The Pelf

One word to describe Mike Pelfrey's performance last night? Splendiferous. That makes two straight extremely encouraging starts from the former number-nine overall pick. Last week he looked very good against the Phillies, burying that sinker to the tune of a 14-to-2 groundball-to-flyball ratio. Against the Nationals he had the sinker working again, only better this time. He sawed off bats and induced one groundball after another. He allowed four flyball outs overall, but two were pop-ups (statistically-speaking, automatic outs) and a third came in his seventh -- and last -- inning of work.

Pelfrey also struck out four batters, and his game score of 69 was the second-best of his big league career, trailing only the 70 he racked up against the Braves last September. In many ways, last night's start was even better than the one against the Braves. He recorded more groundball outs (12 to 8), pitched an extra inning (7 to 6) and allowed one fewer walk (3 to 2).

I mentioned it in my writeup for yesterday's game thread, but given the injuries to Pedro Martinez and Orlando Hernandez the Mets really need Pelfrey to figure things out this year, and through two starts he certainly seems to be on the right track. I love what I have seen from him so far; if he can be consistent with that sinker, show decent command of his slider and be relaxed and confident in his stuff he is going to be hugely successful. I had serious doubts about him in spring training, not because I didn't think he had the talent, but because he showed a reluctance -- presumably an unintentional one -- to harness his talent towards the ultimate goal of getting big league hitters out. Two nice starts doesn't change all of that, but those butterflies are definitely flying in formation towards the catcher's mitt right now.

Hooray for Willie!

Whatever his reasoning, I give Willie Randolph credit for demoting Proven Veteran™ and Bona Fide Gamer™ Luis Castillo to eighth in the lineup. The move may be short-lived, but I will enjoy it while I can. Despite a slow start, Castillo still has strong on-base skills. He has zippo in the power department, and I kind of like that he'll help turn the lineup over as it gets down to the dregs. I have no objective evidence to this point, but it seems feasible that Castillo's getting on base gives the pitcher something useful to do, namely bunt him over. I normally don't espouse a game plan of sacrificing, but lousy-hitting pitchers are certainly an exception to that rule.

WTF of the night

Ryan Church with the sacrifice bunt in the bottom of the third with Jose Reyes on second and nobody out. I'm guessing he was bunting on his own and with the intention of winding up with a hit, but the play went in the books as a sacrifice and a fairly prepoculous one at that. Seriously, Ryan: WTF?

I love walks

Carlos Beltran has zero homeruns but twelve walks through the season's first dozen games. David Wright has nine walks to go along with fifteen ribs and ten extra-base hits. He's hitting .311/.418/.711. He is teh awes0me.

Oops

I kinda screwed the pooch on last night's game form. There were two questions that had you choose who would reach base more: Ryan Church vs Lastings Milledge and Brian Schneider vs Paul Lo Duca. Well, (a) Paul Lo Duca didn't play. I used Johnny Estrada instead, and he had one HBP to Schneider's bupkis, so those of you who picked Paulie Walnuts will get credit for that question. Church and Milledge each reached base twice, and since I didn't provide a "Same" response, everyone gets it wrong. Sorry!

Per various requests, I will try to get the game forms up earlier in the day. Like, by noon, work permitting. I'm not really an early-riser on the weekends, so I will try to post those the night before for Saturday/Sunday afternoon games.

A cursory glance at Mike Pelfrey's pitching line from last night reveals a good-but-not-necessarily-great performance.

IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	HR	PC-ST	GmSc
5.0	5	2	2	2	3	0	100-66	50

The three strikeouts to two walks is nothing special, and 100 pitches thrown in five innings isn't the kind of efficiency you'd like to see out of your starting pitcher. Two numbers stand out to me, though, and neither appears in his pitching line:

10

2

The first number represents the groundball outs that Pelfrey recorded. The second number represents the flyball outs he recorded. The ratio of the two is what excited me the most about Pelfrey's start, because he is going to be a successful pitching if he can keep the ball on the ground. I wrote at length about Pelfrey back in spring training, and not to get all self-referential on you, but I said this at the time:

Against a crummy St. Louis offense, Pelfrey recorded one out via the whiff, six outs on the ground and seven outs in the air. Quite simply, a groundball ratio like that isn't going to get it done for him. With his slider and changeup as mediocre as they are right now, and his overall control nothing to write home about, Pelfrey is going to get killed if he can't generate a copious supply of groundball outs. If the fastball isn't working, forget about it.

So finally, for the first time in any start I have seen in 2008, spring training included, Pelfrey had his good sinker working for him, and the proof is in his batted ball splits. Even when he allowed base hits to the Phillies the balls were on the ground. All good signs, and extremely encouraging considering that Pelfrey is this team's number four starter now.

Offensively, the Mets racked up eight runs mostly thanks to erratic pitching and defense on the part of the Phillies. Every starting position player for the Mets walked at least once, and they drew (or were issued) nine walks overall. Angel Pagan, batting second in place of the again-injured Luis Castillo, walked twice and knocked in two runs with a double. He may not be an ideal two-hole hitter in the long run, but I don't have a problem with riding him there while he's hot.

