It was a DJ Stewart, Rafael Ortega kind of day at Citi Field Wednesday afternoon, which wasn’t incompatible with it being a winning kind of day, for Ortega was on base four different times three different ways and Stewart socked a pair of homers and was in on a pair of sparkling defensive plays, and the Mets won, defeating the Pirates, 8-3, in a game that means just as much as you want it to mean at this point of this type of year.
When the Mets became a DJ Stewart, Rafael Ortega kind of team, winning seemed the furthest thing from the Mets’ objective of simply finishing out the season in 26 pieces, but here are The Leftovers heating up a little and making for a savory enough series. Stewart and Ortega and 186th Mets third baseman ever Jonathan Araúz, and wasn’t that catching caddy Omar Narváez chipping in? Lest we make this completely the second coming of the Bench Mob, Pete Alonso homered, Francisco Lindor and Brandon Nimmo drove in runs and relay man Jeff McNeil served as essential conduit between Stewart and Narváez to nail Andrew McCutchen at the plate in the fifth when the Mets weren’t ahead by so many runs that it wasn’t beyond the pale that Pittsburgh could abscond with the whole darn thing. Team effort, you’d have to say.
Tylor Megill lasted five frames, which made him the IronMet of the rotation for this series. No wonder relievers come from and go back to Syracuse like there’s an outlet mall holding the maddest of sales in Onondaga County. Quick! Somebody pitch two-and-a-third! It will end your major league stay, but one day of service time is one day of service time! Today’s special guest in the bullpen was Dennis Santana, who replaced Jose Butto, who replaced Tyson Miller, who replaced Denyi Reyes, who replaced Jimmy Yacabonis, who replaced John Curtiss, and this — no kidding — was all in the span of eleven days. Meanwhile, Edwin Uceta, who went on the IL in April following three innings of work in a single relief outing, was activated on Wednesday only to find himself simultaneously designated for assignment. “What do Santana, Butto, Miller, Reyes, Yacabonis and Curtiss got that I ain’t got?” Uceta might have been heard to think. Hard to build team morale when the team keeps becoming a slightly different team.
Today’s core for four (innings, that is) could count on being aboard the flight to St. Louis when all was said and done: Phil Bickford, Brooks Raley, Trevor Gott and Adam Ottavino. Santana could sit and watch and check if his plane ticket involved another time zone.
Happy flight!
The Mets winning a series from the Buccos and preparing to take on the Redbirds seems apropos to the 50th anniversary of a particular playoff push of yore. Thus, if you’d like to take a delightful baseball flight of your own back some fifty years, I suggest the handiwork of Len Ferman, who bills himself as The Sports Time Traveler. Go to Len’s home page and find the 1973 Mets tab, where you can relive, as if it’s all happening for the very first time, the Mets’ pennant-winning season, day in and day out. Len’s got articles, podcasts and a joie de vivre for his subject matter that Rusty Staub would have appreciated.
“I’m essentially trying to relive the experience I had when I was 9 years old in 1973,” Len tells me. As one who was 10 years old in 1973, I can confirm it’s an experience to experience in every form possible in 2023.
Hm. 1973 Mets, after game 121: 55-66, 6.5 games behind NL East. 2023 Mets, after game 121: 55-66, 7.5 games behind 3rd wildcard. If the Mets can lose a 7 game lead with 17 to play, they can make up 7.5 games in 41 games, right? Since Cohen decided to sell at 48-54, the Mets have lost all of .5 games in the 3rd wildcard chase. If the journeymen get hot, who knows? It’s hard to foresee the patchwork pitching staff, starters and relievers, able to sustain a run even if the journeymen unexpectedly heat up the offense, though.
Seaver/Koosman/Matlack/Stone >> Senga/Quintana/Carrasco/Megill/Peterson.
Not to mention that in the sixth and seventh inning of those 1973 games, Seaver/Koosman/Matlack/Stone would still be on the mound, whereas in 2023, the sixth and seventh innings are the domain of the “option” pitcher du jour.
The 1973 Mets also had plenty of head to head games in late August and September against each N.L. East team that they needed to catch.
yes ironic that such a big spender was unwilling to buy a couple of difference makers at the deadline.
with a full mlb roster and a bit of fresh blood, who knows what might have been. we’ll have to wait and see what may be.
the last time i remember feeling like this as a met fan was as a kid trying to tell myself that pat zachary would be great after the seaver trade…and i didn’t even care so much for this year’s castoffs (though i woukd have kept tommy pham. he’d be inexpensive fepth at very least, or even a solid DH in 24.
those mets heated up 6 years later, so maybe 2029??
We kept “young Ron Hodges,” and he was still on the team when we finally turned the corner.
“we’ll have to wait and see what may be…those mets heated up 6 years later, so maybe 2029??”
I accept the sell-off is meant to further Cohen’s goal for the Mets to become a perennial frontrunner like the Dodgers or Braves. Or the Rays, who are perennial contenders, if not frontrunners, despite the churn of their roster. I feel like the Rays could make equivalent trades as the Mets made and they’d keep up the same pace in their division race.
I want that, too. But in the short term I can’t ignore the 3rd wildcard has moved only a step farther since the trade deadline. Even now the carrot isn’t out of reach. If the Mets don’t go on a run and a mediocre record wins the 3rd wildcard and the fundamental transformation of the Mets fails to happen, then we’ll look back and lament that as disappointing as the Mets were before the sell-off, a real chance at the 2023 playoffs was sacrificed for nothing.
For the long term, my biggest concern from the trade deadline is Verlander’s observation that the Mets’ analytics department is worse than the Astros’ analytics department. Cohen is on year 3 of his ownership, and he’s supposedly invested heavily in the team’s infrastructure in order to fundamentally transform the Mets to a perennial frontrunner. Given Cohen’s wealth, spending, ambition, and day job, I expected the analytics department to be the first, fastest, and easiest fix under his regime. So, if Verlander is right, why is the Mets’ analytics department still second-class?
The historic dollar investment in this year’s roster failed to translate to commensurate actual competitive value, which led to the sell-off. Looking down the road 6 years in light of Verlander’s “constructive criticism”, what if Cohen’s dollar investment behind the scenes is similarly failing to translate to the fundamental transformation of the Mets promised by the sell-off?
I understand that more baseball is always better than less, but I simply do not get why the THIRD freaking wild card is a “carrot”. Maybe for some/all of the players, or a manager who is looking to protect his phony-baloney job, but as a fan, why would I want to pony up another wad of dough just so we can get waxed early and run off?
“I simply do not get why the THIRD freaking wild card is a “carrot””
Because of the 2022 Phillies. Throughout the 2022 NL playoffs, the lower seeds beat the higher seeds until the Phillies won the pennant. And the Phillies never got hot in the regular season. They stumbled into the playoffs as the 3rd wildcard and then got hot. For the current Mets to catch the 3rd wildcard, they’d have to get hot just to make it to the playoffs, which would take a bunch of Mets doing what they haven’t done this season or in their careers. If the Mets made it to the playoffs with that kind of momentum (though we saw in 2015 momentum can dry up fast), we’d have hope against an NL Central winner that isn’t much ahead of the wildcard teams.
As far as the defending NL champs, maybe year 1 of the 3rd wildcard turns out to be the anomaly. But plenty of wildcards have won playoff rounds, including the World Series: https://www.mlb.com/news/wild-card-teams-to-make-the-world-series-c273264024.