213 Miles From Shea

Remember that time we had our AAA team down in New Orleans which didn't really make any sense. And remember that time that their uniforms were terrible, and a city with that much history and should deserve a little more. Well according to milb.com, that has finally happened:

(Image From Milb.com)

Now this is classy. This is nice. This is what they should have had the entire time. Not talking about the color scheme (which is odd, because it is Rays colors and they are a Marlins team, whatever) the physical design looks nice and is something to be proud of.

Good Job Zephyrs, this is a good move.

Over at Fan Huddle, I just wrote an article about a disturbing situation that occurred this week.

In a report by Peter Gammons, it has become unclear who the real GM is. He states that it really is Jeff Wilpon, with Minaya more as a puppet to accept criticism for bad decisions.

This could do a lot of damage. Read the full article and join the discussion.

Over at Fan Huddle, I just wrote a quick article about the Mets players in the AFL yesterday, including Ike Davis's big day. Here's a quick summary of the stats:

Davis 4-6, 2 2B, GS, 6 RBI
Duda 2-5
Tejada 2-5

Also, Mejia starts today. Check out the link for some commentary on these performances.

First, read this story.

This story raises up the tradition of keeping homerun balls and giving them back. As the article states, the first really famous situation of this was Marris's 61st where Roger wanted the fan to keep it. These situations always boil down to who is the nicer person. Is the fan going to say that I really respect your career and I  am going to let you have your milestone back. Or, is the player going to say that I really respect your support, and realize that once that ball leaves the yard it is the fan's property, that I am giving literally to the fans.

While that debate could range on, it is clear, so clear, that the real problem here is the Phillies office skills. Most of the time when either the player doesn't step up (who in my opinion should always offer to) or if the fan doesn't step up, then the fan and the player start a barganing process for the ball. What the Phillies did here was wrong. They took the ball, told the girl she was going to get it back, and then gave her a different ball. Generally, when a fan gives up the ball, they get autographed balls, bats, pictures with the players and chance to meet them. This didn't happen here!

No matter how you feel about who did the right thing, it is safe to say that the Phillies PR department really botched this one.

Hey Readers!

Have you heard of Fan Huddle? Its a new website that features over 200 writers that are writing for every major sport and every team. Well I am the representative writing for the New York Mets. Its a new place and I am starting to get accustomed to it. Anyway, my writing will be split between here and there. Whenever I write something over there, I'll make it known here.

Anyway, here is my article about why we should still play Dan Murphy everyday.

Thanks for all of the support
-Elliot Teichman

When switching from Shea to Citi one of the bigger selling points was the Mets were going to transfer from playing in a stadium to playing in a ballpark. That means baseball is the sport that will be played on the Citi Field green.

Oops.

On November 4th the UFL comes to town to play the first ever UFL game in New York. If you haven't heard of the UFL, which most likely you haven't, its a 4 team development league for football. I am really fuzzy on the details, but I know the teams are New York, Florida, Las Vegas and California. California and Vegas played last night. This is a great blog to read, if you like to read complaints about things, because he just rips into the UFL.

Anyway, Citi Field will be a football stadium tomorrow.

Its hard to say though that it actually will be a football stadium considering in last night's game, people who actually watched the game said it looked practically empty.

UPDATE:
Wrong Date of game in the original article, so I changed it.

The Mets finish up the 2009 baseball season today as they play they the Houston Astros. While we all have strong feelings about this team, and as a group, have gone through a lot this year, it is always hard to write the last game preview post of the season. Even though we stumbled this season, we still played (something that resembled) baseball, and now we are about to go through the winter without seeing the Mets take the field till late January, play something of a game until March and not play real game until April. In that respect, I'm sad to see the season end as I'm sure many of you are too (I'll be writing more on this later today). Anyway, the Mets have the opportunity to end the seaosn on a very strong note by sweeping the Houston Astros (I believe its possible, this past weekend my high school just ended a 53 game losing streak, so anything is possible). Figueroa will be getting the start against Lopez.

