213 Miles From Shea

(MLB.com)

The Mets had a big win tonight (my attempt in the title was to spell it french). In the first inning tonight it looked like it was going to be one of those days again as the Cards put up an early run, however thanks to Wright, Beltran and Davis in the second inning the Mets put up the tying run. The big blow was by Frenchy. In the 4th inning where the Mets had two runners on, Frenchy smashed a homer way out and put the Mets up 4-1. This was huge hit as the Mets just started rolling after that putting up two more innings of multi-runs, including another homer, this time by Reyes.

Niese was fantastic tonight as he racked up 6 innings allowing only one run. Acosta put up the other run as the Mets bullpen only allowed one run. The Mets had another complete game at home as they for some reason they play really well in Citi. All of this came as Jerry was not managing tonight. That was, in my opinion, a coincidence.

The big story for the night was the offense. They put up the best showing against Wainwright this year, who now looks to be the frontrunner for the Cy Young award. The Mets were able to get hits and drive in runs while they had RISP, something they haven't done at all for what feels like a month now. In terms of what the Mets have to do, this was exactly what the Doctor order to start off the homestand.

The Mets try to turn this all around starting tonight with Jon Niese vs Adam Wainwright. The Mets are coming off of an abysmal road trip with a lot of questions coming to this week. There are ton of off the field issues going on (coaching, trades, releases) but ultimately it is about what is done on the field and while the Mets pitching of late has been spot on, the bats have been whack.

Niese has a 6-4 record this season with a 3.54 ERA. He wasn't as good in his last start as he has been in previous allowing 3 ER over 5 innings but he still managed to strikeout 6 batters. In the month of July he has a 1-2 record while pitching 26.2 inning with a 2.70 ERA. Niese's only start against the Red Birds was a memorable one for all the wrong reasons. He was cruising through 1.2 innings until he went to cover first base, get injured and was gone for the rest of the year. During his young career, only a few Cardinals have AB's against Niese. Holliday and Ludwig are both 0-1 while Pujols is 1-1 with a double.

The Mets bats will have to face a now infamous foe in Mets history, Adam Wainwright. More specifically, we could have a rematch of that moment that ended the 2006 season. To make matters worse, Wainwright has been terrific this year with his 14-5 record and 1.94 ERA. In fact, in the entire month of June he has allowed one earned run. The Mets scored more runs on him than that the first time this season (3) however Wainwright picked up the win in a complete game outing where the Cards edged the Mets by the score of 5-3. To give you an idea how long ago that was/feels, that was the series of the 20 inning game and right before the Mets called up Ike Davis. Anyway the Mets have these numbers on Adam:

The season is winding down but the hottest month of the season is on its way. How are the Mets going to get fans to stay in the stands instead of heading to the comfort of their air conditioned homes (where they can change the channel when the Amazin's play bad)? Well the Mets marketing department hope they have the solution with the August 2010 promotions (All images via mlb.com):

August 1st: The Mets open up the month with a highly anticipated event as they induct fan favorites: Gooden, Strawberry, Johnson and Cashen. This players, manager and GM were integral to the success of the 1986 Mets and finally get their place in Mets Hall of Fame history. Fans get into the action to with a Hall of Fame Hat:

It's a nice hat. The only complaint is that it would have better if they could incorporate the inductees onto the hat. It would make it look more cluttered but this is one those times where clutter is better than the clean design.

August 13th: The Mets want to keep your beer cold. But they don't want anyone to keep it cold. They want the ace of the staff with ice waters in his veins to keep your beer nice and frosty. Behold the Santana Koozie:

August 14th: Obligatory Green and Orange Hate:

August 15th: One for the kids:

August 29th: Another one for the kids. This one is a Mets Build-a-bear:

There was a no-hitter for the sixth fifth time this season last night as Matt Garza for the Rays pitched a historic game, and it was historic for a few reasons. First, and fore most (now giving away the title of this article), it was the first no-no in Rays history. It was also the third time this year the Rays were involved in a no-hitter (two have been pitched against them) and 2010 now has the most no hitters since 1991 when there were 7, and there are still two months left in this season.

At the start of the season, there were four teams in Major League Baseball who have never had a no-hitter (Mets, Padres, Rockies, Rays). The Rays and the Rockies each have had their first one this season as the no no-no's club has become exclusive to two teams, us included. To some degree, its fitting in some sort of cosmic humor that out of the four teams on that list, the two of them that haven't had no-hitters this year are above and beyond the oldest with the Mets being established in 1962 and the Padres in 1969. The universe if laughing at us while the young recent expansion teams get to baseball history. For the Mets, and I'm speaking for myself here, I don't if any of you take this as personally as I'm starting to, it is like watching your friends at work or at school constantly get recognition. You are happy for them, and happy to be associated with the history, but it is getting to the point that even being humble is frustrating.

