Nationals 6 Mets 2

Apparently, someone forgot to tell the Washington Nationals that they were supposed to roll over and lose to the Mets amicably.

The worst-hitting team in MLB — the one that’s averaging less than four runs per game — crossed the plate six times against the Mets in gaining their 44th win of the season. Crafty lefty Mike Bacsik threw pus-balls for seven innings, scattering eight hits and allowing only two runs. The only Met to accumulate more than one hit was Carlos Delgado, who blasted two singles.

Jorge Sosa pitched six non-solid innings, allowing nine hits, three walks, two homers, and five runs. With each start, he is looking more and more like the 2006 version that went 3-13.

Sosa got through the first inning OK, then was the victim of a Doublemint commercial in the second, as the punchless Nationals found the strength to hit four two-baggers in five minutes, scoring three runs. The Mets came roaring back with a run when Lastings Milledge bounced into a double play, but Ryan Church hit a solo homer in the third to make the score 4-1.

The Mets scored again, and for the last time, in the fifth when Shawn Green doubled and scored on a Damion Easley single. However, the Nats came back in the sixth with another homer — this of the leadoff variety — by Austin Kearns. They scored their sixth run in the eighth off the previously invincible Pedro Feliciano.

Notes

Hmmm … bright spot, bright spot … there had to be one somewhere … ah yes, just-promoted Jon Adkins pitched a perfect seventh inning, retiring three batters on nine pitches. Aaron Heilman also pitched a nearly perfect inning (scoreless), the ninth, but finally allowed a hit.

Next Game

Day / night doubleheader on Saturday, with game one starting at 12:10 PM and game two commencing at 7:10 PM. El Duque vs. Tim Redding in the first game, then Mike Pelfrey tries not to lose against Billy Traber in the nightcap.

The soft part of the Mets’ schedule continues as the Nationals come into Shea for a four-game set, including a day / night doubleheader on Saturday.

The Nats are expected to send four journeymen to the mound, as their already awful pitching staff has been recently decimated by injuries. Which poses a problem for the New York Mets, who have a hard time hitting mediocre pitching.

Here are the matchups:

Game 1: Jorge Sosa vs. Mike Bacsik

Since beginning the season with six wins in his first seven starts, Jorge Sosa has fallen back to earth, going 1-4 after June 8th. He was most recently rocked for 8 hits and 6 runs in 4 innings in Los Angeles, and has given up 23 earned runs in his last 30 innings pitched. Not good. It appears that batters have caught on to the fact that he throws one speed, and relies almost exclusively on his slider. However, he does have the benefit of facing the Nationals, which is both the lowest-scoring team in MLB (their 385 runs are 24 less than the next-worst Pirates), and the MLB team with the lowest batting average (.248).

Mike Bacsik is a soft-tosser that might be considered a “poor man’s Tom Glavine”. I disagree. He’s more like a “destitute’s Glavine”, or perhaps, a “homeless man’s Tom Glavine”. He tops out around 84 MPH, throws a change-up in the 70s, and keeps the ball in the strike zone. Sounds like BP, right? Except, he has one huge advantage: he’s never before started against the Mets. Can you say “Wandy Rodriguez Effect”? Further, in his last outing — against the Rockies — he pitched into the seventh inning and gave up only three hits and no runs. So he is capable of getting batters out. Also, let’s not forget the Mets once gave up Matt Lawton and four top prospects for his services, so he’s got some skills (there was another guy the Indians threw into the deal, don’t remember the name … some forgettable infielder).

Game 2: Orlando Hernandez vs. Tim Redding

Game 3: Mike Pelfrey vs. Billy Traber

Mike Pelfrey looks to stay winless in the bottom end of a day / night doubleheader. Well, you know what they say — “the ninth time’s a charm”. The Mets hope to coax five mildly effective innings out of Pelfrey in this latest showcase of his talents — directly in the face of his potential suitors (part of a package for Chad Cordero?).

Meantime, Billy Traber takes the mound to show the Mets one more time why they never should have traded him for Mike Bacsik. Though it all seems so pointless now that they’re teammates.

Traber has made only one start this year, and has yet to pitch more than four innings in a game in 2007. However, he is 1-0 with a 0.79 ERA career against the Mets in four games (one start). On a good day, Traber doesn’t have much velocity-wise, but his command can be very good, and he’s hell on lefthanded hitters. Righties, however, pound him — to the tune of .350 this year, .312 over the last three years.

Game 4: John Maine vs. Jason Bergmann or Joel Hanrahan

After two straight poor outings to begin the second have, John Maine rebounded with a fine performance against Pittsburgh, allowing only two runs in seven innings. Granted, it was the Pirates, but his next victim is the Nationals — and, well, he’s expected to dominate them as well.

