213 Miles From Shea

I am a little behind on my game reviews and recaps so I'm going to knock out the past week one at a time tonight.

On Tuesday the Mets lost their second straight game and it was an excruciating, frustrating loss. Perez started off fairly effective tossing 4 scoreless innings and during that time the Mets were able to score 4 runs. Perez then got really wild, allowed some runs, then walked in a run, then Fossum came out and walked in another run and the game was tied. Then the game was history. The Mets allowed two more runs during the game and lost 6-4.

Both of the Mets major problems were exposed in this game. Their starting pitching was terrible again (behind Santana) and wasn't able to protect the lead that the offense gave them. However, the offense isn't off the hook either. They couldn't score after the fourth inning and the first four innings, they could have done a lot more each inning, but they couldn't get the key hits. So both of their weakness shown through and became themes for the rest of the season. The Cards showed why they are a good team and the Mets needed to start winning to make their case that they are a contender.

In terms of the pen, Feliciano was good, and he needs to be good for the Mets to compete, but Putz had a hard night as he allowed the two runs that then gave the Cards the win.

The Mets look to hit the breaks tonight as they play the Nationals to work their way back to .500. The Mets are now on a four game slide that is so incredibly frustrating. The Mets will be sending their one consistent starter to the mound today, which of course is Johan Santana who has been the opposite of every other pitcher in the Mets rotation and they will have to face Scott Olsen tonight.

Santana is 2-1 on the year with 19.2 IP with 5 BB and 27 K. The most amazing number so far though has been his 29 K's. Seriously, he is on fire. Last year against the Marlins he went 3-0, with a 2.57 ERA over 21.0 IP, 5 BB, and 18 K. The Mets need Santana right now to stop this slide and just set this team back on the right track. Here are the stats the Marlins have put up on Santana over their carears:
    Belliard 4-23, 7 K
    Zimmerman 4-13, HR
    Willingham 2-8, 2B, HR
    Kearns 2-9, 2 2B
The player I am most worried about is Willingham. He is one of those guys who loves to play against the Mets because he gets into all sorts of key situations and always performs. If the Mets can stay out of those situations tonight, then the Mets will be able to reverse their fortunes, of course, that is contigent on the Mets scoring some runs.

The Mets will have to face Olsen who has been struggling so far this year. He is 0-2 with a 9.00 ERA as he has given up 15 runs in 15 innings, he walked 7, and struck out 10. Last year in five games he was 0-3 agianst the Mets over 28.0 innings while he allowed 19 runs (6.11 ERA) while walking 7 and striking out 18. Here are the numbers the Mets have put up on Olsen:
    Reyes 14-35, 4 2B, 3B, HR, 5 RBI
    Beltran 13-30, 3 2B, 4 HR, 11 RBI
    Wright 9-32, 4 2B, 3 HR
    Delgado 7-29, 2B, HR
    Castillo 3-10, HR
The Mets have had pretty lack luster power hitting, which is one of the reasons they have not been scoring runs in bunches. Hopefully if the Mets can turn it on tonight and give themselves a boost they will start to remeber how to win. Look for an aggressive offense tonight. Lets Go Mets! Stop the streak! Beat the Nats!

IMPORTANT NOTE: DUE TO A FAMILY EMERGENCY, I HAVE TO POST TOMORROW'S PREVIEW POST A DAY EARLY, THIS IS THE GAME PREVIEW FOR THURSDAY AFTERNOON, THE GAME PREVIEW POST FOR TODAY CAN BE FOUND HERE. THANK YOU FOR UNDERSTANDING.

The Mets and the Cards will be battling it out for the early afternoon game as the Mets send their number 5 guy out, who has been their number two guy, in the form of Livan Hernandez and he will be going against the new ace of the Cards, already making his forth start, Lohse. Now Hernandez has a win in two games so fart this year over 11.2 innings ptiched, a 4.65 ERA, 3BB and 7K. He didn't face the Cards at all last season but in 2007 he got a No Decision (feels awkward typing that, a pitcher recieving nothing), over 7.0 innings of work, allowing 3 runs, no walks and 4 K's. Here is what the Cards have been able to do against Livan:
    Pujols 8-29, HR
   Greene 3-20
   Molina 2-11
   Ludwig 1-4
   Duncan 2-3
Livan had a really good start his last time out until he gave up the lead pretty much all at once. This feels like commonsense saying this, but as long as he doesn't hit that wall, or he gets pulled before reaching that wall, then I am not really concerned with the Mets pitching today.

The Mets will have to beat up on Lohse to get the win today and I am always worried about that. Although the Mets have been able to do that in the past, sometimes Lohse just comes out and rips the Mets to shreds. He is one of those pitchers that get me very nervous (similar to Josh Johnson, even if the numbers don't support the claim, this is a statement just about nerves). So far this season he is 2-0 over 3 games and 21.0 innings ptiched with a 2.57 ERA, 3BB and 21 K. Impressive Numbers. Last year against the Mets he went 1-1 over 12 IP, 7 ER, 3 BB, and 6 K. Not as impressive numbers. Here is what the Mets have been able to do with Lohse:
     Beltran 18-34, 3 2B, 4 HR
     Delgado 7-17, 2B, HR
     Reyes 4-14, 2B, HR
     Wright 6-14, 2B, HR
     Church 5-11, 2B, HR
     Sheff 3-8, 2 2B, HR
The Mets have been able to put up the power numbers on Lohse in the past. Like I said before, the numbers don't justify my nerves about Lohse but they are still there (maybe I'm just really strange, which is a very realistic possibility). Anyway a win today is “crucial” because we want some form of momentum coming together for the series with the Nationals this weekend (then again, how can play be “crucial” in April). Lets Go Mets!

