19
2012
Mets Have Worst Spring Record In MLB, Does It Matter
An article by 
After yesterday’s loss to the Astros, the Mets have not won in their last nine Grapefruit League games. At 3-11, they have the worst spring record in the majors. On the bright side, with no game scheduled for today, there’s no chance that they can extend their winless streak to ten.
This is certainly not the start manager Terry Collins was looking for, I can tell you that. And no matter how much Collins and the players try to downplay it by saying the games don’t matter, it is what it is. All 29 other MLB teams have more wins than the Mets this spring. That and the small fact that the Mets are playing at a level consistent with what most experts have them pegged for in 2012 anyway – last place.
Don’t kid yourselves… deep down inside, Collins is feeling the pressure. So do the players. If the games didn’t matter, they wouldn’t smile and high–five each other after a win, or head to the clubhouse with their heads hung low as the Mets have after their last few losses. I didn’t see Collins smiling like his counterpart in the other dugout either.
Yesterday’s loss matters… It matters because Mike Pelfrey gave up another eight earned runs and has now allowed 16 runs in 9.2 innings including 4 home runs. He of the reinvented sinker and fixer of a flawed release point – a Spring ritual with this one..
Five of the last seven losses mattered because the new Three Amigos in the bullpen, Francisco, Rauch and Ramirez, have looked terrible and have five blown saves and allowed 15 runs on 24 hits in 14.2 innings. Everybody’s watching, guys.
What about all the aches, pains and bruises, should I mention them? What about all the errors, the dropped popups, throwing to the wrong bag, not reading the ball off the bat, getting picked off? Does that matter?
You want to say the standings don’t matter, fine I’ll buy that, but guess what? Results still matter – and so far things aren’t looking so good for our Amazins.
About the Author: Joe DeCaro
I'm a lifelong Mets fan who loves writing and talking about the Amazins' 24/7. From the Miracle in 1969 to the magic of 1986, and even the near misses in '73 and '00, I've experienced it all - the highs and the lows. I started Mets Merized Online in 2005 to feed my addiction. Follow me on Twitter @metsmerized.
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No, standings don’t really matter, especially midway through. D’Backs finished last and Twins finished first last ST.
However, individual results do matter. And there are some definite areas of concern, IMO.
-Half the BP
-Pelfrey
-Bay
-Health issues especially with Wright and Tejada
It’s getting late in March now……
Don’t worry Joe. Collins said everybody’s got something to prove. That includes Pelfrey. Players with something to prove execute better, isnt that what he said? Jon Rauch $3.5 million as a reliever coming off an atrocious season has something to prove too. Francisco and his $12 million has something to prove after 25 blown saves in his last 75. No worries.
For us Met fans this is also our spring training to get us ready for the regular saeson. After all we also have to get our minds and spirits conditioned too. I will be able to ease myself into my pschologist’s session rather than being shocked from opening day. Their performance is positive for my mental health. You see the Mets is the only team I love. I care squat for football, basketball, hockey, fussball, soccer, LaCrosse, ping pong, bowling and NASCAR although I do admit I like a good body slam by those WWF women wrestlers, their hot! Let’s Go Mets-Or Not!
Hey Lou, it’s not WWF anymore, its WWE lol.. Trust me, i made the same mistake and was corrected..
Joe D, we have seen teams win 20 games in ST and be dead last during the regular season, but i do agree, given the situation of the team, players must be looking into this and probably saying that this may be a mirage of whhat the season will be like.. Pressure is on the players and TC, imo, as i’ve said often Terry collins will EXPLODE by half of season and/or be replaced as a met manager and the mets will finish with less than 70 wins…
Yes, I forgot that. Collins may be going batty this year. He’s always gotten off to a good start in his first year with a team, but it’s years 2 and 3 that he goes schizo. I have the Mets pegged for 70-75 wins, because basically it’s the same team as last year without Beltran, Reyes and K-Rod. Matching last year’s 77 wins would be classified as a monumental achievement for this bunch.
to be fair, none of those guys were here for the full year anyway, and they should be having a full year of Ike and Duda, plus (hopefully!) wright will play significantly more.
And don’t discount how much difference having Ike back is going to make. The way he was going last year, him going down was the killer.
agree.. He’s already starting to get mad at players for dumb stuff.. he knows the clock is ticking and he’ll be the one to take the fall for…
The record itself doesn’t matter at this point. Individual performances do though. So the injuries, pelf being pelf, those matter.
