Comments on: Offense, Not Bullpen, To Blame For Mets Second Half Swoon

By: Marco

Marco — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 15:57:54 +0000

Good analysis. But are we also witnessing the beginning of a Citifield curse? The mets have not won a home game since July 7.

By: Alex68

Alex68 — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 14:22:11 +0000

The question is, with the marlins 2 games out and the phillies 3 games out will the mets hold that lead in the end of the season???

By: Metstheory22

Metstheory22 — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 14:05:08 +0000

As bad as we have been, there are still two teams below us. Happy to say, Marlins and Phillies.

By: K Maxx

K Maxx — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 13:41:31 +0000

Wrong. It’s not the offense or bullpen, it’s the architects who did a lousy job putting this team together. This front office is going through the terrible twos.

By: Metfan Lou

Metfan Lou — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 13:38:12 +0000

Oh how those dreaded Yankee fans must be mocking us now. I just hope they have health insurance because sometimes when you laugh too hard you can injure yourself and get the hiccups too.

By: Javi

Javi — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 13:38:08 +0000

This whole team has been a train wreck since the All Star break. They’ve always found new and exciting ways to lose games. For most of the year, it was the bullpen blowing games left and right. As a team, the Mets have 17 blown saves. Parnell, Francisco, and Rauch are the 3 biggest culprits with 5, 3, and 3 BLSV respectively. Had we actually won all those that our atrocious relief corps have blown for us, we’d be looking at a 70 win team right now.

That doesn’t take starting pitching off the hook either. Collectively, the Mets are 12th in the NL with a 4.24 team ERA. When your pitching gives up more than runs per game, it’s hard for he offense to overcome, despite being 5th in the league in BA and OBP. The telling stat is that despite the fact that this team leads the league in doubles, it’s 10th in the NL in slugging, which confirms what we can see for ourselves that there is a serious power outage in Flushing.

While the offense has to take it’s fair share of the blame for the team’s struggles, the pen has flushed our season down the toilet.

By: Des

Des — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 13:24:23 +0000

Amazin — I was just expressing another point of view and having a bit of fun. Yup our times are desperate. Last night was the worst. We lost in a football game score. So to one and all, let’s pull together and help our team get out of this mess. It’s all we can do.

By: Des

Des — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 13:18:27 +0000

Alex68 — I agree with most of what you’re stating, not all of it.

Murphy has twice the doubles of Tejada and his defense has improved a lot. So why would Sandy and Terry, who wanted Murphy to play originally for his offense, now be playing Tejada and sitting Murphy?

This season Murphy has .303/.347/.431 with 33 2B, 3 triples, 4 HR, and 7SB and 2CS
This season Tejada has .321/.369/.391, with 16 2B, no triples, 1 HR and 1SB and 2CS

In the area of bat discipline, Murphy has a K/BB ration of 1.93, while Ruben has a poorer 2.58.

On defense, Murphy has committed 11 errors in 425 chances for a .972 Fld%
On defense, Tejada has committed 9 errors in 271 chances for a .967 Fld%
Both Murphy and Tejada have below league average Range Factors with Murphy the poorer.
(Last night Tejada had another throwing error.)

I’ve been pleasantly surprised by Ruben’s 2012 play, but I’ve also been pleased with Murphy’s.

By: Metsie

Metsie — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 13:00:20 +0000

You forget who picks the guys he sendsbetween those lines!

If a General sends the Staff from the Mess Hall in to do a job that requires battle hardened Marines, you don’t blame the Mess Hall staff for the failure you blame the General!

By: Amazin

Amazin — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 12:55:30 +0000

Of course Des, don’t blame the front office. Afterall what is its job?? In most organizations the job is to improve the talent on the field. See Des and all the Alderson lovers, that’s why just about every team with a chance to go to the playoffs makes moves to try to get over the hump. but not, etc our brilliant front office. We had a team playing exceptional ball despite having several problems. So our front office does what nobody else ever thought of. They sat on their butts and waited for the team to have a slump so they could have an excuse to continue their failed ways, their inability to judge talent, etc. They they further proved their incompetence by not dumping the has beens playing over their heads to build for tomorrow. They did nothing. Yes Des that’s why my statement was correct, unless of course you are going to tell us that we had a perfect team on the field that needed no improvements so the fault lies entirely with the players. You’re not going to do that are you? We’d expect that from a dolt like donal or jessup but you know the game.

By: Metstheory22

Metstheory22 — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 12:49:21 +0000

It’s amazing that Keith Hernandez can tell what D. Wright is doing wrong and how he changed his swing and no one on the team sees it.
Otherwise when something works (bullpen) the Starters don’t or offense goes south.

By: Alex68

Alex68 — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 12:35:55 +0000

Yeap… just like last year and the year before last..

By: srt

srt — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 12:29:50 +0000

Judging by the looks of that sparse crowd last night, it’s going to be a ghost town at Citi very shortly.

By: Alex68

Alex68 — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 12:17:17 +0000

Mex, Phillies are in last place, MArlins in 4th.. SOon to overtake the mets. Point is, with reyes at the leadoff spot playing SS, with Tejada at 2B our defense and 1-2 spot in the lineup would’ve been much better, instead we have to watch guys like torres and even valdespin just destroy that spot there… Wright would’ve probably had 120 RBI by know.. this team is dead last in SB and we have ZERO speed in the lineup…

By: Mex_17

Mex_17 — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 12:09:38 +0000

I don’t get the logic. We should have given Reyes a huge contract? How are the Marlins doing with him? Last place.

By: Alex68

Alex68 — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 12:07:37 +0000

Well, don’t go to the games… Plain and simple.

By: Alex68

Alex68 — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 12:06:14 +0000

Bro, i get what you are saying, but we have play teams with good SP also. so it’s not like we could’ve gone 10 runs on each game you know.. Again, 4 BS in the first 10 games… We went 1-9.. Who knows what the outcome would’ve been had we won those 4 games. i am not saying the offense is not the culprit, i am saying that the bullpen has been all year, and to KNOW blame the offense and look the other way for the bullpen’s meltdowns is not right.

By: srt

srt — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 12:04:57 +0000

‘This ownership does not care about winning; only about paying back their debts.’

Couldn’t agree more.
But you know, they could pay back those bets in one fell swoop if they’d just sell the team already…..

As long as the Mets are broke and the Wilpons insist on hanging onto the team, I don’t believe much will change.

By: Mex_17

Mex_17 — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 12:02:53 +0000

I totally disagree. The Mets were competitive in June, and then there was a ridiculous streak of games where the bullpen blew them all. After the relief pitching lost game after game after game, we suddenly dropped out of the race, and everyone knew it was over.

At that point, the Mets hitting dried up as well. Now that we’re completely out of it, the bullpen is pitching halfway decent, and our offense still stinks.

The bullpen pitching “ok” in August, when we are 12 games out, is like Reyes hitting a HR when the game is 13-0. It’s meaningless. Too little, too late.

The story of 2012 is that the bullpen ruined a promising season. Would the offense had been this bad if we had a good bullpen earlier in the year? Maybe. But we’ll never know the answer to that, because our relief pitching ensured that we dropped out of the playoff race in July.

By: Des

Des — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 11:55:13 +0000

Alex68 — By the way, you think it’s the bullpen, not the offense? Not both? You make excuses for four blown saves since most were in the first two weeks after the All Star break. Last time I looked, all the games count.