Mets Daily Farm System Report - 9/2: Doubleheader-Mania!
New York Mets Daily Farm System Report - Results from the night of Wednesday September 1, 2010.
The Usual Suspects
AAA - Buffalo (73-66)
- Buffalo played two, so the numbers below cover two games.
- LF Jesus Feliciano: 3-8, R, K (.340/.384/.409)
- CF Kirk Nieuwenhuis: 4-6, K (.214/.287/.327); needed that
- 1B Nick Evans: 2-5, 2B, BB (.320/.392/.578)
- SP Raul Valdes: 5.0 IP, 3 ER, 9 H, 1 BB, 5 K, 0 HR (2-1, 3.00 ERA, 36.0 IP, 12 ER, 9 BB, 36 K, 3 HR); didn’t pitch great but pitched well enough
- SP Josh Stinson: 6.0 IP, 4 ER, 6 H, 3 BB, 4 K, 2 HR (1-2, 3.32 ERA, 19.0 IP, 19 H, 6 BB, 17 K, 4 HR); been a little homer-prone since his promotion
Braves 4, Mets 1: The Duda And Co. Out Of Their Element Against Hanson
Welcome to Atlanta where the Braves play, and the Mets get got like er'day.
The Mets' offensive struggles continued -- two hits, two walks, one run. Lucas Duda went 0-for-3 with a strikeout in his mildly hyped debut. Two Braves batters individually out-hit the entire Mets lineup. Quoth Keith Hernandez: "It's a little depressing". On a positive note, David Wright hit a double and is no longer 0-for-Atlanta this season. Chris Carter stole his first MLB base.
Mike Pelfrey stumbled through five innings, throwing just 46 of his 83 pitches for strikes (55%). His season rate is 63%. He allowed nine hits and all four runs. Pedro Feliciano, Bobby Parnell and Hisanori Takahashi each tossed a scoreless inning.
Oh, and here is your Amazin' Avenue moment of zen:
In related news, Kevin Burkhardt sent the most texts tonight since the Kris Allen vs Adam Lambert final on American Idol. I'll stop talking about Francoeur when everyone else does. Hopefully it will die down, and people will no longer accuse us of disliking Francoeur, human being, as opposed to Francoeur, baseball player. To reiterate -- if you are/were a fan of Frenchy and are put off by any criticism directed his way because you like fun players with affable personalities, that's fine. You may enjoy going to the ballpark and rooting for guys like that, regardless of how good the team is. If so, terrific. To each his own. But don't go bitching and moaning about another fourth place finish, thanks in no small part to the Mets receiving the worst offensive right field production in the league.
The Metsies look to avoid the sweep Thursday night, featuring a battle of aces: Johan Santana vs Tim Hudson.
Poem by Howard Megdal
Hanson sings lullaby Mets cannot stop
While Braves greet Pelf with a batting MMMBop
Open Thread: Mets vs Braves, 9/1/2010
The Duda abides! Lucas Duda makes his major league debut tonight, starting in left field. Get excited. New month, newish players and the Braves have gone 122-87 (.584 win %) since trading Jeff Francoeur. Maybe the Mets will be similarly energized. Here's some Morricone to get you pumped up:
Tonight's Lineup
Castillo 2B Thole C Wright 3B Carter RF Beltran CF Davis 1B Duda LF Tejada SS Pelfrey P
Joaquin Arias, or Not Jeff Francoeur
The Twitter machine was aglow last night as the news about Jeff Francoeur's trade came down the pipe. Here are the two tweets that probably demonstrate the poles best:
@billsweet Steaming pile of cat vomit for Francoeur? Also good. @enosarris Joaquin Arias for Francoeur? Sure, sounds good.
and
@totalmets Guess how many HRs our big new slugger Joaquin Arias has in his career? Try 0, nada, none. 19 RBIS over 4 seasons!!! Whooo. Dumbass trade!
You can guess which side the average Amazin' Avenue reader comes down on. (Seriously? RBI? For a top/bottom of the order middle infielder? Um, okay.) Getting Francoeur off the team to see what we have in Lucas Duda - called up today - is good enough, but what did we get back in the trade? Let's take a look at the man that was once traded for Alex Rodriguez.
