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The Mets (21–19) defeated the Yankees (20–23) by the score of 7 to 4 in the Bronx yesterday.
For a boxscore, stats, etc, check out SNY’s Recap Page.
- Johan Santana looked great, minus the three times he allowed a home run. It’s amazing how great he can be, yet allow so many long balls. It’s odd. Anyway, Santana in to the eighth, to Billy Wagner, is always going to be a winning combination.
- Ryan Church picked up a hit in the gap by Bobby Abreu, threw to Luis Castillo, who threw to Brian Schneider, who blocked home plate with his foot, tagging out Johnny Damon, who was trying to score from first.
- Given all the stress around the Mets of late, I am happy they were lead to victory by Santana, and David Wright and Jose Reyes. It only seems fitting to me. Wright was 3 for 5 with a home run, while Reyes was 2 for 5 also with a home run. Nice job by Reyes, running so hard out of the box on his home run, because in most parks that’s bouncing off the wall, that he essentially sprinted around the bases, while trying to hold his batting helmet from falling off. Run, Reyes, run.
- It was clear that Joba Chamberlain would be throwing an inside fastball to Carlos Delgado, with a Carlos Beltran on third in the ninth, and the Mets up two. Yet, he turned on it and ripped a ground ball by the first baseman, allowing Beltran to score and add an insurance run.
- I was not nervous at all, with Billy Wagner pitching and two runners on and no outs in the ninth. Not nervous at all. You’re right, Billy, you can pitch in the eighth. He’s looking more and more like a Cy Young candidate every day.
The Mets face the Yankees tonight at Yankee Stadium on ESPN at 8 pm, with Oliver Perez taking on Chien-Ming Wang.
haha, perez is going to last 4 innings, if that. he’ll be at 100 pitches with the patient yankee lineup before you know it. thankfully the bullpen’s rested.
7.2 innings, 5 hits, 2 er, 5 k, 2 bb
7.1 innings, 5 hits, 0 er, 6 k, 3 bb
ollie’s two starts against the Yankees last year. And that’s with a-rod and posada. Here’s hoping this year’s Ollie returns to his big game form.
actually Ollie usually kills lefty heavy line ups, look for him to have a pretty good start.
The same Yankee lineup that at one point produced 9 outs on 17 pitches yesterday?
Yeah, you know your stuff. Good job.
yeah, against JOHAN SANTANA. i mean, if you want to compare a scrub with Santana, you’ve got no business talking to me. then again, you have no business talking to me in the first place.
bedwetter
A scrub who’s been destroying lefties so far this season.
good for him. too bad righties destroy him.
Questions for those who said the weekend series would be a referendum by the Mets players on Willie …
If the Mets win tonight and sweep, does that mean they approve and want him to stay?
If they lose tonight and split the series, does it mean at worst they are neutral on him?
If they had lost yesterday and were to lose tonight, does that mean they had no faith in him and wanted him to be fired?
What say you?
Agreed hopefully they’ll stay quiet for a while and actually start cheering for their team (and coach).
It was nice to see a starting pitcher stay in late, refreshing.
Let’s see Ollie last 7-8 strong, make a statement.
willie did a great job yesterday showing everything the fans wanted them to see. He managed a great ballgame!! He was into the game showing emotions, he placed fielders in perfect spots to field the ball and he minimized pitchers by going straight to Billy Wagner from Santana in the Eight.
He has ALWAYS been a good manager although he is stubborn sometimes and yesterday he showed that he is listening to what the fans say and want him to do and therefore showing that he really has emotions and cares about winning like we do.
Hopefully you can keep on doing a great job Willie!!
We really want you to succeed deep down.
By the way the NY Times has a good article on Willie and his emotions on saturdays game
danny, you can’t limit pitchers when you don’t always have Santana starting for you. It’s really out of Willie’s hands.
And Willie often positions players on the field.
He might have been a little more active yesterday, but maybe he got caught up a little in being back at Yankee Stadium for one of the last times and it being a subway series game?
I read the NYTs piece and thought it was a little silly. Did I really need a blow-by-blow account of what Willie did in the dugout, such as clapping 6 times and stuff like that?
So, danny, do you think the weekend series should determine Willie’s fate?
Re the Times coverage — looked to me like Shpigel and Curry had a wager going, and the winner got to cover the game, the loser had to cover the other team’s embattled manager….
if willie is listening to the fans, he needs to have his head examined. the majority of fans are ignorant idiots who didn’t play baseball past 8th grade.
or, as you continually prove, have yet to even reach 8th grade.
