Hey! Darren O’Day wasn’t on the team by Game 162 — in fact he was gone before the end of April. So what the heck is he doing as part of the 2009 analysis?

It’s a sore spot, that’s why — and O’Day’s brief tenure as a New York Met is a symbol of the organization’s shortsighted, knee-jerk “strategies” of building and maintaining the 25-man roster.

What this post should have been was a congratulatory note to Omar Minaya and his scouting staff for having the boldness and acuity to pluck Darren O’Day in the Rule 5 Draft. The acquisition could have been a soothing bright spot amidst a dark year of disappointment. But even when the Mets did something right, they found a way to undo it.

O’Day earned a bullpen spot on the strength of a sparkling

Casey Fossum pitching for the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Yankees

Anywho, as you may also remember, Fossum was DFA’d to make room for Ken Takahashi. We assumed he’d simply report back to Buffalo and return to orange and blue when needed.

Instead, Fossum elected free agency, and is now in pinstripes. The Yankee kind. The Yanks signed him and sent him to Scranton/Wilkes-Barre to take the injured Ian Kennedy’s place on the roster.

Last night, Fossum started against the Norfolk Tides and, on a limited pitch count, tossed 3 2/3 “sharp” innings, helping the AAA Yankees to a 5-1 win.

Also, as mentioned earlier this morning, Jason Vargas picked up the win for the Mariners in a 15-inning affair last night. Vargas threw 2 1/3, striking out 4. And in other news, Darren O’Day — who is developing his own “Six Degrees of Separation” — threw another perfect inning in relief for the Rangers last night, striking out two. He’s now appeared in 6 games, pitched 4 1/3 scoreless innings, and struck out 4. Who says the American League has better hitters?

He’d been gone only hours, but Darren O’Day already appeared in a game for the Texas Rangers, facing Kevin Millar in the 11th inning last night against the Blue Jays.

O’Day was so new they didn’t have a uniform for him, so he wore Kason Gabbard’s jersey. Yes, O’Day went into the game with the name “Gabbard” stitched across his back.

“I got off the plane in the eighth inning and had to go through customs and all that jazz,” O’Day said. “The traveling secretary was texting me back and forth. We originally planned to go to the hotel and he said ‘Go to the field, we might need you.’ I got here, got on a uniform and went out there.”

O’Day shook hands and introduced himself to his new teammates in the bullpen, immediately prior to warming up.

Unfortunately for Darren, Millar ripped a game-winning single off of him to deliver a victory for the Jays.

“Gabbard I thought was a left-handed pitcher and he came in throwing sinkerballs, side-armed right-handed, so I was a little confused at first,” Millar joked.

Darren O’Day, a Rule 5 pick offered on waivers by the New York Mets a few days ago, has been claimed by the pitching-starved Texas Rangers.

The Rule 5 requirements now apply to the Rangers, meaning, if they choose not to keep O’Day on the 25-man roster, they must waive him and then offer him back to the Angels of Los Angeles / Anaheim / California / Disneyland.

Some “play possum”, while in Flushing we “flay Fossum”.

Read on to decipher and debate the mysterious moves that brought Casey Fossum to New York and sent Darren O’Day and Nelson Figueroa packing.

O'Day and Morrissey, courtesy of Angels blog Halos Heaven

Rotoworld is reporting that the Mets have designated reliever Darren O’Day for assignment. O’Day – a Rule 5 pick – will be placed on Rule 5 waivers. If he clears waivers, he will be offered back to the Angels.

O’Day’s departure will make room for Nelson Figueroa, who will start in place of Mike Pelfrey in Sunday’s series finale against Milwaukee.

I’m surprised Omar Minaya is so quick to scrap a piece of the bullpen that has been dominant so far this season. In four games with the Mets, O’Day had not allowed an earned run.

Given Pelfrey’s youth and his workload last season, I can’t imagine why they wouldn’t put him  on the DL, retroactive to his last start. He’d only end up missing one extra start and the bullpen could remain intact.