The last 2 weeks of ST though it is a little different. Up to now, the regulars don’t play much, and many games are decided by guys that are going to be in the minors anyway. So teams winning or losing late thanks to a bunch of guys you never heard of is not that important.
the mental aspect of it? That I can see right now, that getting a few wins will take some pressure off, but I still don’t think the team/players are that focused on it. Still getting their work, etc.
Last couple weeks though is when the MiL guys are back in their camp, and the “real” team is supposed to start playing every day and getting into season mode.
No team wants to stagger into the regular season playing like crap, though being healthy is still job #1. And plenty of teams have played like crap in ST (or looked like world beaters), and as soon as the season starts, they revert to form.
BREAKING NEWS: Mets ownership and trustee have agreed to settlement. LIVE coverage on SNY coming up
Thanks for the heads up, Alex.
Interesting….
NY Times reporting that Wilpons settle with trustee for $162 million and can use recoveries from Madoff funds that lost to offset.
about time. And this means that Picard knew all along he was holding a losing hand.
And saddest for Mets fans (and madoff victims) is that this deal could, and should, have been reached well over a year ago.
So it seems the Wilpons in the end are really only on the hook for 29 Mil over 3 years…
also, as it relates to guys “working on stuff” (since in theory Pelf was), i was reading my local (Philly) paper this morning. They had a piece about the phils game yesterday (where Hamels got beat up every bit as bad as Pelf did). He was going into detail about how he was working on 1 particular thing (working on the inside edge to RH hitters I think), so he get pitching in that zone trying to get a feel for it. So, guys were rocking the ball for the most part.
But, obviously, if it was the regular season, he would have been pitching in and out, etc.
Not saying that Pelf is suddenly going to switch to some effective game mode, just pointing out why even individual performances may not mean all that much.
….”as it relates to guys “working on stuff” “….
Good Point there Stick!
Pitchers do tend to start out ahead of batters but thats when they are all throwing fastballs early in the count. Because a Pitcher’s best pitch (the fastball) requires no FEEL to throw it, they can do so and if it has decent velocity it has pretty much all it needs.
It’s much harder to throw a mistake pitch when all your throwing are fastballs. Unless your throwing it right down the middle and even when you do the batter still has to catch up to it!
It’s not until they start working on their breaking balls that you see these scores get rung up. Thats because a breaking ball that doesn’t break properly is easily hit!
So I’m not really going to worry about what the pitchers give up at this point.
This is the time they focus on making pitches not making pitches to a particular batter. That doesn’t happen until the last week in ST when they are tuning up for the Reg Season.
As for pelfrey he went 0-4 in 2010 ST and wound up 15-9 during the reg season and was even considered for the All-Star game that year…
So lets just hope thats a pattern that repeats!
The answer is two-fold. ST records almost never matter b/c they are no bellwether for what a team’s season will look like. First off, so few starting players play much or care much in ST. And second, the pitching is mostly experimental, as others have said.
On the other hand, the Mets–aside from a few bright spots–don’t look like a good baseball club at all. No one is tearing it up at the plate, no really great fielding, some decent starting pitching, and overall a very queasy, sickening feeling. Let’s face it: at the moment it isn’t a team that looks or acts as if it feels good about itself, plays with confidence, etc.
I have no idea what the espirit d’corps is on the team now. But if they start losing faith in one another through April, we will have just a horrible season on our hands.
Not a single friend of mine who is a Mets fan feels excited about 2012, which is really sad and a testament to how much we have all convinced ourselves that this will be one of the fastest lost seasons in modern Mets fans memories.
WHo knows maybe we’ve seen the worst of spring’s ugliness.
It doesn’t matter how they started ST…More important how they end it!
They should not be focused on winning/losing/score until the last week of ST when everything should be coming together in preperation for the start of the season.
Couple all that with the fact Wright hasn’t played in a single ST game yet it really doesn’t suprise me they have lost so much.
It matters how they’re playing, not necessarily the result.
The problem is that they’re playing terribly.
It’s how they got the record not the record it’s self. I posted most of this yesterday…
As for the Starters…
Positive-other than Pelf, the rotation has looked pretty good. Everyone expect for RAD has something to prove this year…Santana, Niese and Gee have all given us a positive.
