It really doesn't matter if the names are McLouth, Nady, and Doumit ... or if the names are Crosby, Malkin, and Hossa, the sad truth is this: the city of Pittsburgh kinda owns us right now.Doesn't matter if it's Marc Andre Fleury holding off the kitchen sink, or if it's Tom Gorzellany blanking the Mets through his five innings of work. Because here's how you know it's not your day: When Gorzellany has some serious back spasms after 4 and 2/3's and he decides to gut it out and throw some cookies to David Wright to get that final out ... and Wright still can't buy a hit? The lords of baseball are against you. Go home and get some sleep.
The scary part was that Gorzellany, with back spasms, hit the plate today with better accuracy than Oliver Perez, who issued as many walks as he retired batters (that would be five) during the 13-1 drubbing. Perez got no help in that seven run second, as Luis Castillo's mitt doing an impression of a skillet on a double play ball made five of those runs unearned. But on the bright side, it was Cyberchase Day, so the stadium was full of kids who haven't been taught the concept of "boo" yet.
(Speaking of boo, whether you believe that booing is cathartic and necessary to get a message across, or whether you believe that only positive reinforcement will help a player get out of a slump, I don't think anyone will disagree that when nobody covers second base on a rundown ... as happened in that second inning, that's fair game. Boo!)
Having squandered a small chance to build on taking two out of three from Atlanta by splitting the rain-shortened series with Pittsburgh, the Mets now go to Arizona ... a place they've dominated in the past. Hey, they've even beaten Brandon Webb a couple of times. But mostly, they've beaten the likes of Russ Ortiz and Miguel Batista. This weekend, it's Micah Owings, Webb, and Dan Haren. Add those three to the memory of Eric Byrnes' mustache, and you've got trouble on so many levels.
1 comment:
That inning seemed to be all Castillo's. That rundown goof was all his. I've watched the Mets work on rundowns and used what they do for my teams and pretty much every team does the same thing. Castillo knew where Reyes was, along the leftfield line for the cutoff to third, and should have known he wasn't going to have anybody there to cover second. Here's what should have happened. Castillo should have been walking him back to first, this way if the runner tries to go home, he just has to turn and fire as oppose to stopping his running momentum to be able to turn and throw home. He should have kept walking him back till Delgado was close enough to yell "Now", where he would be able to catch the ball and tag the runner pretty much in one motion. The one throw rundown. But, Castillo decided to just throw the ball toward Delgado and get out of the way, even though Delgado was 20'away from the runner. There was nobody to cover the bag. The pitcher was backing up third, Reyes was out in the outfield down the line for a cutoff, and the centerfielder isnt suppose to be in the infield to cover any base, and even if he were to attempt it, Castillo went so fast he didnt have time to get there.
All those walks just put the fielders to sleep and then it became contagious to everyone else. Even Fig was guilty. He gave up that hit for two runs and when the throw came home from Church, Fig cut it off near the mound. He was suppose to be behind the plate backing up the catcher. It was an all-around miserable day.
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