He Needs A Manuel: Giants 2, Mets 0

The Mets combined poor hitting with poorer managing to drop the series finale against the Giants, falling shy of the four-game sweep we were all clamoring for. The Mets somehow managed to leave only nine men on base, but that's a tad misleading because it only counts runners left on at the end of an inning. Run your finger down the LOB column of the boxscore and you've got a slew of crooked numbers.

Tatis: 2
Castillo: 1
Beltran: 2
Sheffield: 4
Murphy: 1
Pagan: 3
Reed: 4
Pelfrey: 2
Church: 1

As a team the Mets officially left nine men on base, but individually (and in aggregate) they actually stranded twenty baserunners in nine innings (actually eight since they went down like dogs in the ninth). Astonishingly, Omir Santos doesn't appear on this list anywhere, but he makes up for it by sucking at everything he does (case in point: his edgy .283 on-base percentage).

Jerry Manuel's Retarded Move of the Day: Already covered.

Overshadowed by the Mets' offensive ineptitude and Jerry Manuel's indefensible managing was Mike Pelfrey's outing which, despite three balks (?), was actually quite a success. He allowed just eight baserunners in six innings (one by intentional walk) and induced ten groundballs to just six flyballs. He struck out only two batters, but his strikeout rate of 5.88% should still go up as a result. The Giants aren't a particularly adept offensive machine, but you have to take your silver linings where you can get them.

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
* McCovey Chronicles Gamethread

Win Probability Added

Big winners: Carlos Beltran, +11.3% WPA, Mike Pelfrey, +5.0% WPA
Big losers: Angel Pagan, -26.0% WPA, Gary Sheffield, -20.1% WPA, Jerry Manuel, -INF %WPA
Teh aw3s0mest play: Beltran double in eighth, +18.7% WPA
Teh sux0rest play: Pagan GIDP in eighth, -26.0% WPA
Total pitcher WPA: +9.1% WPA
Total batter WPA: -59.1% WPA
GWRBI!: Bengie Molina

Game Thread Roll Call

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