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So It Has Come To This: Nationals 7, Mets 1

If this game wasn't just the worst thing ever, I don't think I know what is. Here's a numbered-list summary of the events.

  1. John Maine was terrible.
  2. John Lannan pitched the Nationals' first complete game of the season.
  3. The Mets sent just three batters more than the minimum to the plate.

That's it. Any other details I gave you would be superfluous. There's nothing about this game worth repeating here. Nobody on the Mets did anything particularly interesting. I guess Fernando Nieve struck out two in two scoreless innings. There, are you happy? You got something out of me.

Instead of dwelling on this shipwreck of a game, I'd like to be a little more positive about things. That can't really happen within the context of any discussion about this game, so instead I'll point out that the new ESPN.com boxscores are pretty great. They've included starting pitcher game scores for a number of years now, but just recently they added a few new bells and whistles that really help distinguish them from everyone else's generic boxes.

First, they've ditched the player 'LOB' column, which was mostly useless. They've replaced it with a '#P' column, which indicates the total number of pitches seen by that batter across his plate appearances. This is great. Now we know that Luis Castillo saw 21 pitches in his four times up. We also know that Omir Santos saw seven pitches in his three times to the plate.

ESPN has also added a column to the player boxes; to the right of the 'AVG' column is a new 'OBP' one, so you can easily tell each player's on-base percentage for the season.

Lastly, they've enhanced the pitcher sub-box (the information beneath the pitcher line score) to include first pitch strikes as a ratio to total batters faced, but they've also added complete strike breakdowns. Now we know how many strikes were called strikes, swinging strikes, foul balls, and in-play strikes. This is awesome, frankly. ESPN's baseball coverage -- both on teevee and the internets -- takes a lot of abuse, much of it from this community, almost all of it entirely deserved. The one thing ESPN.com has done well over the years is provide solid sortable stats -- both for individual players and for teams -- and now they've improved an already solid boxscore. So, a tip of the cap to the four-letter: they may get a whole lot of things wrong, but they got this one right.

P.S. This might be the worst swag contest I've ever seen. Check out the link below; a total of 40 points were earned by 31 participants.

Swag Contest

Swag contest results can be found here and the next game's swag form already available. You can read more about the swag contest here.

SB Nation Coverage

* Boxscore
* Amazin' Avenue Gamethread
* Federal Baseball Gamethread

Win Probability Added

Big winners: Omir Santos, +3.9% WPA, Luis Castillo, +2.8% WPA
Big losers: John Maine, -26.5% WPA, Emil Brown, -11.0% WPA
Teh aw3s0mest play: Santos single in third, +3.6% WPA
Teh sux0rest play: Dunn two-run homerun in first, -14.4% WPA
Total pitcher WPA: -25.9% WPA
Total batter WPA: -24.1% WPA
GWRBI!: Adam Dunn

Game Thread Roll Call

Nice job by JADDENHOPKINS; his effort in the game thread embiggens us all.

Num Name # of Posts
1 JADDENHOPKINS 39
2 supermets 38
3 Michkin 19
4 EMSfan9 18
5 wrightHOF 16
6 lstorie1971 9
7 Prince 9
8 Stearnsfan12 9
9 Major 7
10 Meddler 7

0 recs  |  Comment 16 comments |

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Well

“P.S. This might be the worst swag contest I’ve ever seen. Check out the link below; a total of 40 points were earned by 31 participants.”

Technically you can say 40 points were earned by two of the 31 participants. The rest of us combined for a whopping total of 0!

"We have to find a way to play better, there's no doubt. Overall. I'm not pointing fingers at anybody. Offense, defense, pitching -- we have to find a way to play better. The reality of this is, coming here to Pittsburgh and being swept -- personally, I feel embarrassed." -- Carlos Beltran

by EMSfan9 on Jun 7, 2009 2:58 AM EDT reply actions   0 recs

For realz?

I got in this top total posts with 7? I’m ashamed of all the people who had better things to do tonight than occasionally check the AA gamethread!

Seriously though, fustercluck huh? Whatever, Maine and Pelf were bound to get bombed eventually. Lets just keep it to once a month, aight fellas? Johan can’t pitch every game. Well, maybe he can, but I’d rather not find out. Jerks.

Wow, I was going to try to find something else postiive that Eric missed, but all I had to do was take a look at the Mets WPA leaders for the night, and I immediately regretted that instinct. Omir Santos at 3.9%? I hate saying this phrase more than once, but somehow I feel the urge to say it twice: For realz?

"All energy flows according to the whims of the great magnet

What a fool I was to defy him"

-HST

by Meddler on Jun 7, 2009 4:22 AM EDT reply actions   0 recs

cg and castillo

martis and detwiler have complete games this year. And castillo’s baserunning gaffe is worth a mention. WTF?

by wobatus on Jun 7, 2009 6:20 AM EDT reply actions   0 recs

club record

tied.

5 double plays. At least it keeps those pesky LOBs down.

by wobatus on Jun 7, 2009 8:50 AM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

Something positive

Lidge blew another save!

by SupT on Jun 7, 2009 8:40 AM EDT reply actions   0 recs

Omir Santos sucks.

(I’m going to post this in every game summary until he’s demoted)

"I dunno. I never smoked any Astroturf"
-Tug McGraw

by squid92 on Jun 7, 2009 9:27 AM EDT reply actions   0 recs

Mediocore Baseball not going to cut it in the East

The National League East has to be one of the toughest divisions to play in. If the Mets think that for one second they could just show up for games and teams are just going to give them the victory then its going to be another long and disappointing season with a team thats loaded with talent that just don’t come to play everyday…every week for that matter…

Bigtimemetsfan

by longtimemetfan on Jun 7, 2009 12:00 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

Maybe it's the fact they're missing 40% of their roster...

"I dunno. I never smoked any Astroturf"
-Tug McGraw

by squid92 on Jun 7, 2009 12:24 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

Actually, no

By most measures, the NL East has been the worst division in the NL and arguably the worst in the league thus far. Much of that is due to the awfulness of the Nationals but they do represent 20% of the division. The division’s winning percentage (.473) is better than only the AL Central (.470) and its records against the NL Central (26-37) and NL West (27-34) are abysmal. Interleague play in the next month will determine which league is stronger but if we assume that the AL is still a slightly better league, it’s hard to argue against the NL East as the worst division in the league.

by Zwill on Jun 7, 2009 12:31 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

certainly

not whn they are showing up sans Reyes, Delgado, a healthy Putz, Church

by wobatus on Jun 7, 2009 12:24 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

i'm guessing

that steve phillips and joe morgan had absolutely nothing to do with the new espn boxscores.

by englishgrey on Jun 7, 2009 12:34 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

Yes

The East looks forward to interleague play because they get a chance to play against teams they are better than and my guess is that the Braves, Phillies. Marlons, and the Mets would pad their stats against the rest of the league and then after interleague play we will see who has the worst division.

Bigtimemetsfan

by longtimemetfan on Jun 7, 2009 1:36 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

The Marlons.

Filled with grit and intensity.

by BlackOps on Jun 7, 2009 2:33 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

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