The Mets (26-26) are in San Diego again tonight, to take on the Padres (31-20). Mike Pelfrey (7-1, 2.54) looks to continue his strong start to the season against Wade LeBlanc (2-3, 3.71).
For a primer on the Padres, check out Joe’s interview with Geoff Young of the great Padres blog Ducksnorts. You can also check out Long Live Shea Stadium for some more info on LeBlanc’s recent struggles.
First pitch at 10:05pm Eastern…
Discuss…
Not much big news. Ollie is dominating much of the Mets talk today… Luis Castillo is still injury prone… Here we go:
MetsBlog – Matt Cerrone points out that Jon Heyman thinks Oliver Perez will be with the Mets for the foreseeable future.
New York Mets Report – John Delcos points out that no matter how bad it looks, Perez is simply exercising his contractual rights. You can blame Omar for that.
NY Post – Mike Puma reports that Luis Castillo’s right foot has caught a case of the ouchies from his left foot. This is not good. Now Castillo is going to have to learn to be a scrappy second baseman while playing on his hands… or a DL stint could be in the offing.
NY Daily News – Sources close to the Mets insist the Mets were never close to replacing Jerry Manuel with Bob Melvin. Does anyone actually believe that?
Sportsnet.ca – Sportsnet is reporting that the Pirates have traded for recently DFA’d 26-year old southpaw Dana Eveland. Eveland has been awful recently for the Blue Jays, but you have to wonder if the Mets considered trading for him. For the record, the Pirates gave up a minor league reliever for Eveland.
ESPN-NY – Mark Simon shares all kinds of stats and significant developMETS. For example, why Johan Santana and David Wright are going in different directions, and how Angel Pagan and Rod Barajas are two of the most surprising players over the last month.
It’s June 1 and the San Diego Padres are in first place in the NL West, fresh off an 18-6 drubbing at the hands of the New York Mets. Eighteen runs? Aren’t the Padres supposed to be a poor offensive team? Wait, they’re in FIRST? Aren’t they supposed to be wallowing in the NL West basement, and taking calls for an Adrian Gonzalez trade to “rebuild”? What the heck is going on out there on the Left Coast?
To try and sort out what appears to be something from Bizarro World, I’ve called on fellow ESPN SweetSpot blogger Geoff Young of Ducksnorts. I can’t guarantee Geoff’s answers will clear anything up, but perhaps they’ll give us an idea of why the Padres are doing better than anyone ever imagined — including the Padres’ front office. Continue reading
In an article written last week in The Record, Bob Klapisch suggests that the makeup of the current Mets team would not respond well to the “old school” style of Wally Backman.
Specifically:
Today’s major-leaguers are athletic specimens, not to mention brighter, better educated and more socially enlightened than their predecessors. But that’s not to say they’re tougher or more competitive. Bay and Francoeur are two of the nicest guys around, but they would’ve never survived in the Strawberry-Keith Hernandez-Lenny Dykstra clubhouse 25 years ago.
That’s a point worth remembering when the Mets go hunting for a new manager this winter. Among the many candidates they’ll consider is Wally Backman, who, like Strawberry, is as old school and un-nuanced as they come. While that’s made him a terrific manager at the minor league level, the decidedly un-PC mentality has cost him job after job.
Jeff Wilpon is taking a gamble by installing Backman at Class-A Brooklyn, but it’s worth a shot. Wilpon, in fact, told Backman over the winter that he’ll someday manage the Mets – if he can stay out of trouble.
Backman swears he’s conquered his demons, including alcohol, but it’s his temper that’ll really be the deciding factor. The real question is whether Backman can speak the language of today’s ballplayer: can he motivate the Bays and Francoeurs of the world without trampling on their egos?
There are few problems with this series of paragraphs, and the article in whole.
First of all, the Continue reading
So… last night’s game didn’t turn into the pitcher’s duel that I kind of hinted at in yesterday’s Open Thread. Well, get ready for my next prediction… I predict it’s time for Mets links:
Brooklyn Met Fan – Adam Salazaar is trying to put a positive spin on last night’s record-setting 18-6 loss to the Padres at Petco Park. TO THE PADRES! AT PETCO!
ESPN New York – Adam Rubin has an in-depth look at Olliegate, Alex Cora, and the upcoming draft.
OnTheBlack – Kerel Cooper hands out his own personal Player of the Month award for the month of May. And the winner is…
The Daily Stache – Matt Esposito looks at the options the Mets will have on draft day.
Amazin’ Avenue – Regardless of what you think of Jerry Manuel, you will get a good laugh out of “Jerryball: The Art of Giving Away a Game.”
And if you caught the Senior Professional Baseball Association over the weekend (click here), then you might wanna check out this CNN report from the league’s Opening Day:
Note to kids: That ATM-looking machine behind the reporter in the last shot is what humanity loosely referred to as “personal computers” in 1989. No joke.
You know things aren’t going well when Oliver Perez’s presence on the mound is a sight for sore eyes.
But that in fact was the case, after watching Hisanori Takahashi allow 6 runs in 4 innings, Raul Valdes allow 4 runs (half of which came on bases-loaded walks) without registering an out, and Ryota Igarashi give up 6 runs in 1/3 of an inning.
That’s right — Takahashi, Valdes, and Igarashi all shat the bed. Meantime, a pumpkin waited in the Petco Park parking lot to take the three of them home.
The only positive to be taken away is that the Mets offense scored 6 runs against a team that has pitched very well this season.
Oh, wait, there’s another: the Mets turned four double plays. Funny, I don’t remember any of them.
To put this embarrassing laugher in perspective: coming into the contest, the Padres were averaging 4 runs per game — and were 24th in MLB in runs scored (204 in 50 games). Did that not hit home? OK, consider that Nick Hundley and Chris Denorfia bat 5th and 6th in the lineup.
Mets and Padres face each other again at 10:05 PM EST on Tuesday night. Mike Pelfrey faces Wade LeBlanc.
The Mets (26-25) take on the Padres (30-20) tonight in San Deigo. Hisanori Takahashi (4-1, 4.23) looks to continue his recent success against Kevin Correia (4-4, 4.03).
Takahashi has been excellent in his only starts of the season – allowing five hits in six scoreless innings against both the Yankees and Phillies. He should find his job a bit easier tonight against a relatively weak Padres lineup in spacious Petco Park.
Correia has been solid for San Diego so far this season, especially in Petco. While pitching at home, he has allowed more than 3 earned runs only once. That rough start came after a 12-day layoff, following the untimely death of his brother. Last season, Correia was 4-6 at home with a 3.68 ERA, while holding opposing batters to a .236 BA.
Here is the lineup, as per the Mets PR team:
Jose Reyes- SS
Alex Cora – 2B
Jason Bay – LF
Ike Davis – 1B
David Wright – 3B
Angel Pagan – CF
Rod Barajas – C
Jeff Francoeur – RF
Hisanori Takahashi – LHP
First pitch at 10:05pm Eastern.
Discuss…
And feel free to leave links to any Mets-related links you’d like to discuss. That includes Tweets, Twitpics, articles, videos… etc. That’s why it’s called an OPEN thread…
In an earlier post, I outlined some of the possibilities surrounding the future of Oliver Perez. Mike Puma of the NY Post reports that several Mets players want Ollie gone asap. One of the unnamed players had a great line about how the Mets might use Ollie if he stays in the bullpen:
“What, we need another 20-inning game and then use him after we’ve used all our pitchers and if a position player’s sinker isn’t biting?” the player said.