Actually, I think Nelson Figueroa has a great analogy for it. It is basically like the Mets farm system. The older players who should have been due a long time ago are being looked over while the young players who should get some more seasoning (to at least go through what the older players have) get called up too quickly. Ah the universe again, making a microcosm of the Mets not pitching a no hitter in our minor league system.

Maybe we will get one soon (doubt it), we've been close this season (Niese ftw).

Over the last month or so, I have focused a lot on Shea Stadium in this section and while I should probably stop doing that in order to give it some diversity, there are times I can't help myself. This is one of those times. Everything I've shown so far for Shea Stadium basically takes the item and keeps it to being a collectors showcase item. There really hasn't, unless you count the cup holder, much function of these items. Shea Stadium Chairs could function, but when you pay a huge amount of money for the chair, do you really want anyone sitting on it? Well marketing wiz's created this interesting item to give some function to Shea Stadium memorabilia:

(via MLB.com)

Yes, those are cuff links. The orange part is actually made out of the plastic from the Shea Stadium chairs. This is a fairly interesting idea because its a piece that doesn't scream Mets. In fact, you would either have to bring it up in conversation that they are Mets pieces or someone would have to prompt you to explain where you got those orange cuff links. The only downside to them are that they are about $150. That being said, its always interesting to see when products get transformed into something else entireley.

The Mets try to split the series tonight as they face the Dodgers for the last game in the series. After winning on Friday, the Mets couldn't get it done last night as they fought back to make it a 2-2 game, but fell completely silent until the 13th inning where Loney won the game for the Dodgers against Oliver Perez. The Mets will try to reverse their fortunes with RA Dickey on the mound as they try to take down Clayton Kershaw.

Dickey (6-4, 2.73 ERA) gets the nod this afternoon. He has two losses in his last two games, however in those games he has pitched 14 innings and has allowed only 4 ER (in other he has fallen victim to low run support, shocking). Dickey wasn't with the Mets the last time they played the Dodgers. Surprisingly, he has not faced the Dodgers. However the following Dodgers have these numbers against RA:

The Mets bats will try to channel Friday night against Clayton who is 9-5 this season with a 3.15 ERA. In his last three starts this season he is 1-1 with a 3.93 ERA. Last year Kershaw pitched against the Mets once and he picked up the win as he pitched a 6 inning shutout where the Mets only got 3 hits. The Mets have these numbers agianst Kershaw:

Lets Go Mets!

The New York Post after last night's loss:

(NY Post)

The Mets and Dodgers play the third game of the series this afternoon on FOX as the Mets try to repeat what they did last night and win a game. On the topic of last night, it was great. The Mets hit, pitched, and played great defense and took the game 6-1. This is an important game for the Mets for another reason as Pelfrey really needs to perform this afternoon. I'm not going to spend time looking into his recent numbers. We all know they have been terrible. Last year, he made one start against the Dodgers and it wasn't good as he allowed 5 runs, 4 earned over 3 innings against the boys from Hollywood. The Dodgers have these numbers against him:

The Mets bats will try to repeat last night against Carlos Monasterios. In his rookie season, Carlos is 3-2 with a 3.61 ERA. For Carlos this will be his first start since June 18th as he has been used in multiple roles this year. He did pitch two innings against the Mets in April where he allowed a hit and that was it. Oddly enough, it was Castillo that managed the one hit. For the Mets bats they need to do what they did last night again, score runs early and then have someone play the Jason Bay role with the killer hit late in the game to put it away for good.

Lets Go Mets!

With our ace on the mound, things returned to normal tonight as the Mets fired on all cylinders with great starting pitching, great relief pitching and great production out of the bats. Also, the Braves loss so the Mets can officialy start their climb back into contention.

In my opinion the star of the game has to be Santana as he threw 7 innings, allowed one earned run, walked one, allowed five hits while striking out 4. He provided exactly what the Mets needed tonight giving everyone else on the Mets a chance to help win this game. This also marked the 13th time this season that he has allowed one run or less in a start (and yet he has only 8 wins, which speaks volumes on multiple levels).

Ike Davis. He was given absolute junk up there and yet he sent that 53 mph pitch straight into the night. Bay helped his own cause (showing his worth) by driving in a huge double and ending up with 3 RBI on the night.

The Mets also showed the night that they want to win. All three outfielders tonight showed hustle as they all made plays where they risked themselves for the team. Thats exactly what you want to see in a team that wants to win. Hopefully these good feelings tonight in defense, pitching and hitting will carry on for a while now, as the Mets try to reverse their fortunes since the start of the second half.