Nope. Individual Ws mean zero at this point. They need to show they can string 6 or 7 of these together before we get excited
So even if they had gotten swept this weekend, it wouldn’t have meant they disapproved of Willie, right?
No, because if they got swept, it would have meant that they lost 5 of 6 to last place teams.
So, you’re saying it’s a vote against Willie if they had gotten swept but it’s not a vote for him if they had swept?
You can’t have it both ways. Just can’t.
before you get excited you mean? Who are you speaking for?
right now, in the entire major leagues, the longest winning streak is 4 games, and that’s held by the Orioles and the White Sox.
But you need 6-7 in a row to be “excited” about this team? Time to readjust your expectations game to the reality of parity in the big leagues.
sorry .. the reds have a 5 game streak going, raising them to a dominating 20-23. Streaks are not necessarily an indication of a great team.
I think though, the real issue is, there are not really any great teams in the majors right now, meaning anyone has a chance to rise above, by “getting hot at the right time” as they say.
I don’t think any Mets fan is asking for a 7 game winning streak, but I would like to see this team play good baseball for an extended period of time. I think that winning 8 of 10 would temper my desire to see Randolph fired, but mostly just seeing a team play smart, fundamentally sound baseball with hustle would do the same. I can live with the Mets not winning if good teams playing good baseball beat them – I can’t stand watching them lose to bad teams because the Mets play even worse baseball.
“They need to show they can string 6 or 7 of these together”
this fan specifically was asking for a 7 game winning streak, and this what I was addressing.
That said, I agree, a long period of good baseball, win or lose, would do a lot to grab my full attention back to this team.
As someone who has grown frustrated with Randolph at this point and wouldn’t mind a change, I think most fans agree with your assessment of what is “needed.” The fact is Wang is a good pitcher and even if Ollie is on his game, the Mets could still lose tonight but play a good game. Personally, with a hard sinkerballer on the mound, I want to see an approach at the plate where the hitters are not trying to pull off everything unless they’re ahead in the count or with a lead. I want to see smart baserunning in what stands to be a close game. And I don’t want to see Aaron Heilman in a late-inning situation in a 1-run or tied game.
Prolonged winning streaks are tough for even the most dominant teams in baseball. But it’s not unreasonable to expect a team with $140M payroll and a TON of talent, to play smart baseball for 10 days.
My answers Free Aaron Heilman are as follows –
No. No. And no.
FAH –
What are you trying to prove? I love this argument tactic. You ask 3 questions, and if we don’t have concise answers/arguments for each one of them, than our entire stance is illegit.
You might have some level of comfort by putting things in your perspective with these 3 questions. But your perspective is missing one major issue. And that is this……WE SHOULDN’T EVEN BEING ASKING THESE QUESTIONS AT THIS POINT IN THE SEASON WITH THIS TEAM!!! Front and center, that is the point.
Every scenario you list falls into the category of “Difusing a bomb after it has already gone off”. What say us? We say Willie should have been gone last October. The referendum has already passed.
Yes…they have to win tonight. They have to win the ATL series. Adn they have to prove that they can win 8 out of 10. playing .500 baseball ain’t cutting it. They (under Willie) haven’t proved anything yesterday, nor will a win tonight do anything definitive. Proof is in doing it again, and again, and again. Something they haven’t done over the last 162 games.
Hi Danny —
I am trying to show that those in the media and among the fans who said this weekend will be a referendum by the players (not by the fans) on whether the players will play hard for Willie and whether they like him or not will now change their tune. It was thought that after the meeting, the players now had to go out and prove they were with Willie and had to save his job.
BTW, I answer no, no, and no to all 3 questions myself. I just want to see what others will say now.
And whether or not we should be asking these questions is NOT the issue. I didn’t bring these questions up. The media did this week. And many fans seemed to agree with what the media said.
Also, no referendum has been passed by the fans last fall. Even now, those who want Willie fired are in the minority (according to Matt’s polls).
cool..understood. Apologies for showing frustration, but these have been the type of questions Willie Apologists have been stating all year. What if? What if? What if? As opposed to actually realizing the ‘What is’ to the entire situation. That ‘What is’ is that this is not a team…it’s a collection of players. One 2 game weekend series against a cross town rival won’t change that.
I think the Mets will play hard for Willie this weekend. Because they better. I do not know if they will play hard for Willie the rest of the year (or, say…the next 10 games). I honestly would be shocked if they do. I’d welcome it and start feeling more confident in Willie.
