Jenrry Mejia has had a couple of good outings so far this season for Buffalo. He’s pitched 12.2 innings, allowed no runs and only seven hits and five BB, while striking out 11. He’s held opposing batters to a .156 AVG. During his two stints on the mound, he has thrown 189 pitches, 113 for strikes, which is 60% rate. This shows Jenrry still needs to improve his command because it translates in 135 pitches per nine innings.

In summary, Jenrry is doing a very good job and if he can polish his command, the Mets have a great young pitcher.

First off, Relievers and Starters fall into 2 completely different categories when addressing the subject of throwing strikes. A reliever should/must throw strikes. Most times a reliever is brought in to replace a starter who is probably walking hitters, hence the reliever is brought in to get hitters out, not put them on via the walk.

Starters on the other hand don’t necessarily need to pitch strikes only to get hitters out. Pitches outside the strike zone can be just as effective as that back door curve ball that hits black. However, in order to be effective of pitching outside of the strike zone, you must know how to Pitch. That is, know how to set up that splitter down and away, or that fastball that climbed the ladder out of the strike zone.

Hitting and a hitter’s philosophy has changed from identifying pitch type and location and swinging to guessing what pitch will be thrown and if they guess correctly, then they swing. Guess hitters can be difficult to a pitcher who follows a standard script. That is, up in the count, I use my breaking stuff, down in the count, I use my fastball. The pitcher has become too predictable. The on reason Chris Young has been successful thus far is because he is able to Pitch, using both balls and strikes to set up hitters and force hitters to follow his plan, rather than the hitter dictating what the pitcher will throw next.

Possibly some of the Mets pitching struggles stems from Thole’s lack of experience behind the plate. If the Mets pitching staff is letting Thole call the pitches, than perhaps it is not 100% the pitchers fault. Say Thole calls for a pitch that the Pitcher is not 100% confident in throwing in a certain count. Well that Pitcher might not make the best pitch he can because of his lack of confindence in the pitch. A pitcher isn’t going to tell Thole, “Hey man, my slider is hanging, or my fastball has no life on it”. It is up to the catcher’s experience to recognize which pitches are working for the pitcher that day, and utilize those pitches in certain counts to get hitters out.

Just because statistics say that a certain hitter is suseptible to a fastball high and tight doesn’t mean that you should pitch that pitch if your pitcher’s fastball has no life to it that day. You have to rewrite the script.

If the walks are atleast partially a result of Thole’s pitch calling, well, there is really nothing we can do to fix it other than let him get the experience the hard way, by learning when and when not to call certain pitches and to learn how to judge his Pitcher’s stuff during the game.

I like Thole and I believe he can be the future back stop of this club, I do question the Mets move last year to trade Barajas away. I think we could have brought him back on another 1 year deal and Thole could still use another year of study and learning. I question the Paulino signing because 1) he violated the drug program and is not necessarily the best positive role model for Thole to learn from 2) Has yet to return from suspension and injury to work with Thole. Plus Paulino in my opinion is not as good of a catcher as Barajas was anyways.

Time will tell, and hopefully Thole will and this Mets pitching staff will work better together as an unit. And let me re-iterate that all Mets relivers must throw STRIKES, no if ands or buts.