The Nats may or may not have Bergmann starting, as he left his last start due to a hamstring injury. The former Rutgers ace gave the Mets fits in his start against them in April, but much has changed since then — most significantly, an elbow injury that sidelined him for a month. Since the injury, he hasn’t been the same. In two June starts, he pitched a total of 8 innings and sported a 7.88 ERA, with opponents hitting .375 against him. He’s been pounded in July as well, with his ERA increasing with every outing. With the hamstring injury added to his decreased performance, it may make sense for the Nats to give him a break.

Should that be the case, Joel Hanrahan will come up from AAA to make a start. The Nats picked the 25-year-old off the scrap heap in February, and has gone 5-4 with a 3.90 ERA in the AAA International League. He’s a 6’3″ righthander once touted as a jewel prospect in the overzealous Dodgers organization. He doesn’t throw overpowering stuff, but rather relies on throwing strikes and pitching to contact. As Ryan Moore of Distinguished Senators stated, the Mets ” … shouldn’t lose to this guy … “.

Mets Bats

Let’s hope the Lastings Milledge show stays in town through the weekend — LM has been a one-man wrecking crew since his promotion, driving in 12 runs in 12 games. Paul LoDuca is also swinging a hot bat, and for power too — though if the Pirates stationed a legitimate centerfielder in the middle of Shea’s outfield grass, he might not have hit two doubles against the Bucs. David Wright continues his steady pace, and methinks Jose Reyes is about to explode. Rumor has it we’ll see Moises Alou in uniform (don’t hold your breath).

The Mets can be beaten if the offense strays from its recent strategy of taking pitches and working deep counts. None of the Nationals pitchers have any type of stuff to be concerned about, but their effectiveness can be multiplied by aggressive batters with poor pitch selection. Stay the course!

Nationals Bats

Dmitri Young — affectionately known as “Da Meathook” — is the only bat the Mets need to be concerned with, and he’s really not more than a singles hitter these days. Imagine Mo Vaughn without homerun power and there you have Dmitri; he’s currently hitting over .330. Ronny Belliard is batting .301 and is a threat to hit a bloop double at any time. Ryan Zimmerman is having a terrible year, batting only .257. The Nationals as a team are hitting .248 and on pace to finish the season with less than 100 homeruns. Get the picture?

Bottom Line

The Nationals are bottom feeders, and after this series the Mets must travel to Milwaukee to play a first-place team, then travel to Chicago to play the second-place Cubs, and then they’ll face the Braves. That said, the Mets must take at least three out of four from the Nats, and if they have it in them, a sweep would be nice. Will they? We’ll see.

Pirates 8 Mets 4

The Pirates mixed in one longball with several dozen cheap hits and used the Mets’ hangover against them to avoid being swept at Shea.

The Mets — or shall we say Jose Reyes — jumped out to another first-inning lead to begin the game 1-0. Reyes led off with a single, stole second, advanced to third on a groundout, and scored on a shallow fly ball. Anyone who doesn’t believe that “speed kills” hasn’t watched Jose.

Oliver Perez was nasty — for five innings. Through those first five he was nearly untouchable, striking out eight, with great command of his fastball and a downright filthy slider. Think he was amped?

With the dominating stuff Ollie had, there was only one way the Pirates were going to score against him: with a lot of luck and mistakes by the Mets. In the sixth inning, they got both. First, eighth-place hitter Nate McClouth got sawed off and bounced the ball just over the head of Ollie and it squeaked into the outfield for a cheap single. Then, with an 0-2 count, pitcher Paul Maholm drew back the bunt and stuck it back out butcher-boy style and dribbled the ball over a drawn-in David Wright for an infield single. With men on first and second, Cesar Izturis dropped a perfect bunt that was thrown away by Perez, scoring McClouth and putting runners on second and third. Ollie settled down to induce two consecutive popups, and seemed to be out of the inning when he went 2-2 to Xavier Nady. The next pitch was another nasty slider, but Nady blistered it off of Wright’s knee, and both runners scored (the play was scored a hit, but it was questionable). Perez went 2-2 to the next batter, Josh Phelps, but allowed a two-run homer into the bleachers. Ollie completely lost his focus and his fight after that blast, and walked Jose Castillo after going to a full count. Finally, Perez struck out Ronny Paulino to end the inning. By that time, the score was Pirates, and Perez had expended over 100 pitches.

The Mets started fighting back immediately in the bottom of the sixth, as Lastings Milledge went deep to make the score 5-2, but the Pirates scored three more in top of the seventh off relievers Scott Schoeneweis and Joe Smith.

Ruben Gotay drove in a run with a sac fly in the seventh, and Jose Reyes blasted a solo shot in the eighth, but it was too little, too late.