IMO players play more for the glory of the game itself and for themselves and their bank accounts than they do for their manager. To some extent they also play for their teammates. But I think the manager is always low on the list of reasons they play for.
For example, I don’t think the Boston Red Sox players play for Franconia. Schilling is the only one I know of who has a particular preference for him.
Therefore, I think the whole idea that a team needs to play hard for the manager is rather specious and weak. If they don’t have enough reasons apart from the manager to play hard, then something is wrong with the players. Seriously wrong.
I really don’t think you can quantify this, my man. It’s practically 100% intangible. Your Francona example can backfire big-time when you consider the fact that he took that team to a WS when the exact same team folded under Grady Little the year before, and other managers for nearly a century.
Every team throughout history is different. It’s chemistry. Some rally around an injured player. Some rally behind a bad-boy image. Some rally around the underdog moniker. Some rally around nearly 30 WS titles and the image of perfection. And many other rally around a manager. I mean, do your really think the ‘86 Mets would have been as successful out of the gate if Davey didn’t declare their ‘dominance’ in Spring Training?
The manager matters to the players and the effort they give. To what degree in certainly debatable. But what is factual is that these 2008 Mets aren’t inspired by Willie’s. So, unfortunately, your argument holds very true when applied to this team.
I don’t know what you mean by “intangible.” Millions of dollars are very tangible! That is what many players play for. The glory of the game means things like records, all-star berths, individual awards, postseason play, recognition by peers … these things are tangible too.
And to the contrary, if anything the 2004 Boston team was a huge upgrade over 2003 because of 2 players — Schilling and Foulke. We all know what a big part pitching plays in the postseason, and both Schilling and Foulke certainly did in 2004. In addition, the only difference between the ‘04 and ‘03 club in terms of performance was the former went 4-3 in the LCS vs. the Yankees and the latter went 3-4. And it took the biggest collapse in baseball history for the ‘04 team to get to 4-3. Bottom line: It’s very easy to say the ‘04 Red Sox was a much much better team due to superior pitching. There is no realistic way anyone can say the ‘04 team was the “same exact” team as the ‘03 one.
And, yes, I think the ‘86 Mets team would have been as successful under a different manager. Davey Johnson merely stating something and perhaps firing them up with the statement is not the same thing as them playing for him all year long. Their inspiration could have been achieved many different ways from many different sources.
So I still maintain that the manager matters very little to the players and the effort they give — as long as they are not actually at war with him.
But what is factual is that these 2008 Mets aren’t inspired by Willie’s
I submit that no team is “inspired” by their manager then. Not more than individual concerns, their bank accounts and their teammates. Name a current team who is. Since this is my argument, I agree that it does hold very true to the current Mets team.
Curious….Were you around in ‘86? Where you actually able to experience that season?
Danny ….Yes, I was around in ‘86. This was a wild bunch. I think the only type of manager who wouldn’t have fit them is a strict disciplinarian — someone like Hodges actually. But any manager considered a players’ manager (such as Francona) could have managed that team to a WS title.
BTW, Johnson is my favorite Mets manager.
alright…just want to make sure you aren’t a baseballreference.com/baseballcube.com poster who goes on stat sheets and never experienced the things which he claims to professes truth about.
You didn’t understand my point on the intangible. You are trying to quantify the influence of a manager on the team, specirfically the inspiration part, and that is something that is very difficult to quantify. But you are speaking in absolutes by saying he has very little influence. How do you really know that?
Unless you are a player in MLB, I don’t think you have a clue as to what you are talking about. Nor do I. I’m going on my experience as an athlete through HS and the NCAA, and my coach/manger had a hell of a lot of influence on how I and my teamates performed over the course of a season, and sometimes specifcally each day. Putting a few million $’s in my pocket would not have changed my approach to playing the game or the things I relied on all my life to prepare for a game, which included the direction and inspiration of the coach/manager.
These guys are not phuking robots with huge bank accounts, man. They are still playing a childs game that requires instruction, influence, and Inspiration. ANd a manger that cannot inspire is a bad manager.
If by intangibles you mean the inspiration, then I agree that it is hard to quantify. Which means you have no basis for saying in your previous post — “But what is factual is that these 2008 Mets aren’t inspired by Willie’s.” That is NOT factual since it’s something you can’t know.
I played many sports in high school. And I can honestly tell you that the head coach was never the main thing that motivated me. Hardly. It was usually individual accomplishment and my teammates first, as well as the sheer joy of engaging in a particular sport..
