JAYSON WERTH WHIFFS: Sit your ass down, sucker!

You know that feeling when Scott Rice walked the first two batters in the 8th inning yesterday with the Mets clinging to a 2 run lead? Kind of a helpless sense of doom and despair where you can’t bear to watch? With a little help from Jayson Werth the result didn’t turn out like so many other late-inning debacles have, but as I exhaled and wiped the sweat from my forehead it got me thinking about the psychological effects of these recurring meltdowns.

Lets consider for a moment a couple of researchers who tortured some dogs for the sake of behavioral science. Like Pavlov only more twisted … they conditioned these animals to expect an electric shock after they heard a tone. Initially the dogs would leap and jerk and look for escape in an attempt to avoid the shock, but after a while the dogs became conditioned to the stimulus and quit trying to avoid it. Once the animals were thus acclimated, the researchers observed that even when the animals were presented with a lowered wall in their boxes they made no attempt to jump over it. Even with a clear avenue of escape, they did nothing to avoid the shock. The researchers were Martin Seligman and Steven F. Maier, who went on to develop a theory they called “Learned Helplessness.”

Now lets look at an unpleasant set of random shocks that the Mets have experienced over the past six seasons:

September 27, 2007

After a 3-0 loss to the Saint Louis Cardinals the Mets are tied with the Phillies atop their division. Between the beginning of their September 14th series against the Phillies and the start of last night’s game against Saint Louis, Mets relievers have given up 30 earned runs for a 6.54 ERA. The Mets are 4 and 10 in their last 14 games.

September 21. 2008

With 7 games to go and the Mets clinging to a shot at the post season, Aaron Heilman gives up a two-run double to Martin Prado that gave the Braves a 7-4 lead rendering Carlos Delgado‘s two-run home run in the ninth inning irrelevant. It was the 16^th blown save since the All-Star break.

August 21, 2011

After another masterful performance by R.A. Dickey, Manny Acosta walks Nyjer Morgan to start the inning. With runners on first and third and two runs in, Tim Byrdak is brought in to pitch to Prince Fielder who hits a routine double play ball to second base. Justin Turner makes a wide throw on the double play attempt as the winning run crosses the plate. The Mets fall to 6 games under .500.

July 18, 2012

With the Mets only 5 games out of the wild card, Miguel Batista in relief of Chris Young comes in and gets two quick outs. He then allows two singles to Jesus Flores and Roger Bernadina before allowing a 2-run double to Steve Lombardozzi putting the Nationals ahead 4-1. Riding a 6 game losing streak the Mets bullpen ranks last in the Majors with a 5.03 ERA.

April 18, 2013

The Mets are swept in a weather-shortened three game set in Denver as Met relievers give up 18 runs to the Rockies.

April 20, 2013

After coming back from three runs down in the 4^th inning to take a 5 – 3 lead, the Mets bullpen gives up 4 runs as the Nationals win 7 – 6 on a Saturday game following an inspiring win by Matt Harvey.  The Met bullpen has given up 28 earned runs so far this season. As of this writing the Mets have the worst bullpen ERA in baseball.

No escape … Learned Helplessness.

The “D” adjectives keep coming … disheartening, demoralizing, deflating … Met fans have been stuck in a perpetual electro-shock holding pattern for the greater part of a decade owing primarily to this organization’s persistent inability to construct even a league average bullpen. We know this, we’ve been over this ad nauseam … the above list is just a sampling, there were other grueling losses, too many to list.

In May of 1978, Diener and Dweck published a fascinating analysis of Learned Helplessness in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology in which they concluded that helpless children showed marked decrements in performance when put in situations where they failed, whereas children who were oriented to mastery focused more on self-monitoring and self-instruction. The study looked specifically at the attribution of failure in these learners. It was posited that for helpless children (their “helplessness” was based on how they perceived the tasks), failure was internalized and attributed to a lack of ability (even when that wasn’t necessarily the case), while mastery oriented children tended to engage in more positive behaviors following a failed attempt.

Learners who are conditioned to fail, show performance decrements with each failure. They give up, they stop trying, even when subsequently presented with tasks that are well within their ability, they stumble. Like the dogs in the electrified pens, they neglect to look for a solution, they acquiesce to their condition.

Baseball players are only human and they reflect the same patterns of response to failure that any of us might, but bullpen meltdowns are unlike other kinds of failures in some very important ways. They tend to be games that were “in the bag” at some point – which is to say many other aspects of the team’s play (namely starting pitching and offense) were successful for the greater part of the contest. The team played well, the team should have won, but the game unraveled somehow at the very end. These losses are gut punches to morale, exasperating in that they reinforce a sense of helplessness … no matter how well you play, no matter how many runs you drive in or how well your starting pitcher performs, you become conditioned to believing that the bullpen will find a way to give it up.

