Mets

[Amazin69]

I hope that everybody knows by now that Ottavi-NO is Styrofoam™ cup material, at best.

[Westheim]

In hindsight, I should have highlightered only "Ottavino breaks down", because that's what he did in the Mets pen for what felt like 17 years, but what I'm told were just three.

Yes, "highlightered". That's how much brain damage I have from watching Ottavino tossing and giving up trebuchet shots for 192 games.

[Westheim]

Weird. I thought we had at least three "DB" pitchers.

Designated Bottlers.

[Amazin69]

Yes, one inning of Ryne Stank makes me want to jump off of a bridge, they got that correct…

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MLBN decided they can't show me the Mets every day, so they stuck the game on the alternate channel and blacked it out here in Palmetto-ville. I spent a few useless minutes waiting to catch another glimpse of David Peterson…

…yes, David Peterson remains our "ace"…

…before giving up and as they went around the ballparks, I was overwhelmed by all Chitty Connect unis various home teams were wearing. Boston, ew, Phillies, ew, Cleveland, ew, Black Jays EW…a symphony of sartorial disasters!

Not our Metsies, though, since they've foregone Andrew Goldberg's Magenta and Grey dreams to stick to tradition. And by "tradition", I mean the 1990s' brainchild of the felon Charlie Samuels, those "hey, 'urban youths' have made a lot of money by selling…well, we don't need to know…let's honor gang culture and wear black and get ahold of that crack money before they blow it all on bling" quasi-racist unis, instead. Choose your poison, indeed.

[Westheim]

Apparently the Mets can't score a runner on second with nobody out if they get him crammed up their stupid tushes.

Peterson threw a Peterson (six innings, couple o' odd runs, no win), which is the gold standard around here.

At least Pete managed to flick one out for the first time in Idon'tevenwannalookitup ...

[Amazin69]

And he hit the sac fly off of our newest Old Pal Jose Buttó to tie things up, after previously victimizing Old "Pal" Joey Lucchesi.

Alas, the San Francisco Old Pals have so many of our old pals, they could afford to let Conforto go down to SoCal. Old Pal Dom Smith (hero of the Last Real Mets Game, never forget) drove in the winning run, and Whomping Wilmer Flores had a couple of hits, as well.

(Last Sunday in San Francisco, I saw Wilmer pinch-hit for Dom, and it felt like 2018 all over again…)

Meanwhile, Stank stank again, Hell's Bells dodged some bullets, and Edlose Edlost, again. Now that we've added a pile of ex-closers, can we make him an ex-closer, please?

(Yeah, yeah, he's been mostly fine, you can't beat him up for giving up the stupid Free Run, and it was the Six Most Common Words in English that did us in…but if you think I'm passing up a Free Shot at Edlose, think again.)

#249 ties Polar Pete with Jose Valentin, who helped us win that 2006 World Championship by posting an .820 OPS and 3.6 WAR at age 36, which was pretty impressive.

(What do you mean, we lost that NLCS to the Cardinals? Did you see that Cardinals team? I'm still shocked we didn't sweep them…)

[Amazin69]

The Giants are starting a pitcher named "Teng" today, who is making his major-league debut.

If you don't know the "¡Yo la tengo!" story by heart already, you've got several hours to catch yourself up. I recommend Five Seasons by the great Roger Angell, which is where I read it, originally.

(Gary must have mentioned "¡Yo la tengo!" at least a few times, wouldn't you think?)

[Westheim]

Pete clonks a 3-run homer in the first inning against Two-to-Tango or whatever his name is, and that makes it 250 for his career!

Just two behind Daryl Strawberry for the Mets franchise record now.

[Amazin69]

Originally Posted by Westheim

Pete clonks a 3-run homer in the first inning against Two-to-Tango or whatever his name is, and that makes it 250 for his career!

Just two behind Daryl Strawberry for the Mets franchise record now.

And tied with a raft of impressive people, such as MVP at both SS and CF Robin Yount (whose brother Larry will probably always hold the record for Shortest MLB Career EVER), and Fred "Cy" Williams, 4-time NL HR king, and the first player ever to face a "Williams Shift", a decade before the Indians used it against Ted.

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by Amazin69

And tied with a raft of impressive people, such as MVP at both SS and CF Robin Yount (whose brother Larry will probably always hold the record for Shortest MLB Career EVER), and Fred "Cy" Williams, 4-time NL HR king, and the first player ever to face a "Williams Shift", a decade before the Indians used it against Ted.

Nah, those have 251. Gotta stop lining out to Chapman to get there.

[Amazin69]

Originally Posted by Westheim

Nah, those have 251. Gotta stop lining out to Chapman to get there.

Ouch, my bad! I might be confused because all the 251ers are tied for 252nd place. Or I might just be confused, in general.

I spy Todd Zeile at 253…

[Amazin69]

Wasn't thrilled watching Ceddy Mullins circle 67% of CF before deciding which angle to try for Devers's long drive yesterday and failing. He's had enough time in the Show to know the "first, find the fence" rule. But I won't panic over one weak play…yet.

The Giants are starting a pitcher named "Carson Whisenhunt". Or, as I shall refer to him for the foreseeable future, "Carson Whisenhunt IV". Just because.

