Mets Game 51: Win Over Pirates
Mets 4 Pirates 2
Under the direction of new batting coach Lamar Johnson, the Mets explode for four runs on seven hits and six walks to power over the Pittsburgh Pirates in a 4-2 laugher.
Mets Game Notes
OK, I’m being a little facetious. But the Mets did walk a ton and did get big hits, finally. Was it because Dave Hudgens was canned? Because Lamar Johnson was whispering sweet nothings in the hitters’ ears? Or because it was not Edinson Volquez / Dr. Jekyll on the mound, but Julio Reyes / Mr. Hyde?
I put Volquez in the same container as Ubaldo Jimenez and the Oliver Perez of 2005 to 2008 — an absolute crapshoot from one start to the next. Maybe he’ll pitch a no-hitter, or maybe he’ll be gone from the game by the fourth inning — there’s no way to know, and no rhyme nor reason to explain how he can be so successful and so dreadful from one start to the next.
Meanwhile, Jonathon Niese did his usual thing — work quickly, throw strikes, get outs in unspectacular fashion. Until the sixth inning, that is, when, with a two-run lead, he walked three Bucco batters and a two-run single to allow Pittsburgh to tie while jettisoning him from the ballgame.
During the postgame press conference, Terry Collins was flummoxed to provide an explanation for the sudden lack of command by Niese. Or, was Collins pretending to flummoxed? I believe — firmly — that Niese is, and has been, in major arm pain since spring training, and is merely gutting through every start based on his fierce competitiveness and pain killers. I can’t believe I’m the only person wondering how/why Niese’s velocity — at age 27, in the prime of his life — has dropped from the low 90s to the high 80s. I can’t believe that Collins (and Dan Warthen) are truly at a loss to explain Niese’s command issues in the 6th inning of this game, when he was already struggling with command in the fifth, and was struggling to throw his fastball as fast as 87 MPH (with a few clocking in at 85-86) as early as pitch #70. A healthy 27-year-old MLB pitcher who used to touch 93 (or 94, on a great day) as recently as a year ago shouldn’t be running out of gas at 70 pitches. If that’s not a red flag, I don’t know what is. Niese was saved several times earlier in the game by poor hitting and/or great defense, or else the game might have been closer. Niese’s strong numbers, in general, have masked the fact that he is not the healthy young man he should be right now. I’m not going to be blinded by Niese’s sparkling sub-3 ERA, just as I wasn’t blinded by Johan Santana‘s no-hitter — this is a pitcher throwing with pain, with an injury, and is dangerously close to being done for the season. The shame of all this is that his mechanical flaw could have been easily fixed a long time ago.
So on to the positives … Ruben Tejada had one of his best days as a Major Leaguer. Does that make you happy, or annoy you? To me, Tejada playing well just confuses an already confusing situation at shortstop. I’ve come around to believe that the Mets should stick Wilmer Flores at the position and see what happens. But then Tejada comes up with these spectacular days, making one wonder — is he really this good, or is he only this good once in a while, the way Omar Quintanilla (or any other part-time player) occasionally can be? If Tejada IS this good, why can’t he play at this level all the time? Is it motivation? A mental thing?
One question that no longer needs to be answered is whether Juan Lagares should be starting every day in center field. He is now out of his hot streak but still proving that he’s made tremendous strides at the plate since last year. Why he’d ever be removed from the lineup is the only question that needs to be asked.
I liked seeing Jenrry Mejia used for a two-inning save, and would love to see more two-inning saves in MLB in general — as long as managers understand and respect recovery guidelines. Since Mejia threw 37 pitches, that means he’s out tomorrow, and should not even touch a baseball — he needs one full day of rest. If the Mets have a save situation on Wednesday afternoon, give the ball to Jeurys Familia, see what he can do.
Though the Mets scored 4 runs, they were 3-for-16 with RISP, and struck out 12 times. Not much has changed in the Lamar Johnson Era, but it’s still early.
Meanwhile, Mets pitching walked 8 Pittsburgh batters. That’s too many.
All the walks on both sides, combined with way too many mound conferences and other such dilly-dallying led to a ballgame that lasted a far-too-long 3 hours, 43 minutes. This is excruciating, especially on school nights. I’m starting to wonder if there are better ways to spend my time.