Players can only suffer through so many games of this sort before they stop investing their heart and soul into a game’s outcome – if only to preserve their sanity. You might call it developing a thick skin, letting failure bounce off of you, turning the page — there are lots of clichés to describe moving past failure — but, in the end, acclimating to failure increases the likelihood that it will recur. As shown in the study above, failure itself can be toxic — individuals conditioned to fail show decrements in performance relative to individuals oriented towards success even when their ability levels are commensurate.

This should not be confused with the notion that a good reliever has to have the temerity to ignore the occasional bad performance … that trait is advanced by the innate confidence that the reliever will return to his successful norm. The above has more to do with players who experience repeated failure, and thus begin to expect it.

Take two kids of equal ability who are learning to play shortstop. With player one you hit 20 hard smashes always just out of his reach. Then you bounce 20 routine grounders to player two. Follow that up by giving both players an identical set of grounders at a variety of difficulty levels and you will find that the player conditioned to failure is likely to make more errors than the player who handled the easy grounders. This is why coaches like to end sessions with a few successful reps.

Over the past few seasons the Mets have been conditioned to the late inning (and the late season) collapse. Beyond the hard work and talent unquestionably necessary to reverse this malaise of the spirit, this team needs individuals who refuse to turn the page, individuals who do not accept the loss. Sometimes all it takes is one guy. In 1967 it was Tom Seaver, perhaps Matt Harvey can act as this sort of catalyst in 2013. We need more Matt Harveys, we need players who refuse to acquiesce to failure.

But you absolutely have to have a bullpen that will hold it’s own and prevent these recurring gut-wrenching morale-killing failure-conditioning losses, because one thing is certain, you can only take so many late inning meltdowns before the dog decides to just stay in the box.

The post Reversing the Trend of Late Inning Mets Collapses appeared first on Metsmerized Online.

Chris Young was victimized in late innings as has been the theme, the bullpen faltered and despite a ninth inning rally including two solo home runs, the Mets lost the second game of the series, 4-3.

Game Recap

Chris Young had a pretty solid outing, going six innings allowing two runs on six hits, walking one and striking out two. Young was good for the most part, but as has been the case in his last few starts he gave up a late-inning homer that put the Nationals on the board first. The big problem with Young is not endurance, but his variety and sharpness of pitches after the sixth inning. Young does rely fairly heavily on control and drawing weak contact, so that will always doom Young third time around the order.

The bullpen had some major work today, with Miguel Batista allowing two runs on three hits with one strikeout in two-thirds of an inning. Batista wasn’t particularly ineffective, with one hit coming off a freak ricochet off of Miguel Batista’s shin. However, the most egregious sin was leaving a fastball down the middle that Steve Lombardozzi drilled for a two-RBI double. Josh Edgin came out for a third of an inning, and got Bryce Harper to fly out. Jon Rauch came out to pitch the eighth, and had his best outing in a few weeks, striking out two and allowing no hits. Rauch seemed to have some extra zip on his fastball, turning it up to 93 MPH.

The bullpen still struggles, and Jesus wept. Reinforcements cannot come soon enough.

Offensively, the Mets were kept in check by Jordan Zimmerman for the course of his start, but came alive in the late innings. A Lucas Duda RBI double set up Andres Torres for an RBI single, but in a boneheaded move tried to stretch it into a double down by two. The real comeback began in the ninth, when to leadoff the inning David Wright sent a blast to right field for a solo HR. After Davis & Duda struck out swinging, Jason Bay sent a moonshot off the LF foul pole to bring the Mets within one. Yetserday’s hero, Jordany Valdespin came to the plate to try and recreate his magic from the night before, but struck out swinging to end the game.

Outside of the baserunning error, the Mets were aggressive at the plate today, and it didn’t translate into hits.

Turning Point: Miguel Batista giving up the freak hit. If it goes up the middle, Murphy has a play on it if not Tejada to end the inning. Instead, it caroms into no-mans land and keeps the inning alive.

Game Notes: David Wright – 3 for 4 with an RBI and a run on a solo HR. Can he play any better? On a day where nine hits are totaled, Wright accounts for a third of them. Jason Bay went 2 for 4 with an RBI and a run on a solo HR.

On Deck: The Mets will look to finish the series against the Nationals with a win, sending R.A. Dickey to the mound against Gio Gonzalez. Game time is 12:35 P.M.