Putting a few million $’s in my pocket would not have changed my approach to playing the game
Maybe not for you. But I bet most baseball players would tell you today that money is a big motivator. I think it is a big reason, for example, why Heilman is not motivated. Because what he can earn in his current role is drastically smaller than what he can make as even a crappy starter. And look at A-Rod. Maybe he is the extreme, but he has admitted that money has pretty much been the biggest motivator in this life.
It is precisely because many don’t have huge bank accounts (relatively speaking) that money is a primary motivator for these baseball players. No one is calling these players robots. Being inspired by . money, personal goals, your family and teammates is not robotic at all.,
Of course there are cases where a certain player usually fresh up from the minors needs a lot of coaching and counseling along the way. In these cases, a mentor relationship often develops, such as that between A-Rod and Pinella. But these are isolated instances applicable only to a few individuals on a team, and the relationship is just as likely to develop between a player and a bench, hitting or third base coach, instead of with the manager.
Good win and I really hope the batters are turning the corner in terms of how they go about their at bats. For too long it seems like our batters have been working the count for the sake of working the count. I’ve seen a lot of automatic takes in situations that almost guarantee a pitch right down the middle. I’m all for shrinking the strike zone in hitters counts, but automatic takes are for the birds. It almost seems that our hitters are being too cerebral, and then succumb to emotion within the same at bat. Very weird.
blasphemy! You sir, are not a sabermatrician. Didn’t you know walks are way more important than hits. In fact, at the end of the game, they just count up the total number of walks a team has and whichever team walked more automatically wins. That’s why young, impatient teams like the Diamonbacks suck, and old, patient teams like the Yankees are awesome. Keep on not swinging those bats, boys.
lmao nice
Actually, the D-Backs have more walks than the Yankees … and a higher OBP too, which many feel is very important.
I don’t think the Yankees are all that patient a team right now.
fwiw mets are 5th in the league in walks 8th in obp, the diamondbacks 7th in both, yanks 23rd and 18th. first in the league in walks is the cards, first in obp is the cubs.
Sounds about right, mook. Which shows that OBP and walks are important.
Billy Beane be damned!
way to talk out of your a$$, ignoramus.
Look, they did win, but it was given to them. When they had the bases loaded with NO outs and Delgado pops out to Jeter and Easley strikes out, thats is the true METS. We got lucky that Church walked and Castillo bloop, bunt, whatever that thing was, stayed fair and died. That is the kind of thing we CAN NOT have. We should have been up 3 or 4 runs at that point. We where just lucky that the Yankees are perhaps the only team hitting less than we are. Lets hope that his win and Willie’s meeting changes things and we start to get the clutch hit when we need it. This is only one win, if we loose today we are back where we started from. We need to win 3 or 4 in a row before we loose 1 to gain any ground. LETS GO METS !!!!
Wagner has been freaking amazing so far this year.
that windup appears to really be making a difference.
Thats the story of Wagner’s carrer. Strong april, awful september
Please don’t let it be a rainy nite where the game keeps getting interrupted and delayed with bringing the tarp on and off the field. Might be better just to play it tomorrow on both team’s off day.
I don’t have a lot of confidence in Oliver Perez lately anyway but in a rainy nite situation I have even less for some reason.
Love the blocking of home plate by Schneider yesterday.
off day???
the mets have a double header tomorrow!!!
or tuesday…
Cerrone, why do you stamp the post with:
By Matthew Cerrone – May 17, 2008 10:05 pm
When it was clearly posted – May 18,2008 10:05AM??
Well I think it is to cover up the fact that he didn’t post a Post Game yesterday. He waited till this morning to do it, and the oblivious fans would just accept it.
Or he just put the wrong date.
Matt you’re the best, so don’t take my comment in a negative way. Without Metsblog I would literally go insane!
My guess — He wrote it last night but didn’t intend to post it till this morning. He just kept the original time stamp.
Most blogs automatically date/time stamp something as soon as you START writing. So, if you started something right now but didn’t post it until Tuesday it would still say Sunday, 11:30am. The writer doesn’t necessarily have control over that.
I figured Matt had started it yesterday but didn’t finish until this morning when it was posted.
Or Matt is an international man of mystery
You guys are awesome, you have gone from knitpicking willie to knitpicking cerrone. Someone should write a blog about this blog.
MetsblogBLOG.com
Yeah c’mon people. You’re gonna knitpick over the time stamp of Cerrone’s post?! ! Amazing.
