MEET THE METS - RYAN CHURCH

A preview of the 2008 Mets, presented in the expected batting order, followed by pitching rotation, followed by impact bullpen/bench players. Today we focus on right fielder Ryan Church.

2007: .272 avg, 15 HR, 70 RBI, 57 runs, 3 SB, .349 OBP

I am not ashamed to say that I know next-to-nothing about Ryan Church. So let's learn about him together.

Church is a lefty-throwing, lefty-batting, 6-1, 200-pound outfielder. He'll be thirty when the season ends (October 14), and has been in the majors for four years now, all with Montreal/Washington. Last year he played in the most games of his career - 144, putting up the numbers you see above. The numbers aren't bad, but one that's a little alarming, which you don't see, is the 107 strikeouts. He seems to strike out a lot, although at least last year his strikeout rate dipped (in 2006 he struck out 60 times in 71 games!). I would have thought he was speedier than his numbers indicate - but he doesn't steal many bases at all, so I guess not.

Church will see plenty of playing time this year. He will be the Mets' starting right fielder, and won't really see platoons, because the next option is Endy Chavez, who also hits lefty. But what will happen is there will be many times when both Church and Chavez will be in the lineup because of either an injury to or rest for Moises Alou. The key to the Mets' outfield situation this year will be the health of Chavez and Church, because they are the ones who will need to go the distance in order for the likes of Alou, and to a lesser degree Beltran, to be rested and most effective (with Beltran, there's a chance he'll miss about 20 games because of an injury, not so much that he needs the rest).

And I think I'm OK with Church playing that role. Church has a little bit of pop - he hit a career-high 15 homers last year, and ten the year before in half as many games. Maybe the Mets see something in their scouting that indicates Church is poised to break through. I don't know. They seemed content to get him along with Brian Schneider in exchange for Lastings Milledge, leading you to believe they would rather have Church in right than Milledge.

Here's what I'm going to believe about Ryan Church - he's Eric Valent if he had the chance to play every day. I've always liked Valent, and he made some contributions to some pretty poor Mets teams earlier this decade as a pinch-hitter. I'll start out the season believing that comparison is accurate. And maybe Church will prove me right, and I'll become a Ryan Church fan. If he turns out better than Valent, all the better for the Mets. Let's just hope he's not worse - because the Mets will be facing Milledge a bunch this year, and I'm sure he'll remind them with his hitting of what they traded to get Church.

METS 4, MARLINS 0

HALLELUJAH! HALLELUJAH!! HALLELUJAH! HALLELUJAH! HA-LEEI-LU-JAH!!!

THE METS WIN! THE METS WIN! THEY WINNNNNN!!!!

Our lead story today - the New York Mets have won a baseball game, beating the Florida Marlins, 4-0, in Miami. The win put an end to the Mets' 11-game losing streak, and also ended a 10-game losing streak to the Marlins. Kris Benson combined with Bartolome Fortunato and Braden Looper to get the shutout.

Benson pitched well after skipping a start because of a sore shoulder. That'll just drive up his asking price as he enters free agency. But I'm still hearing that Benson wants to re-sign with the Mets, and that the talks should be picking up again soon. So that's contrary to what "Dave from Brighton" had written in his letter (you can still see that below this posting) in yesterday's mailbag...referring to Peter Gammons saying that Benson was going to test the free agency waters during the off-season. First of all, I don't know who this Peter Gammons is, and I don't know why Dave would go reading this Gammons fellow, who for all I know doesn't know a baseball from a foosball, instead of me. Trust me, Dave...trust me. Benson will re-sign with the Mets by November.

So back to Thursday afternoon's game (sorry this is in such a huge font - I haven't figured out how to fix it). David Wright - a big 2-for-4, and a stolen base. He tripled off of David Weathers (back with the Marlins - didn't even know about that one), and scored a run. Eric Valent hit his eleventh homer. I love Eric Valent. Valent's hitting .273, Wright's hitting .291. Just FYI.

I need to go write the Jets site, and get back to some kind of normal font. Enjoy the opening weekend of football - and check out johnnyjets.blogspot.com!!

Game 1: Mets 10, Rockies 3; Game 2: Mets 4, Rockies 2 (58-61, 7 GB of wild card)

An interesting thing happened on Thursday night. After the softball game, we went to get pizza and beer at the local bar (more on the softball game later), and the Giants-Panthers NFL Preseason game is on the TV. They do a score update at the bottom of the screen, and underneath the score of game one of the doubleheader, Mets 10, Rockies 3, it says "NYM: 7.5 games back of the wild card." It could be that they just needed a stat to put there, but I think of it as an omen. Especially after the big win in game 2.

Al Leiter pitched very well, but again threw way too many pitches, so he left the game in the sixth inning trailing 2-1. It was 2-1 into the eighth, when Eric Valent, our boy here at johnnymets.blogspot.com, hits a pinch-hit solo homer to tie it. Then, with a 3-2 count and one out, one man on, in the top of the ninth, who else but future Hall of Famer David Wright with the first of what will be many dramatic game-winning homers to give the Mets the 4-2 lead. Mike Stanton pitched an excellent inning and a third to get the win.