The Mets try to bounce back tonight after last night's loss with a win against the Cards last night. Here is a good trend and a disturbing trend so far. Good Trend: After the Mets drop the opener they win the second game of the series. Disturbing Trend: After winning the second game, they fail to win the rubber game. Anyway, tonight will feature John Maine against 2-0 Pineiro.

Tonigh'ts game is really important because we need to see something out positive out of John Maine. So for this season he is 0-1 over 2 games with a 10.0 IP, 8 ER, 4 BB, 9 K. Last season he lost his only game against the Cards where he went 4.0 IP, 3 ER, 3BB, K. However the year before he won his only start against the Cards where he went 7.0 Innings and allowed no runs, walked 2 and struck out 6. Here are the Cards numbers against Maine:
     Pujols 4-9, 2HR
     Duncan 1-6
     Greene 2-6
     Molina 2-6
The key for the Mets pitching is to not let the Cards rally, to frustrate them. Last night in three consecutive innings they allowed the Cards to load the bases and then allowed the cards to score 2 runs, 2 runs and then no runs. If they can keep them for scoring in those scoring situations, then they can frustrate this offense and lock them down.

The Mets will have to battle with Pineiro, who isn't pitching as well as his record of 2-0 suggests. He has 11.2 innings on the season, a 5.40 ERA, 4 BB and 5 K. Last year against the Mets he pitched two games with no decisons in either of them totaling 9.0 innings where he allowed 9 runs, 2 BB, and 6 K. The Mets can hit on him:
      Delgado 5-17, 2 2B, HR
      Beltran 3-13, 2B
      Castillo 3-12
      Reyes 6-9, 2 2B, 3B, HR
      Wright 4-8, 2B
In the first four innigns the Mets did a good job getting runs in with 2 outs with RISP. The problem though was in those situations, they could have easily have done more, and that came back to haunt them. The Mets have to get runs in and then keep getting them in. The concept of a rally sometimes escapes this team. If they play the way we all kow they can, mabe they can do it. I really liked how they played more agressive last night, hopefully they can keep that up. Lets go Mets! Put one in the Win Column!

This is a new segment about baseball sites that if its your first time visiting the site, you can kiss the rest of your day good bye because the sites are that interesting. These are the sites that you email to all of your friends and become the sites that you visit at least once a week.

For this entry, I wanted to highlight one of my personal favorites, Uni Watch Blog. It is an amazing site where they just don't focus on baseball but focus on uniforms. They write about old uniforms, new uniforms, uniforms mistakes and so forth (like the big mistake with the Nationals Jerseys last week when two players went out of the field without the O in Nationals). The blog is written mainly by Paul Lukas who is a Mets fan and gives great personal insight in every post no matter what topic it is about. If team logos are something that interest you, then this blog is a place where you will waste a lot of time (For example, they caught a mistake with Pelfrey in the first week of the season where he went out of the field with a jersey without a Mets patch).

If the name Paul Lukas sounds familiar to you, that is because he is one of the writers on ESPN's page 2, where he writes about uniforms. I cannot stress enough how interesting this site is. You gotta go visit it.

The Mets open up a quick, one series, three game road trip tonight with the Cardinals as they will go toe to toe with one of the best teams with one of the best hitters in all the land. Tonight is a good opportunity to jump as the Marlins continue to play the surprisingly above .500 Pirates. The Mets will be sending out Perez tonight and he will pitch against Wellemeyer.

Perez started off the season in a terrible way and then in his last start he pitched really well and dropped his ERA from 16 and change to 7 and change (I love stats in the beginning of year). He hasn't faced the Cards since 2007 where he got a no decision after pitching 6.1 innings and allowing 2 runs off of 3 walks and 6 strikeouts. The question then becomes who shows up tonight. By the law of averages, you should be able to flip a coin and determine his performance.  Here is what the Cards have been able to do to Ollie over the years:
     Pujols 10-26, 3 2B, 3B, 3 HR
     Molina 5-16
     Greene 2-9
     Duncan 0-3
     Thurston 4-4
     Ludwig 1-3
I am always worried when we play Pujols. Speaking of which, have you seen the new Sportscenter commericial with him? At first I wasn't a fan but the ending of the commericial made up for it. Anyway the key to playing the Cards is controlling Albert, but not to lose focus on the rest of thier lineup.