2 reasons the mets wont win tonight. 1st reason is that they never win on sunday night baseball. 2nd reason is that the mets cant beat the yankees on sunday night baseball at yankee stadium
what the hell are you even going on about
That and Wang is pitching tonight, and the Mets are a sinker baller’s wet dream.
Matt, it’s really not that odd that Santana allows that many HR’s. He’s constantly in the strike zone with his pitches, he constantly challenges hitters. He’s not one of these paint the black, or have ‘em swing at stuff outside the zone. He throws his stuff in the zone, and a vast majority of the time, his stuff is so good, guys can’t touch it. But he left a few pitches up yesterday, and of course they were in the strike zone, so guys hit them out.
it’s a good point .. early in the season Willie and M&MD were talking about just this .. Santana is not afraid to challenge guys, and is always throwing strikes, so he’s liable to get knocked hard when he makes a mistake. They went on to list a few old time pitchers who had the same thing going, though the names escape me right now.
Not sure I’m right. But I am sure I’ll be jumped on if I’m not. (Seems to be the blogger’s way.) But I think Jim Palmer was this way as well.
Santana was extremelt disappointing yesterday.
Santana was extremely disappointing yesterday.
I respectively disagree that Santana was “extremely” disappointing. I would like to see more of the dominating performances he has done in the past with the Twins but he still pitched pretty well yesterday, and did what was needed to get the win for the team. As others have pointed out,and I’ll take them at their word as I’m not gonna research it myself – but Santana apparently heats up as the season goes along.
The lack of his supposed “dominance” has been extremely disappointing as well.
When you have a 4 run lead you throw the ball over the plate. I’m not concerned
4 ER over 7 2/3 innings is a 4.70 ERA, is everyone on this Blog going to tell me that if Santana pitches to a 4.70 ERA all season they will actually be happy with that???
no, obviously not, but is that what he’s going to do? no, it isn’t. He also isn’t going to pitch to a 1.00 era all season. Even aces give it up sometimes, the difference is that he’ll rarely if ever have that real bad game, we’ll be in the game most every single time. You’ve posted this over and over and over again, did you think posting this same thing 10 times in the past day would somehow validate your point? You’re point makes no sense, the best pitchers of all time give up runs, you need to accept that.
and i mean, furthermore, “extremely disappointing” is quite the strong words for a guy who won us the game, and kept us in it the whole time. No one is saying this was his best game but assuming this game equates to him pitching to a 4.7 era all year is just foolish. Why even attempt to make that point?
OK, so would you be happy with Santana’s performance if the offense only scored 3 runs and the Mets lost 4-3???
OK, so would you be happy with Santana’s performance if the offense only scored 3 runs and the Mets lost 4-3??
yes
So this is what Mets fan have come to, expecting below average performances from All-Star players. I’m sorry, I expected Santana to go out there yesterday and BE AN ACE! Go out there and throw up 0’s for at least hte first 3 innings, but he had the team down 2-0 in the 1st inning.
To me, he needs to Cowboy up in those spots and put up 8 innings with 2 or less runs, that’s what an Ace does in this kind of big game.
And practically every analyst, report, and fan disagrees with you.
So enjoy the weather on your island.
we won the freaking game, calm down, Santana has been good, great? no, but good, and he’ s a notoriously great 2nd half pitcher, so quit your b*tichin’, calm down, and realize we have a really good pitcher on our team, who does “cowboy up” ( i hate that phrase). He’s a bulldog, bottom line, and you should appreciate that he keeps us in the game every single time out. There’s no, “oh i didn’t have it today” he bulldogs through every game.
An Ace keeps his team in the game…did he not give the mets a chance to win by putting up 0’s after the first inning and letting them catch up?
seriously, this is such a non argument. Why are we even bothering?
OK, so everyone wants to turn a blind eye to Santana’s performance, that’s fine, but I’m a realist. Yesterday was a below average performance for any team’s “Ace”.
We’re going to see the Yankee Ace tonight, I hope the Mets beat the snot out of him, but more likely we’ll see 8 IP and 1 ER like a true Ace.
You’re stirring things up Insane Mets Fan!
