7
2012
Gee Pitches Gem, Long Ball Carries Mets To 3-1 Win Against Cubs
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Dillon Gee had an excellent outing today, and Ike Davis and Jordany Valdespin continued on their hot streaks as the Mets won 3-1 against the Cubs.
Game Recap
Dillon Gee had his longest and most effective outing of the season, going eight innings allowing one run on seven hits while striking out four. Gee had control of all of his pitches, and relied on the aggressive Cubs approach to walk zero batters as well as take swings at the pitches that would generate weak outs. Gee appears to be turning a corner in his development as a pitcher, and despite him not having the stuff to be a number one starter, he has the chance to be one of the best fourth or fifth starters in the NL. Bobby Parnell came out to close the ninth and notched his second save in lieu of Frank Francisco, allowing a hit and striking out a batter. Parnell is key to this bullpen in whichever role he assumes, since he is one of the only pitchers in the Mets bullpen who can get strikeouts.
Offensively, the Mets didn’t go crazy today but continued their home run resurgence as of lately, with Jordany Valdespin hitting his second home run in as many days and Ike Davis continued his torrid hitting as of late with a big two-run homer. The Mets had nine hits overall, and David Wright stole his ninth base on the season.
Player Of The Game: Dillon Gee. Great outing, great composure and continuing the spectacular run of quality Mets starting pitching.
Mets Notes:
Ike Davis started turning his season around in June, and is keeping the pace. His batting average is .205, and while that is still bad, he hit .264 in June and the season isn’t lost. His defense merits him playing every day.
Bobby Parnell hasn’t been scored on since June 10th, a span of eight and one-third innings, striking out seven and walking none.
Jordany Valdespin may not have great plate discipline, but when he connects he can be a home run threat. ‘Spin has speed as well, and being able to play virtually every position on the field sans catcher and first makes him a weapon off the bench.
On Deck: The Mets will look to win the series against the cubs sending LHP Jonathon Niese to the mound against the Cubs and Chris Volstad. Game time is 1:10 P.M.
About the Author: Sean Kenny
Sean Kenny is a student/writer currently attending school at the City College of New York. For more Mets news, notes and thoughts follow him on twitter @TheSeanKenny
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Ike Davis and Ruben Tejada.
Ike can still hit 30 HRs and again not a single word about Dan Warthen.
In the case of Parnell you might just be correct in giving Warthen some credit…
Still feel he has little to do with the starters and I wish he could get through to the other relievers as a pitching coach should.
While I have doubts about his influence with the others I will admit he probably does deserve some credit for Parnell.
Solid pitching effort from Gee. He did exactly what he should against a struggling offense like the Cubs. It makes you shake your head to think how these Cubs lit up Santana yesterday.
Spin making a case to keep him on the team and Nieuwenhuis better be careful cause when it comes to options he may find himself back in AAA if he doesn’t.
Look at Spin & Kirk’s last 46 and 45 at bats respectively including today’s game.
Valdespin last 46 at bats
6/3/2012 thru 7/7/2012
19/G, 8/GS, 46/AB, 15/H, 13/R, 5/2B, 1/3B, 3/HR, 11/RBI, 1/BB, 8/SO, .326/BA
Nieuwenhuis last 45 at bats
6/16/2012 thru 7/7/2012
15/G, 11/GS, 45/AB, 6/H, 1/R, 1/2B, 0/3B, 1/HR, 1/RBI, 3/BB, 23/SO, .133/BA
What are the chances J-Bay & Francisco are called up and to make room the Mets remove Nieuwenhuis & Quintanilla? Don’t know but Torres also has not helped himself of late at the plate.
Torres last 46 at bats
6/17/2012 thru 7/4/2012
16/G, 12/GS, 46/AB, 7/H, 7/R, 1/2B, 0/3B, 0/HR, 3/RBI, 7/BB,12/SO, .152/BA
Offense from CF has been lacking to say the least.
What can be said that hasn’t been said about Mr. Tejada? Great catch in the 9th and another 2 hit game.
Ike with another HR as well. Good signs as the Mets head into the 2nd half.
Now with Niese on the hill 2morrow and reports that Dickey is available out of the pen the Mets try to go to the break 8 games above .500.
LGM!
Just a great team effort by all.
Let’s take the series tomorrow.
“Jordany Valdespin may not have great plate discipline, but when he connects he can be a home run threat. ‘Spin has speed as well, and being able to play virtually every position on the field sans catcher and first makes him a weapon off the bench.”
How about we just keep him in the starting lineup? When Davis, Tejada, Kirk, Wright and him are in the lineup, they look so much better. He may not have great discipline now, but give the kid time.
