We’ve all heard Keith Hernandez say it, that common word that a California accent (or maybe it’s just Keith being Keith) strips of one familiar consonant. And Lord knows we felt it on a long Sunday that wound up for naught.
The Mets took walks. and the Mets pounded balls all over Busch Stadium against a Cardinals team they’d manhandled to the tune of nine straight wins. But not Sunday — nope, on Sunday they wound up a run in arrears in the afternoon, and then again in the evening.
The first game was more interesting than the second, as it brought the at least moderately heralded debut of Blade Tidwell, who looks about nine years old, with a funny way of repositioning his feet on the rubber that makes it look like he’s sliding sideways along a track built into the mound, like one of those hockey players in an old 70s tabletop game.
Tidwell’s final line was ugly, but I thought he actually pitched pretty well: He was a mess in the first, with his fastball elevated and no location on his offspeed pitches, but that’s to be expected. After that he was better, but undone by dinks and dunks over the infield, and a couple of pitches he put more or less where he wanted them in crisis situations, only to have the Cardinals convert them. Meanwhile, Erick Fedde walked five and got hit hard, but wound up only a little damp while Tidwell got drenched.
The Mets mounted a furious comeback in the eighth against old pal Phil Maton and JoJo Romero, and loaded the bases with one out and Pete Alonso coming up. Alonso put together yet another terrific AB, and on 3-2 Romero threw Pete a slider low and away, the kind of pitch that’s sent the Polar Bear crashing through the ice in previous seasons. This time Alonso spat on it, which was good; unfortunately it caught the tiniest sliver of the plate for strike three, which was bad.
The ninth was even more horrifying: Against Ryan Helsley the Mets got a leadoff single but then saw Luis Torrens miss a hanger, Jeff McNeil hit a bolt of a line drive directly at the right fielder, and Luisangel Acuna pop out to end the game.
Buzzard’s luck, and then we all got two hours to fume about it before watching the second game, which in the early going was like watching two drunks wail away at each other in a roadhouse parking lot. Neither Tylor Megill nor Andre Pallante was any good, leaving the game tied 4-4 after three. Then the Cardinals called on Michael McGreevy, who was wonderful in his season debut, cooling down the Met offense.
That offense ran hot but also hideously inefficient: The Mets left 10 on base and once again kept rocketing balls right at people, with Juan Soto particularly unlucky in this regard. Though not quite as unlucky as the little girl in a front-row seat who wound up flattened by Nolan Arenado through the netting on a great catch in the eighth against Soto. In the aftermath Arenado looked horrified while the girl looked cosmically nonplussed, as you might if a large baseball player suddenly came out of the sky to Panini-press you into your seat. Fortunately all involved were OK, with the exception of Soto’s BABIP.
It was that kind of day. The Mets lost, then lost again, and looked supremely frustrating in doing so. Or, sorry, make that fustrating.
McGreevy was great.
Tidwell did well not.
The “reversion to the mean” thing seems to be happening with our pitching.
The Mets just kept hitting it where nobody ain’t.
The Senga-can-only-pitch-every-six-days rule already costs us, by my reasoning, two games this week and will cost many more if continues (have to factor in weaker starter AND burning bullpen even more than usual). Plus the question no one ever asks: What about the OTHER pitchers who are used to going every 5 days and now have to wait one or two extra days? The cliche is “it’s nice to get extra rest” but actually the opposite is true for some. We may have already seen some signs of this in recent days.
And on Soto: yes, nice that he almost drove two pitches out of the park but close doesn’t count and he is still hitting .150 with runners in scoring position, and there have been a LOT of them. He has killed so many rallies, sometimes with GIDP, and his RBI total is horrendous. Yes, he may break out at any moment but too many people are claiming he has been “fine” so far just because of the walks.
My favorite Keithisms:
– All you kids at home…
– Everybody contributes!
– Too close to take.
– (sigh)
– Nice, level swing.
– I’m Keith Hernandez.
Saw the replays on MLB. As you say, frustrating. The good thing about buzzard’s luck is that it doesn’t usually stick around that long. We beat the Cards a gazillion games in a row, they were due. Next time around, the line drives will find the holes again, and all will be right with the universe.
To me, the most annoying thing about it was hearing the Cardinal announcers. Shameless homeboys. I’ll take Keith and the gang any day of the week over those clowns.
Couple of more quick observations:
Small sample size, but it appears that Blade Tidwell is not quite ready for prime time. The guy I’m looking forward to seeing is Brandon Sproat, although he may not be ready yet either.
Tip of the cap to the Card center fielder who robbed Soto of a three run homer. That was the game right there. And the Arenado fan interaction was classy – give the devil his due.