The post Despite Late Rally, Mets Fall Short In 4-3 Loss To Nationals appeared first on Metsmerized Online.

Chris Young had a good outing but ran out of steam in the seventh, and the bullpen faltered in the 9-2 loss against the Phillies

Game Recap

Chris Young went to the mound and has kept with the theme of quality outings, going seven innings allowing  three runs on five hits while striking out three and walking none with all of his runs allowed in the seventh inning. Chris gave up two big home runs back-to-back, and the issues as mentioned on the SNY broadcast is that Chris doesn’t seem to tire as much as his repertoire becomes predictable. The only concerns with Chris Young are durability and exactly how many innings is Chris Young good for per start.

The bullpen received some work today, with Miguel Batista coming out for the eighth inning to face one batter, and gave up a hit and a run. Tim Byrdak relieved him and gave up two runs in two-thirds of an inning on one hit while walking one. Jeremy Hefner came out to do the heavy lifting, giving up three runs on five hits in one and one-third innings including a home run.

The pen has been horrible. Outside of Francisco or Parnell, the Mets do not have another pitcher they can rely on in a situation of any leverage to get a key out, less in fact a strikeout.

On offense, the Mets hitters were fooled by Phillies starter Cliff Lee for most of the game, minus a Scott Hairston solo home run and a sixth inning that saw a series of singles capped off with a David Wright RBI single. After that, the offense was victimized by Cliff Lee and called third strikes on the day.

Game Notes

Mets one through six hitters each had one hit, with Andres Torres and Mike Nickeas both struggling. Torres struggles have been noted, but with the recent development of Kirk Nieuwenhuis and his hand possibly sending him to the DL, he looks to be the starting center fielder for the foreseeable future.

Ruben Tejada went 2 for 4, continuing his hot hitting since his return from the DL. Ruben’s average on the season is now at .331.

Miguel Batista ended June with a 4.22 ERA and a 1.31 WHIP. Beato-watch 2012 looks like: after the ASB.

Jordanny Valdespin was called up and took the place of LHP Justin Hampson. Whether this is a precursor to a possible DL stint for Kirk or just to avoid playing with a short bench will be decided.

Turning Point

When the bullpen surrendered six more runs. In only two innings of work.

On Deck

The Mets will look to win the series tomorrow, sending all-star pitcher R.A. Dickey (12-1, 2.15) to the mound to face-off against the Phillies and Cole Hamels (10-4, 3.08). Game time is 7:10 P.M.

The post Bullpen’s A Dud, Mets Lose 9-2 To Phillies appeared first on Metsmerized Online.

How many times have we seen this already this season… I’m talking about Terry Collins lamenting about what he could have done to prevent another bone-jarring moment in a Mets loss.

He has compiled enough material to complete his own personal volume of a Book of Lamentations.

Last night, was another typical Mets loss you can hang on the skipper of the Mets. Mike Vaccaro of the NY Post explains:

After his team had grinded and bloodied its way back from deficits of 4-0 and 5-1 all the way back to 5-5, Collins tried to squeeze an extra inning out of Miguel Batista. Robinson Cano was leading off the eighth. Two nights earlier, Cano had dented the Whitestone Bridge with a rocket blast off Batista. One night earlier, asked why he hadn’t used Byrdak to pitch to Raul Ibanez (who would tie the game with his own blast), he essentially said Byrdak’s job against the Yankees was to pitch to Cano.

Here came Cano. Tie game. Buzzing ballpark.

No Byrdak. All around Citi Field, the buzz was replaced by something else: by the sound of Mets fans among the sold-out crowd of 42,364 engaging in a community-wide first-guess, nobody waiting for hindsight to provide 20-20 clarity.

Seconds later, Cano struck again and as his blast soared into the night we felt the ice coarsing though our veins as we saw the inevitable worst-case scenario unfold before our unsurprised eyes.

“I should have brought Byrdak in,” Collins said after the game.

Too late for that, Terry.

The Mets lost 6-5 and their hard-fought five-run comeback went to waste.

“Should have brought him in,” he said a second time.

Yes, you should have.

You said that’s what Byrdak’s job would be during the Subway Series – to pitch to Cano. It was a good plan, but you blew it and it cost us the game. What were you saving him for? Another one of those moments that would never come?

Collins has done a fine job instilling confidence in this team and having them all believing in themselves. But when it comes to in-game strategy, Collins is his own worst enemy and he’s the first to admit it.

