. But i see him as a bridge as they figure out ollie. I can see some credence in what Isuzu has been preaching…..that the mets are not that good. however the flaws are not in the nucleus…they are in the older..fringe players…Pedro, el duque, Carlos, Ollie, Marlon and Alou are not producing consistently…but they are older players who are ALL FA this yr. All of the above account for over $40M of this yrs payroll.
I do think something could happen with Ollie, del, el duque and possibly heilman. I think an AL team may ask for Del as his price tag& time left on his contract dwindles.
Good observation, Mic, but not sure if I totally agree. The Mets have the potential to be a 95 win team, so I guess in that respect they’re “good.” They’re “on paper” good. But we all know that’s not how games are won. And after watching the last 162 games dating back to last June, many of their “good” players were pretty bad. And some still are. You’re very right in that most of our flaws are found in the older players. But that still doesn’t account for Reyes’ lapses on defense. For Beltran’s prolonged cold streaks. For Ollie’s bouts with wildness. For Heilman’s relief woes. And those are some of the main players in our nucleus.
Whereas, for the past 2 weeks, the Mets have been getting great performances from many of the same players that were constantly cast as goats over the past year, there’s still a distinct possibility they revert back to their slumps and bad habits that made them a losing team. Whether or not that happens is when we’ll be able to distinguish whether it was just a fluke that the Mets collapsed last season and started off slowly this season, or if these players just aren’t as good as we’re giving them credit for.
I think we expected Maine and Ollie to start better. maine will get 15 wins, santana 18-20. I think the collapse is overstated. I see the same team as last yr wth santana added. despite my Willie-isms, i think this team should at least be the WC team. Ohh, Heilman has had wilting issues the past 2 yrs. But his overall body of work always looks palatable. Part of my point is that Heilman IS NOT the set up man, Ollie is not the #3 starter, both can be extracted from the mix and substituted. as opposed to last yr the Mets have more depth. Willie has to be less stubborn and show less tolerance with non-performance and better rotations.
I liked two articles on Metsblog pointing to Easley’s strengths and Reyes value. I think Easley should play more, i think delgado should be platooned.
The biggest suprise so far is Pel who for lack of support might look better. He is improving.
I know that I sure as all Hell expected Ollie to start better. I forecasted 18 wins for the guy, figuring that $cott Bora$’ $taff would be constantly reminding him that this is a contract year, and he needs to take steps to do his absolute best. Obviously, I was wrong.
John Maine has been a tad better than I thought. He’s a tad tougher than I thought he was. If it wasn’t for two poorly-timed errors by Jose Reyes, Maine might be 8-2 right now.
Mic, I’m a tad off on why you are lumping Pedro as a “fringe player,” as he really hasn’t had a chance to show us this season what he can do. I think that he’ll actually come roaring back to win 10-12 games, and he’ll get 120+ innings. Remember his ego. It is almost as big as El Deadguy’s. But, Pedro puts the team a bit higher on the totem pole than El Deadguy does. If Pedro is hurting the team, he’ll pull himself from starting. I don’t think that El Deadguy would do that.