The Mets offense struggled to get anything going tonight, as they managed five hits in tonight’s 8-0 loss against the Blue Jays.
- Jon Niese had a quality start tonight, as he went seven innings, let up three runs, struck out six hitters, but walked four hitters.
- Akeel Morris came in for relief and struggled mightily in his first big league outing, as he walked two and allowed a three-run homer to Danny Valencia in the eighth inning.
- Darrell Ceciliani struggled offensively tonight, as he went 0-3 with three strikeouts.
- Kevin Pillar had an excellent game for the Jays, going 3-4 with 2 RBIs.
Niese pitched well, but the offense and bullpen did not help his cause. The Mets will look to do better tomorrow as Bartolo Colon will go up against the Mets former ace, R.A. Dickey.
Number of the day: 67.50.
Akeel’s ERA is officially the same as my final grade in HS calculus…
Thanks for the chuckle Doug! That was a great comment haha!
The Blue Jays came into the day with a 143 wRC against lefties and 128 wRC at home, so the fact that Niese was able to limit them to 3 runs in 7 innings is probably more impressive than people are giving him credit for. Plus, the last time he was in Toronto, he was absolutely shelled for 8 runs in 3 innings.
Niese once again pitched well. So did Matz last night.
IMO Niese is a better pitcher than Colon. It is rumored that other teams won’t give Sandy the value he seeks for Niese. A team that commits to obtain Niese will have him through 2016 with two option years. The supposed injury time bomb in his shoulder detracts from his value. Colon should be the one traded to make room for Matz. If Sandy can get a Herrera for Byrd, who was also an older player in the last year of his contract, then he should attempt a similar return for Colon. These types of trades are Sandy’s forte. Matz should wait for promotion until after the trade to avoid a Gee reoccurence.
I have seen Morris pitch a few times last year for Savannah. He was dominant. Last night he was a nervous rookie unable to command his change up. I am glad that he got a chance in the show. Good move on TC’s part and TC was right when he said that Morris will get them the next time.
You can’t win them all and we woke up still in First Place.
It would take a pair of brass balls to trade Colon with the Mets barely holding on to 1st place, along with the possibility of falling out of WC contention.
Any team that trades for Colon would be doing so because they were making a run at the playoffs, and subsequently they would never surrender a player who could help the Mets this season. So the move would theoretically hurt the Mets this year in order to enrich the vaunted farm system.
I don’t know. I get the sense that Colon is important in that clubhouse, his relationship to Familia, his veteran presence. When things get tight — and we know that TC will be an absolute stress case come August — the club might like to have a guy like Bartolo around.
Yes, there’s the Matz effect, the young stud. But he is another guy with innings limits, coming with his own bag of problems.
I am truly undecided on this one. On paper, I can see that trading Bartolo, for the right amount of talent, Herrera+, makes a sort of cruel sense. But it could also be a move that sends the worst possible message to the clubhouse and the fans, dooming the season. In that light, this feels like a risk that SA would never make.
It’s not even July yet. We’ve got four more weeks of information to gather & process before making that decision. As we’ve seen many times before, often these decisions are made by chance and accident rather than plan.
Two other huge factors will be: 1) What kind of player are you getting back? Could it be someone who represents a rare opportunity? and 2) Does the potential savings on salary allow SA to make a corresponding move, a reinvestment, that bolsters the roster in an overall positive way.
At this point, I’m really okay if no trades are made. Sure, I’d like to get an upgrade, but I’m not going to gnash my teeth if we don’t.
And if other teams want to view Niese as too big of an injury risk — that’s their loss. His overall durability has been just fine since 2010 and he’s made 26 straight starts since a brief DL stint last year. He’s rebounded from four poor starts to be solid in his last three appearances, which were all Quality Starts. Unlike Gee, I don’t dread the days when Niese takes the mound for us. I feel like he’s going to give us a chance to win.
I would be shocked if the Mets dealt Colon.
I agree, Brian, because I just don’t see the trades to make. For who, where, and to what end? You know. I commented earlier that all their descriptions of the type of player they wanted sounded exactly like . . . Daniel Murphy. He comes along on Tuesday. Mejia will be here, and so on.
And of course, the David Wright situation makes it all extra tricky.
Plus, unlike several here, I firmly believe that Conforto can help down the stretch. It wouldn’t hurt to try! Just wait till Granderson & Cuddyer start to melt in August.
It feels like TC has lost all confidence in A. Torres, which is dumb and a direct result of misuse from Day One. He is a guy who has control issues but is hard to hit, historically tougher against RH and LH hitters. So TC brings him into tough situations against LH hitters. Sigh.
I still like Torres. And Gilmartin, for that matter. Even Leathersich has been effective (so far). Sure, it would be nice to plug in a quality RHP to the pen, but this is an area where I actually favor the default position of “internal solutions.” The hope is that Parnell will be better in August than he is in June.
I do fault Sandy Alderson for his inactivity, his inability (or unwillingness) to address clear weaknesses, but I don’t believe mid-July presents much in the way of opportunity. He needed to get some of this work done over the winter, when he was relaxing in St. Croix.
The Abbott and Costello routine of Alderson and collins astounds me. First you make a 3 step promotion, which is ridiculous, then, in his first appearance you expose him in a game we were theoretically “in” to the most vicious string of 4 hitters in the big leagues. I mean pitching to A+ hitters on one day, then Bautista, Donaldson, Encarnacion the next? Who dreams this crap up?
I’m not alone: Keith Hernandez strongly criticized the decision saying he couldn’t believe the front office would subject a player from Single-A to that kind of abuse. “I don’t understand what they were thinking. I’ve never seen anything like this before.”