Notes

It’s really hard to say that Oliver Perez was entirely at fault in letting the game get away, though it may have looked that way. The key, I think, was Perez going to a 3-1 count to McClouth with the pitcher on deck. McClouth, as the 8th-place hitter, should never have seen three balls in his at-bat. But he fought to a full count, broke his bat, one thing led to another, and next thing you know the Pirates are winning. If Perez disposes of McClouth quickly, he very well might pitch into the eighth inning.

A similar snowball effect occurred in the seventh — bad luck, bad bounces, compounded by some poor pitches that followed. It’s too annoying to re-live the play by play.

Joe Smith’s velocity is down, and slider has lost some bite. It’s fairly clear that he’s fatigued, which is to be expected considering he’s never handled this kind of a workload before. It may be time to demote him to AAA, have him pitch just once or twice a week to continue building his endurance (for next year), and add another arm to the bullpen. Have Smith disappear for the month of August, get him some rest, and bring him back up just before rosters expand, so he can be a situational righty in the postseason.

Ruben Gotay looks more tense and aggressive, with less strike zone discipline, from the right side. He doesn’t seem as cognizant of strikes and balls, probably because he’s right-eye dominant. One wonders why switch-hitters who can be so Jekyll and Hyde don’t simply give up the weaker side of their ballgame, and concentrate on one.

Next Game

The Mets host the Nationals for a three-game set beginning on Friday night at 7:10 PM. Jorge Sosa takes the mound against former Met Mike Bacsik.

Mets 6 Pirates 3

It was deja vu all over again.

The Mets jumped out to a six-run lead in the first three innings, with four of the runs being driven in by Paul LoDuca and one each by Damion Easley and Marlon Anderson. With a six-zip lead, it looked like Tom Glavine would cruise easily to his 299th career victory.

However, he struggled in the fifth, allowing three runs — capped by a two-run homer by Jason Bay — to turn what looked to be a laugher in the making into a save situation. Tommy settled down to pitch a scoreless sixth, though he did give up several hard-hit balls. By the end of his six full frames, he’d thrown 113 pitches, and left his 299th in the capable hands of the bullpen.

And capable it was, with Aaron Heilman pitching two perfect innings. He’s now retired 16 out of the last 16 batters he’s faced.

Billy Wagner came on in the ninth to save his 23rd game of the season without incident.

Notes

As pointed out in the series preview, Jason Bay was batting .162 with four homeruns in the months of June and July. So far in this series, he’s 4-for-7 with three homers.

While LoDuca was driving in all the runs, Lastings Milledge also kept swinging a hot bat, going 2-for-4 with a run scored. He also was the recipient of an intentional HBP, as he had drawn the ire of the Pirates with his theatrics in Tuesday night’s game.

Glavine has me a bit concerned. He’s struggled in his last two starts, and I thought for sure he’d eat up the aggressive Pirates hitters. Some of it may have had to do with the tiny strike zone of Tony Randazzo, but that’s part of my concern — if he doesn’t have a generous, “pitcher’s” ump, he’s in deep doo-doo, even against a horrific-hitting team such as the Buccos.

How about Shawn Green doing every little bit he can to show value, with Milledge swinging like a man possessed? He’s not hitting for much power, but he’s dumping little hits here and there and running his butt off on the bases — including getting a basehit and then a steal vs. lefty John Grabow in the sixth. He eventually made his way to third and faked an attempt to score on a shallow fly caught by second baseman Freddy Sanchez — which drew two throws, the second of which was nearly thrown away. (Green went 2-for-4 with a double, by the way.) Can you say “motivation” ?

Carlos Beltran sat out the game with a pulled stomach muscle. Good thing the Mets DFA’d outfielder Chip Ambres instead of demoting Sandy Alomar, Jr. or AHern, eh? Genius.

I keep checking, but haven’t seen any changes in the MLB Official Rule Book in regard to the hit by pitch. Yet, remarkably, Nate McClouth was awarded first base after getting hit by a pitch he swung at, in the ninth inning. It didn’t matter, but it’s the principle. The rulebook clearly states in section 6, rule 9(b):

(b) He is touched by a pitched ball which he is not attempting to hit unless (1) The ball is in the strike zone when it touches the batter, or (2) The batter makes no attempt to avoid being touched by the ball;
If the ball is in the strike zone when it touches the batter, it shall be called a strike, whether or not the batter tries to avoid the ball. If the ball is outside the strike zone when it touches the batter, it shall be called a ball if he makes no attempt to avoid being touched.

So, based on the above, explain to me how McClouth gets first base?

Anyone who watched the SNY postgame, I have a question: was that George Hamilton sitting in for Lee Mazzilli? Either my TV color is way off or Maz is looking like the inside of a blood orange. Take that tan to South Beach, Mr. Toasty.

Next Game

Oliver Perez makes his first start against his old teammates in an odd 12:10 PM afternoon start (day camp field trip!). Lefty Paul Maholm hurls for the Pirates.