Well, so much for riding the momentum of sweeping the Yankees.
As it is a common occurrence to the Mets and their fans, they tend to show up for the big affairs but fail to get up for teams they should beat. After riding into Miami with a five-game winning streak, the Mets were once again lifeless in a 5-1 loss to the Marlins–a team with a 14-41 record (with, yes, four of their victories against the Mets).
Alas, all hope is not lost. As long as the Mets can win the series, then they can carry some serious momentum into Washington next week. With five of the next eight games for the Mets being against the Marlins (they visit Citi Field for the Weekend of June 7), they’ll have to step up their game if they have any idea of breaking .500 anytime this year.
It is critical that the Mets treat the Marlins as if they were the Yankees. Granted, that’s a tall task, as the Marlins are doing their best impression of a Triple-A team. Playing the Marlins hardly generates any buzz or electricity. Seriously, how do you get up for this? It’s like children doing chores. You have to bring your hard hat and treat this as grunt work. The Mets simply can’t just show up and expect to beat the Marlins. The Marlins have a group of scrappy players who will not lie down.
If the Mets revert to old habits-like they did on Friday night-then yes, this Mets’ team will continue to be who we thought they were.
After the Mets’ sweep of the Yankees, the mood in the Mets’ clubhouse was jovial, with the team giving off a harmonious bravado. After the Thursday night’s game Terry Collins even suggested to the media that “we’re not that bad.”
Well, time to prove it against the rest of the league, Terry. It’s easy to get up for the Yankees, but the difference between good teams and bad teams is how you do against supposedly inferior competition.
As Brian Joura pointed out, it is key that the Mets get solid quality starting pitching. Right now, that’s pretty much all the Mets have going for them. The pitching is what will carry the Mets this year. With such a small margin for error, the Mets have to find ways to win when one of their starters tosses a quality outing.
The Mets will get pitching reinforcements when Zack Wheeler gets his call. Heck, maybe towards the end of the season Rafael Montero could get the call too. But for the Mets to really shake things up, they need to add some bats.
Sandy Alderson has stated that regardless of what place the Mets are in at the deadline, they could be on the market for an outfield bat (Alex Rios, Carlos Quentin being some of the names being tossed out). This way they can get a jumpstart in reviving a punch-less outfield in anticipation of the 2014 season—a season they are looking at making big strides in.
So, these next two months could be telling, as it’s time this team creates an identity the fanbase can relate with.
To other baseball teams “playing the Mets hardly generates buzz or electricity.Seriously, how do you get up for this? It’s like children doing chores. You have to bring your hard hat and treat this as grunt work.” Any team that doesn’t and is motivationally ill prepared should get a new manager (and replace the ill motivated players) because it is a terrible professional attitude.
Sandy had a whole winter to put 3 average major league outfielders in the lineup. He didn’t do anything last July when something was needed so I can’ t believe him now.
The Mets will get better in the second half but this is on paper a 70 win team. Wheeler and d’naurd will improve the team and maybe Leathersich, he of 9 consecutive k’s in his last three appearences. He has to be better than Carson.
Why bring up Leathersich?
We haven’t sent Rice to the DL yet. :/
And don’t we want to take a poll, to make sure everyone on the team “feels better about themselves” before you start to bring in new players? #Hefnerexit #TCasLockerroomAlchemist #letsplayguyswith280OBA
Rice to the DL first….ok that was priceless.
LGM
How exactly can a team not be up for a supposed “easy” kill. Fangs are sharp…now bite. When I played in LL and HS, we couldn’t wait to get the beater teams so we could immerse them dreary. Those were easy games to get up for because of the possibility of unleashing a fury. As with Metsense, I couldn’t disagree more about the premise of getting up for a bad team. Furthermore, as bad as the Marlins are, they are beating us in the season series. I’m not sure how we can’t get up to face the lashing we get from Dobbs, Pierre, Ruggiano, and Stanton (even on DL)…and now the minor league scrubs we turn into Cy Young or Silver Slugger contenders. It’s a familiar, and most unsightly, refrain — does anyone remember our play against the Astros? Rockies? Cubs? Last year. What is consistent about this team is the Jeckyll and Hyde nature of our play.
We need to stop worrying about streaks and wild cards and the unattainable .500 and simply focus on every game as if it were the last. Streaks are retro perspectives not something worth predicting as if it were true. Today we have Colin McHugh facing Fernandez, who if I recall stymied us in his debut against the Mets. We face a real potential to lose today as well. Someone better man up and try to do something against this AAA team, or the egg on the face will be orange and blue again.
As humans, we tend to overreact.
After sweeping the Yankees, most people were thinking that the Mets had hope of playing meaningful and possibly being relevant for the rest of the season.
Now after losing the first game to Miami, people are pushing the panic button once again and calling the team unpleasant names.
That being said, with the way the team has played over the first two months, the margin for error is much smaller than at the beginning of the season. If they wish to remain relevant, they do have to start winning games fast and in bunches.
Is relevant getting to playoff baseball?
To be “relevant” you need to keep your losses down to around 75. We need to play nearly .600 ball for the rest of the way. And at this point, the 14 games against the worst team in baseball are already baked into the standings.
To put that into perspective, the team was playing .400 ball about a week ago. We’re not going to be that kind of relevant.
What we can be, is a team that wins 55% of their games the rest of the way … from some undetermined point in the season. Hopefully that point was against the Braves last week. I think that makes us a relevant team and one that the rest of the NL has to respect.
I still think we can win the next few games and have the Braves come to us wondering about the 8-2 Mets. Then maybe the Nats have to wonder about playing the 10-4/11-3 Mets, that just played the Braves pretty tough. And from there …
Too many pixels, but it’s not even 1 PM and its hot and the beer is cold. LGM.