Players aren’t machines, not even superstars like Santana. There is another team out there trying to best him, beat him after all. Playing professional sports is not like the jobs that most of us have, where we can do our best and usually do pretty good at it – but we usually don’t have someone trying to stop us from doing our job well, like an opposing hitter or pitcher. And the early 2 run HR he gave up was to no less a future Hall of Famer than Derek Jeter. There’s no shame in that, Jeter does have decent HR power even if his HR #’s have been down.
wang has only gone 8 inning once this year, does that mean he was only an ace once this year? seriously, how long have you been a baseball fan? Is it really this hard for you to understand how “aces” operate. They don’t give you 8 innings and 1 ER every game, sorry, it doesn’t happen like that. If it did, you’d have at least a few pitchers each year with like a 1.5 era the whole year. Was Santana’s performance yesterday “ace-like”? No, it wasn’t, but he’s still an ace. I’m being a realist here, you’re being delusional. The best pitchers in the entire game, ever, won’t give you an ace like performance every time out. Saying you’re extremely disappointed because our ace didn’t give an ace like performance in one game is ridiculous. You don’t judge a guy from start to start like that. SAntana is still an ace, and like i’ve said, he’s a notoriously strong 2nd half pitcher. Just relax already.
Santana has not gone 8 inning once this season and I’m not saying he needs to give us 8 IP and 1 ER everytime out, but yesterday was a big game because it was the Subway Series and all the other non-sense going on and he did n’t come up big in my opinion.
All the papers want to praise Santana today, but the offense if what showed up yesterday, Santana was on the lucky end of 7 runs. If he gives up 4 and loses, then it’s a different story with the same performance, it doesn’t make sense.
He pitched well and came up big enough. He pitched to the situation. With a lead late in the game, you don’t want to walk any. So a solo HR isn’t bad. That fourth run wasn’t given up till he had pitched 7-2/3 innings. To give up 3 runs in 7-2/3 innings is very good.
Also, Johan is typically a 2nd half pitcher. It’s still early in the season.
Good pitchers pitch to the game situation and score. He had a 6-2 lead when he gave up the 2 HR’s in the later innings. You’re assuming he would’ve given up those HR’s had the Mets only had a 3-2 lead, and I don’t think anyone can say that. The score would likely have changed his approach, his pitch selection and location.
But hey, listen – you have a right to think or feel what you do. If you were extremely disappointed than that’s your right.
Good pitchers do not turn blow outs into dicey situations. Wanger had to come into the game to face the tying run at the plate. An Ace does not put his team in that situation.
Wally, thanks for being the only understanding guy. That’s how I feel, for what ever it’s worth.
As I said you ARE entitled to your opinion. And I admire you sticking to your guns so to speak, and not backing down. It’s not easy to have an un-popular opinion.
In the end, we all want the same thing – for these Mets to take off and start winning consistently.
From your keyboard to God’s ears Wally!!!!
so what are you saying now insane? that Wagner isn’t a good pitcher because he let a couple men on in the 9th? You truly are insane and delusional. If you’re expectations are that Santana will have a 1.5 era all year and will never, ever, put men on base in a close game, you’re not just insane, you’re stupid. If that’s your definition of an ace, you truly know absolutely nothing about baseball, because no pitcher is able to do that every time out.
hope you’re still here, insaneyankeefan. your ace, wang, has a big fat 0 in the playoffs. jealous, are we? the mets got santana and not the yankees.
Darkstar, I didn’t mention anything negative about Wagner. Wagner would be perfect this year if it wasn’t for 1 Reyes error.
The fact is Santana came up small yesterday in a big situation, but the offense bailed him out. Are you so desperate to see Santana pitch well that you’ll say 7 2/3 IP and 4 ER is a well pitched game??? Seriously, HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN A BASEBALL FAN?? How many Cy Young awards have been awarded to guys with 4.70 ERAs???
Do you know anything about baseball whatsoever???
Oh and Benny, you’re just a fool.
Oh and my expectation for Santana going into this year was 18-20 wins, with a 2.75 ERA, and 220+ strikeouts and to also shut down teams when the Mets need it the most.
Yesterday the Mets needed Santana to shut down the Yankees, but he couldn’t do it. Like I’ve said, the offense bailed out Santana.
are you blind? did i say that santana pitched great yesterday? have i said that? read everything i said, i haven’t, and yet you still just want to put words in my mouth so you can continue raving on and on about absolutely nothing. Everyone knows santana wasn’t great yesterday, give it up, it’s the fact that you’re “extremely disapointed” in him which is ridiculous. NO ONE SAID HE PITCHED GREAT. Give it up already. And your point about a 4.70 era is just stupid. Is that his era? is it? you tell me…just continue on with your ranting and raving about absolutely nothing. About a game we won. If you can’t be happy our team won, then i have no clue what to tell you. IT’s not about individual players, IT’S ABOUT THE TEAM WINNING, and if you can’t see that, then you are truly lost.
and I never said ANYWHERE that Santana needed to pitch to a 1.5 ERA all season. Have you read the papers today?? Everyone is saying Santana pitched great.
