Thursday, May 8, 2008By Mike Steffanos
Game 32: Mets 12 - Dodgers 1
On the one hand it's a little frustrating, because with a clutch hit or two in Tuesday night's game the Mets could have had a terrific 4-2 swing through Phoenix and LA. On the other, if they hadn't won this one it would have been really ugly. In any event, it's a 3-3 road trip with all of the same questions still hanging over this team with one-fifth of their schedule completed.
One Met who has the right answers lately is John Maine. His pitching secured 2 of the Mets 3 wins on this trip. An 8-1/3 inning effort gave a tired bullpen a needed night off. He's back to pitching aggressively and throwing strikes, and he's also chipping in with the lumber -- his first hit of the season plated 2 runs.
The Mets let the Dodgers off the hook in Tuesday night's loss, but they weren't so generous to Brad Penny Wednesday afternoon. They pounded LA's starter for 10 earned runs in less than 5 innings of work, pushing his ERA from 3.19 to 4.79 in the process. This was despite Moises Alou and Carlos Delgado both getting the day off.
Ryan (Lastings Who?) Church was the offensive star with 3 hits including his sixth home run, tying him with Wright for the team lead. Luis Castillo and Marlon Anderson, both of whom have been scuffling, had two hits, as did Raul Casanova in what might be his final start with Castro close to coming back.
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Comments (3)
When Maine has that high heat working he is hard to touch; and that's what he brought yesterday. He was touching 94 and 95 mph.
The high fastball, from a guy who actually has a good fastball, is a tough pitch to hit, and almost as hard to lay off. It's a fact that gets overlooked often, but it's none the less true.
Posted by dd | May 8, 2008 10:24 AM
Maine definitely looked good out there, and I'm starting to like the 1-2 of Santana and Maine. If Ollie can get it going, the Mets will start to break out of the pack a bit...
My biggest problem was that in the Dbacks/Dodgers series, there were only two guys really hurting the Mets: Ojeda and DeWitt. Take them out of the equation, and the Mets probably do better. That only makes it more frustrating.
That being said, after the 5-4 loss, I think someone got the message that the Mets need to start hitting with runners on. We'll see if this carries over, any.
Posted by Jason B | May 8, 2008 1:53 PM
If I saw a sign of a message delivered, which I rather doubt anyway, it was in that perfectly executed first-to-tagout-the-runner doubleplay executed by Castillo, Anderson and Reyes in the 5th. Oh, and Pagan's catch too, but he is fighting for a job as always.
BTW, there was a baserunner running from second at the time of that double play, wasn't there? It was Loney, I believe, and he had plenty of time to score, but he didn't.
It would have made the score 11-0, so it's easy to dismiss the missed opportunity, but, don't you know, there is a way the game is supposed to be played. We have seen evidence before that the Dodgers just don't teach baserunning worth a damn; this would be another example.
Posted by dd | May 9, 2008 9:02 AM