Baseball Toaster was unplugged on February 4, 2009.
On the morning of Friday May 18, before the first subway series of the season, the New York Post's back page headline was "Flying & Dying" and was accompanied by an illustration that made it clear that it was the Mets who were flying and the Yankees who were dying. Entering this weekend's rematch, that headline still applies, but the the script has been flipped. The Yankees enter the weekend with an active nine-game winning streak while the Mets come to the Bronx riding a five-game losing streak and having lost nine of their last ten. Most recently, the Mets were swept by the Dodgers in L.A. by a combined score of 18-5. The Mets still hold a two-game lead in the NL East because the Braves have been nearly as bad, and the Yankees are still 7.5 games back in the AL East because of the huge deficit they have to overcome, but the Yankees enter this series with a record just three games worst than the Mets. That means that, if the Yankees can sweep the weekend series (a highly unlikley scenario given that it would extend their winning streak to an improbable 12 games), the two New York teams would have identical 36-31 records come Monday morning.
The Mets have been hit hard by injuries thus far this year, with their starting second baseman, three corner outfielders, two of their starting pitchers, and a key releiver spending time on the DL, but two of those injuries (to Pedro Martinez and Duaner Sanchez) were carried over from last year, and Shawn Green, Jose Valentin, and Orlando Hernandez have all returned to action in the past few weeks. Still, the Mets are down to plans C and D in left field while Moises Alou's quad strain shows no sign of improvement. Meanwhile, Carlos Delgado has finally found his power stroke (seven homers in his last 16 games after hitting just three in his previous 44), but home runs are about the only way he's getting on base (three walks and just nine other hits over the same span). Still, one has to assume the Mets are just slumping and the Yankees should be wary of the cross-town rivalry awakening this sleeping giant.
Tonight, Roger Clemens makes his second start of the year against Oliver Perez. Perez looks like he's finding his lost 2004 form under pitching coach Rick "The Jacket" Peterson, though his last outing against the Tigers looked more like the pitcher the Pirates were eager to unload in last year's Roberto Hernandez-Xavier Nady deal than the young ace that had baseball buzzing three years ago. Still, Perez is just 25 years old and has been murder on his fellow southpaws this year, allowing just one home run to a lefty batter. The good news is that the lefty in question was Hideki Matsui, who cracked a two-run job off Perez in the opener of the last series between these two teams at Shea. The bad news is that two-run dinger was the only score the Yanks were able to muster against Perez in that game as they handed Andy Pettitte another hard-luck 3-2 loss.
As for Clemens, he last faced the Mets in April of 2005. Clemens dominated in that game, allowing just a walk and two singles in seven innings while striking out nine. Then again, the Mets lineup that day featured Kaz Matsui, Eric Valent, Victor Diaz, Doug Mientkiewicz, very different versions of Jose Reyes and Carlos Beltran (in his first year as a Met), and an over-the-hill Mike Piazza who was off to a very slow start.
Rooting incentive for tonight's game: the Yankees are currently two games over .500 and have not been three games over .500 at any point this season. With a win, they'll hit their high-water mark.
Fun fact for tonight's game: Julio Franco will start at first base and bat eighth with Carlos Delgado as the DH. The first major league line-up Roger Clemens ever faced featured Julio Franco at shortstop and batting sixth. That was exactly 23 years and one month ago today. In that game, Franco singled, grounded out twice, and stole a base against Clemens. Fun fact footnote: The Indians stole six bases against Clemens in his major league debut.
New York Mets
2007 Record: 36-28 (.563)
2007 Pythagorean Record: 36-28 (.564)
Manager: Willie Randolph
General Manager: Omar Minaya
Home Ballpark (2007 Park Factors): Shea Stadium (95/96)
Who's Replacing Whom?
Orlando Hernandez (DL) replaces Jason Vargas (minors)
Guillermo Mota (drug suspension) replaces Ambiorix Burgos (minors)
Ricky Ledee (minors) replaces Endy Chavez (DL)
Jose Valentin (DL) replaces David Newhan (minors)
25-man Roster:
1B – Carlos Delgado (L)
2B – Jose Valentin (S)
SS – Jose Reyes (S)
3B – David Wright (R)
C – Paul Lo Duca (R)
RF – Shawn Green (L)
CF – Carlos Beltran (S)
LF – Ricky Ledee (L)
Bench:
R - Julio Franco (1B)
R - Carlos Gomez (OF)
R - Damion Easley (IF)
S - Ruben Gotay (IF)
R - Ramon Castro (C)
Rotation:
L - Tom Glavine
R - Orlando Hernandez
R - John Maine
R - Jorge Sosa
L - Oliver Perez
Bullpen:
L - Billy Wagner
R - Aaron Heilman
R - Joe Smith
L - Scott Schoeneweis
L - Pedro Feliciano
R - Guillermo Mota
R - Aaron Sele
15-day DL: R - Moises Alou (OF), L - Endy Chavez (OF), R - Pedro Martinez, R - Duaner Sanchez, R - Juan Padilla, L - Dave Williams
Typical Lineup:
S - Jose Reyes (SS)
L - Shawn Green (RF)
S - Carlos Beltran (CF)
R - David Wright (3B)
L - Carlos Delgado (1B)
R - Paul Lo Duca (C)
S - Jose Valentin (2B)
L - Ricky Ledee (LF)*
*With Moises Alou and Endy Chavez on the DL, the Mets have used Ledee and righty-hitting Carlos Gomez in a strict platoon in left field. Also, in their three games with the DH this season, the Mets have twice used Lo Duca in the role with Ramon Castro getting the start behind the plate.
six strong for roger; six hits, two runs.
perez pitches well, but walks too many and is gone after 5 innings, 101 pitches, and three runs. yanks feast on middle relief.
final: 7-3 yanks.
proctor gives up a seventh inning dinger to delgado.