Next Mets Game
The rubber game between these two clubs starts at 1:10 PM on Wednesday afternoon. Bartolo Colon faces Charlie Morton. I hope the Mets batters wear their body armor, as Flemington, NJ native Morton leads MLB with 10 HBPs.
I think the first thing you should do is send your post about Niese to anyone–ANYONE–who might pass it by the eyes of a person within earshot of a person on the Mets’ staff. They really need to hear these things, and as a fan, I can’t stand watching these players go down because of outdated/inefficient ways of dealing with preparation, use and injury.
Totally have the same feelings about Tejada. It annoys me when he’s good, because I can’t tell if he just happened to try tonight for some spooked-cat-like reason, or he really just got lucky, thereby momentarily smoke-screening us to the fact that he should never be a major league shortstop.
Keep Lagares at CF every day. If nothing else, he was born in Costanza, DR. I don’t know if Howie Rose ever mentioned that and made “Seinfeld” jokes about it, but there are a lot of games every season–about 432.5 with Spring Training and the Home Run Derby.
I’m certain the Mets are aware that Niese is shredding his arm every pitch he makes — they just don’t know how to fix it. So they’re allowing Niese to do what Pelfrey did back in 2010 and hoping for the best (http://www.metstoday.com/6290/mets-injuries/mike-pelfrey-pitched-with-rotator-cuff-strain/).
Joe, it looks to me like Niese isn’t striding too far toward first base any more, and hasn’t been for a while. In his previous start, the opposite seemed true — he was opening up too quick, dragging his arm through, and spinning off to the third base side. Against Pittsburgh, I didn’t get much of a read on him, but I agree that he doesn’t look like his old self.
As for Niese, I haven’t seen enough angles in his last few starts — the “Emmy Award Winning” TV producer of Mets games is too focused on facial close-ups and fixated on the center-field camera view. From the limited vantage point available to me, I haven’t yet seen Niese land on a straight line to home plate — it still looks, to me, like he’s landing toward first base. Are you sure you’ve seen him “opening up too quick”? Because it can seem like in real time, but when I’ve looked at it on high-speed film, he’s actually landing with the lower body closed, and because his upper body has to over-compensate to get the correct release point, it appears that he’s opening up the upper body. What’s truly happening is that the over-compensation causes his balance to be completely off, and the momentum of his upper-body fighting to get across sends him spinning toward 3B. See the photos here: http://www.onbaseball.com/pitching/jonathon-nieses-shoulder-injury-explained-part-1/
Bottom line is he was struggling to throw 86-87 after 70 pitches. Something is wrong. It’s not a red flag, it’s an effing fire truck siren.
Mets starting pitching would be outstanding if this was 2006-2010. But it’s 2014, and everyone in MLB has good starting pitching now. It’s not extraordinary to have 4-5 guys who can give a team a “quality start” nearly every time they take the mound.
I think that people are both stuck in their tiny Mets universe, and/or are not realizing that the game is cycling back to the 1980s, when pitching was more dominant.
My two or three cents –
Agree that Met pitching was bad last night, but they gutted out a win so I’ll credit the team for that.
Niese’s velo is a big concern. Additionally, Alderson has no lefty is sight…should Niese go down it is all RHP. Blame that on signing Colon over Kazmir, not monday morning QBing since most of us were looking to sign Scott. But, here is where Jeffy W once again cost the team, and Scott wasn’t pursued.
Agree that Mets starting pitching is overrated…too many pitches, not going deep enough into games, and Colon has been mostly bad, driving up the staff ERA. They do have potential, and they have given the team a shot to win most every day, and should be credited for that, but many other teams have gotten better results, as the stats bear out.
Tejada had a great game. He would serve as a strong backup on my team, at both SS and 2B, despite the lack of power and speed. I think he can play well in a part time capacity or as an injury fill in.
Lagares is fun to watch and root for, and needs to play every day. I would bat him leadoff vs. LHP and lower in the lineup vs. tough RHP.
Grandy needs to play daily, despite looking lost at the plate at times. He brings good corner D even with a bad arm, and offers some of the only power on the team.
The D made a difference last night and Collins had the OF gloves on the field at the end of the game, which preserved the win thanks to Grandy’s catch (despite the error by Campbell). Abreu and Flores belong nowhere near the field in late innings when the Mets have a lead.