You know it's a bad day when the Mets use five pitchers and the second-best is Oliver Perez.
You know it's a bad day when the starting pitcher gives up six earned runs in four innings and the lead story on the postgame is how bad the bullpen was.
You know it's a bad day when the punchess Padres, who scored a total of 16 runs in the first six games of their homestand, an average of 2 2/3 runs per game, put up 18 runs, all earned, against the Mets.
Hisanori Takahashi allowed six runs in four innings, raising his ERA from 2.13 to 3.21.
Ryota Igarashi gave up six earned runs in 1/3 of an inning. He has now allowed 11 runs in three innings since his return. That's an ERA of 33.00.
Igarashi, who had an ERA of 1.35 when he went on the DL, now has a season ERA of 11.17.
Raul Valdes gave up four earned runs without getting an out. His ERA jumped from 2.86 to 4.13.
Oliver Perez gave up two runs in 2 2/3 innings. Fortunately for Ollie, his ERA was already so bad that it only went up from 6.25 to 6.28.
The one that really hurts is Takahashi. Nobody thinks R.A. Dickey can keep it up, but Takahashi looked like he could be the real deal after his sensational performances against the Yankees and Phillies. Now it looks as if teams might be figuring him out.
Even if Takahashi just had a bad night and is able to hold down a rotation spot, the Mets still have to rely on Dickey and Jon Niese, while hoping that Pat Misch or Dillon Gee can eventually contribute.
Jerry Manuel has burned out Fernando Nieve. Raul Valdes was stretched out to start, then somehow passed over for Nieve Saturday night. After last night's loss, who knows what t0 expect from Valdes.
The Mets also can't count on anything from John Maine at this point. And there's no need to even mention Oliver Perez when talking about the rotation.
At least last night's quieted the talk about how the Mets are just one starter away and need to give up the likes of Jenrry Mejia for two months of Cliff Lee or Roy Oswalt.
2 comments:
To be fair, the Padres ARE a significantly improved team this season. They currently have the best record in the National League, the same record as the Yankees and Minnesota, and in all of baseball only Tampa Bay is ahead of them. There's no shame in losing to them. In how, perhaps.
Still, the Mets had a loss as stunning as the one the Yankees did against Cleveland this past Saturday. Six runs should be enough to win, and it wasn't. Even going from 10-4 up to 13-11 down isn't as bad as 18-6. That's a football score! I think the Padres scored more against the Mets than the Chargers scored against the Jets in the past NFL season's Playoffs! (Checks: Yeah, I was right, the Jets won 17-14.)
Nothing left to do but tell yourselves it's just one loss, and that it counts the same as a 7-6 loss, and move on and try to win the next one.
And they did. Maybe the Mets don't have enough talent yet, but they are showing some character. Oliver Perez excepted, of course.
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