To win tonight, the Mets might like to try to do something they used to do but havn't for a while which is this really cool concept of when runners, who are on the bases, go across Home Plate in a manner that scores runs. To score tonight they will have to beat up on Wellemeyer who is 1-1 this season in as many games and has a 4.50 ERA. Last season he had a loss against the Mets after 5 innigns of work where he allowed 6 runs, 2 walks and stuck out 2. Here are the numbers the Mets have against him:
    Beltran 1-8, 2B
    Reyes 2-9
    Wright 5-7, 2 2B, HR
    Church 2-5, 2B
    Castro 2-4
    Castillo 2-4
Very simple concept tonight, lets score runs and then lets win this game. Lets Go Mets!

The Mets restated their issues yesterday with failing to complete a sweep for the second time this season, which puts them back at .500 for year. Now its still very early, but I also have this problem where when I expect my team to go somewhere, I practically expect perfection (for example, I was not like this in 2003, or 2004 where it was nice to see wins, but it wasn't expected but really since 2006 I expect wins all the time, hopefully I can get out of the phase in my life soon). Anyway the Mets lost yesterday thanks to one of the two problems they have developed this season.

They either get no starting pitching and score a ton of runs
OR
They get effective starting pitching, but decide not to score any runs.

And its not like the Mets didn't hit yesterday either. They had over 12 hits but they couldn't get runs home which is starting to get really agervating. The hope is though: If you are getting a lot of hits, then it should be just a matter of time until the hits happen in succession of each other and the runs start coming home. They need to figure this out soon because this upcoming series is going to be tough, but its also important because it is a statement series. Also, if they get momentum with the Cardinals, then they should be able to roll over the Nationals, who teams seem to be beating up on this season to get their records up.

Meanwhile, we all still wait for the Marlins to run out of gas…I hope that happens soon.

213 Miles From Shea has been going through some changes over the last few weeks and the first stage of renovations is pretty much over. If you look along the columns, you will see a couple of new sections and a few updates. Starting on the left, I finally updated the Get To Know a Prospect Section with Brad Holt and Dilon Gee. Below that I added two sections the first one that groups all of the posts about MLB Drafts together, and the one below that all about the Battle of the Mets Blogs. Finally on the left side, the Link List has been updated on the bottom of the page.

On the right side of the page, the major, major change is the inclusion of Facebook Links and Twitter Links. Please go to both! Become a fan on Facebook and follow the blog on Twitter! (I'm new to Twitter so its gonna take me some time to get used to using it). Below that section I added the Ball Hype button. On the top of the left column is a whole section for information about the blog, about me and about adverstising. Finally on the left side, I posted all of the 2009 Preseason Articles in a group.

Later on this season the blog will be going throug a second set of renovations including new graphics and maybe a new layout all together, so stayed tuned and thanks for reading!

The Mets and the Brewers will play another day game today as the Mets try to complete a sweep for the first time this season. So far in this series, the Mets have had a walk off win where they won 5-4 and they had a close win yesterday that was decided by a score of 1-0. Before they played the Brewers, the Mets lost by the score of 6-5. That means their last three games have all been decided by one run. Today the Mets decided to play on the cautious side and they brought up Figueroa to start the game against Jeff Suppan who has been struggling so far this season.

Figueora had a very interesting Spring Training where he was average with the Mets but he was pretty much spot on while he was pitching with team Puerto Rico. He started the season off in AAA where he has pitched in two games so far getting no decisions but alloing only 3 runs in 9 innings (3.00 ERA) and during that time he has allowed 3 BB while striking out 6. In 2008 for the Mets, he made 10 appearences including 3 starts adding up to 28.1 innings pitched, a 3-3 record and a 5.72 ERA. Relatively speaking, he pitched a lot against the Brewers last year where he saw them three times, including one start where he had a 2-0 record over 9.0 IP, allowing 2 runs (2.00 ERA), walking 3 and striking out 10. Here are what the Brewers have done against Figueroa:
     Cameron 1-6, 2B
     Braun 1-5, 2B
     Kendall 0-4
     Weeks 1-4
     Fielder 1-3, 2B
The key for Figueroa is for him to know his limit. If he pitches within his limit, then he will handle this lineup well. Manuel so far this homestand has been able to gauge his starters pretty well (look at Oliver's outing) and he will be able to pull out Figueroa at the right moment. This matchup originally worried me, but I feel a little bit better knowing that Figueroa has a good amount of experience with the Brewers.

The Mets will have to do battle against Suppan today to get the win and to get the sweep. So far this season he has not been effective at all. He is so far 0-2 over 7.2 innings pitched where he allowed 11 earned runs so far (12.91 ERA). He pitched against the Mets once last season where he didn't get a decision in 4 innigns of work where he allowed 6 earned runs, walked 2 and struck out 2. Here is what the Mets have been able to do against him over the years:
      Delgado 8-36, 2 HR, 11 BB
      Beltran 4-17, 3B
      Wright 5-12, 2 HR
      Reyes 4-12, 2B, HR
      Chuch 3-3, 2B
The Mets offense was really restricted yesterday so hopefully they will be able to push around Suppan today and get some momentum going. Of course the key of the game for the Mets bats is to not leave a ton of Mets out on the bases again, and this going to remain a key for them every preview post until they can consistently prove that they can bring home RISP. Lets Go Mets! Sweep the Brew Crew!