The Mets are wearing their Chitty Connect uniforms, meaning they have gone the entire series without wearing actual Mets threads even once. **** Andrew Goldberg.

If this is indeed the starting pitcher's choice, then I hope Frankie MOAN-tas gets his ass mown repeatedly to the point where he doesn't want to wear the filthy rags any more, and gets yanked early enough that the Mets can climb out of whatever five-run hole he's driven us into. I grant you, pretty much all of our "starting rotation" might accomplish that regardless of whether they were wearing Chitty Connect unis, normal unis, a selection of fine lingerie, or nothing but a loincloth, but even so.

[Westheim]

"Carson Whisenhunt" sounds like the name of not one, but two players, at the same position, that somehow look very much alike, but are actually not related and have never met each other before winding up on the same ballfield in Arlington on a random Wednesday night.

[Amazin69]

And here I thought the multiplicity of Maxwell Muncys was strange enough! I mean, that time when there were, I think, seven Justin Millers in the minors at the same time was one thing…many people being named both "Justin" and "Miller" after all.

But to finagle a flock of Feigls…fantastich!

[Westheim]

Maybe snarky remarks about the perceived lessening of your role should be reserved for pitchers that can pitch mop-up in a budding 5-run loss without klutzing a game of "double or nothing!" ...

Edit: I like that Torrens kid's stuff. I could see him pitch the seventh or eighth on a regular basis.

[Amazin69]

Originally Posted by …

Yes, one inning of Ryne Stank makes me want to jump off of a bridge, they got that correct…

I stand by my previous statement. Can we call Ping-Pong Garca back and give Cryne Ryne the ticket to Syracuse?

Also, clearly we should have started Austin Warren…

*********************************
I enjoyed the standard "grinders = heros = hoagies" discussion and Keith blissing out over day games (to where Gary said he sounded like "a wellness podcast") and I found it interesting to learn that John Hernandez served with Stan Musial at Pearl Harbor during WWII…

…but I'm a bit sad that we had an entire discussion about hitters "stepping in the bucket" and not a single shout-out to the immortal Aloysius Harry Szymanski



I used the picture from "Bucketfoot Al" as a member of the 1933-1935 White Sox, even though those Sox were…not great, even the injection of players from Connie Mack's Depression Fire Sale (Simmons, Jimmy Dykes, George Earnshaw, Mule Haas), because I just love the uniform design.

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I stayed on MLBN after the Mets because I was watching Tex-SEA to see how Jake bounced back from that unfortunate lapse (5.1 IP, 5 ER, L) on Monday. And the answer is…not great. Bummer.

What does look great is the Mariners' alternate Sunday home uniform:


Vintage late '80s color scheme, and no names on the unis for the first time since the Pilots! Very cool.

*************************************

Also cool was hearing the Citi organist do a version of "Blinding Lights" by The Weeknd as Dom Smith hit during that disaster of the 9th. But…why that song? Why then?

Because Dom is "blinded" by the lights of New York after having hit nearly every small town in the league over the past couple of years? Nah, he's been here before, and the organist had Dom's previous at-bats for that, anyhow.

Because Ryne Stank was pitching like a deer in the headlights at that point? I have to think there were better options.

Because, just as it is now known that virtually every Judas Priest song is about man-on-man sex (albeit it took Rob Halford until the 1990s to come out), people claim that nearly every Weeknd song is about cocaine and the organ player was saying that the only way to survive watching Stank stink the joint out was with a couple of toots? Possible, or at least I choose to believe so.

(Yes, Eric Clapton's "Cocaine" would have been a more direct choice, but with Polar Pete using "Layla" as his walk-up tune, best not to confuse the Clapton songbook, I agree.)

[Westheim]

Pete hit another 3-run homer for #251 ...

Originally Posted by Amazin69

And tied with a raft of impressive people, such as MVP at both SS and CF Robin Yount (whose brother Larry will probably always hold the record for Shortest MLB Career EVER), and Fred "Cy" Williams, 4-time NL HR king, and the first player ever to face a "Williams Shift", a decade before the Indians used it against Ted.

There you go!

But a 4-for-5 with 4 RBI from Pete wasn't enough to beat the Clevelands.

[Amazin69]

Pretty much a repeat of last Monday, no? Mets futz around, climb out of hole with help of late dinger, lose in Manly Manfred's Mangled Mess (which replaced extra innings), helped as always by the Six Most Common Words in Baseball.

I saw that graphic that said the Billion Dollar Babies are currently 14th in a 15-team NL in RiSP. Which clearly means that whomever is behind us (Rock Pile? Izzat you?) has got some 'splainin' to do, to quote Ricky Ricardo.

Did the Mets even get two hits wRiSP yesterday? Yes, GG Swaggy V tried to become GS Swaggy V once more, but SF ≠ H, as is properly taught in the schools, AFAIK

SHI…

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by Amazin69

Did the Mets even get two hits wRiSP yesterday?

Box score says yes.

Box score even says 4-for-15.

Box score also says that's BETTER than what the Clevelands did (3-14).

Baseball is a harsh mistress.

[Amazin69]

No Six Most Common Words in English, tonight. I've seen goldfish put up bigger fights than the Mets did.

Two of these on only "highlights". Not really pumped up for seeing the boys in action tomorrow afternoon.