A Little Mets Article for All of You Pagan Lovers Out There

Since Darrell can't seem to get over his Yankees bias, I will say a little something on the Mets. I will admit it; the Mets look decent so far this year. To have an over-.500 record with injuries to your 2nd best starter, and your starting right fielder is impressive. Everything else is pretty much going great. Santana has been dominant, and with a little more run support he will have one of the best seasons of his career. John Maine and Olivier Perez have been more than serviceable as middle of the rotation starters and Nelson Figueroa (Figueroa as Bert) is still the front-runner in his local Bert and Ernie look-a-like pageant. The bullpen is pitching better than expected-Scot Schoeneweis, Pedro Feliciano, and Joe Smith are all canceling out the horrid performances of Aaron Heilman, Duaner Sanchez, and Jorge Sosa. These great performances have allowed the Mets to have the 6^th best ERA in the league and the 5^th best batting average against in the NL. And it is a good thing too, because the offense has been stuttering thus far.

The team batting average is .248, 13^th in the NL, and you know you are in trouble when Ryan Church is the leading hitter with a .312 average. It is easy to place the blame on two of the Mets bigger offensive starts-Carlos Beltran who is hitting a paltry .210 or Carlos Delgado who is only hitting .213. Beltran’s troubles can be explained by the fact that he is not hitting the ball in the air as often as he has been. Over 42 percent of his balls hit in play have been on the ground, which is his second highest percentage ever, narrowly behind the amount of groundballs he hit in his first year with Mets in 2005. However, I think this year Beltran will return to form because he continues to take pitches and draw walks, eventually the long fly balls will return and the line drives will find the gaps. For Delgado I think that this down turn is more than just a slight aberration. Delgado began the year injured and it seems to have taken some of the pop out of his swing. Delgado is no longer hit line drives; he has become an all or nothing type of hitter. When he swings its either going to be a homerun or a little dribbler to second base, and he has been swinging more and more often this season, than any other time in his career. Until his patience at the plate returns Delgado will continue his struggles. Incredibly Angel Pagan of all people has picked up the slack and has given the Mets a bit of the offensive spark that they have been missing. If Pagan’s production continues and the only David Wright picks up his pace the Mets offense will rise to at least the top half of the NL, if not beyond, and that would be a very very good thing for their playoff chances.

One more note on the Mets season thus far. Over one third of their games have been decided by 2 runs or less, and more than half have been decided by 3 runs or less. This has made Mets games a lot of fun to watch, even for a Yankees fan. I am sure that Mets fans would prefer a blow out every game, but I would say that it is a good thing that they are getting practice in tight games because at the end of the season you do not want a repeat of last year. Unless of course you have a masochistic streak (again not talking about Darell’s Mom), and in that case good for you.

-Mose