The Mets, who’d looked so plucky since the trade deadline, seem to have settled back into their extended sag.
On Thursday night nothing went right: Sean Manaea was horrid, getting tattooed by the Brewers and adding insult to his own injury by alligator-arming a throw to first, giving Jackson Chourio an extra out which he turned into a two-run homer. (Chourio was a menace all night: 4 for 5, two homers, four RBIs.) Meanwhile, Jacob Misiorowski wasn’t at his best, working with reduced velocity and fussing about the condition of the mound. But that just meant Misiorowski was pitching in the ionosphere instead of in his usual otherworldly realm. His C-level game was plenty good enough to beat the Mets, who didn’t scratch until a fifth-inning double from Jared Young.
Watching Misiorowski at work, I found myself sad in a very modern baseball way. It’s possible Misiorowski was born with golden ligaments or a remarkable capacity for healing, a la connective-tissue unicorns like Nolan Ryan and Tom Seaver. And let’s hope that’s the case! But it’s vastly more likely that he’ll break, as nearly all power pitchers do. A pitch will go awry, Misiorowski will grimace and shake his arm, there will be opinions and second opinions, and then we’ll get an inevitable year to a year and a half of inactivity, followed by a big question mark.
In some ways this lament is about framing: Before Frank Jobe met Tommy John, pitchers also blew out their elbows with distressing regularity, but instead of spending a season on the shelf and returning to starting rotations they became mop-up guys — or milkmen, farmers or truck drivers. From that perspective, today’s progression is a far better outcome. But it’s still a drag, particularly the foreshadowing that weighs down every extraordinary pitch.
(If you’re interested in this topic — and if you’re here, you probably are — I highly recommend Jeff Passan’s The Arm. It’s one of my favorite baseball books, approaching a complicated subject with both curiosity and rigor, and refusing to endorse easy answers or one-size-fits-all takeaways.)
As for the again-saggy Mets, well, are we really surprised? The Brewers are literally the best team in baseball, so the Mets were probably lucky to steal a lone game from them. Uncle Andy’s Baseball Camp remains more fun than I would have guessed, even with the campers currently moping in their cabins hoping it stops raining. And there are certainly reasons to be hopeful: emerging rookies, some not bad complementary players, an OK record despite Juan Soto being nowhere near the proceedings.
But when one is watching Brewers amble around the bases without particular opposition, positivity is hard to maintain. The other thing that made me grumpy Thursday night was watching Francisco Alvarez flail at the plate and wondering how it is that he, Brett Baty and Mark Vientos have all been downgraded from prospect to suspect.
I like Alvarez, but every season seems to follow the same pattern, like a sigh-worthy game of Chutes and Ladders: He looks better for a couple of weeks at the plate but then falls back into bad habits, with his renewed offensive shortcomings bleeding into his defense. Vientos has fallen off a cliff both at bat and in the field — when’s the last time you even thought of him? And Baty looks like he’s bumped into a depressingly low ceiling, trundling along as an OK-ish utility guy. Not so long ago, it wasn’t crazy for the Mets to hope they might get solid contributions from all three of those guys; now, it wouldn’t be shocking to see them all become other clubs’ fix-it projects.
If so, just don’t let their renaissances come as Brewers. Because we’ve had enough of that.
“If so, just don’t let their renaissances come as Brewers. Because we’ve had enough of that.”
The team it currently pains me to look at is the Cubs. Never mind PCR – that is what it is. But Clay Holmes has been even better for them than he was for us and David Peterson looks like 1st half of 2025 David Peterson.
I’d like to think Baty having to learn the outfield in addition to 3 infield positions has affected his bat and he might come back. You’d think taking outfield reps would reduce his cage time. But that would be thinking optimistically and when it comes to those 3, optimism seems to be the wrong mindset.
Uncle Andy’s Baseball Camp with “campers currently moping in their cabins hoping it stops raining” for some reason brings to mind Camp Granada (“Hello mudda, hello fadda”). Yikes, I’m dating myself…
Strangely, I’m encouraged.
There are 28 games left — 5 1/2 turns around a 5-man rotation.
If everyone stays healthy, Scott, McLean and Thornton will pitch 18 of those games — good chances to win.
Manaea will pitch 5 of them — He didn’t pitch well last night, but if he had pitched better, Les Miz would have probably pitched better, too (I’m with those who say the mound conditions in the rain were mostly to blame). When you’re facing a Cy Young candidate in a stretch run in a pennant race (the Brewers, not ours), you are likely losing that night.
Either way, Manaea will always give you a puncher’s chance.
And the last 5 games, will be Stock, or you said yesterday, Jonah Tong, or whoever. The bullpen isn’t set up well enough to do a bullpen game right now. Anyway, we need their arms for the 18 games when Scott, McLean and Thornton pitch.
23 out of 28 games with a reasonable chance to win isn’t bad for a team that really can’t hit and, except for Carson Benge and half of A.J. Ewing and Marcus Semien, can barely field. (I bet we’ll get to October and be told that Lindor has been injured all year. He looks like it.)
Alvarez should DH every day until he proves he can’t. The Mets should have called up a minor-league catcher or pulled someone down from the waiver wire weeks ago, so that Torrens doesn’t have to play too often (there are years of data that say he can’t handle the load after a certain point). Hopefully, the Mets will add a catcher when rosters expand on Tuesday, and if they don’t, hopefully I’ll have the character to turn off the TV for a month.
We all know, and no one knows better than David Stearns (sic), that as soon as Brett Baty plays for anyone else, he will join Jeff Kent, Daniel Murphy and Justin Turner in the collection of All-Star infielders that the Mets didn’t know what to do with.
Regarding: Bruce from Forest Hills
Bruce, you have made several very excellent and insightful observations regarding the Mets. Your comment regarding Jeff Kent, Daniel “Mr. Net Negative” Murphy and Justin Turner would probably prompt WFAN radio host and lifelong Mets fan Joe Beningo to lament, “Oh, the pain!”
First, there was Bruce from Flushing, a longtime caller on both WABC and WFAN. I remember hearing Bruce from Flushing talking sports with the late Art Rust, Jr. on WABC back during the 1980s.
Then, there was the late Bruce from Bayside, who was known for his great quips and puns on WFAN.
You’re in very good company with these two legendary New York City sports talk radio station callers.