I thought I had spoken too soon. I feel like I do that a lot, actually- at least every time I write something positive about the New York Mets, whether it's about a winning streak or a player who is hitting well, it ends within 48 hours of my writing it. I almost did it again. Almost.
Last week I weighed in on the lack of big bats in the Mets lineup after being two-hit by Joel Pineiro. The Mets promptly responded by putting an 11-0 beating on the Cardinals, getting a two-run homer from recently recalled Nick Evans. Jerry Manuel's crew won the final game against St. Louis the following day to take three of four from St. Louis. A nice change of events, and a much better circumstance for making me eat my words.
Then the Yankees came to town. OK, technically they're already in town, but they made their first visit to Citi Field, and cleaned house. On Friday night the Mets managed just three hits against C.C. Sabathia, Gary Sheffield's solo blast accounting for the only Met run of the night in a 9-1 pounding.If you thought that would be the worst of it, it wasn't, and if you thought C.C. exposed the weakness in the Met lineup, A.J. Burnett rubbed it in their faces with a combined one-hitter on Saturday. The Yankees sealed up the sweep as Chien-Ming Wang further lowered his astronomical ERA to 10.06, allowing just two runs and four hits over 5.1 innings. The Mets would not tag Joe Girardi's bullpen for any more runs, and managed only one more hit the rest of the game.
To recap, the Yankees bashed four home runs en route to 18 runs in the series. The Metropolitans, on the other hand scored three runs on nine hits, which would be good in any one game, but over the course of a three game series is absolutely atrocious.
Three runs. Nine hits. That is all. The same Mets that racked up sixteen hits in the 11-0 victory last Wednesday have managed six runs on 14 hits in the four games since, adding the five Met hits from Thursday's 3-2 win
So as the Mets now sit at an even .500, if you ask me which scope is better suited for gauging this Met team, the obvious answer would be the one focused on a half-empty glass. But let's examine some of the positives.
The Mets rotation, which with Pelfrey, Maine and Perez 2-3-4 was so unstable in April, has morphed into a rotation of three #5 starters who are exceeding expectations. Livan Hernandez has been a pleasant surprise, and has pitched seven innings in each of his last three starts, having given up just 7 earned runs. Unfortunately, the Mets have lost all three, but by no fault of Hernandez, who has at least kept them in each game.In addition to Livan, New York has gotten production from Tim Redding and Fernando Nieve; neither of them were on the Mets' opening day roster. Redding, despite a 6.35 ERA on the year, has had a respectable June. He went 1-1 with a 4.99 ERA and 1.27 WHIP, also posting a strikeout to walk ratio of slightly better than 2:1. An even bigger surprise, Nieve was 3-0 with a 1.31 ERA and 0.97 WHIP in his three starts plus two relief innings heading into Monday.
What makes Fernando's numbers even more impressive is that he accomplished them in facing the ML home run leading Yankees, the reigning AL Champion Tampa Bay Rays, and the NL Central's first place Cardinals. Not too shabby.Ultimately, what this shows is that the Mets' patchwork rotation is holding up better than their patchwork lineup. Not only have their bats gone virtually silent, but their slump at the plate has also been hurt by their play the field. Manuel's boys shot themselves in the foot early in Friday's contest, committing three errors in the second inning against the Yankees. They never recovered, scoring just the one run on Sheffield's homer, their only bomb of the series.
I'm not the one in charge of this team, nor am I a genius. Truthfully, it doesn't take one to realize that the events of this weekend put a bold exclamation point on the already overstated problem that is New York Met hitting. Even if ".500-ish" is the goal for this team heading into the All-Star break, it still doesn't look great if Subway Series '09: Part 2 was any indication. Even at this very moment, I'm watching Milwaukee pound this team 7-3 in the 7th inning... make that 8-3, and I'm not even kidding (see: Bill Hall, RBI double). The Brewers have 16 hits and counting. The Mets have 8. One more and they'll match their run and hit totals from this past weekend, not something to be striving for. Should this hold up, the New York Mets will fall to 37-38, a game below .500, which is eerily similar to last June.
Look, I've already weighed in on this, and I won't back off from my stance now, or any time soon at the rate this team has been playing. Honestly, unless Omar Minaya subscribes to, religiously follows and is chiefly advised by this blog- which he does not and is not- there's nothing I can say or do that will make any difference. It's all wishful, and it's all opinion. And whether you agree with my suggestions or not, I think what we can agree on is our overall sentiment: Omar, please. Do something.
Let's put this out there right now, Omar. Your job is on the line, and frankly, none of us will be sad to see you go should you lose it. Because if you do in fact lose your job, it will be well deserved and essentially long overdue. It will mean that you have failed to take this team to the next level following the '06 season that featured "Our Team" and was supposed to be "Our Time." For die-hards, this is still our team, but there's no evidence of our time being anywhere close.
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You can hide behind injuries for a period of time, but when your three top stars are nowhere near returning to the field, there comes a point where things need to be shaken up, so as to keep the team in contention. The St. Louis Cardinals, a team 4 games above .500 and hovering around first place is still making improvements, having just traded for Mark DeRosa (left), a guy that was rumored to be heading to New York.Don't let the 3 game gap between yourself and first fool you, Omar, because when Raul Ibanez returns on July 3rd, the Philadelphia Phillies will not be looking back. In fact, the Marlins may not be looking back either. That's right, the Marlins, who as of a minute ago are now in second place. The wild card does not look to be coming out of the NL East, and even if it does, when you're closer to .500 than you are to first place, many, many red flags should be flying, not white ones.
So, what color flag are you waving, Mr. Minaya?
