Marcus Stroman gave the Mets everything they could have hoped for, as he went eight innings after the bullpen logged so many frames the past three games. On top of that, Stroman did not allow a run, as the Mets had a rare laugher from start to finish, with a 7-0 win over the Reds Wednesday afternoon to take the rubber match of the series.
Jonathan Villar got the Mets on the board with a solo homer in the second inning. Dominic Smith broke the game open with a grand slam in the third. And Luis Guillorme got in on the long ball party with a two-run blast to cap the scoring in the fifth inning.
Meanwhile, Stroman allowed just one hit in his eight innings and lowered his ERA to 2.59 for the season. Jeurys Familia pitched the final inning and struck out the side to clinch the win.
The Mets have a much-needed day off on Thursday, which will give the bullpen a break. They return to action on Friday with an interleague series against the Blue Jays.
Rojas not letting Stroman finish the game really made my blood boil.
Fire the ***********!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Starting Pitching 2021 – 90 pitches is the new 100 pitch count; relievers throw until their arm falls off.
Kudos to Stroman who delivered big time with the team in desperate need of quality innings.
Gut Reaction: Removing the starting pitcher that throws 8 innings of one hit shutout ball with only 90 pitches and a 7-0 lead is one a of the reasons that bullpen is overworked. In this situation, unless there was an injury and fatigue, the pitcher should not be pulled.
Otherwise it was a nice victory and the hitting has returned.
Not sure why this generation of pitchers are so fragile that they need to be pulled, often as they reach that 6 inning quality start goal. Part of it must be the exercise regime that is so advanced that teams all across the MLB are placing players on the IL. Complete games are almost as rare as a no-no. That being said, this was a good win with hits from all starters except Conforto and Stroman. Nice to see the long ball continue and hope they still do so against the BlueJays who are a rare AL team with a winning road record. Taking 2 of 3 on this home stand keeps us moving in the right direction. It was also easy to root for our crosstown rivals last night who survived and beat the Phillies.
Pulling Stroman with just one inning left in a one-hitter reveals Rojas’s problem. He’s manages scared. Let the freaking guy finish his gem… stay out of it!
No, Rojas needs everyone to see that he’s in charge… essentially insecure… he’s a superstitious, old-school guy caught between Alou-family machismo expectations and modern cybermetrics’ disorientation .
Maybe someday he will find himself, but he’s pretty far from it now.
Do any of you know whether Stroman asked to he pulled or told Rojas he was fatigued? No? Then quit your yapping. Always something to complain abt I guess.
The bullpen is not overworked bc Familia pitched an easy inning before a team day off. Rojas is no different than 29 other managers who all would have most likely made the same decision to pull the starter. That’s the game today. Stroman didnt pitch last year. Is the extra inning really a huge deal? The reality is this year more than any other teams are going to he careful especially if they expect to need their arms healthy in October.
#lfgm
Boomboom,
your point is correct, and without knowing details of a particular game removal it is mere conjecture/belly-aching on our part. Personally, I have no gripe with Rojas over this pull, and Stroman may well have been gassed at 90 pitches or nursing some nagging injuries or whatever. I also agree that most any other “replacement” of Rojas would do the same. That said, I do wonder what Seaver or Gooden or Darling or even a Matt Harvey would have done at being lifted in that exact spot. Yes, pitching has changed whether we like it or not…some ways better, some ways worse. I think the bigger concern should be the disparity in treatment…bullpen guys, and especially AAAA types, are afforded no TLC, and are often abused to protect the “higher value” guys…just another item to add to the list of labor issues.
Seaver, gooden and Darling would have stayed in the game and finished it off. Different Era. We saw what happened when the manager allowed Harvey to talk him into staying in for the 9th once.
I also have no problem with this move, although for a different reason.
We tend to look at usage in terms of not over-using a reliever. But you have to be worried about the other side of the coin, too. Familia hadn’t pitched in two days. If he wasn’t used yesterday and with the off day today, then you’re looking at four days off. What’s the optimum number of days between appearances for a reliever? I’m sure it’s fluid, where some parts of the year you don’t mind having three or four days off. For one inning relievers, two days off seems ideal under normal conditions.
You shouldn’t need Familia on Friday but with the day off, he can go if necessary. But Diaz, Lugo, May and Castro will all enter Friday with three games off. They’d all been used heavily since the break so that extra day off is a good thing.
All in all, Wednesday couldn’t have worked out more perfectly for the bullpen.
Just because something is the norm doesn’t make it right.
For years at this site a lot of us have railed against the LOOGY as a suboptimal position yet 30 out of 30 teams deployed one.
For 100+ years the game played without a shift and now almost every batter’s defensive configuration is different.
Pulling a SP at 90 pitches with a 1-hitter and a taxed bullpen in the middle of July is beyond idiotic. And if people don’t call it out and call attention to it, change will never happen.
If you want to follow the norm and have a cookie cutter manager, a computer program can do that and you can save a manager’s salary.
Again we have no idea why stroman was pulled. Familia wasnt taxed and the bullpen will be completely rested with the day off.
Plus context is everything. 90 pitches this year is equivalent to 100 or 110 the last time stroman pitched a full season.
And no offense to Brian but calling something out on mets360 isn’t going to change anything.
That the mets won a laugher, went .500 on the road trip despite the issues with the starting rotation, and the offense has awoken should all be the focus. Yet here we are arguing abt 8 innings vs 9. Please.
We know exactly why he was pulled. You even called it out. The 90 pitch boogeyman.
I don’t agree with it and i will call it out every time he does it. It doesn’t matter that it’s the norm. It’s bad managing no matter how much you want to frame it or context it. Most likely yes i would unsatisfied with almost every current manager in baseball.
If I didn’t know the result of the game and just read these comments I would think the Mets lost a game that the manager gave away with stupidity, not a win that could not have been scripted any better. It was great to see Stroman step up and also to see a really good inning from Familia. I’m happy.
exactly