Carlos Delgado continues to get on base, reaching twice again last night with a hit and a walk. He's hitting .357/.419/.536 in the early going and, whether or not he keeps it up, it's nice to see the big guy swinging the bat well.

In fact, other than the big three -- David Wright, Carlos Beltran and Jose Reyes, who combined to go 0-for-12 with three walks -- everyone contributed last night. Strangely, the Mets only managed five hits overall, but the nine walks and four Philly errors made up the difference.

If you want to pick nits, after nine consecutive losses the Mets didn't really *beat* the Phillies last night as much as the Phillies beat themselves with sloppy play all over the diamond. 1-9 is a lot better than 0-10, but I'd feel a lot better if the Mets go out and win again tonight without any help from the Phillies.

Ugh, now what? Orlando Hernandez and Mike Pelfrey both had their respective fifth-starter asses handed to them by the Cardinals on Sunday afternoon, further distorting what was already a slowly-developing potato sack race for the last spot in the rotation.

El Duque made his first start of the spring and, after throwing in the mid-seventies during a simulated game last week, was apparently rocking the mid-eighties this time around. Though pretty fast for a jalopy, 85 isn't enough mustard to get the ball by established major leaguers like opposing starting pitcher Todd Wellemeyer (1-for-2 on the day). All told, Hernandez allowed five runs on four hits in just three innings, striking out one and walking two.

Thankfully, I didn't see any of the game when it was on, as I was amidst a marathon five-hour Resident Evil 4 session on Wii. I went back and watched some of it on MLB.tv later on and was surprised to see El Duque look even worse than his pitching line would have you believe. Despite a sweet "Mirror, Mirror" goatee*, El Duque had very spotty control of most of his repertoire and featured a fastball that was noticeably devoid of life.

*Perhaps fitting, as this crappy El Duque must be from a diametrically opposing universe from the real (read: good) El Duque. We'll know for sure if this one stays healthy all year.

I'll concede that we should cut Hernandez some slack; having pitched using his customary stork-kick for so many years, many of them under the iron fist of Ramon Fidel Castro, there is unquestionably an adjustment period as he acclimates himself to pitching like everyone else. Radar gun flakiness notwithstanding, his fastball was reportedly ten clicks quicker on Sunday than it was last week, so given another three weeks it doesn't seem so unreasonable that he could ramp it up to the low-nineties by then. Given the assorted off-days in early April -- scheduled and otherwise -- the Mets won't need a true fifth starter until the middle of the month, so that gives El Duque a bit of leeway as he continues to get himself into playing shape.

El Duque wasn't alone in his brutal suckitude yesterday. Mike Pelfrey, who is also competing for that last rotation spot, was so much worse than El Duque yesterday as to make the Cuban's outing seem decent by comparison. Pelfrey allowed eight runs, all earned, on 13 hits in just 4.1 innings, a bit-spitting of biblical proportions. When Pelfrey struggles it is usually because he can't keep his fastball down, and this game was no exception, as his "sinker" would consistently drift up in the zone. I wrote about this last week, but Pelfrey will continue to fail at this level if he can't induce more groundballs. Sunday was more of the same, as Pelfrey recorded just four outs on the ground, just half of his flyball out total. That ratio needs to be flipped for Pelfrey to be successful.

I'm not the sort of fan/writer/basement dweller to throw around tired baseball platitudes like "step up his game", but Pelfrey has to be kicking himself for letting a golden opportunity to win a starting job with this team slip away. El Duque is a mess right now, and this was the perfect time for Pelfrey to "step up his game" and win the last starter spot out of spring training. Even a decent spring -- 3.50 ERA with so-so peripherals -- would have done it. But, much like intelligent design, that hasn't exactly happened. Pelfrey has an ERA of 8.31 in 17.1 innings and a lousy 6-to-7 strikeout-to-walk ratio. That's called "not getting the job done", whether you're from the new school or the old school.

To make matters worse, the Mets don't even have a passable Plan C. They've got Tony Armas in Triple-A, but he just arrived in the states last week after sorting out some visa issues, so he won't be ready for anything for at least a few weeks. Also, he's Tony Armas.

What else? Jorge Sosa, I guess. He was decent as a starter last year until his weak strikeout-to-walk rate came face-to-face with a little something we like to call "regression to the mean", and *bam*, he turned back into a pumpkin.

What the Mets could really use is a guy like Kyle Lohse, whom the Mets could have had for pennies on the dollar (i.e. $4.25 MM), but for whatever reason they didn't make an offer and Lohse signed with the Cardinals. It's possible that the Mets were interested but Lohse simply preferred a guaranteed spot in the rotation. Whatever the case, one year and $4.25 million seems like a pretty reasonably-priced insurance policy.

So now we wait and see. It may be that both Pelfrey and Hernandez stay behind -- Pelfrey in Triple-A and Hernandez in extended spring training -- until the Mets actually need to call on that fifth starter. Maybe one or both of them will figure things out by then and we'll have gotten all worked up over nothing. One prominent trait of championship teams is player depth*, and the Mets have very little in that department right now, particularly in the rotation. As it stands they have four guys for five spots. What happens if one (or two!) of their other four starters get hurt? Bad things, man. Bad things.

*Unconfirmed, but sounds reasonable.