How is it a player named Ben Sheets never played for a team whose signature promotion involves fans carrying bedsheets?
No, that’s probably not your uppermost Met concern following a very unbanner day in Atlanta, but after being subject to the worst kind of familiar — getting swept at Turner Field for the thirteenth time since 1997 — what is there to say about yet another unpleasant valley Sunday (the Mets have lost six in a row on the literally taken day of rest)? The peaks of June are behind us and peeking out ahead of us are three with the front-running Nationals, three with the Kempified Dodgers, another three with the new age whiz kids from D.C. and then it’s off to the desert and the Coast, where no one in his right mind forecasts good this far in advance.
Johan got screwed by the spatially challenged C.B. Bucknor, who offered Sheets one kind of strike zone and Santana another, and that’s a legitimate beef, but that primarily explains one inning out of nine. For six, the Mets did nothing with a guy who hadn’t pitched in the major leagues in two years. Dan Warthen showed more fight against Bucknor than the Met bats did against Sheets.
What is there to say? In jockspeak, shake it off. Go after Ross Detwiler on Tuesday and take it from there. Don’t inspire innuendo-addict Andy Martino to write more silly “one team official said” conjecture laced with whispers about “surly older players”. And, if all looks decent for him against the Toledo Mud Hens (in a Bison tilt to be telecast on SNY), what the hell, make room for young Harvey.
There’s your pep talk, boys. Don’t say nobody’s tryin’ to fire ya up.
(George Costanza voice) “Let’s not go into panic mode here!!!”. Staring pitching has been the core of this mildly magical 2012. If that goes south, we’re toast.
Why does this always seem to happen right after the All-Star break? EVERY SINGLE YEAR?
Loved Joel Sherman’s column today … not. Makes you wanna punch him in the face. Collapse appears to be here. Would love it if they shocked the hell out of us and DIDN’T fold. Rough two weeks ahead. If they’re still alive, schedule gets easier after that. SOMEBODY not named David Wright needs to step up. Anybody? Anybody?
Seems like Met hitters have made a commitment to looking at a lot more third strikes in the second half of the season.
Just how many backwards Ks did Atlanta pitchers ring up on these guys over the weekend?
Actually it was only Sunday’s game that the called strike three hurt us. We scored enough runs for Dickey and lost anyway. They also scored enough runs to win Friday night even though Young is starting to look more and more like the tired arm many of us thought he was.
It’s not that we don’t score enough runs, it’s just that the bullpen seems to allow others to score more…. and now that our starters are beginning to join them in that futility, I don’t even think the Yankees would have enough fire power to overcome it.
Let’s just hope this is a bad stretch and things begin to click again.
Dickey basically introduced a new pitch to baseball…a fast knuckler. I have heard that it requires a lot of arm strength to throw. So now you have two problems…first, he is going to likely tire. Second, the league is going to adjust the second time around seeing this pitch.
Being so dominant with it is another problem, as Dickey will probably stick with the pitch too long. With all this going on, I am bracing for an epic return to earth here.
Great plays in the field and shitty umpiring will almost always beat you..
I would be very happy with one win in DC!!
Rich P
[...] Dreadful was how he was pitching. As dreadful as he’s pitched in a Mets uniform, probably, and that includes those horrible Yankee Stadium starts and the last two games when he also surrendered six earned runs. Those six-packs weren’t as resolutely flat as this one. You could kind of blame the ankle tripping him up against the Cubs at Citi Field right before the All-Star break and note that until C.B. Bucknor brought his inept magic to bear in Atlanta he was doing pretty well at Turner Field. [...]
[...] even dreamed Ben Sheets was back, wearing a Braves uniform. I think that one’s a recurring thing. Like I said, [...]