Mon 31 Mar 2008
Santana done for the day with a tidy 7 innings 100 pitch effort. Santana made just one mistake a HR to Josh Willingham but with a 6 run lead Santana did what your supposed to do throw strikes.
With a 4 run lead Willie goes to Matt Wise Interesting I figure no Heilman with a 4 run lead but I guess it’s a noce welocme to the team for Wise
I’m off to Little League to get my roster and equipment like I said today is like a baseball holiday All baseball all the time.
March 31st, 2008 at 7:05 pm
I know that pitching philosophy has changed over the years across MLB but using 4 pitchers to wrap up 2 innings in a game w/ 4 and 5 run leads? Granted Wise looked like Doug Sisk out there. They had a 4 run buffer though. Why not let Sosa finish the game? This is what got the Mets in trouble last year. They burned out the pen. Definitely too early to let Johan go the distance. But if this was May I’d let Johan take you thru the eight at least. Something tells me Professor Rick won’t let that happen.
April 1st, 2008 at 9:48 am
My observations from the game: will be long winded i’m sure
1. I was extremely impressed with Santana and his stuff. He started the game throwing 94 and ended throwing 89. I noticed he was shaking off Shnieder almost everytime they had the camera on him and also, Schneider was calling for locations and Santan rarely hit one. Schneider would set up for an inside pitch and the pitch would go outside and vice versa. My take on this as a once semi pro pitcher is that Santana knows at this point that his stuff is so good, he doesn’t need to hit locations yet. Maybe in a few years when his fastball tops out at 89 he will but not now. Like any power pitcher, he throws his “stuff” and says “hit it if you can”.
2. Reyes was safe at second base on his steal attempt by almost an arms length.
3. Wright was also safe at third base as he hooked his arm around the bag and didn’t get tagged until is hand was there
4. And for the worst umpire call of the game: Hanley Ramirez should have been struck out to end the inning but somehow a pitch right down the middle was called a ball and 1 pitch later Ramirez is walked. That should have ended the inning but then Willingham came up and hit the homer. IMHO, Santana gave up NO runs. The umpire gave up 2 runs there.
5. Watching that game made me realize how bad the Marlins are this year. Wow! Also though, you could feel the cool confidence the Mets had. It was all business and I think this entire year will be the same - all business. This team is on a mission and it’s going to take some significant injuries or down years to hurt that.
6. Finally, Delgado looked clueless at the plate. Eaten up by inside fastballs once again which has his mind so messed up that when they throw him junk down and away, he flails at it. Something is seriously wrong with him and I don’t know if it’s mental at this point or physical. I hope mental and he can get some help.
Was an enjoyable game to watch and can’t wait to watch Pedro tonight