Then again, maybe the Mets weren’t high on O’Day in the first place and/or maybe they have a late inning reliever in mind to replace him once Pelfrey gets back.

Marlins 5 Mets 4

Though the Mets lost this one, they did show a lot of fight in the later innings, which is something we didn’t see enough of in 2008.

John Maine pitched well enough for his first outing since shoulder surgery, allowing two runs on two hits and one walk in five innings, striking out five. Both runs came on solo homers, on the same high fastballs that Keith Hernandez “likes to see”. Yes, those high fastballs can be strikeouts, but they can also be gopher balls, unfortunately. At one point, Maine retired seven Fish in a row, and he began the game with two consecutive strikeouts. His velocity was up to around 93 MPH, but his command was nonexistent. It appears he’s healthy, and on the way back, but will take some time.

Spoiling Maine’s encouraging performance was the Mets bullpen, which allowed three runs over the final four innings. If this were 1978, we might have seen J.J. Putz enter in the sixth and K-Rod record a two-inning save, but this is 2008 and pitchers don’t do that anymore. So instead, we watched Sean Green, Bobby Parnell, Pedro Feliciano, and Darren O’Day show us that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

On a positive note, Carlos Beltran belted his first homer of the year, with three hits on the day. Ryan Church also had three hits, as did Danny Murphy, though two of Murphy’s “hits” easily could have been scored errors. We’ll take them, though.

On a negative note, the Mets stranded 14 runners on base. Fourteen. Ouch. Well, at least they’re getting guys on base, right?

Back to the positive: Jeremy Reed came through HUGE with his hit as a New York Met, blistering an RBI single in the ninth inning off Matt Lindstrom to tie the game at four. He was the Mets’ best hitter in spring training, and it’s a wonder it took this long for him to get an at-bat in a regular-season game.

However, Feliciano and O’Day couldn’t hold the tie, and the blur known as Emilio Bonifacio won the game with his legs, reaching base on an infield single and racing home on a hit by Jorge Cantu. It was the second time in three innings that Bonifacio changed the game with his speed — he’d earlier reached base on a two-out bunt off Parnell, eventually scoring the Fish’s fourth run.

Game Notes

John Maine’s stats belied his performance. He gave up only two runs and walked one, but many of his strikeouts had more to do with undisciplined Marlins hitters chasing balls out of the strike zone than Maine throwing great pitches. Further, Maine was consistently missing spots, even when he was throwing strikes. This may not make sense, or it may sound like nitpicking, but the truth is, Brian Schneider was doing a lot of reaching to catch Maine’s pitches, because Maine was missing the intended target by a foot or more — that’s too much for an MLB pitcher.

Luis Castillo came to bat with runners in scoring position about fifteen times in this game, and failed in each one. We’ll still try to hammer that square peg into the round eighth hole of the lineup.

Speaking of, did anyone notice Castillo’s strike-three looking in the top of the seventh? It was a darn close pitch on the inside black of home plate. Maybe you also noticed Marlins catcher John Baker “stick” that pitch — he held it exactly where it crossed the plate, and was awarded with strike three. Maybe I’m harping too much on the art of catching lately, but the concept of “framing” is one of those universally taught, yet completely illogical, baseball skills that needs to called out and buried. (That “thump” was the sound of me hopping off the soap box.)

Ryan Church remains red-hot, against righties and lefties. He must like the month of April, because he started out similarly last season.

A little strange to see Gary Sheffield, instead of Ramon Castro, come in to pinch-hit for Brian Schneider. Seems like a waste to burn two players in one shot like that, especially in a close game where you might be going into extra innings.

Sean Green appeared in yet another ballgame. For those unaware, Green pitched very well for Seattle for the first half of 2008, then had a poor second half, and most people felt it was because of overuse. His arm action and mechanics certainly do not make him look durable. Green, Parnell, Feliciano, and Putz are on pace to appear in 121 games each this season.

The young Marlins look like they are finally starting to “get it”. If they can find one more solid bullpen guy — or a legit closer — they will be a serious playoff contender.

