To say that tonight’s affair against the Pirates was a slug fest would be an understatement. The Mets fell on the short side of a 12-7 tilt Friday night. Pitching on either side of the field was a rarity until the Pirates reached their bullpen. After a dominant start in his last outing, Matt Harvey was looking to continue his strong form. Instead, Harvey walked four and allowed six earned runs over five innings. In a bases loaded no outs jam in the first inning, Harvey only allowed one run to score. When the same problem arose in the fourth inning though, Harvey was unable to produce the same results. He allowed a bases-clearing double to Elias Diaz, who had one career RBI entering the evening. Hopefully for Harvey this was just a little bump in the road for Harvey’s recovery this season.
The Mets offense tonight largely focused around the home run. Lucas Duda continued the mashing of the baseball, smacking two home runs this evening. Michael Conforto contributed a two run home run, opposite field of course. Neil Walker produced a triple that also drove in a run. Curtis Granderson and Wilmer Flores each had a single, and Travis d’Arnaud went two for three with two singles this evening. Asdrubal Cabrera seems to be at a dark place right now, going 0-5 tonight. With low production coming from him and Jose Reyes, my gut reaction is that a call for Amed Rosario is not too far away.
Tonight, it was Paul Sewald’s turn to break our hearts out of the bullpen. In a dreadful 0.1 of an inning, Sewald was lit up for five earned runs. Not good for his standing kn Terry Collins’s “Circle of Trust.” Neil Ramirez gave up a run, in 2.2 innings, and Josh Smoker pitched a clean inning. It was certainly tough to watch Sewald struggle, who seemed he was left in for too long.
The Mets try to even up the series tomorrow night, when Robert Gsellman will face Tyler Glasnow at 7:15.
Rivera at 3B last night made Wilmer look like Brooks Robinson.
Which explains why he never got a “fair chance” by the Mets. He has no power, no speed, and he can’t field. But he can hit for average. A one-tool player.
I mean now you are sounding like me! Flores had the easiest chances imaginable. Flores andRivera are about the same person. Neither can play 3B.
I wasn’t knocking Flores in that comment. I was expounding upon Rivera’s limitations.
oh I know. I meant the hyperbole!
I’m not sure why I’m acutely seeing this now after watching baseball for 50 years, but this season I’ve become highly aware of pitchers who are able to get batters to chase out of the strike zone.
It seems like an essential talent for all the great pitchers, a talent that is in direct relationship to “stuff.”
Likewise, most clearly with Montero, I’ve seen the perils of the reverse: When you can’t induce batters to chase. When they lay off the junk, the slider six inches off the plate, the curve in the dirt, the high fastball. Instead they calmly wait, let the pitcher fall behind, and stand ready to mash at something fat over the plate.
It’s a hard way for a pitcher to live. Impossible, really.
And to my eyes, that was Matt Harvey last night. The diminishment of his stuff. Now he has to make due with craft and guile and a batter’s own impatience until one day, hopefully, the stuff returns. He’s like Dillon Gee out there. He’s like . . . Montero.
I think it can get better over time. But I’m just talking right now what I saw last night. The hitters didn’t swing at anything off the plate. The curveball like a tumbleweed. The slider without any bite. The fastball without late life.
Also: He’s a 90-pitch guy these days. It just fades fast and pushing him doesn’t seem to work at all.
Can it be that other teams see something about Mets pitchers the Mets don’t see? While Warthen has done a good job, might it be necessary to get fresh eyes on the staff?
Is Rivera really that bad?
At this point, it is more effective for him to pitch to contact rather than chase the strikeout.
Salas also had a good game.
There are games the other team will take from you (Friday), then there are loses in close contests (Thursday), and there are games you just weren’t in from the start (Wednesday). That is why it is important to limit the games you screw up and give away, because losses will happen.
Last night was all about Harvey. He couldn’t build on last start but when I turned on the radio in the third inning, he had just set down nine in a row. How did he just lose it? How did all these guys lose their “put away” stuff? Unlike his last start, Harvey hasnt finished the sixth inning all year.
I didn’t see the game, but I noticed in other games TDA doesn’t always give a target. Was this last night too? Wonder why that is, who came up with that, and how the pitchers feel about that?
The Mets have lost three games when they have scored seven runs. They have lost five others when they have scored five runs. That is a lot of bad pitching.
Harvey did not have his command or his “stuff”. He was very inconsistent which makes him very unreliable. Sewald should have taken a Ferris Harvey Day off.
The offense is fine with: TDA almost up to an 800 OPS, Flores with another hit and Duda at a 931 OPS. It is the pitching that needs to be addressed and maybe some tough decisions need to be made when Lugo and Matz arrive.
Sewald clearly had nothing. Was Terry asleep in the dugout?
Sewald was dead as soon as he went in the game, he just had nothing.
Leave it to the Mets to make Elias Diaz look like Joe DiMaggio.
I don’t believe it’s time to call it quits on Harvey. You command Pitches and then you command the at bat…he’s not in command of much of his repertoire.
Pitchers get chases when they can spot locations and make hitters responsible for a larger area, physically and mentally. Right now, he mostly throws 2 and 4 seemers “around the plate”.