Negative-Pelf has completely sucked…all his off-season work has achieved nothing…he looks worse now then he did last year.
For the Pen…
Positive- Batista, Acosta and Parnell all are fighting for jobs and they all have looked good
Negative- I know that Ramirez, Rauch and Francisco all are supposed to be the “big upgrades” and they all suck…I’m not going to worry about them until the season is closer. I tend to believe that relievers can’t be effective in games that don’t matter.
Defense…
Positive-It’s hard to say, overall the guys who are going to be playing everyday have looked pretty good…it’s the AAAA players who have looked the worst.
Negative- Murph is still learning, on the limited times I’ve seen him make plays…he still covered the bag incorrectly once and his inexperience lead to the ball finding the 5 hole. he still plays the position as a corner infielder. He has looked good making the pivot and throw to 2nd and has made a good throws to 1st.
Hitting…
Positive- Not much, some guys look good, others still seem a little slow. But overall I haven’t been impressed. Bay is still not where I’d expect, but he is slowly looking better.
Negative-There has been no runs getting put up. I hope as we get closer to the start of the season, we’ll start seeing better results from the actual opening day roster.
The Big Negative is health. How can we get an idea of how the Mets are going to perform when we don’t see the Mets on the field playing together.
Really this just points out the biggest problem…there is no depth. Even losing one player will be too much for this roster to over come.
Well true the depth is shallow, it also matters in the fact that right now the depth is injured too.
This ST record does matter this year. The way you see the Mets playing now is not much different than how they’ll look during the season.
And with healthy lineup they will score more runs but still be just as bad. They are playing sloppy inconsistent baseball and that is exactly the way the team is built – no improving the starting pitching and ignoring strength up the middle specifically catcher & second base.
You ignore the foundations of success you get the results you deserve.
To answer your question Joe D no at least as far as I am concerned. If the Mets were 11-3 would it matter? No as well at least where I am concerned.You want to see good execution and that has been lacking for the most part thus far but personally I focus more on the execution and results around the last 10 days or so of camp and what will be the everday lineup barring injuries has yet to play 1 game together. Many names in the lineup are with players that will prob not even be on the team when all is said and done. Now with many recent cuts that should change but for now the current record doesn’t matter the execution is more of a concern but not as much as it would be if it is still happening say over the last 10 days of camp.
We all know that this team is going to be worst than the 1962 Mets. There is no argument that this team does not have pitching, batting and there are not rbi’s producing players. So just enjoy the ride and maybe within the next decades we might have a decent team, that we could call a winner…
No, they will not be worse than the 1962 Mets. You have no idea what kind of catastrophe that would require.
Also,yes, the team does have hitters. Seriously, look at their offense last year with no Ike and a crappy year from Wright. Yes, Beltran was the RBI leader, but he only had 67 for the Mets. They missed a solid month of Reyes and he limped along the base paths the second half. Somehow, they still put up runs. A full, healthy year from Wright, Davis, Murphy and Duda will not leave us wanting for runs.
True that our starters are pretty much 3 and 4 guys in a good rotation and we’re in a tough division, but thats life. It will be a tough season, but to be worse than 1962 would have to involve a biohazard.
FUNNY, JUST LAST SUNDAY, AS IS MY TYPICAL ST HABIT I CHOSE TO REVIEW THE STANDINGS AND FOUND, TO MY SUPRISE, THE METS WEREN’T EVEN LAST IN THEIR OWN DIVISION… AS OF 3/17/12 THE NL EAST DIVISION STANDINGS WAS:
TEAM W – L W%
MIA 7 4 .636
PHL 6 8 .429
NAT 5 7 .417
METS 3 9 .250
BRV 3 11 .214
WITH NY MET TYPE DIRE HEADLINES SURROUNDING PHL’S HOWAERD, UTLEY, HALLADAY IT APPEARS BOTH OF OUR RECENT NEMESIS MAY BE BOTH SHAKEN & STIRRED DURING THE COURSE OF THE NEXT OFFICIAL 162G GRIND.
MY 2012 RAW “GUT” STANDINGS POSITION FORCAST IS:
NATIONALS
MARLINS
PHILLIES
BRAVES
METS