NEW YORK METS: Offense Breaks Out Big Time In Big Texas. Tie Series At One Game Apiece. Rubber Game Sunday.
After the game, Jon Niese said of his speedy heart, "..it's nothing." Apparently he's used to this. Who knew?
Well, his racing heart gave manager Terry Collins and Mets fans quite a scare. The more worrisome aspect if this latest physiological yellow flag is that the Mets' doctors will still want to see him back in New York.
Uh oh. He may wind up in a foot boot too.
As far as the fourteen runs the Mets scored Saturday; let's face it, Alexi Ogando, or any other Texas pitcher didn't have it today. You and I could have grabbed a bat and gone 2 for 3, with a double and a run scored. You know how that goes; when you're bad, you're going to be awful.
Jon Niese is the real story though. Up until the moment Niese's body told him to stop pitching for the day, he had pitched 5.2 innings of six hit ball. He allowed Texas two earned runs; walked two and struck out seven. He surrendered two solo home runs in the fourth inning. But solo homers I can deal with. He rebounded to pitch a strong fifth inning and finally left the game in the sixth for said medical concerns.
The successes of the Mets have already been proven to hinge on the effectiveness of Jon Niese and Dillon Gee pitching together as a consistent one-two punch. They started June like wild fire and burned up the competition together. The Mets need them to get reignited post-haste, after having a few less effective starts towards the end of this month. Gee and Jon Niese need to start doubling up on wins again pronto.
Dillon Gee's string of consecutive victories was snapped his last time out to the mound. Coach Collins had an interesting take on Gee's performance. Coach thought he needed to rely on his secondary pitch more, due to his ineffective fastball. Coach accused him flatly of not making the adjustment. And listening to Coach's reasoning, I see his logic and actually buy Terry's criticism. Tom Seaver always said the mark of a good pitcher is being able to win when you don't have your best stuff. There's a lesson to be learned there.
By Dillon Gee's standards, he's victimized himself with high walk totals. And when you're struggling to find the strike zone, pitches tend to be more hittable; or not at all resulting in base on balls. So, his last time out, he got smacked up. Hey....it happens.
But tomorrow we need Dillon Gee to regain form and finally get this team back to .500 again. Time is of the essence and the Mets can't afford to spend weeks at a time tripping over themselves trying to reach the .500 level. It's been deja-vu after deja-vu; again; and gain; and again. Finally something needs to give. And the hope is Dillon Gee can supply it; whatever IT is. The way things work is, it takes getting to .500 before we can take a Wild Card seriously.
Gee was thwarted by rain and didn't get a decision the last time the Mets tasted .500 against Pittsburgh. The rain also stopped him short of qualifying for a win. But tomorrow he'll take his 7-1 record and try to improve it, and the Mets positioning in the standings.
Lastly, if you keep up with me, I told you about a fascinating little coincidence whenever Josh Thole catches Dillon Gee. Josh Thole miraculously turns into Johnny Bench whenever he catches Dillon and wins games for him with his bat. In Dillon Gee's last start, Coach Terry separated the duo in favor of starting Ronnie Paulino. I hope he doesn't make that mistake again. I beg the Coach, - please leave Josh Thole and Dillon Gee together.
As a matter of fact, I'd ask that he just leave Josh Thole alone and let him play.
SUNDAY
NEW YORK METS
vs.
Texas Rangers
From:
The Ballpark Next To Six Flags Over Texas
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