Game 99, Mets at Mariners
Roenis Elias vs. Jon Niese, 7:10pm
The M’s take a break from intra-divisional contests (and their importance for the wild card chase) to host the Mets, who are still (let me check…) mediocre. I’ll admit I don’t think about the Mets often, but I just sort of assume they’re posting a .450 winning percentage or thereabouts. They’ve won between 70 and 79 games in each of the past five seasons, and that sounds about right for 2014 too. I know the M’s haven’t exactly been the toast of baseball since 2009 and have frequently been worse than mediocre, so I’m not pointing and laughing at them – they’re just freakinshly consistent.
Lefthander Jon Niese gets the start today. Niese has been a guy with a solid control and some sink, so he’s been fairly consistent too. He doesn’t overpower anyone – his four-seamer’s been in the 91 range, and his cutter was generally around 89 – but he had decent command and his curveball gets whiffs to lefties and righties. After some HR problems in his first few years in the rotation, he put up a very good season in 2012 thanks perhaps to increased command. And he did it despite the fact that the Mets brought their outfield in for the 2012 season, and lopped eight feet off the height of the wall. He’s never managed 200 innings, however, and he missed time due to injury in 2013.
He’s just coming off the DL to make this start, in fact. Looking at his peripherals, you see warning signs everywhere. First, his velocity’s down fairly dramatically. After averaging 91+ on his four-seam fastball every year since 2010, he’s down to 89.5 this season. After averaging 30-31% o-swing rate (getting batters to swing at balls) from 2011-12, he’s at just 26% this year. As you’d expect from that, his contact rate is up over three percentage points this season. His GB% is the lowest it’s been since 2010, and his K% the lowest it’s been since 2009. Thus, it’s not exactly a shock to look at his ERA and FIP and find…wait, what? Niese’s ERA is below 3, and his FIP’s staying steady in the mid-3 range, where it dropped to in 2012-13. If you guessed BABIP, yes, that’s clearly part of the explanation. A career .310 BABIP hurler, Niese and his defenders are allowing batters to post only a .283 mark this year. His HR rate’s stayed low, too, and he’s stranded more runners than he has in the past.
Thanks to that curve ball and a solid change-up, Niese’s platoon splits are fairly ordinary. He’s a bit better against lefties, as you’d imagine, but he’s been fairly tough on righties as well. They’re smaller, over his career, than his home/road splits, actually. That sounds promising and all, but essentially all pitchers benefit from Safeco.
The Mets have been a disappointment offensively, but they’ve posted solid defensive numbers; that’s clearly a factor in Niese’s low BABIP.
The line-up:
1: Bloomquist, SS
2: Jones, CF
3: Cano, 2B
4: Seager, 3B
5: Romero, RF
6: Smoak, 1B
7: Hart, DH
8: Ackley, LF
9: Zunino, C
SP: Elias
Go M’s
Z Man!
Need Hart gone, and Saunders back ASAP!
Even Montero could of ran out that grounder that Hart hit, I was secretly hoping he pulled his hammy.
Hart is a failed experiment that I don’t blame Z for. We just need to cut ties and move forward. Sadly, Cory is not a valuable commodity for the Mariners.
The big question is, will they cut ties.. He’s dead weight.
I’m sort of here – only half paying attention to the game.
I agree that Hart needs to go. He was worth a shot, but at this point they can’t afford to keep giving away DH at bats.
Just got home from dinner. Looks like Elias is trying to tiptoe through a minefield again tonight. Hasn’t gotten blown up yet.
You know who is only hitting a teeny tiny bit better than Corey Hart? Justin Smoak.
WFB is 3-3! wowza!
I only have audio, and MLB Audio wasn’t going to give me English feed, only Spanish. I was hoping that wasn’t a bad sign.
“Really. You don’t want to know.”
Juneau are you in the NW? its the free game of the day if your outside of the viewing area.
Every time Ackley, or Smoak, or Montero does well for more than a day or two, I get a tiny bit of hope that they can turn it around. Ackley has hit well now over several games…
This rally brought to you by Hart, Ackley, and WFB!
Nope, in Alaska. The ‘area’ for the Mariners. 🙁
Then J.Jones becomes rally killer.
Our game is free on MLB.tv tonight. Willie is having another good game, Jack Z made a good move bringing him back.
Oh ya the Seahawks are from Alaska as well arent they? lol, that “joke” annoys me.
lol got a text alert from ESPN app –
July 21, 1988 – Yankees traded OF Jay Buhner to the Mariners in a deal for DH Ken Phelps.
Made me laugh, but I had to look at it twice because at first I thought we just made a trade.
Elias being hurt would be pretty bad. The pitching depth would get tested really quick. At least it sounds like Paxton is getting close.
Yep….totally against George Costanza’s level-headed advice!
Ackley did a thing – on defense!!
Hey-hey!!!
So, Dustin Ackley just did that…. pretty cool, haven’t seen our guys pull one back from someone in a while.
Man I wish all these kids were good. You look in that dugout and it’s mostly guys that grew up as Mariners in A-AAA. They obviously get along and play hard for each other. Wish Smoak, Franklin, Ackley, Zunino (offensively), Miller, Romero, Paxton, Walker and Ramirez would all come of age. It would be so enjoyable to see this group improve and get it done!
woah, thats where Dice-K went.
What are all those marks all over the back of his neck, strange.
Along the lines of the kids getting good, Scott Weber at LL wrote today about being afraid to trade Nick Franklin to the A’s for fear that they will fix him and he’ll be really good. And it’s such an indictment of this organization, feeling that the players might be so much better if they were somewhere else.
Just saw the replay of Zunino’s home run. My goodness that young man is strong.
Yeah, the whole Dice-K ending up with the Mets bullpen is really sad.
nice hit hart, to bad you can’t do that when there’s someone on base, its like scoring in a blow out in the NFL, it don’t even matter.
Ackley with his third hit. I like it while it lasts.
D-Farq best mop-up guy in the majors???
What a nasty pitch to Tejada!
Dustin Ackley, MVP!
Gee nice comments about Ack and WFB – WTF
Tonight anyways! Go M’s!!
Smoak sent to AAA. Wonder who’s replacing him? Montero?
Erasmo?
Sounds like it’s Erasmo, but I wonder who comes up when Erasmo goes back down.
They need to bring Montero up again and give him regular at bats. It sounds like he’s a prick, but he’s a prick that can hit better than all but a couple guys currently on the roster. Assign Endy and Boom Boom to mentor and/or dope slap him depending on the situation – this is the sort of situation where veteran leadership might offer a tangible benefit.
I’m glad LoMo is getting an extended look at first base.
I still think it’s time to part ways with Hart.
Divish thinks Walker comes up to start Wednesday’s game.
Westy-
I LIKE that idea… Endy gets DFA’d if Montero gains too much weight, and Willie gets cut if Montero says anything stupid to the media.
Make it someone ELSE’s responsibility to keep him on the straight and narrow, since he can’t do it.
Genius!