People love to bash Jorge Cantu for his poor fielding, but the guy made some really nice snares on hot smashes in the late innings. That man has no fear of the ball, that’s for certain.

Next Mets Game

The Mets and Marlins do it again, serving as the opening act to Flo Rida. You won’t see the first hour of the game, but can listen to it on WFAN or XM Radio. SNY coverage begins at 7:00 PM. Livan Hernandez makes his Mets debut against Ricky Nolasco, though there’s no guarantee that either pitcher will still be in the game by the time it is broadcast on your TV set.

Reds 8 Mets 6

You can’t win ’em all …

Not a good day for Oliver Perez, who was charged with 8 runs in less than five innings of work — though he wasn’t helped by Darren O’Day, who allowed two inherited runners to score.

Ollie cruised through the first two innings, then allowed four runs in the third and fell apart in the fifth. Other than O’Day, the bullpen did its job in holding the Reds scoreless, and the offense tried to chip away, but fell short.

If nothing else, it was interesting to see that the Mets would in fact play all nine innings when behind. There was some speculation that they would concede the contest after the seventh, since JJ Putz and K-Rod were acquired with the intention of shortening the game by two innings.

Sure, you don’t like to see the Mets lose, but look at it this way — they took two out of three, and won their first series.

Mets Game Notes

Prior to Opening Day, the Reds were my sleeper pick for the Cinderella team of 2009. If these first three games are any indication, I’m WAY off. Their pitching is thinner than it appears on paper, and their young hitters may still be a year away. Mostly, though, they look sloppy in the field, reminiscent of the Marlins of the past few seasons. If they don’t find another quality starting pitcher and tighten up the defense, they’re headed for another dismal season.

Before the game, Jerry Manuel told reporters that “if you can get six good innings out of Ollie, that’ll be great”. No kidding. That’s pretty much the hope for every starting pitcher, isn’t it? For example, wouldn’t it have been “great” if Johan Santana could have given the Mets six good innings on Opening Day? I can’t believe they cut away from the game action to show us that pearl of wisdom.

Ryan Church is starting out similarly to last April, mashing line drives to all fields.

I seem to remember the Mets having a hard time winning the final game of a series when it was a weekday, day game. I can’t find the numbers anywhere to support that assumption, but it sure felt that way.

Keith Hernandez likes the new SNY graphics. I don’t, since they remove about one-fifth of my TV screen real estate. Andrew Vazzano of TheRopolitans agrees.

Keith and I do agree on one thing though — Joey Votto is the real deal. I’m sticking by my outrageous MVP prediction.

A number of missed hit-and-runs from both sides in this series, yet nearly all of them resulted in a stolen base.

Gary Sheffield made his Mets debut in this game, appearing as a pinch-hitter to lead off the ninth (he struck out looking). Strange move, since high-OBP man Luis Castillo was available on the bench. Maybe Jerry Manuel promised Castillo a full day off — I’m sure he was absolutely exhausted after playing two full games over the previous three days.

Ramon Castro remains a sloppy catcher, who drives me crazy with his annoying habit of jerking (I’m sure he calls it “framing”) every pitch. I spotted at least five occasions where Castro lost a legit strike because he jerked his glove toward the middle of the plate instead of catching the ball when it was a strike (a.k.a., “beating the ball to the spot”). One of those pitches came in the fifth and would’ve been strike three to Votto, and on the next pitch Votto hit an RBI single. Think about that. Votto’s single would’ve been an out, which means there would not have been a man on third so Brandon Phillips’ fly ball would not have been a sac fly driving in a run, and Ryan Hanigan’s fly ball would’ve been out number three, and Paul Janish would not have come to bat and singled in two. Do the math, and you tell me whether I’m nitpicking.

No, Paul Janish is not related to me. People in my family can hit, and have much larger feet. And my name is not pronounced “Yahn-ish” — it’s “Jan-ish”.

Next Mets Game

The Mets travel to Miami to play the first-place Marlins in a three-game set, beginning with a Friday night game at 7:10 PM. John Maine is scheduled to face Anibal Sanchez.