Furthermore, his ERA 3.30 and went up as a result of yesterday’s game.
All I want is for him to come up big in big spots and he did not do that yesterday.
Everyone is saying he pitched great, analysts and fans are praising him and you are missing why? A pitchers job is not to throw up zeroes, that is far to much pressure. By the way wang got lit up by the sox 2 weeks after his 1 hitter, is he not an ace? How about cc sabathia or verlander are they not aces due to early season struggles. Marathon buddy not a sprint.
A pitchers job is to manage the game, and when santana got the 6-2 lead he continued to challenge hitters and not drive his manager crazy by walking people. Santana’s greatness is not only in his ability to throw up zeroes (we haven’t seen that in this marthon just yet, remember this is a marathon not a sprint) but what we have seen is his keen ability to pitch accordingly in each game wether or not he has his best stuff, as he usually does towards the end of the year (last year not included). You need to understand the game a bit better, expecting your ace to throw up zeroes in every big game is a bit much, but they should keep you in the game every time out. He has dome that and could easily be 6-1 or 7-0.
Dave, I understand the game far far far more than any one on this site who thinks giving up 4 ER is a good performance.
I don’t think anyone is saying giving up 4 ERs is a “good” performance. It’s more like — giving up 3 ERs in 7-2/3 innings is a good performance which is exactly what he did. Had Pettitte been able to do that, the outcome might have been in his favor because they wouldn’t have brought in Farnsworth when they did. So the length is just as important as the number of ERs allowed.
At the point when Santana had pitched 7-2/3 innings, it was just a matter of NOT walking anyone and challenging hitters. They could afford the solo HR so he went right at the hitter — something he might not have done with a 4-3 lead. As someone mentioned, an “ace” is someone who not only makes good pitches but knows how to manage a game.
I’m very happy with Santana’s performance so far this year. Especially considering he’s typically a 2nd half pitcher.
It wasn’t a great performance. Just good. And good enough to win and satisfy most Mets fans.
ok…you know what? I’ll say this.
2 years ago, I would have said you were completely off-base. But HR’s and scoring are down in the post-mitchell report era that we have just begun. I think we are going back to he 80’s style of baseball (cue: ‘Ode To Joy’). With that said, I would expect an ace not to give up 4ER. Yes, statistically, yesterday was not a performance of an ace. But beyond the stats, Johan went deep into the game, battled, and provided balance and composure to an unsettled team with a very hot spotlight on them. He came through. And that is an ace. And there are not too many of those guys on this team, let alone in the entire league.
Run scoring and HRs in the National League this year are actually at about the same rate as they’ve been over the last decade. While they’ve dropped this year in the AL, the offense has stayed the same in the NL and it currently outpaces the AL. So it would appear Johan might have been better off staying in the AL from an ERA perspective. But bottom line — so far he has reaped no advantages by moving to the NL in terms of facing weaker offenses.
you’re right. I was just trying to see this guy’s argument. You just proved that it’s not a valid argument. I’m wasting my time.
who’s the fool here? you’re the one named insane, pretending to be a mets fan. maybe you’re not a yankees fan, phillies fan? just go back to your own blog or something.
Benny is the fool.
Johan Santana has a career ERA of 3.57 before the all star break. His post ASB is 2.79. His May ERA is 4.02, in June its 2.63. Meaning he’s pitching just as well as everyone should expect to this point. I fully expect him to get better as the season goes along, and his numbers would show that.
But if you’re really disappointed in a pitcher who is 5-2, with a 3.30 ERA, and has a 57:15 K-BB ratio then you’re completely insane.
And I fail to see how the subway series is an important game. Beating the Yankees is less important than a series against the Braves and the Phillies. I’d rather have Johan save his “8 inning 1 run games” for when we play one of those teams later in the season. Interleague games are the LEAST IMPORTANT GAMES of the regular season, they don’t impact the record of teams in your division, don’t affect the record of teams you’re battling for the wild card, they are essentially the most worthless games in the regular season
It was important for more than the Subway Series, this tea mneeded a win and offense got that win, not Santana. Spit out all the stats you want, yesterday was a bad start.
santana saved the bullpen, completely shut the yankees down in the middle innings, giving his team a chance to build a lead, once he had the lead, he pitched to contact and got into the 8th. We used two pitchers. How is that a bad performance? The team got the win, which is a concept you seem to have a serious problem with.
anytime you go 7 and 2/3, its not a bad start, sorry, maybe it wasn’t good in terms of Santana’s standards, but it wasn’t “bad”. You’re seemingly inability to understand the circumstances of the game amazes me. You’re more concerned with ripping on Santana then realizing we won the game. Why is how Santana did more important then the fact that we won the game? Petty Met fans like you give us all a bad name.
