The Mets have run some bad lineups out there in the past. So anybody who's watched the Mets for a while would have recognized a "B" lineup when they took a look at the Dodgers' lineup card Thursday night.
No Matt Kemp. No Andre Ethier. No secondary offensive stars to help when they were in there to begin with. That's how you end up with Juan Rivera hitting in your third spot. That's how you end up with a starting lineup that features Matt Treanor as your only hitter showing production that's even within 10% of the league average. That's how you end up with Adam Kennedy getting meaningful at-bats.
No reason to be too harsh -- after all, the Mets have been there before -- but it does color the outing a little.
Chris Young seemed great, actually. He struck out six over six and a third, and somehow everyone was missing his 85 mph fastball at the letters. He didn't walk a batter, and nobody was doing a great job centering the ball. Then again, allowing a double to tiny little Dee Gordon and a triple to Elian Herrera, well, that's not great.
On the other hand, there were unmitigated positives to take away. The bullpen didn't face the best, but they got eight outs and only allowed two baserunners. Sure, Bobby Parnell only faced Scott Van Slyke, Adam Kennedy, and the corpse of Bobby Abreu, but he looked good. He hit triple digits multiple times, used his other offerings, and generally kept the batters off-balance. That was a soothing balm for the barking hammy that has been the Mets bullpen all year this year.
David Wright is also legitimately great. He doubled in the first to score Ruben Tejada. He made a beautiful one-handed diving throw to first to beat Dee Gordon on a bunt-for-hit attempt in the early going, and didn't look back. He homered in the fourth. He walked in the eighth inning and broke the Mets record for walks. It would be tempting to call him a one-man show on the position player side of the ball.
But there were other standout performances. Ruben Tejada was legitimately strong on defense all game. He also got a hit and scored a run! Andres Torres doubled home the winning run! He was also hit by a pitch! (He also stole third for no reason and then was thrown out by a good margin by a bad throw in the ninth inning, but hey.) Mike Nickeas walked and singled! That's something.
So David Wright, Ruben Tejada, Andres Torres, Chris Young and Bobby Parnell were the standouts. And the competition wasn't fierce. They still won a game they should have, and it still went in the correct column. And Friday the Mets throw R.A. Dickey at that lineup.
SB Nation Coverage
* Traditional Recap
* Boxscore
* Amazin' Avenue Gamethread
* True Blue LA Gamethread
Win Probability Added
Big winners: David Wright +22%, Bobby Parnell +17%, Jon Rauch +13%
Big losers: Lucas Duda -10%
Teh aw3s0mest play: Andres Torres doubled to right, Mike Nickeas scored, +18.2% WPA
Teh sux0rest play: Elian Herrera triples, Dee Gordon scores, -18.3% WPA
Total pitcher WPA: +49% WPA
Total batter WPA: +1% WPA
GWRBI!: Andres Torres