If you are going to commit to a young guy like this, you have to be willing to sign on for the roller coaster ride. Certainly going to be some highlights, mixed in with some really ugly moments!
I fully understand that, but I firmly believe that he deserves a spot here instead of being jerked around between Flushing and Buffalo. In my mind, he’s going to be a big piece of our core for years to come.
Here is the problem I have will Valdespin…
Yes he has had some very big hits and quite a few HRs of note…
But looking at his swing and approach I see the possibility that he has done well more because the pitchers haven’t seen enough of him to find his hole yet and once given regular playing time they will and he could be an easy K!
He has baounced up and down so much that no one has had a real chance to figure out how to work him yet and once they do everything he has done could go away just as quickly as it came!
Kirk was really hot when he first came up too and look at him now!
They just neecded to figure out where the hole in his swing was and since they have the K’s have increased a lot!
I fear the same could happen to the Valdespin who has a less diciplined swing than Kirk does!
if you look around at the sorry state of pitching in the league, Gee probably already is one of the best 4th, and certainly 5th, SPs.
Gee is one of those guys that as long as you provide him good defense to play behind him and decent run support (3-5 Runs) he will win a lot of games!
I still see a lot of Rick Reed in him.
Best line of the night? When asked if he thought Tejada was going to make that catch Terry Collins gave the reporter an emphatic “NO!”.
Kirk is in a slump right now but we can’t take away a rookie’s job based on his first prolonged trouble.
They have figured Kirk out and he has to make the adjustment. Everyone should have expected they would solve his swing at some point and he would have to make the adjustment.
All Rookies have an extended slump sometime during thier rookie year.
How quickly they get out of it is usually the determining factor in their ROY status!
He, Cap Kirk, has look un-disciplined lately at plate swinging especially at the tailing away high fastball and yet if he is to be part of future then Mets have to decide to either wk with him, hey batting coach, and help him with this issue and let him stay on squad or send him down to have Wally or whomever the roving batting coach is to get him to have a little bit more plate discipline because he has shown power to all fields, shown that he can play CF, RF, etc and had good arm to go along with great, not fast, speed so that decision has to be made cause Torres is bad form left side or they could bring up Van Dekker to play CF and show if he has solved his strikeout problem because he has the plus speed to play CF and put Cap Kirk in RF and Duda in LF where he belongs when Bay leaves.
The only issue with my rambling above is the lack of RH power in system to protect LH heavy lineup that will be exposed as season gets into Sep and if, IF, they get to one game playoff at end of season and have LH pitch against them.
Hopefully TC decision to play Duda, Ike, Cap Kirk and Josh against lesser lefties will help their growth but only Duda seems to be a bit better against lefties but it will be solved over the last few months.
Parnell’s progression, as he goes, will be a big part of Mets chances come Sep and important match ups come up cause FF has shown that at times he can be wild.
Bringing up Edgin soon to see if he is the power LH to complement Byrdak in BP that Mets will need late into season cause having only one reliable LH has hurt Mets lately.
My hope is that once AS break is over and Bay does his rehab and plays some games that he can return to the power bat he was, especially against LH pitchers which he has a history of hitting well and the RH pitchers, well with all the LH bats we have it won’t be so bad.
The return of FF and hopefully some good work by Edgin will alleviate having to trade good pieces for another BP arm plus the return of Beato to his better form will greatly help team.
Amazing Mets show world they are for real and are in it for the long haul.
I don’t believe the coming months, important games, pundits and fans will hurt the resolve this team has and will have till season’s end with the gentile handling of TC and Warthen, whom I did not like but he has proved me and others wrong.
Lastly congrats to Omar and all the jewels he left this organization when he left . Too bad he couldn’t stay to help especially with Latin America.
Terry Collins gave thanks to the previous administration for the minor league system right there on TV on SNY during the post game.
I was surprised when he said it. He gave thanks to Alderson but it was more in a setup tone for what he really had to say and that was thanking the “previous guys” for the minor league system.
Surprised nobody has mentioned that by now..but i can understand why – from a certain group.
Did you also hear Keith Hernandez comments about Alderson and what they should do at the trading deadline? The comments about “He knows what he’s doing, probably wont and shouldn’t make any big splash at this time, that fans need to be patient, and that he’s a smart guy”
I too am surprised nobody has mentioned that by now..but i can understand why – from a certain group.
I heard Keith’s comments as well. Immediately thought about some posters here who have been critical that no moves have been made yet this month.
Also heard TC’s comments post game. What I heard was equal praise for both the current FO and past FO for putting together the all homegrown team on the field yesterday and the success this team as currently constructed, is having this season so far.
Dan Warthen is the best, he pitched so well yesterday.
Happy?