Jeff Francoeur And Why I Like Certain Players
Frenchy is gone, but there will be no snark, no cheap jokes. That well has been tapped for the last 14 months or so, there's nothing else really to say. Bad player went on a 2.5 month hot streak in 2009, won the hearts of fans and the front office with his smile, hit like Jason Kendall in 2010 and even in departure the members of the New York media refuse to say a bad word about their best friend. Whatever. The saga leads into another discussion -- why do fans like certain players? More specifically, since I won't speak for others, why do I like certain players?
I'll spell it out in elementary fashion. The Mets winning makes me happy. How do the Mets win? By having good players (David Wright, Jose Reyes), as opposed to bad players (Francoeur, Oliver Perez). Good players --> winning --> happiness. In general, the better a player is, the more I like him. In graph form:
(click to embiggen)
Professional baseball players are not my drinking buddies. I don't know them personally. Cui gives a s**t if Frenchy tells a good knock-knock joke if he's batting .230? If a Met does well to help the team win, I will most likely be a fan. If said player stinks, I will probably not rally around him. It sounds cold but it's reality. I'm emotionally invested in the Mets, but not to the point where I think I'm on a first name basis with the players, or whatever. Angel Pagan isn't coming out to the bar to play Buck Hunter and dominate the jukebox with me this weekend. He'll be on teevee at the bar, hopefully hitting homers and making great catches, leading to much rejoicing.
There are exceptions. Off the field stuff matters (see Francisco Rodriguez on the above graph). I prefer homegrown players (Wright, Reyes, Dwight Gooden). Productive players irrationally hated by the fan base are also favorites (Carlos Beltran, Mike Cameron, Fernando Tatis). Bonus points to things like Carlos Delgado earning the Roberto Clemente Award in 2006 for sportsmanship and community involvement. Ditto Pagan standing by young Jenrry Mejia during interviews, helping the rookie out because English isn't his first language (That's the "good clubhouse guy" stuff that impresses -- not yukking it up about your fantasy football team). But in general, the best fit line on the graph is the norm.
Rational fans want their team to win. This is why I get riled up when I read or hear people say that a Frenchy type is their favorite Met. Even worse, some of these people simultaneously slam the good players on the team. One prominent Mets blogger (who will remain anonymous) consistently praises Alex Cora while calling for the team to cut ties with Reyes. Go away -- I don't want you in my fan base.
There's plenty more to be said here but that's enough for now. Suffices to say, if you praise Jeff Francoeur and Alex Cora for their grittiness, while bashing Jose Reyes, you lose the right to complain about the team not winning.
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Mets Daily Farm System Report - 9/1: So Long, Kingsport
New York Mets Daily Farm System Report - Results from the night of Tuesday August 31, 2010.
The Usual Suspects
AAA - Buffalo (72-65)
- LF Jesus Feliciano: 1-4, K (.339/.385/.410)
- CF Kirk Nieuwenhuis: 1-4, 2 K (.185/.265/.304); really struggling right now
- LF Lucas Duda: 3-4, R, 2B, BB (.314/.389/.610); performance is a nice swan song to Duda’s 2010 minor league season
- 1B Nick Evans: 1-4, R, HR, 3 RBI (.317/.387/.577); will Nick get the call?
- SP Fernando Nieve: 6.0 IP, 5 ER, 10 H, 0 BB, 6 K, 0 HR (2-1, 5.77 ERA, 34.1 IP, 41 H, 11 BB, 28 K, 2 HR); well, no walks and no home runs is good
- RP Chad Cordero: 1.0 IP, 0 ER, 1 H, 0 BB, 0 K, 0 HR (1-1, 1.88 ERA, 14.1 IP, 13 H, 5 BB, 11 K, 0 HR)
- RP Yhency Brazoban: 1.0 IP, 1 ER, 2 H, 3 BB, 5 K, 0 HR (0-0, 9.00 ERA, 7.0 IP, 11 H, 3 BB, 5 K, 1 HR)
- ROSTER MOVES: RHP Jenrry Mejia and OF Lucas Duda were called up to the big club. It will be interesting to see who else gets the call in the coming weeks. I’d expect Evans, Feliciano, and Justin Turner, at least, will all be up once the Triple-A season ends.








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