The problem is that he doesn’t seem to learn anything when he gets burned like this and he continues to make the same bad judgement calls again and again. I don’t mind having a manager who doesn’t do everything by the book and goes with his hunch occasionally, but you can’t keep betting against the odds and losing your pants like he has.

And what’s with his love affair with Miguel Batista?

The post Regrets… I Have A Few… appeared first on Metsmerized Online.

Game Recap

Jeremy Hefner coming off of his last outing couldn’t duplicate the same level of success today against Washington. Hefner went six innings, allowing four runs (three earned) on seven hits, walking one and striking out three. The aforementioned home run came off of the bat of Adam Laroche, and one of the runners on base was thanks to a Daniel Murphy error. While not a poor outing from Hefner, it just wasn’t as stellar as his last outing.

The bullpen was forced into some work today, and received two-thirds of an inning from Tim Byrdak, allowing a run on one hit, while walking one. Miguel Batista came out for the last inning and one-third, and allowed one hit and one strikeout while walking two. With the much welcomed news that Pedro Beato was called up, hopefully the Mets pen will not have as much heavy-lifting tomorrow as they did today.

Offensively, the Mets managed three runs on three hits the entire game, drawing five walks. Ike Davis was the only Mets player with an extra base hit. When a team manages three hits, but does score three runs it is a curious situation. Runs scored on a Kirk Nieuwenhuis RBI single in the third, an RBI groundout by Lucas Duda in the fourth and a Omar Quintinilla RBI groundout in the seventh.

Game Notes

Daniel Murphy continued his struggles both offensively and defensively, going 0 for 4 today with a strikeout, and making two more fielding errors. As the SNY broadcast mentioned, he seems to be losing focus during the transfer, and that is if he gets passed the actual catch

Josh Satin was designated for assignment to make room for Pedro Beato, while Chris Young was placed on paternity leave to allow Jason Bay to be on the roster. Once Young returns, it seems likely either Vinny Rottino or Jordany Valdespin would be heading down.

Ike Davis went 1 for 2 with two walks, a double and a run scored. By Ike’s recent standards, this is a good game.

Tim Byrdak is at 33 Games played this season – we have yet to reach the All-Star Break

No Player Of The Game today, with the second straight ugly day of baseball who honestly performed to deserve it?

On Deck

The Mets will look to salvage a game from this series, sending RHP R.A. Dickey (8-1, 2.69)to the mound to face off against the Nats and RHP Chien-Ming Wang (1-1, 6.43) at 1:05 P.M.

The post Mets Fall To Nats 5-3 For Third Straight Loss appeared first on Metsmerized Online.

Through the use of the scorecard, let’s take a look at how David Wright did this week:

Wright continues to impress everyone this year, and his batting average for the entire year sits at .412. His strikeout count has decreased quite a bit this year, he is not chasing many pitches out of the zone and thus is also getting more walks this year.

Honorable Mentions

These players, although not winning the Player of the Week award, had a very strong showing this week and deserve to be recognized. We will also show how strong a showing they had through the use of the scorecard.

Mike Baxter

Lucas Duda

Miguel Batista (Now on DL)

Tim Byrdak

Rob Johnson (Catcher in Relief)

Not So Hot

The Not So Hot area mentions a few players who did not have a good week this week.

Manny Acosta

Jon Niese

Jon Rauch

Dillon Gee

Mike Nickeas

Andres Torres

Ike Davis

Kirk Nieuwenhuis

Player Of The Week Scoreboard

This area shows the scoreboard of the Players of the Week, and who has won already this season and how many times.

1. David Wright – 3

T2. Kirk Nieuwenhuis – 1

T2. Johan Santana – 1

T2. Andres Torres – 1

Trivia

To finish off the Player of the Week announcement each week, I’ll be asking you a trivia question. The answer will be announced during the next Player of the Week announcement, as well as the first person who answered correctly. Another question will then be asked. Last Week’s Answer is: 16 wins for Tom Seaver in 1967. Adam was the first person to correctly answer the question. So here is this week’s question:

When did David Wright make his Major League debut and against what team?

The post MMO Player Of The Week: David Wright appeared first on Metsmerized Online.

Through the use of the scorecard, let’s take a look at how David Wright did this month:

David Wright only missed three games this month, all due to a fractured finger, and during those three games, the Mets went 1-2. He had 3 home runs. This year, he has looked stellar.

Honorable Mentions

These players, although not winning the Player of the Month award, had a very strong showing this month and deserve to be recognized. We will also show how strong a showing they had through the use of the scorecard.

