Mets Walk-Offs And Minutiae

My last post actually reminded me of something. The link below takes you to a list of Mets promotional dates for the 2009 season. http://newyork.mets.mlb.com/schedule/promotions.jsp?c_id=nym Notice something odd? There is not one promotion related to the 40th anniversary of the 1969 team. There have been a lot of complaints in the media and by fellow bloggers about the Mets failure to honor their history. I haven't seen any of them mention this. Just for the heck of it, I looked up 3 teams celebrating anniversaries this year. The Athletics (1989), Tigers (1984) and Dodgers (1959) all have promotions related to celebrating past championships. Heck, the Pirates have a day in which they are commemorating the 100th anniversary of a championship, by giving away "1909 Honus Wagner" figurines. The games of June 23, August 2 and August 22 are all listed as generic "Promotion" dates. Here's a few ideas for the Mets on what they could do for those dates, beyond the ba

The 1969 Mets started 6-9 too. True Metssimists know... Albert Pujols is the first player with a 2-HR, 4-run game against the Mets since...Gary Sheffield in 2004. It's also the first time in 35 years that the Cardinals had a relief pitcher allow six runs IN A WIN. The last to do so was Al Hrabosky, in a 13-12 walk-off victory that put the Cardinals into first place in the NL East on September 25, 1974. The Cardinals trailed the Pirates, 12-9 in the bottom of the 11th, but scored four times to win. The last three runs came in via ex-Mets Joe Torre (reached via error by Rennie Stennett, plating two) and Jim Dwyer (sacrifice fly).

I'm not convinced that Daniel Murphy slipped. I think he was trying to avoid the baseball for safety's sake. I say that because we've seen that sort of thing in St. Louis before, in a similar kind of gakking encounter. I've alluded to the game of June 1, 1991 once before and the memory of it is still etched in the brain some 18 years later. It was a similar sort of affair, one in which the Mets built a 5-0 lead with single runs in the first and second, and a 3-spot in the fourth.. But once the Cardinals bullpen went to work, the Mets bats went silent. A Frank Viola balk aided a three-run Cardinals fourth. An error by Kevin Elster led to another tally in the fifth and then a miscue by Rick Cerone eventually brought the tying run home in the seventh. The Mets did nothing over a five-inning span against Scott Terry and Lee Smith, than went into full Bad News Bears mode in the 10th. The Mets managed three hits and a walk, and only one batter made out, yet they did not sco

Like the Mets, I can read the writing on the wall...(pardon the pun, fans of Dwight Gooden's signature) The readers have spoken (well, not really), so I have some more information to share regarding Saturday's win. Thanks to the help of David Smith of Retrosheet , I can tell you that it was the 8th "Caught-Off" win in Mets history. A Caught-Off is hereby defined as a Mets win that ends with a runner caught stealing. Here's his list of dates, and a few details... 07-06-1968 NYN at PHI CS2(26) I'm not sure why Phillies slugger Dick Allen was trying to steal second base with his team down 11-6 with two outs in the 9th, but Jerry Grote threw him out for a rather odd ending to a game in which the Mets managed their biggest offensive output of the season. Second baseman Phil Linz was the offensive star, raising his batting average from .188 to .231 with a 5-hit game. 05-03-1970(2) NYN at SDN K+CS2(24)/DP Cito Gaston beat the Mets in the opener of a doubleheader with

Harkening back to Saturday for a few minutes... * Saturday's win was the 118th regular season 1-0 win in Mets history. It was their first since June 23, 2007, which was a 1-0 walk-off win against the Athletics. The Mets went all of 2008 without a 1-0 win. * It was the 2nd time the Mets beat the Brewers 1-0. The other instance was April 26, 2002, when Shawn Estes flirted with a no-hitter, and ended up with a one-hit shutout. * It was the 2nd time that Jose Reyes had the only RBI in a 1-0 win. The other was on April 13, 2005, in a walk-off win against the Astros. * It was Johan Santana's 5th career 1-0 win, his first with the Mets. It was the 27th time that Santana won a start in which he allowed 0 runs. Those 27 tie for most in the majors since 2002, with Tim Hudson. * In what must be one of the most bizarre coincidences of all-time, since joining the Mets, Santana has five wins in which he allowed 0 runs. The final scores of those games, IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER, are 5-0 (Giants)