They say the devil shows up at your door when you are most vulnerable. When a Mets fan is most vulnerable, Jason Vargas is the starting pitcher. The devil leads you into temptation, which lies about four innings further than Jason Vargas would ever take you.
You wouldn’t think that the devil would show up at your door just to have ice cream, but I guess that’s a different type of temptation. In his start against the Braves on Wednesday, Vargas brought a different type of temptation. Five scoreless innings brought temptation to Mickey Callaway to use his bullpen all crazy and what not. Tim Peterson, called up at the age of 27, pitched two innings in what was initially a one run game for him. Peterson made Callaway look smart for pulling Vargas after only 65 pitches, albeit on three days rest, by pitching a scoreless sixth and only giving up a run in the seventh after the Mets had stretched their lead to two runs.
Then Jeurys Familia came in to pitch the eighth against the heart of the Braves order. With runners on first and third base, this happened:
“@Amed_Rosario saves the day!!” — Gary pic.twitter.com/fLhmROfSzR
— SNY (@SNYtv) May 31, 2018
(Sidebar: Amed Rosario was the number one prospect in all of baseball once. Since he came up he’s hit a couple of home runs here and there but as somebody who had the title of “best prospect”, he’s been slow to live up to it. It happens. But that game saving play was the first time … at least for me … that I got really, really excited about Rosario. Hopefully, it acts as some sort of gateway to Lindor Land.)
Then an odd thing happened. Familia, who was inserted into the game without a double switch, was pinch hit for to start the ninth. Robert Gsellman acted as closer for the game after Familia faced the law firm of Inciarte, Albies, Freeman and Markakis. Gsellman got the save while pitching to the lower part of the order. This has been what Mets fans have been waiting for, and perhaps now that Callaway has done it once without it ending in a 57 run inning (which most of his bullpen changes seem to end in these days), maybe this will now happen more often. There have been a couple of times where it could have happened in the past, where Familia could have come in for the eighth against more formidable parts of the order. Perhaps there was hesitation on Callaway’s part during those games … a bit of nerves, perhaps. But now that this has been done without, say, the stadium being set on fire, it will open the door for further temptation.
Today’s Hate List
- Dammit, Camargo again?
- He hit another home run into the same corner.
- Can we stop getting corners named after ballplayers …
- … who hit home runs against the Mets?
- Jeez.
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