Ya Gotta Believe. . .Right?

I remember when I was this optimistic. Now that I am breaking into the world of media, reality has hit me. For the past six years this team has broken my heart. However, this season could be different. My radio host for Downtown Sports on Brookyln College Radio WBCR 1090-AM has high hopes for the second half of this season. I now give to you John “Mouth of the South” Schiavone’s second half prophecy:

This blog is going to be mindblowing. I don’t want to bore you with all the facts, figures, and statistics that will go along with this because, quite honestly, if you’re reading this, you know it all already so, I’m just going to jump right into it. The second half is ripe for the New York Mets to actually make a little noise in this playoff race.

I know what you’re thinking…..this guy is nuts. Mouth is out of his mind again. He’s spouting idiocy but this time he’s putting it in writing for the whole world to see. There is no way in hell the Mets will do anything other than be a sub 500 team with less than 80 wins. Well, your wrong. DEAD wrong and let me get into the reasons why.

REASON 1 THE METS WILL BE INVOLVED IN THE PLAYOFF RACE- Their schedule.

Let’s take a look at the Mets recent play. They went into the break winning 8 of their last 10 games putting them to 5 games under 500 while most would have predicted them being at least 10 under. I know no team is as good as its best hot streak and yes Mets fans, this is a hot streak. Now, they are coming back to a ten game road trip, but they are starting against a weak Padres team that they should be able to take 2 out of 3 from, they then move onto play the Mariners in Seattle. I predict the Mets should lose 2 of 3 there. So 6 out of the 10 games are done with a 3 and 3 record. Then the Mets move onto play the Brewers. This is a team that is fading fast in the NL Central and if the Mets can keep getting good at-bats and fine starting performances, they can take 3 out of four games there. That means they finish the road trip 6-4 and then they return home to take on a struggling Phillies team that I believe they should be able to sweep with little to no trouble. That means that by the end of July, they could be .500! Nothing I am saying so far is completely insane. The Mets are catching one good team, one team who is [coming back down to Earth,] and two bad teams at a really good time considering that they are playing their best baseball of the season. Duda is hitting, Granderson is getting his stroke back, Murph is playing like an allstar and you get possibly your best starter in Dillon Gee back. Granted they lost Jon Niese but DeGrom and Dice-K are filling in nicely and Colon and Wheeler both seem pretty solid. Also don’t forget that the Mets figure to get Niese back soon and he is typically strong in the second half of the year.

Lets move onto August where the Mets will take on a Giants team that is also [losing some ground] in the NL west and find themselves sitting in second place currently after having a dominant start to the season. The Mets, at home, should be able to take two out of four at the least from them, and then comes a real test for them against the second place Nationals on the road. If the Mets can take two out of three from them, then they go back to Philly to beat up on the Phillies some more. That can put them at anywhere from two to four games above .500 by the time they return home to play the nationals on August 12^th. That’s a seven game jump that is at the very least, plausible. If this happens and the Mets can take 2 out of 3 from Washington at home, they then get the Cubs, who are terrible! Say they sweep that series. That means they can be anywhere from 7 to 10 games above .500! This puts them in PRIME position to make noise in the playoff race because after that, most of their series will be against teams in their own division (e.g.) The Marlins, The Braves, The Phillies and The Nationals. These are all teams the Mets play decently against as they are 21-20 against the National League East. They will need to build upon this in order to make the playoffs but if this team can play reasonably well they can make noise. Notice how none of what was said here means they need to go on some sort of major winning streak. They don’t. They just have to do whats expected of them against teams they should have an easy time handling. 

Reason Number 2- PITCHING

The Mets are plus 19 in run differential, only allowing 364 runs to score this year. They are 10^th in the major leagues in ERA with 3.50. That mark puts them at 8^th in the NL. Meaning they give up less than 4 runs a game generally. They have 59 quality starts this season. There are only 4 teams in the NL with more and surprise surprise, all but one would make the playoffs if the season would end today, and the team that’s not playoff bound is one game back from the wildcard.  If these numbers keep up, they are just bound to win more games than they lose in the second half of the season. The fact they are 5 games under right now is due to their hitters not getting the job done in the early part of the season, however, this is starting to look like an issue that is clearing up. Since firing their hitting coach, the Mets are making strides at the plate so if the pitching keeps putting up this kind of a performance, they should be able to pick up some ground in the standings.

Reason Number 3- Their finally starting to hit!

Now this is the most faulty of the reasons but let’s take a look at the Mets offense in their last 7 games. In their last 7 games, as a team, they are hitting .287 with 19 doubles, 7 home runs, and an ops of .814. So that’s 237 plate appearances and 68 hits. Out of those 68 hits 27 of them have gone for two or more bases, meaning their driving the ball. Im not saying that they are going to keep on hitting this way for the season, but if they keep some of this up, they are going to score runs and with the pitching they have, they should win more games than they lose.

Now I know this all seems very optimistic and farfetched. I understand that I can be grasping at straws to say their going to defy the odds and make the playoffs. Currently ESPN has them at a 17 percent shot to make it. I wont go as far as to say they will either. However, I think if they can build off of what they did going into the all star break, keep pitching well, and get that team batting average up to about .260, they can make some noise.  This is, of course, taking into account that the Mets don’t trade anyone like a Daniel Murphy or a Bartolo Colon away. If they do, throw this out the window, but for now…..I can dream a little bit…..right?

Tell me your thoughts on the comments below. Thanks and keep believing Mets Fans.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2R2sH2ScBM]