Kirk Nieuwenhuis

Josh Thole

Ruben Tejada

Daniel Murphy

Johan Santana

Jon Rauch

Jon Niese

Not So Hot

The Not So Hot area mentions a few players who did not have a good month.

Ike Davis

Frank Francisco

Manny Acosta

Miguel Batista

Player Of The Month Leader List

This area shows the winner for each month of this season.

April: David Wright

The post MMO Player Of The Month: David Wright appeared first on Metsmerized Online.

Through the use of the scorecard, let’s take a look at how Johan Santana did this week:

Despite not having any wins this week between his two starts, the Mets won both games. Santana had an absolutely stellar start Tuesday against the Marlins, holding them to 1 run through 6.2 innings, striking out 11. Yesterday, the Mets finally scored with him on the mound, spotting him a 4-0 lead, which he left with, but the bullpen blew the lead and he wound up with two non-decisions this week.

Honorable Mentions

These players, although not winning the Player of the Week award, had a very strong showing this week and deserve to be recognized. We will also show how strong a showing they had through the use of the scorecard.

David Wright

Lucas Duda

Ruben Tejada

Not So Hot

The Not So Hot area mentions a few players who did not have a good week this week.

Ike Davis

Frank Francisco

Manny Acosta

Miguel Batista

Player Of The Week Scoreboard

This area shows the scoreboard of the Players of the Week, and who has won already this season and how many times.

T1. David Wright – 1

T1. Kirk Nieuwenhuis – 1

T1. Johan Santana – 1

Trivia

To finish off the Player of the Week announcement each week, I’ll be asking you a trivia question. The answer will be announced during the next Player of the Week announcement, as well as the first person who answered correctly. Another question will then be asked. Last Week’s Answer is: Pittsburgh Pirates. Alex68 was the first person to correctly answer the question. So here is this week’s question:

What Met was traded for himself?

The post MMO Player Of The Week: Johan Santana appeared first on Metsmerized Online.

Through the use of the scorecard, let’s take a look at how David Wright did this week:

Despite missing three games due to a pinkie injury, Wright still had two home runs, five runs batted in, and a .571 batting average. During those three games he missed, his impact was noticed, as the Mets went 1-2 without him, while going 5-1 with him. This is the David Wright that we all want playing out there, week in and week out.

Honorable Mentions

These players, although not winning the Player of the Week award, had a very strong showing this week and deserve to be recognized. We will also show how strong a showing they had through the use of the scorecard.

Ruben Tejada

Daniel Murphy

Johan Santana

Jon Niese

Jon Rauch

Frank Francisco

Not So Hot

The Not So Hot area mentions a few players who did not have a good week this week.

Ike Davis

Jason Bay

Miguel Batista

Ramon Ramirez

Player Of The Week Scoreboard

This area shows the scoreboard of the Players of the Week, and who has won already this season and how many times.

1. David Wright – 1

Trivia

To finish off the Player of the Week announcement each week, I’ll be asking you a trivia question. The answer will be announced during the next Player of the Week announcement, as well as the first person who answered correctly. Another question will then be asked. So here is this week’s question:

In the 2000 NLDS, most Met fans remember that Bobby Jones won the clinching Game 4 with a one-hitter, and many fans remember that John Franco saved Game 2 for winning pitcher Armando Benitez to even the series when he struck out Barry Bonds. But what pitcher won game 3 of that NLDS for the Mets?

The post MMO Player Of The Week: David Wright appeared first on Metsmerized Online.

Additionally, Andres Torres (calf) and Frank Francisco (knee) will avoid the DL and be ready for Opening Day on Thursday when the Mets take on the Braves at Citi Field.

Opening Day Lineup

1. Andres Torres, CF
2. Daniel Murphy, 2B
3. David Wright, 3B
4. Ike Davis, 1B
5. Jason Bay, LF
6. Lucas Duda, RF
7. Josh Thole, C
8. Ruben Tejada, SS

Bench/Reserves

1. Scott Hairston, OF
2. Mike Baxter, OF
3. Justin Turner, IF
4. Ronny Cedeno, IF
5. Mike Nickeas, C

Starting Rotation

1. Johan Santana, LHP
2. R.A. Dickey, RHP
3. Jonathon Niese, LHP
4. Mike Pelfrey, RHP
5. Dillon Gee, LHP

Bullpen

1. Frank Francisco, CL
2. Jon Rauch, SU
3. Ramon Ramirez, SU
4. Tim Byrdak, LS
5. Bobby Parnell, MR
6. Manny Acosta, MR
7. Miguel Batista, LR

This is it…

LETS GO METS!

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