This is such an obvious step to scapegoat Giambi and for MLB to defer attention away from THEIR role in the steroids issue.
I will not rant on, but I feel very protective of my boy Jason. He is the ONLY player to step up and both admit to and apologize for his role in this issue.
My blood is boiling! I hate this low-brow sh*t. Fehr and Selig should both step down as the 2 of them had more to do will this problem then anyone else.
The buck stops at the top, Bud. Jason effected one player... himself. But you enabled hundreds.
/rant I didn't have
You do realize it's 2-2 right? Pedroia hit a 2-run home run on like Zito's 3rd pitch.
Amn on 2nd, so IBB. 2 outs, 1st and 2nd.
zito better not get those boston bats alive again.
And Miggymania was knocking on the door a couple of minutes ago, huh?
It really was pretty intriguing.
Clemens is pitching well enough to win, too.
That's what my dad used to call Stanton during the dynasty years, "the Arsonist", because he had this knack for throwing more fuel on the fire, instead of putting the fire out.
I perfer Sliced's "VizcaiNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" myself.
And, oh yeah, yet another close call blown against the Yankees.
Nice job, Miggy. Not maniacal, however.
Phelps hit it hard, but nobody else did. We've had some decent long flies. This is reminding me too much of, you know, 14 games ago...
Maybe what the Yanks need instead of Dunn is a righty-power bat. The Yanks have only four guys who have an OPS over .800 vs LHP - and one of those is Giambi. (Matsui is close at .798 though). Who are the other three? Exactly who'd you expect: A-Rod (righty), Jeter (righty), and Posada (switch, but has always crushed lefties).
The only problem is, I don't know of a righty power bat that's available. (Teixeira, besides being on the DL until the ASB, is a switch hitter who, IIRC, hits better from the left side.)
Red Sox 3 to 9 hitters are 0 for 20. stupid drew and pedroia are their entire offense. and lots of walks.
(breathe in. breathe out. breathe in...)
I can't believe Perez is back out there. C'mon, Cap'n, make Willie pay for not bringing in a crappy reliever!
time to strike. c'mon leche!
I might tune out of Banter shortly.
It seems like there are a lot of games when nobody but Jeter can hit. Not so many recently, of course.
It's more convincing when I tell myself that we're doing okay, we just can't break through and you can't win 'em all. That wasn't working so well three weeks ago. Still frustrating, but not so bad.
167 Don't get me started ;-)
Good night all.
And Jorgie strikes again. So that's something.
Now let's do it with the bat...
Night folks. We'll win tomorrow to compensate.
have a good nite all...
Nine wasn't enough! Let start another win streak, fellas!
Good night all.
It would seem Perez pitched a nice game.
Tip your caps.
Too bad, but we'll get 'em tomorrow.
Consider this my "bellyfull of guts" way of trying to ignite the offense, as it were.
Some of it I could follow, some I couldn't, but I appreciate the response. You guys are the greatest.
Explain your role: Stay positive, continue to work, come up with a routine, stay with the film, keep it simple, i.e., don't come up with ten possible things that are wrong.
Arod makes great adjustments. His leg kick was too high, Long told him so, and he adjusted the next AB.
They have a good relationship and he's good about making adjustments.
Cano swinging 3-1: Mattingly and Arod both talked to him about that.
What have you told Chien-Ming about preparing to hit next week?: Not much. They don't work with the pitchers in preparation for interleague.
Brian Bruney hit one out the other day.
Not too much out of that interview, but he sounds a decent guy.
His assessment of Farns is indeed what many of us probably suspect: his control isn't bad because his control is bad, his control is bad because he relies on "throwing the ball a hundred miles an hour and hoping he can just get it by guys."
He thinks Farns might be forced to make an adjustment when he loses velocity.
Which means that it's not that Farns is trying his best. We do not have a pitcher on our hands who just can't seem to get it right, we rather have a Nuke LaRouche who's too obstinate or lazy to bother trying.
He must go now.
I've always wondered what would happen if pitchers were allowed to go to a number of different coaches to see what worked best for them - like a tennis player or golfer or medical patient - as opposed to being under the thumb of some baseball lifer convinced they had the right plan.
Or is it that you find his opinions/analysis usually unsound?
I don't know if he's right or not about Farnsworth, but his explanation sounded plausible to me and seems to corroborate the intuitions I have about the guy based upon unscientific (but intent) observation.
Embarrassing, even.
He missed with a breaking ball outside on 1-2 and then through the same pitch right over the dish to get LoDuca swinging.
Nice work, Yankee Clippard.
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