The Mets wasted a rare solid outing from Jason Vargas as the bullpen coughed up two long balls and the middle of the order failed to come through with any hits.
Vargas held the Orioles to one run through five innings and entered the sixth inning with a 2-1 lead, courtesy of RBI singles by Kevin Plawecki and Amed Rosario. In the bottom of the sixth, Vargas surrendered a game-tying solo home run to Adam Jones and then exited the game for a pinch hitter with the score tied 2-2. That the Mets couldn’t score more than two runs off the struggling Andrew Cashner speaks volumes about our offense. And against three relievers this blogger never heard of before this game, the Mets managed to score just one unearned run on an errant throw.
Meanwhile, the Mets young relievers took their lumps. Bobby Wahl served up a home run to Chris Davis in the 7th that gave Baltimore the lead for good. Paul Sewald, who had looked much better of late, reminded us tonight of why he was demoted a few months ago. The righty with the hittable slider allowed an inherited runner to score in the seventh and then gave up a two-run home run to Tim Beckham that put the game out of reach.
On the positive side, both Brandon Nimmo and Todd Frazier seem to be breaking out of their slumps, combining for four hits and a walk. The Mets also got hits from Rosario, Plawecki and Jeff McNeil and Jose Bautista drew two walks and threw out a runner at home. However, Michael Conforto (DH), Wilmer Flores and Austin Jackson went a combined 0 for 12 with four strikeouts.
The series continues in Baltimore tomorrow with Zack Wheeler opposing Dylan Bundy.
Bad team and just as bad a boring team!
8 million $ for one good start. That’s a lot of money.
They signed a Guy who has been a 5-6 inning starter….. with Mediocre Track Record…. questionable demonstrated durability….. good news… His FIP is better than his ERA, so there’s upside…. Not!!!
Take a look at his Pitching Log after July 1, 2017
https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/gl.fcgi?id=vargaja01&t=p&year=2017
Take a look at his 2017 1st half / 2nd half splits
https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/split.fcgi?id=vargaja01&year=2017&t=p
The guy had just about a zero season in each of ’15 and ’16….. 100 innings or so combined.
This was a signing based on ignoring virtually all the facts and relying on pure hope. Nobody who saw his last 15 starts in 2017….nobody who looked at his stats from the last 15 starts of 2017….. nobody could have said that what you see is what you want.
Terrible…Bye Sandy….Bye Troika….Next!!!!!!!!!
I maintain that the talent evaluation in the Alderson regime is among the worst in baseball. Vargas is one of the poster children.
I hope you maintain being a survivor Sandy and wish the best for you and your family. However, I dont want you near the Mets ever again for any reason.
Eiland seems to have done a fine job with the Met starters. He saw all of Vargas’s performances in recent years, and Callaway saw a lot as well. I suspect they had a strong role in Sandy’s signing. Ok, sometimes you wind up signing the worst pitcher in team history…it happens. But a guaranteed 2nd year? Who were they bidding against?
The Vargas signing is no different than the signings of Bruce, Frazier, Swarzak and many previous free agent signings by the Mets. They ball at the price of the A free agents, don’t know how to find diamonds in the rough and instead throw money at the mid tier guys who are often busts. Jason Bay instead of Matt Holliday, Ollie Perez instead of Derek Lowe, etc. rather than signing 4 B FAs they’d have been better off signing two As and filling in with Cs and minor leaguers. I don’t hold Sandy accountable so much as the Wilpons. I suspect that they issued a mandate about no long term contracts and Sandy had to work within those parameters.
In fairness check out last year’s FA class. Most have underperformed or gotten injured or both. Signing FAs seems like a great idea in November but more often then not don’t work out,sometimes even in the first year of the deal.