Want to point out another falsehood. Brazoban comes in and they show his 0.00 ERA. It’s bullshit. His inherited runners that score should be like 9. Even allowed one more for Senga yesterday before he got out of the inning. This is another Mendy thing that drives me nuts. Brazoban cannot pitch with runners on. He is great when he comes in starting an inning but every outing he has come in with runners on he has allowed runs to hit the guy before him. He did it big time with Peralta. Allowed 2 more runs to hit his line. This isn’t new. He has done it since he’s been here. How nobody sees it baffles me.
Nice job, Andrew. I think your screed speaks for many of us who saw this coming in February and March. This is patch job - there's really no other way to put it.
This is why I predicted an 82-80 season on pre-Opening Day.
There's no reliable, let alone equivalent, replacements for Diaz and Pete and the starting pitching is shaky at best. Add on the fact that we still have no 3B or 1B and the outfield isn't going to win any Gold Gloves either.
It's a mess.
Yes, they'll win games and go on a streak or two, but it won't, imo, add up to even 85 wins.
I definitely agree with you. The lineup is weaker than it was last year. With Nimmo and Alonso leaving that is over 60 home runs and over 200 RBI. And Stearns replaced Alonso with Young/Baty/Vientos and Nimmo with Robert? Semien is good defensively but not a good hitter. And Bichette is out of position. This is the team that Stearns built. On top of that 3 starters are getting hit. No surprise that the Mets are not performing well.
I generally find the GM talking akin to listening to a politician trying to sell you something.
The hits were nice. Not so nice? Both teams had the same number of hits, and one team scored 8 more runs.
I'm sick of the bad team play. They make errors. They misplay balls. They make bad choices on the bases. If the manager and coaches aren't to blame here, why are they there? No. The manager has agency. What is his job, exactly, if not to address this sort of thing?
I'm okay with Benge's first season learning process.
They made a bunch of changes. But they left the same manager and mostly the same starting rotation. The starting rotation is a problem. Other than your young ace, who you can't expect to be perfect season-long, your other two mostly reliable starters often won't even go six innings. So you stretch your still-unreliable pen. If you wanted to change the coaches and a bunch of position players, why leave the rotation mostly the same? It's an "if everything goes right" affair.
Fire the manager and get rid of at least one starter. Get an inning eater. And learn how (curse) to play the game better.
Stearns to me has been a smug arrogant asshole since day one. He believes he’s the smartest guy in the room and while that may have worked in Milwaukee there are plenty of Mets fans who know baseball and just because they don’t have that fancy Harvard degree knew going into the season that there were holes with this team. Hoping and wishing don’t win ball games. Stearns even with his Mets fandom isn’t going to snow Mets diehards. The press can circle the wagons all they want and write puff pieces with cliches that are meant to calm down the fan base or give false hope. This new season is looking like the old season of last year and if the team continues to play this brand of baseball it falls on management. Sorry David. Uncle Steve waited for you for three years and your grade so far is C-/D+. To take a quote from Al Davis. Just win baby. That’s all that matters. It doesn’t matter how you do it. Just Win!!
There was concern about a 6 man rotation but it's really down to a 3 man rotation and it's still April ... not because of injuries, but just lousy pitching. Are we going to see bullpen games in April?
Yes. All true with the exception that Diaz's departure may not be Stearns's fault. If our Mets don't make the playoffs, it would astound if Stearns isn't shown the door. Senga started off so well this season, shame he's crumbled.
Yes, who knows what Diaz wanted? I don't really blame him for being sick of the mess in NY & going to the Dodgers. Who wouldn't want to go to such a winning team?
This is at best a reactionary and short sighted blog post. Do you want to know what else the GM is responsible for? The Met's having on of the top farm systems in baseball. Also, a pitching lab that is in the top of the gave developing young arms. They just installed a corresponding batting lab that will begin to show the same production soon. If you chase Stearns out of town - you'll lose all of that and we will go back to Endy Chavez types and batting coaches for the who damn system. You'll have GM's trade our top prospects for even worse aging vets. Sure Stearns took some shots that don't look great right now, but we still have one of the top prospect lists in the game after it. The season is still early - try to keep it together so we don't lose everything we've gained in Stearns tenure. We are just now beginning to see the long term benefits of this work.
