213 Miles From Shea

Tejada. Castillo. Cora. Which one has a winning record in appearing in Mets games? Well, as you are probably not surprised, the winner is…..Tejada! The player with the least amount of veteran experience is the one that brings the winning sensation (which is really funny that two of the players that are supposed to bring the veteran knowledge are Cora and Castillo). Anyway, the numbers:

The problem with looking through those numbers is that they are all over different amounts of AB's. The one area though that Tejada clearly stands out on is the amount of wins he has vs losses. It is a lot better than the other two, we'll get into that later but first lets even the field and assume that each player had 200 AB so far this season:

Interestingly, Tejada is hitting doubles at a better rate than the other options, Cora and Castillo. Tejada may lack in RBI's but check out how many times in 200 games he would cross home plate, vs his other options. This has to have something to do with why he has the best winning record vs the other two.

There are also things Tejada brings that the numbers don't show. His youth brings energy to the team while his defense is starting to improve greatly. However that topic branches away from the numbers so it won't be discussed here. What can be said is that he is the defensive upgrade to Cora and Castillo, and I believe the above numbers show he is or is nearly the offensive upgrade.

This afternoon was the end of a 5 day journey through the heart of sports collecting world. Baltimore was the lucky home this year of the National Sports Collectors Convention, the 31st annual, and it was a sight to behold. I have attended one sports collectors convention in the past (Baseball's Best in Baltimore) but nothing was close to this convention. There were 600+ dealers ranging from huge corporate sources (Topps, Upperdeck), mega-internet dealers (DA Card World), online auctions, small dealers, and people who were just trying to sell stuff from their den.

Over the next several days I will posting more about my time at this convention, the problems this sector in sports has with the FBI, and all of the photos I took (over 50). While I'm working on that, here are some quick points:

Anyway, like I said before, as soon as I can I will upload a photo essay here.

Up and Down Day For the Amazin's Today.

Stop Me If You Heard That Before.

Actually, don't stop me, because it is what you have heard before. Anyway the Mets started the day off good getting two quick runs off of Roy in the first inning. In the bottom of the second they let one back, making the score 2-1. In the bottom of the third though, the flood gates opened as Dickey showed that he was human. He got lit up, allowed 5 runs, making the score 6-2. The Mets would later scrap together three more runs to finish the game in a 6-5 loss.

The two heroes of the game are easily Reyes and Pagan who between the two of them went 4-8, 3 R (Reyes 2), 2 SB (Pagan both), 2 RBI (Pagan both) and 2 2B (Reyes both). The problem is that Beltran, Wright and Davis behind them went 1-12 with one RBI (Davis). In other words the Mets main problem continues, that once they get runners on, they are not getting them in.

I'm not too concerned with Dickey's start because he has to be human at some point. The key for the pitching staff is that they were able to come in and pitche 6 shut-out innings of bullpen ball.

The Mets try to take a step in the right direction as they play Jimenez and the Rockies on Tuesday.

The Mets try to make it two in a row and try to take a road series today as they take on the Phillies this afternoon. Today's contest features the pitchers with the best ERA's on their staff. For the Mets it will be R.A. Dickey who is 7-4 on the season with a 2.36 ERA. In his last three starts he has pitched 20 innings with a 1-0 record and an ERA of 0.90. He goes up their fighting and that is what the Mets will need today. He picked up his first win of the season against the Phillies as he threw 6 shutout innings against the Phils, striking out 7 of them. The Phillies have these numbers on Robert Allen:

Halladay is having a Halladay season as he is 13-8 with a 2.17 ERA. He has pitched 24 innings in his last three starts with a 3-0 record and 0.75 ERA. His only start against the Mets this year was fantastic as he threw a complete game shutout in Philly where the Mets were only able to scrap 3 hits off of him. The Mets will look to end their slump and reverse the fortunes as they sport these numbers against Roy:

Lets Go Mets!

The Mets won a very important game tonight as they beat the Phillies 1-0.

The main story of the night was Johan Santana who was fantastic. He had a no hitter going through 5.2 innings and that was mainly due to his change-up keeping the Phillies off balance (and being thrown for strikes). Santana got into some trouble in the 8th inning, and Manuel didn't waste anytime with the rest of the pen, bringing in Krod for the 5 out save. So, altogether, the pitching was fantastic as the Mets notched another shut-out win.

