Why go all the way to Afghanistan to kill when there are still so many good targets in Atlanta?
Early Lead Disappears: Whilst normally one of the predominant qualities of a typical Met loss, establishing an early lead and watching it frittered away, last night it was the Atlanta Braves who established a 3-0 lead after five innings only to watch it evaporate mysteriously.
Late Inning Scoring: One of the more serious offences the Mets have committed throughout the April schedule was an abject failure to score in the late innings, the general rule being if you were ahead of the Mets by even a tiny little run after 6 innings you could be pretty much guaranteed their Choking Dog Lineup would fail to generate any offence. Oh, they'd get men on base, usually by virtue of opponent error or opposing pitcher walks or hit batsmen but as far as generating late inning hits with runners in scoring position, forget it. The Mets don't do late inning rallies. Until last night. Four runs in the 6th, another pair in the 7th. Baddabing, baddabang. That notorious Met bullpen can HOLD a lead most of the time, they just can't create one, see?
Dire, Humiliating Performances Against the Braves: In this case, the pattern has not been set in the first month of this season rather by a clear case history, lasting at least a generation, of failing, choking, losing to the Braves when it mattered. Especially in Atlanta. The Mets winning in Atlanta is so rare it is not even listed on the 2009 Calendar of Celestial Events. If you expect it to happen again tonight, get back on the meds, kiddies!
Nah, not REALLY the first clutch hit he's had since Team America, is it?
David Wright Up With Men On Base Doesn't Choke When It Matters: This of course is the most astonishing of all the events leading to the this sighting of the AntiMets. It happened in the 6th inning with the Mets down 3-2. Man on base, the perfect opportunity for David to strike out swinging feebly or to ground into a weak double play. Instead? Whammo, home run and a 4-3 lead the Mets would never relinquish. Let's hope this rare event is what was needed to shake Mr Wright out of his batting stupor.
There were many other occurrences last night that nearly defied belief but for now, let's allow these to suffice. Let's stick a nice dollop of humble pie on the barbie and relish how very wrong we were, for one night anyway, to ever disbelieve in the possibility, like The Great Pumpkin, that the AntiMets can not only resurface but prevail against their evil counterpart, the Mets.
*****
Also for your reading pleasure, I do appear in Creating Olliestein thanks to Flushing University.
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7 comments:
Go AntiMets, or is that don't go Anti-Mets? I'm confused.
I was encouraged by wright. no pulloffs. he battled to keep his front foot in and it paid off. hopefuly he continues. producing numbers, however, does not guarantee clutch hitting. we shall see about that. six walks from maine. ugh. he would not survive six walks against the phillies. i do not call it progress although his fastball looked good. i am not thrilled with Putz's stuff. That 93 mph produces no Ks. He is still better than what we had. I like parnell. he challenges guys and pitches like a man.
I am increasingly of the opinion that pitchers who lose their focus all the time have ADD or ADHD. No one can explain Ollie's or Maine's mound blowups logically. I have attributed it to stupidity in the past (on Ollie's part, anyway. Maine is an engineer), but maybe it is more subtle than that. It might just be that they are suffering from an attention deficit disorder. These are not limited to young people. Many adults suffer their whole lives with the syndrome. Ollie falls apart when the defense fails, when a bird flies over his head, when the hole in front of the rubber is not deep enough. Maybe he has a chemical imbalance that needs attention. Maine demonstrates the same kind of focus loss, although on a slightly smaller scale. what the hey, let's send these guys to a pediatrician (or s therapist (did anyone ever notice that the word therapist is also the words "the rapist" without a space? Judging by what hey charge.....well, no, I won't go there.) and let him diagnose. It couldn't hurt.
sanchez, that's Aunty Mets.
jdon, I'm still wondering about the massive strikeout rate for Wright and what he's doing differently to cause it -
Putz will find his way I believe. bullpen woes are nil compared to last season - none of these guys are perfect - just wait til K-Rod starts blowing saves with his wildness. It'll happen.
jdon maybe they should try waterboarding Ollie and see if that increases his focus at all. They could do it in Buffalo where shhhh, nobody'd notice....
I think Keith is right about David. He curls his bat abit and comes through slowly. He also has been bailing trying to jerk everything and become very vulnerable to sliders away. When he first came up he wasn't. The last couple of nights it looks more like his old self
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