Mets Game Recap (ST) 3/21

Dodgers 4, Mets 1

or

Edwin "I'm unapologetic Ms." Jackson 1, Mets Defensive Eyesores (innumerable)

Before I divert energy from my will to live and funnel it into my latest painful elucidation of Mets baseball, allow my ego to expand to Gleeman-length so I can tell you what you should be reading, er, I mean, point to some blog writing I’ve enjoyed recently.

Kaley of Flushing Local has a fairly sympathetic post up about everyone’s favorite lovable loser, Roger Cedeno, in which she advocates the Wilpons cutting ties and letting Speed Racer’s Mets career accelerate into the sunset.

Steve Keane of The Eddie Kranepool Society agrees, yet feels that the antagonism fans have been directing Cedeno’s way is justifiable.

They’re both remarking, by the way, on this NY Times article that shows Roger to be a pretty decent-sounding fellow.

"...I want to win so badly," said Cedeño, who will be relegated to a backup right fielder this season. "I've taken the heat, and I truly believe that if we start to win, everything will be O.K. It's so hard when you are losing in New York. It gets bad. Real bad. You get no support. It's hard for me because 90 percent of the reason I play is for the fans. You don't want your own fans to boo you."

Even considering his struggles this Spring, I’ve found it’s getting tougher to slam him. Not impossible, obviously, but tougher. Tack my name onto the petition to cut him loose and send him somewhere he can regain his confidence and his family can watch him play.

Finally, here’s a preview of the NL East written up in a roundtable format by the all-baseball.com blogging collective. It’s just a bunch of good baseball bloggers together in one place unified by a sleek design, and is considerably less pretentious than this similar project:

What exactly is The Hardball Times? Well, in short, it is a place where you can come to find great writing about baseball. In addition to Aaron and Matthew, THT's lineup includes some of the most intelligent and gifted baseball writers around.

After reading that, I would seriously rather enjoy Red Sox Yip Dawg’s handful of posts over and over than subject myself to the self-important natterings of...well, some dudes who happen to have a website.

(On a related note, Kyle and I have been posting here for almost three months now, which according to the Universal Blogging Filler Accord makes it OK for us to devote close to 30% of our posts to talking about blogging instead of actually blogging. Expect that annoying trend to continue until the five month mark, when we will earn the right to shamefully beg you for Paypal donations and/or cover our site with animated gifs of Mo Vaughn eating things our sponsors want you to buy.)

I can’t delay any longer. The agony:

Heilman looked good in four innings and change. If you didn’t watch, you might be a little dismayed by his line (4.1 IP, 6 H, 3 R, 1 earned). In the first inning he let Bubba Trammel take him deep, which I’m only mentioning because he has a slight problem allowing the longball, and because it’s nice to see the name Bubba on the blog without having to wade through an execrable account of a Big K family reunion. The second inning was where I started watching, and I happily settled in on the couch to see Kaz Matsui make a bad throw which should’ve been ruled an error but wasn't. Ty Wigginton was his usual hard-nosed, hard-pressed self, and followed that up by firing a rocket at least a foot above Mike Piazza’s creme-rinsed locks. Heilman ended up throwing over thirty pitches that inning, which both limited his time in the game and allowed for the creation of a pressure situation in which he momentarily struggled. He looked very good the rest of the outing, throwing a ton of breaking balls and making Dodgers already pedestrian hitters look even more foolish. If our defense is really improved and baseball enacts legislation to prevent the offical scorer’s dog from stepping in for an inning, I think his line would’ve been a bit more favorable. I don’t have BB/K numbers in front of me, but I know he continued to strike batters out. Unfortunately, our defense behind him continued to show just how important that facet of his game will be.

Got another chance to see Piazza at first, and this time with the added bonus of Keith Hernandez shouldering color responsibilities. He emphasized Piazza’s preoccupation with setting himself up to receive throws at the bag, and we were treated to replays of Mike looking over his shoulder to make sure his foot was on the base, and hurrying over a little too much to make sure he got there. He didn’t look horrible by any means, but definitely like someone who is learning a new position and doesn’t know it well enough to patrol it by instinct. After seeing Wigginton hurl a throw off-target early, and watching Piazza somehow lift his stocky frame off the ground in an attempt to snag it, I was worried about that particular connection. Ty made another long throw to Mike spot on later, and Hernandez noted that Piazza had been in “picture perfect” position for it. I hope Mex works with him in some capacity.

Danny Garcia hit very well, with a pair of deep doubles in a huge ballpark. The Mets faced great young pitcher Edwin Jackson for the first handful of frames, and he predictably baffled many of the Amazin’s, so it was good to see one of our young guys succeed -- even if the most Garcia can hope for is to win the utility spot on the roster and eventually get mistaken by a vengeance-minded posse looking for the fat unruly teammate who shares his surname.

I have yet to enjoy a Kaz Matsui at bat. Looking at the way he swings I can only infer that in Japan hitters are taught that it doesn’t matter if you get a hit as long as you hit a groundball directly at a fielder. The Battle of Two Matsuis might be a little different than I had originally conceived; perhaps the outcome should be determined by a tally of sharply hit grounders. Is it possible that our Matsui is just like their Matsui, except without the homeruns? Sono ritsuzen desu ka!