The offense tonight struggled again. They were able to knock in 7 hits, but the only run came from a solo homer from Francoeur that just cleared the fence (probably a Fernando who? shot). Several times during the game the Mets had runners in scoring position, but they weren't pushed in as the Mets bats still fell cold. Since the outcome of the game was a win, this will mostly be ignored, but it is becoming a real issue.

Next up for the Mets is Roy Halladay as the Mets try to take a key road series.

The “new” look Mets take on the Phillies tonight after dropping the opener last night. This could be a potentially very important game (side note: I'm getting tired of writing “very important game”) as the Mets need their ace to step up today. Johan is 8-6 on the season with a 3.20 ERA. He wasn't stellar in his last start picking up the loss allowing 4 ER over 7 innings (he had another rough beginning to that game, and then started to get the ball rolling) however he did get 11 strikeouts. The big story for Johan today, besides the fact that the Mets really need to win, is that it is here in Philly where he had one of the worst starts of his entire career. The Phillies have these numbers on Johan:

The Mets bats will look to continue break out of their collective month long slump against Hamels tonight who is 7-7 on the season with a 3.56 ERA. In his last two starts he has allowed 7 ER over 12 innings pitched. He lost his only start against the Amazin's this year as he allowed 3 runs, 2 earned over 6.1 innings. The Mets have the following numbers on Hamels:

Lets Go Mets!

Masato Akamatsu of the Yokohama BayStars made a catch last night to end all catches. Seriously, this catch is easily the best I've ever seen and well, might make people just not want to try to be the best anymore. Masato made this catch in a game last night. Here's the video:

Seriously those are the catches that are only in the movies and comic books, climbing all the way on top of the wall to bring that back in. Just Wow.

Huffington Post article and Dead Spin.

In what has become a surprisingly really busy August Day, another “major” move was made by the Red Sox. Boston has called up Delgado for his offense services and signed him to a minor league contract. The contract will allow him to opt for free agency if he is not called up to the majors by September 1st. One would have to assume that this move was made because the Red Sox need somebody while Youk is out, and Delgado is a quick solution.

The Red Sox were not the only team to be interested in Delgado. A couple of days ago the Rockies and the White Sox were kicking the tires on Carlos, with the White Sox looking more serious than the Rockies.

For Delgado, this is a critical step for a personal career goal and for a team next season. He wants to play long enough to make it to the 500 club (he has 473 right now) and in order to do that he will need to show people he's healthy. Also, I saw several different Delgado jerseys the other day for 15 dollars. I'm not sure why I just broadcasted that.

The Mets finalized their moves, and they weren't exactly Earth shattering:

My reaction: This is a half-step in a the correct direction

As much as I like Cora, the emotional side of me knows that this was a necessary move. Cora really wasn't hitting, he was just a veteran presence on the bench. He was also really close to enacting his vesting portion of his contract, where the Mets would have to have play next year for 2 million dollars (ridiculous). It was time for Cora to go. The problem with this though is that it also time for Castillo to go. I will tolerate this move if Tejada gets the bulk of the playing time, and Castillo becomes the bench player. If Castillo stays the main second basemen, then this move is worthless.

Feliciano demoted was a necessary evil. The problem is though that F-Mart needs the bulk of the playing time, so we have the Francoeur problem again. No need to go into detail with this because we all know what that means.

Finally, I really would have liked to see Castillo released and Perez dropped. At this point, I guess the reason they are keeping them around is because they want to make a move for some prospects in the winter. Looking far into the future, if they are not moved a week after the Winter Meetings, they need to be dropped because them on the roster will impede on a prime period of time to improve the team. 

It seems that the Mets front office is sick of the last 4 weeks of play. Well actually, sick might be too strong of a word, because if they were, they would have made some other moves earlier this season. Anyway all signs (via Metsblog) are pointing that the Mets are up to something, although the all of the stories seem to have conflicting views of what is actually going to happen:

At this point in the season, youth movement is looking necessary in order to start a new thinking mode for next season, but if they don't get rid of Castillo, than this could be a waste of time. We'll see what happens.

More on this topic later if we can actually figure out what the Amazin's are up to.