Blame It On The Rain (Or Not)

What’s really messed up about Monday’s loss, when you think about it, is that the team that benefitted most from the rain was the team that never sees it.

Okay, so Jeremy Hefner was good in his first major league start until a 68 minute rain delay. And then he came out and was complete garbage. He basically went from Cliff Lee to Lee Guetterman before our very eyes. These things do happen, and when they happen around thunderstorms, they happen in spades. But here’s my question: When the rain delay ended, Hefner warmed up quickly as if it was a normal inning. Yet Padres starter Eric Stults was given all the time he needed after the delay. The umpires obviously wouldn’t give one pitcher that courtesy and not the other. So why wouldn’t the Mets let Hefner know that he had that option? Did the umpires let Hefner know? It shouldn’t be the responsibility of a pitcher making his first major league start to know this. Eric Stults knew it. Hefner didn’t know? Terry Collins said after the game that Hefner was suitably warmed up … well, obviously not.

That I can live with (like I have a choice in the matter). What I can’t live with is giving up 11 runs to an offense that came into the game hitting .220 and giving up four doubles and a home run to a team that was dead last in baseball in slugging percentage. And that’s not even mentioning Everth Cabrera who had two hits all year (albeit in six games) and four on Monday. For the love of hump, this is a team whose first pinch hitter off the bench was Jeff Suppan. Jeff Suppan! The guy that had the series of his damn life in 2006 against the Mets and then collected a paycheck in Milwaukee equipped with a ski mask and a gun. That guy!!! This is the team that dropped sexy legs on the Mets. Could it be that Citi Field looks like a studio apartment in Manhattan compared to Petco Park? Or could it just be that outside of David Wright this game was more Tacoma vs. Buffalo than New York vs. San Diego? Ehhhhhh, could be. So I’m not going to go crazy over the Padres creaming the likes of Hefner and Rob Carson.

But Manny Acosta has no excuse, rain or no rain. And I’m done with him. I don’t know who he has compromising pictures of, and I don’t care. He’s gotta be on the next train to Buffalo. And he can take Rob Johnson with him. That seventh inning that those two gave us, an inning which started just after Wright had put the Mets back into the game with a two run bomb to center, was a complete joke. Bad enough that Acosta is terrible. And bad enough that Ramon Ramirez tweaking his foot or ankle during the game means that cutting Acosta is even less likely than is was before. But when Johnson walked towards the dugout after Nick Hundley struck out thinking it was three outs while Chase Headley stole second, it put a dagger in me. It almost doesn’t matter that Acosta continued on his path to dreck. Johnson’s mental error was horrific. Look, outfielders forget the number of outs all the time. They’re bored out there. Most of them are scouring the stands for pretty women. Some of them are trying to come up with the next prime number in their head. But catchers? They’re controlling the game. And not for nothing, Citi Field has a large billion dollar edifice called a scoreboard, which is facing the catcher! That’s one of the perks of being in the major leagues … big scoreboards that directly face the catcher. And yet, Rob Johnson cost the Mets two runs with a trillion dollar scoreboard staring him in the face. Unbelieveable.

And now the Mets move to the part of the program where they get shut down by a guy who has had 11 career starts. It’s just a normal Friday in Flushing.