Oh wow~ as Gary Cohen would say! This is one brilliant & magnificent tell it like it is editorial, & the absolute best i have seen! It's a heartbreaking disgrace to be honest, to have not even offered our precious & most beloved power hitter, & record breaking Pete Alonso, a contract when he wanted to stay with all his heart! Stearns never showed him the care & love he sooo deserved, as Pete is a wonderful person. & He broke all the fans hearts & broke apart the team in the worst possible way. Switching around players to fill in for new positions, & have them not play up to their potential is also cruel. Brett Baty in an interview after the Cubs game, was pale, heartbroken & speechless. He ruined the team & broke their hearts, & Pete is struggling to live up to all his new expectations, & even he fought back tears. Had Pete returned, he would have began where he had left off. All the other players that didn't return are flourishing elsewhere. Stearns is the worst GM ever & as a human being as well, as he has no heart. He broke all the hearts of the players, new & old , & all the fans. The only goodness is that Pete is loved & cared about where he is now, & he & his precious family deserve gold, for he has a heart of gold! Wishing the players goodness to overcome all this, as they had a wonderful Spring training together & were happy, it's truly heartbreaking for the players, as they are demoralized & not living up to their potential, & for us & all the fans whose hearts have also been broken, & wishing for goodness for our beloved Mets!
If they were playing small b-ball, I'd be here for it. The dreamer in me says they'll make it do th NLCS, and they can give a (very) little nod to the '86 Mets and Howie Rose.
However...the reality is the trio of Senga, Manaea, and Peterson ain't even REMOTELY close to Seaver, Koosman, and Matlack.
Besides talent, the '73 staff had guts.
As I've stated here a few times, I don't see Uncle Stevie sticking with Stearns after this year.
I agreed with breaking up the “core” who had made the playoffs in 2 of 7 seasons. The crazy thing is Stearns was able to build a consistent winner in Milwaukee with a significantly lower payroll. I don’t think he knows what to do when he has unlimited money to spend.
I was willing to go along with it, though the replacements are questionable so far & they left the manager and starting rotation mostly intact. In for a penny, in for a pound, I say.
Want to point out another falsehood. Brazoban comes in and they show his 0.00 ERA. It’s bullshit. His inherited runners that score should be like 9. Even allowed one more for Senga yesterday before he got out of the inning. This is another Mendy thing that drives me nuts. Brazoban cannot pitch with runners on. He is great when he comes in starting an inning but every outing he has come in with runners on he has allowed runs to hit the guy before him. He did it big time with Peralta. Allowed 2 more runs to hit his line. This isn’t new. He has done it since he’s been here. How nobody sees it baffles me.
Nice job, Andrew. I think your screed speaks for many of us who saw this coming in February and March. This is patch job - there's really no other way to put it.
This is why I predicted an 82-80 season on pre-Opening Day.
There's no reliable, let alone equivalent, replacements for Diaz and Pete and the starting pitching is shaky at best. Add on the fact that we still have no 3B or 1B and the outfield isn't going to win any Gold Gloves either.
It's a mess.
Yes, they'll win games and go on a streak or two, but it won't, imo, add up to even 85 wins.
Back to the drawing board, Steve.
I definitely agree with you. The lineup is weaker than it was last year. With Nimmo and Alonso leaving that is over 60 home runs and over 200 RBI. And Stearns replaced Alonso with Young/Baty/Vientos and Nimmo with Robert? Semien is good defensively but not a good hitter. And Bichette is out of position. This is the team that Stearns built. On top of that 3 starters are getting hit. No surprise that the Mets are not performing well.
Since the expansion of the playoffs, less than 6 teams have made the playoffs being 6+ games out in April. I think this statistic says it all.
I generally find the GM talking akin to listening to a politician trying to sell you something.
The hits were nice. Not so nice? Both teams had the same number of hits, and one team scored 8 more runs.
I'm sick of the bad team play. They make errors. They misplay balls. They make bad choices on the bases. If the manager and coaches aren't to blame here, why are they there? No. The manager has agency. What is his job, exactly, if not to address this sort of thing?
I'm okay with Benge's first season learning process.
They made a bunch of changes. But they left the same manager and mostly the same starting rotation. The starting rotation is a problem. Other than your young ace, who you can't expect to be perfect season-long, your other two mostly reliable starters often won't even go six innings. So you stretch your still-unreliable pen. If you wanted to change the coaches and a bunch of position players, why leave the rotation mostly the same? It's an "if everything goes right" affair.
Fire the manager and get rid of at least one starter. Get an inning eater. And learn how (curse) to play the game better.
They should have brought Quintana back instead of Manaea. Q is that innings eater and takes the ball every 5 days.
