Pirates 10 Mets 7: Death By Papercuts

My God, was that painful to watch. Once again, the Mets allow a 5-0 lead to slip away, as this time the Pirates successfully cashed in opportunities afforded to them by a generous Mets team. Tonight's game was courtesy of the defense and the pitching. Hell, might as well throw timely hitting in their as well, as one can't count on two RBI's from the pitchers spot every night, can they? (Tonight, they did, thanks to Brian Lawrence).



One could point to the two out, eighth inning throw by David Wright on a seemingly routine ground ball to third base. With the game tied for the home half, the throw winds up well past substitute first baseman Shawn Green, and the Pirate player winds up at second base. At which point pitcher Aaron Heilman breaks down into " pitching for batting practice" mode, the same manner in which Aaron Sele did the night before, and gives up three straight singles. Combine those hits with the dropped ball on a play at the plate that substitute catcher Mike DiFelice made (in all honesty, that's the worst play I've seen him make since both Paul LoDuca and Ramon Castro went down with injuries four games ago.......but then again, he is the third string catcher). It all adds up to heartache again, made worse by the Phillies winning to pull within two and a half games of the division lead.




There are factors that add to the aggravation in this series with the Pirates: the 5-4 win by the Mets on Tuesday was made possible by the fact that the Pirates could not continue to make the clutch hit despite grabbing the early lead, and yesterday's game was another doozy: the Mets score 5 in the first, and let the Pirates get four runs up until the ninth inning. Then, the Mets score 5 in the ninth to seemingly ice the win with a 10-4 lead. Billy Wagner had been warming up to pitch in the ninth, but with such a large lead, it wasn't deemed necessary, so then Sele gets in their and allows four runs before Wagner is forced in to douse the fire.


On to Washington, where the Nationals are one of the surprise teams of the year, not too far behind the sea of mediocrity that is the National League these days. Hell, the St. Louis Cardinals are back in the race with a sub .500 record, so who knows what to expect in the next six weeks.


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