Since returning from the IL, Starling Marte has posted a .235/.308/.296 line in 92 PA. And that’s with a .322 BABIP. He’s walking a decent amount but he’s producing like a Triple-A backup catcher. And he has 23 strikeouts in this span, a 25% K-rate. The Mets are finally playing Tyrone Taylor over Harrison Bader. Now they have to find a guy to play instead of Marte. If only Jeff McNeil was still healthy.
Carlos Mendoza has benched Jesse Winker versus LHP but he really has to consider benching Marte, instead. It probably doesn’t make any difference with Chris Sale, as the expectation should be that Winker would be as helpless as Marte. But it the Brewers throw a LHP in one of the final three games of the year, my hope is that Winker is in right field.
Common sense says that Winker and Marte should platoon. This year Marte has a 860 OPS vs LHP and Winker has a 791 OPS vs RHP. What is gumming the works is Marte has a 637 OPS and Winker has a 395 OPS in September. If Lindor plays tonight would Mendoza have the gumption to play Acuna in center field and Taylor in right field?
FG has finally erected a paywall around their… “thing”
Funny, because just before I discovered this, I’d been thinking how regularly they bore me
What else bothers me is when some site/merchant/service/whatever tells me something like
“you can join us for only 16 cents per day”
Serious red flag, because I often forget about my memberships, and thus continue to be stroked even though I’m not using it. For example, often a week or more passes between my visits to FG
Anyway, see ya later FG
Happy for a couple of days off is it provides additional healing time for Lindor to come back stronger. Hard to imagine them taking Acuna out of the lineup with Lindor back, so given Acuna’s ability to make the routine plays at SS, maybe Lindor starts back as the DH. Now what do they do with JD Martinez who simply stopped hitting? Winker deserves a shot back out over Marte even as both of their bats have cooled off. Bottom line is it needs to be Nimmo, Alonso and Alvarez continuing to step up. Gotta play Brewers hard all weekend but they are not going to lay down just because they are already in. Keep the faith everybody.
Much is written about the Mets starting rotation, and they deserve it, but the defense deserves some notice. Yes, there have been hiccups, but overall the Mets have not embarrassed themselves.
Interesting question:
Case 1:
Let’s say the Mets sweep MIL, and ATL loses their first two games against KC
At that point, the Mets will have clinched either WC2 or WC3, and ATL can win the other WC only depending upon what ARI does
Case 2:
Let’s say the Mets win their first 2 games against MIL, and ARI lose their first 2 games against SD. At that point, the Mets would have a 2 game lead over ARI, and because the Mets have won the season series against ARI, they will have clinched either WC2 or WC3, and ARI can win the other WC only depending upon what ATL does
In either case, because the Mets post season fate will have been determined, would they be allowed to choose not to go to ATL for that boneheadedly scheduled twinbill – call it a forfeit (X2) if you like – and instead enjoy having Monday off, even though the twinbill’s outcome might affect the playoff seeding?
That was tough to express, not the concept, but the use of English… ness
God, just like 2022, CHOKE. How disappointing.
I started writing this for the “Gut Reaction (9/29/24)” article, but it became so long I decided to put it here
My impression, based upon recent media chatter, was that the current rules of who’d be triumphant for post-season qualification – based upon which of two teams had the season’s better head-to-head record – was implemented to avoid pre-playoff “tie-breaker” games being scheduled between the end of the regular season and the start of the official playoffs
I’m impressed that someone like myself could have written such a long sentence
So, for example, there is a very likely scenario – this year – where 3 teams could finish with identical W/L records while vying for two playoff spots
If the Mets and ATL split Monday’s twinbill, then all three, including ARI, would finish with identical records. Based on current rules, this means that ARI would be sent packing, with no additional pre-playoff tiebreaker games necessary, because ARI has lost the season series against both rivals
It also points out that the entire MLB schedule for all teams requires that each team play an odd number of games against all opponents
But what if there’s a rainout? Then teams would have to resolve the cancelled games, such as during the one day between the end of the regular season and the start of the playoffs
(Gee, when has this happened… in the future…?)
That throws a monkey-wrench into the concept of having no tie-breakers on aforementioned one-day break
It made me wonder what would have happened prior to the adoption of current rules. Would NYM, ATL, and ARI have been required to play some sort of “round-robin” (whatever that means) tournament?
(Note: I’m 99.9% sure that no 3-way tie has ever occurred in MLB)
Looking to resolve this question, I found a Wikipedia article titled
“Major League Baseball tie-breaking procedures”
Reading this article made my head hurt
Especially the part titled
“Ties among multiple teams”
With the risk of being chased off with pitchforks, I give credit to ATL.
They lost last year’s MVP, then they lost MLB’s only 20 game winner in 2023
And if that wasn’t bad enough, they then lost a high quality 3rd baseman to a broken hand – and that’s not even counting that 2nd baseman, who drove in 5 today after missing multiple weeks with a broken wrist.
I was thinking, what could the Mets have done if they had lost players of (Big Bro) Acuña’s and Strider’s quality?
Well, they Mets don’t have a starter as good as Strider. Lindor is their only position player comparable to Acuña, outranking him in defensive ability and durability
And I just read that 2024’s NLCYA has been scratched and won’t start 2nd game
Thence, why TF did Snickers take Schwellenbach out in the 8th?
That first game was a huge loss for ATL
And while I’m ranting, why didn’t Mendoza bring in Butto in the 8th inning?
Anyway, I severely doubt the Mets will make it passed SDP or MIL