Figueroa is 2-8 on the season with a 4.70 ERA over 61.1 innings of work. In his last three games he is 0-3 over 18.0 innings with a 5.00 ERA however, if you only look at his last 2 games he is 0-2 over 13.0 innings with a 2.77 ERA. So the last two times on the mound Nelson has been getting it done. Here are some stats the Astros have on him:
     Blum 1-13
     Berkman 2-10
     Boone 3-8
     Tejada 0-2
     Keppinger 0-2
To win though he will need something that has not been happening for him in his last several outings, and that is he will need the Mets to score him some runs.

The Mets bats get to face another rookie starting pitcher today and this time its Lopez. Lopez is 0-1 on the season over 14.1 innings and has a 9.42 ERA. This will be his second major league start where last time he lasted 3.2 innings and allowed 5 ER. As a reliever so far he has pitched 10.2 innings and has allowed 10 ER. As you probably have guessed, since he came up on August 28th of this year, no Mets have any batting history in the majors against him. The Mets bats though have been clicking the last few games and all they need is just one more game, and then they get the winter. Lets Go Mets! Finish off 2009 strong! Sweep the Astros!

The Mes continue their final series of 2009 with the Astros. Last night was an all around solid game for the Mets, one that we can look to build off of for 2010. For me, it was punctuated with the pinch hit homer of the player on this team that has worked the hardest, and is seemingly being written out for next season before Spring Training (in other words I still believe in Murphy). Anyway, the Mets hope to continue to finish this seaosn on a good note with the enigma of Misch vs Bazardo today.

Misch is 2-4 on the season with a 4.33 ERA over 54.0 innings. In his last three games he is 1-2 over 15.1 innings and a 7.04 ERA. Those numbers would have so much worse if it wasn't for his last outing, a 9 inning shutout (yes, he is the only Mets pitcher to do that this year). Basically he went from 1.1 innings with 8 runs to 9 innings with no runs. Incredible. Anyway here are some Astros stats against him:
     Keppinger 1-5
     Blum 2-4, 2 2B
     Matsui 1-4
     Berkman 1-3
Think of it almost as instant karma for the Mets. They go from playing in Washington, where the Nats fans got to see a ton of ex Nationals in the series and now the Mets fans get to see a good amount of ex Mets in this series (some more liked than others).

The Mets will have to deal iwth Bazardo today who is 1-2 on the seaosn witha  8.34 ERA over 27.1 innings pitched. In his last three games he has a 7.53 ERA and a 1-1 record. The only Met batting record I could find this morning was Wright who is 2-2 lifetime against Bazardo. Hopefully the Mets offense comes out like it did yesterday. Lets Go Mets!

After dropping two straight to the Nats, the Mets and the Nationals play again in a game featuring Redding vs Lannan. This afternoon's game is the last one in the season for the Nationals at home, so that would be what the Mets will be playing for (if you really have to justify it). Today is more of a treat (in a wierd way) for the Nationals fans in a wierd way as they get to see a former National in Redding. The real treat for them though has been Lannan. Now he has a 3.96 ERA on the season, but against the Mets this year he has been lights out with a 0.36 ERA and 2 complete games. Seriously, this guy has our number.

The lineup today:
Pagan
Hernandez
Wright
Beltran
Francoeur
Tatis
Santos
Valdez
Redding

Lets Go Mets! Beat the Nationals!

The Mets and the Braves play again tonight as the Mets try to win one. Last night's game was a pretty good description of how games usually go for the Mets as they went up early, fell back, actually got the lead back (a rarity) and then lost it again, playing poor baseball at the end of the game. In other words, a pretty frustrating game. Tonight could be another frustrating game as the Mets have to deal with Jurrjens who has been just awesome against the Mets this season (1.83 ERA over 3 games with 2 wins). The Mets will counter that tonight with Nelson Figueroa who has been putting up nice numbers over the last three games as he has an ERA over 3.44 during that stretch.

If you need a reason to watch tongiht, make it Josh Thole. He makes contact, a lot of contact. He is still hitting over .400 with the Mets and he is a bright spot on a team that has pretty much be dark and gloomy all season. Lets Go Mets! Beat the Braves!