The Milwaukee Brewers hung on to beat the New York Mets 7-6 tonight at Miller Park.
What a difference a night can make. The Mets were able to contain the Brewer offense last night when they mustered a 12 run outburst, tonight they seemed unable to keep pace with the Brewers offense even though Yovani Gallardo’s fastball was straight and generally sat at around 89 – 90 touching 92 on only one or two occasions. Gallardo had poor command of his breaking pitch and his fastball looked pretty straight.
Unfortunately for the Mets, Shaun Marcum was worse, he wasn’t fooling anyone tonight. The Fox announcers mentioned he was having some tingling in his fingers and was struggling to throw his changeup. Marcum gave up at least one run in every inning he pitched with the exception of one, and in the sixth with a chance to tie the game, Terry Collins elected not to hit for him. Marcum was pulled the next inning without retiring a batter.
Marcum lasted five innings and allowed six runs, five earned on 11 hits and a walk while striking out three. I think it’s time to seriously consider pulling the plug on the Shaun Marcum experiment. He’s had some encouraging outings, but he’s been largely inconsistent and awfully temperamental with his myriad maladies.
I think Marcum was envisioned as being a kind of Dickey light this season. Had he managed a decent first half up to his career norms, Marcum could have made a potentially valuable trade chip to a contender because he’s been awfully good when he’s been right. Unfortunately Marcum hasn’t been right and he’s accrued virtually zero trade value to date. There is little chance Marcum is going to turn things around at this stage in the game and sustain it long enough to become a trade chip so the Mets would be better off trying out some of the arms they’ve stockpiled in the minors.
The Mets continue to sport a different look these days in spite of the loss tonight. From the tightened up defense (Eric Young made a terrific play on an Aoki sinking liner in the 8th) to their activity on the base-paths that included a double steal in the 7th, the Mets seem livelier. David Wright had a throwing error in the 8th that was purely the result of Carlos Gomez’ speed (I think he would have been safe even if the throw was on target) and Murphy made a tough error on a bunt in the bottom of the 6th.
Marlon Byrd and John Buck both went yard with Byrd making things interesting bringing the Mets to within a run in the top of the 9th off Francisco Rodriguez. Young went 0-for-4 and his average is down to .258. Murphy led the team with three hits while driving in and scoring a run. Ike Davis drew three walks and scored a run.
Game time temperature was a beautiful 82 degrees. The game was played in 3 hours 32 minutes.
The Brewers scored 7 runs on 12 hits 0 errors and 9 left on base. The Mets scored 6 runs on 10 hits with 2 errors and 9 left on base.
Note: Before the game, the Mets activated Ruben Tejada from the DL and officially optioned him to Triple-A Las Vegas.
Jeremy Hefner (3-6, 3.54 ERA) opposes left-hander Tom Gorzelanny (1-1, 2.43) in the rubber game on Sunday at 2:10 pm.
