Results tagged ‘ Pirates ’
Why Does It Always Rain on Me[ts]
The good news for Mets fans is that Zach Duke (6-4, 2.62 ERA) won’t be pitching Wednesday night. The bad news is no one will be pitching Wednesday night.
The third of four scheduled games between the Mets and Pirates this week fell victim to a light rain that had been hovering over the Greater Pittsburgh Area since the early afternoon.
Word of the postponement came out at approximately 5:25 pm EST, right around the same time the gates opened for admission.
My first inclination was to walk disappointedly back to the car (that damn garage beat me for $12) and hope for sunshine for Thursday’s matinee.
I assumed that rain must be blanketing the area throughout the night and there would be absolutely no window to play the game.
Not the case. As I began enjoying a hearty meal around 8:00 pm at a fine eating establishment Robinson Towne Center, just a few miles from PNC Park, the rain subsided. Nothing but calm skies.
What are the Pirates doing? Did they not want their fans to sit through a delay? Did they not want their fans to come out to the park, spend a ton of money on concessions, and then be sent home shortly thereafter?
If the Pirates called the game at 5:30 pm for the benefit of their fans (all 1,227 of them), then they should be commended. Still, did they even look at the Doppler?
Maybe they did, and maybe they made their poor decision to call the game with their own interests, not the fans’, in mind. Let me explain.
The City of Pittsburgh is clearly consumed by the Pens (ballpoint or feather?) and the Stanley Cup Finals. In fact, I’m beginning to wonder if half of the city even knows the Pirates still play here.
Meanwhile, school is still in session.
Did they Buccos push this game back to July 2 in hopes they will draw more than the 9,000 they would have had Wednesday night?
After all, the Pirates are the worst draw in baseball thus far this season, sitting last in home attendance.
Hmmmm….
[And for those of you who appreciate the use of allusion in the headline of this blog post, I didn't lie when I was 17.]
Minor League Loss for Mets
My first game at Pittsburgh’s PNC Bank Park reminded much like the time when my girlfriend forced me to a Reading Phillies game. Except, there were more fans in Reading than there were in the ballpark Tuesday night.
From a skeleton crowd, made up mostly of Mets fans who made the trip west, to the annoying mascots the game felt like anything but a Major League experience.
Going right along with the minor league feel, the Mets put up another light-hitting lineup whose most-feared hitter was David Wright and his 54 strikeouts (187 AB).
No Jose Reyes (DL – calf), No Carlos Delgado (DL – hip), and No Carlos Beltran (who knows?).
The crowd did get to see Mets ace Johan Santana, but even he stooped down to the competition and miserable atmosphere. He allowed rope after rope during the sixth inning, his last inning of work in what wound up a 3-1 defeat.
Filling in for Beltran once again, Jeremy Reed followed up the two doubles he hit in the series opener by going 3-for-3 in game two. There’s your Mets highlight right there – Jeremy Reed’s trio of singles.
The Metropolitans went 1-for-6 with runners in scoring position. Fernando Martinez left two stranded in scoring position on his way to an 0-for-4 day.
Ramon Martinez left a duck on the pond with two out as well. That was before the substitute shortstop left the game with a dislocated pinky, which he injured sliding into home for the Mets lone run (can this injury situation become any more bizarre?).
Did I really drive out here for this?
The Lakewood Blueclaws may have been the better option if I wanted to take in some baseball on my week off (yes, I have another job as surpisingly my work on this blog doesn’t yield enough to pay the bills).
Despite a bad baseball atmosphere, a “B” lineup, and another tough loss, I don’t feel nearly as cheated as I have the past two Septembers.
And, yes, I’d make the drive again because I’ll always BELIEVE.
Mets Send Right Man to Mound in Battle of 57s
After a terrible loss, the Mets send the right man to the hill four game two of a four-game series in Pittsburgh.
Mr. Metsmerized has made the trip west out the Penn Pike and will be in attendance at PNC Park to root on the Best Pitcher in Baseball.
Mets’ starter Johan Santana leads the National League in ERA (1.77) and strikeouts (86).
The Pirates will rest their hopes on Zach Duke, who, like Santana, is a southpaw and wears No. 57. The comparisons stop there though.
Surprisingly, however, Duke isn’t having a bad year at all. Unfortunately, his team can’t say the same.
His 2.75 ERA has yielded a 5-4 record thus far.
Young Guns Make It Five in a Row
The Mets made it five in a row by breaking through in the eighth inning Friday night against the lowly Pirates.
It looked as if this could have been a stress-free night when Delgado’s first-inning single brought home two runs, but Buccos’ starter Jeff Karstens settled down to hold the Mets off the board for the remainder of his six-inning outing.
Mets starter Jon Niese turned in six solid innings of his own. (This young southpaw does not come as highly-touted as Scott Kazmir, but Management should make plans to keep this kid in the organization for years to come. Twenty-two year old lefties who sport a 92-mph fastball are worth a bit more than Victor Zambrano.)
So it turned into a Battle of Bullpens with the game tied at 2-2. It was definitely not the case last year, but one would think the Mets would have an edge in this department Friday night. Omar ADDRESSED THE BULLPEN! Remember?
Needless to say, the folks down at Omar’s local bagel joint were all smiles.
After Sean Green (who may or may not be Heilman 2.0, he deserves a chance though) worked around a double, the Mets most-exciting young gun took the hill.
Bobby Parnell actually had an easier time setting down the Buccos than JJ Putz did in his inning last night. It’s hard not to jump onto the Parnell Bandwagon. The farm product, who notched his first career win, is nothing short of a hard-throwing righty that goes right after the opposition.
And it was nice to see former Met Tyler Yates make an appearance, ultimately taking the loss. Remember when this Mets castoff was being groomed as a possible successor to John Franco?
On that note, let’s make it six straight…
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