I was surprised that Quintana didn't generate much interest this winter. Mets weren't alone.
Dude is playing for the Rockies. That’s nuts.
Well, it also suggests that many teams didn't think he was worth picking up.
I thought he was a fine pick-up at the time. At this point, I don't know how much he has left. I wish him well.
Stearns to me has been a smug arrogant asshole since day one. He believes he’s the smartest guy in the room and while that may have worked in Milwaukee there are plenty of Mets fans who know baseball and just because they don’t have that fancy Harvard degree knew going into the season that there were holes with this team. Hoping and wishing don’t win ball games. Stearns even with his Mets fandom isn’t going to snow Mets diehards. The press can circle the wagons all they want and write puff pieces with cliches that are meant to calm down the fan base or give false hope. This new season is looking like the old season of last year and if the team continues to play this brand of baseball it falls on management. Sorry David. Uncle Steve waited for you for three years and your grade so far is C-/D+. To take a quote from Al Davis. Just win baby. That’s all that matters. It doesn’t matter how you do it. Just Win!!
There was concern about a 6 man rotation but it's really down to a 3 man rotation and it's still April ... not because of injuries, but just lousy pitching. Are we going to see bullpen games in April?
Yes. All true with the exception that Diaz's departure may not be Stearns's fault. If our Mets don't make the playoffs, it would astound if Stearns isn't shown the door. Senga started off so well this season, shame he's crumbled.
Yes, who knows what Diaz wanted? I don't really blame him for being sick of the mess in NY & going to the Dodgers. Who wouldn't want to go to such a winning team?
This is at best a reactionary and short sighted blog post. Do you want to know what else the GM is responsible for? The Met's having on of the top farm systems in baseball. Also, a pitching lab that is in the top of the gave developing young arms. They just installed a corresponding batting lab that will begin to show the same production soon. If you chase Stearns out of town - you'll lose all of that and we will go back to Endy Chavez types and batting coaches for the who damn system. You'll have GM's trade our top prospects for even worse aging vets. Sure Stearns took some shots that don't look great right now, but we still have one of the top prospect lists in the game after it. The season is still early - try to keep it together so we don't lose everything we've gained in Stearns tenure. We are just now beginning to see the long term benefits of this work.
At this point I can hope for the best, and expect the worst till a change occurs. Right now, go Knicks!
Oh wow~ as Gary Cohen would say! This is one brilliant & magnificent tell it like it is editorial, & the absolute best i have seen! It's a heartbreaking disgrace to be honest, to have not even offered our precious & most beloved power hitter, & record breaking Pete Alonso, a contract when he wanted to stay with all his heart! Stearns never showed him the care & love he sooo deserved, as Pete is a wonderful person. & He broke all the fans hearts & broke apart the team in the worst possible way. Switching around players to fill in for new positions, & have them not play up to their potential is also cruel. Brett Baty in an interview after the Cubs game, was pale, heartbroken & speechless. He ruined the team & broke their hearts, & Pete is struggling to live up to all his new expectations, & even he fought back tears. Had Pete returned, he would have began where he had left off. All the other players that didn't return are flourishing elsewhere. Stearns is the worst GM ever & as a human being as well, as he has no heart. He broke all the hearts of the players, new & old , & all the fans. The only goodness is that Pete is loved & cared about where he is now, & he & his precious family deserve gold, for he has a heart of gold! Wishing the players goodness to overcome all this, as they had a wonderful Spring training together & were happy, it's truly heartbreaking for the players, as they are demoralized & not living up to their potential, & for us & all the fans whose hearts have also been broken, & wishing for goodness for our beloved Mets!
If they were playing small b-ball, I'd be here for it. The dreamer in me says they'll make it do th NLCS, and they can give a (very) little nod to the '86 Mets and Howie Rose.
However...the reality is the trio of Senga, Manaea, and Peterson ain't even REMOTELY close to Seaver, Koosman, and Matlack.
Besides talent, the '73 staff had guts.
As I've stated here a few times, I don't see Uncle Stevie sticking with Stearns after this year.
I agreed with breaking up the “core” who had made the playoffs in 2 of 7 seasons. The crazy thing is Stearns was able to build a consistent winner in Milwaukee with a significantly lower payroll. I don’t think he knows what to do when he has unlimited money to spend.
I was willing to go along with it, though the replacements are questionable so far & they left the manager and starting rotation mostly intact. In for a penny, in for a pound, I say.