You totally overestimate the “circumstances of the game.” Somehow, magically in your mind Santana would never give up runs without a lead…you just out of touch, see the Brewer game.
Uninformed fans like yourself give Mets fans the bad name. We appear like jackasses because every Mets fan is gushing over a 4.70 ERA performance. Your nuts.
You are going to get your 18-20 wins, 2.75 era and 220 K. The guy, even if he has not been great with his location -see the pitches to Jeter and Giambi- is 5-2 with a 3.30 Era. And 57 K.
I think everyone is misinterpreting my feelings on Santana. I love the guy, I hope he wins 25 games and goes to the Hall of Fame wearing a Mets cap, but the fact remains that as far as being an “Ace” he has not done that yet this year. John Maine has been more of an “Ace” so far this year than Santana.
To me, so far in 2008 Johan Santana has been a disappointment and yesterday he was extremely disappointing. I do not want to hear about him pitching to the “game situation” either, otherwise if he had it all under control why couldn’t he bare down and get through the 8th??? Instead he left the game with the tying run at the plate, if he was simply managing the game like everyone says, then he did a poor job at that as well because he left the game with the possiblity of it being tied.
well, at least you’ve accomplished one thing. You are the most popular poster on MetsBlog today.
Yes, Maine has been an ace. Where in the book of baseball does it give only one ace to a team? We have 2 aces. Which actually makes the inconsistent crap with this team and underachieving record even more mindboggling.
You are focusing on a subject that is nearly irrelevant. Any good TEAM wins a game with a performance Johan provided yesterday. It;s about winning, and that is what he allowed the Mets to do.
Want to talk about underperformance? Beltran should be tearing the cover off the ball. Heilman should be keeping the ball down and among league leaders in holds. Delgado should be playing with half at least half heart-beat (btw…where the phuk is his book that he tracks ptiches…haven’t seen that since Aug 2006). Wright should be well above .300. And Reyes should be producing twice as much as he currently is. This list can go on….just name the player.
Johan Santana has been at the top of the miniscul list of consistent performers for the 2008 Mets. His propensity for giving up the long ball and not ‘dominating’ is not the reason why this team is underachieving and inconsistent. He certainly does enough…and then more. You’re focusing on a twig in an entire forrest of issues that is the 2008 Mets.
They win tonight…awesome. Do it again. get on a role. So when Santana pitches again, he’s not pitching to stop a free fall. He’s pitching to build on momentum for a team that is finally playing aggressvie and sound fundamental baseball. And something tells me that when he pitches under that scenario for ONCE this season, we won’t have you wrting post game novels about how he disappointed you.
Team game.
I’m sorry. I misrepresented what you had said, insane.
I should have said…we won’t have you writing post game novels about how he EXTREMELY disappoints you.
ridiculous.
wags looks great, but proposing him as a cy young candidate is ridiculous.
Not impossible, but with what Webb has done so far, I doubt Wagner would win the Cy Young.
this johan discussion is absurd.
he’s putting up the same numbers he always has early and gsve the Mets 7 2/3 huge innings yesterday.
the mets have issue, Johan is not one of them.
now its time for ollie to step up.
and as far as the homeruns santana gave up. i would partially attribute them to an aggressive pitching style that would and should only be employed with a multiple run lead. that being said, santana’s propensity for giving up the long ball is a little startling. he’s a great pitcher, but does not appear to be of the cy young quality, as was advertised.
you’re right, thus far Santana hasn’t had cy young season, now, if a pitcher could pitch like a cy young winner every year, for every month, you’d have something special on your hands (and probably someone who isn’t human). That being said, despite Sanatana not pitching up to his incredibly lofty standards, he’s still an ace. It’s like saying Becket isn’t an ace because he gave up 4 HRs today. We all wish “aces” could go out there and pitch like an ace every game, every month, every year, but it doesn’t work like that. As long as Santana wins games and pitches well in the postseason, i’m ok with what he’s doing. He’s a special kind of pitcher too, because he basically guarantees you that you’ll be in the game. I’d rather have that guarantee for 5 years then 2 months of ace-like pitching.
Darkstar, are you Santana’s PR guy?
Are you Brian Cashman?
I attribute it to the over use of his Change up