The Mets won game one big. 10-3, a typical game in Colorado. The Mets' offense clicked, and Kris Benson pitched very well. And the Mets beat Shawn Estes, who I hold a grudge against. I don't know if the Mets do, but I sure do. Here's why. (I might have written this back when the Mets played the Rockies earlier in the year...if I did, sorry, but it bothers me so much I'm writing it again.) Estes, as you all remember, wussed out of throwing at Roger Clemens in his first at-bat against the Mets at Shea Stadium after he threw the bat at Mike Piazza (it was also the first at-bat after he had thrown at Piazza's head). Estes threw behind Clemens, because he wasn't on the team when Clemens did all this stuff to the Mets, and he didn't want to nail him. (Estes did homer off Clemens, which was good, but I wanted blood.) Anyway, that wasn't so bad.......until, last season, Estes is playing for the Chicago Cubs, it's early in the year, very early in the year, and there's a benches-clearing brawl. Who's out there, swinging away at the opponent, but one Shawn Estes?! He's been with these Cubs for a month and a half, and he's out there fighting for them, but he wouldn't throw one stinking baseball at Roger Clemens to back up his batterymate while he was here in New York??! That makes me so friggin' mad. So thank goodness the Mets beat him up yesterday.

A related situation happened in game two of the doubleheader Thursday night. Joe McEwing took a beating in the game. He had at least three Colorado runners take him out hard at second base, and after the third runner, J.D. Closser, slid into him, McEwing didn't get up. He had to be helped off the field. I don't know if he'll be back at all this season. We'll see. But anyway, Braden Looper faces Closser in the eighth inning, and he drills him good. It was a tie game at the time, and Looper put the potential winning run on first base, and got ejected at the same time, but that's good teammating. Way to go Braden! Especially considering Stanton pitched awesome in relief of Looper, and the Mets won the game. If they had lost, I might have been a little pissed.

As for Future Hall of Famer David Wright, he was 5-for-10 in the doubleheader, 2-for-6 in the first game, 3-for-4 in the nightcap. The homer was Wright's 5th (en route to at least 755), and the RBI's brought his total to 15. Piazza, Jose Reyes, and Matsui might be on the DL, but maybe Wright could be the spark to lead this team to the playoffs, or at least keep things rolling until those guys get healthy. (And now that McEwing is hurt, we need one of those middle infielders back soon.) Also on the injury front, Victor Zambrano was placed on the DL Thursday with the elbow problem. I think Matt Ginter will pitch in his place on Sunday.

Would you believe the Mets are now tied with the Phillies in the standings? The Astros trailed 7-2 late in the game on Thursday, and came back to beat Philly 12-10. So the Mets picked up a game and a half on the Phillies. The Mets can pick up some more ground in the wild card race this weekend. They trail the Giants by seven games, and they have three games in San Francisco this weekend. Steve Trachsel goes Friday night, and Tom Glavine returns from his car accident on Saturday afternoon.

As promised, the softball game. So we won big, behind the pitching of my wife! That's right. She played in her first game of the season, and took the mound no less. (She usually keeps score, but we need two women on each team, and she had to be an emergency fill-in). So she pitches two innings, giving up just two runs, catching a pop-up, and recording a strikeout. She got the win. As for the third baseman, he played better. I think just one error in Thursday night's game. So I think there are just 2 games left in the season (don't expect another appearance by the wife). We're 8-2, and I would say we are definitely in the top 3 of the league. Too bad we'll never know, since there is no playoff system.

Let's go Mets!

Mets 10, Expos 1 (49-52, 6 GB)

OK, don't laugh. But this win over the Expos is just what the Mets needed. I'm back on the bandwagon (if I ever actually was off it). For the first time all year, I really enjoyed watching a Mets game. (OK, again, not really true - I enjoy watching them all...but I'm never really rewarded like I was on Thursday.) Everything fell into place, everything came together, it was a great all-around game. To wit:

Eric Valent (don't forget I wrote 3 months ago in this space how much I like him) goes 4-for-4, hitting for the cycle.
David Wright blasted two doubles, and is on his way to stardom.
Mike Piazza busted out of his slump with a 2-RBI single - when the game was still close, he broke it open.
Mike Cameron hit two home runs.
Al Leiter continued to pitch great - and he was more efficient, throwing 105 pitches in 6 innings.

The only thing that went wrong on Thursday was the Braves' win. The Braves scored two runs in the 9th against Pittsburgh to come back and win, and maintain their 6 game lead over the Mets. Let's take a quick look at the NL East for a second. The Braves are on top, 55-46. Then the Phillies and the Marlins are tied at 52-50, 3.5 games back. The Mets are 6 back. The Marlins crushed the Phillies again Thursday, 10-1, to move into the second-place tie. The Marlins absolutely own Philadelphia. They're 11-1 against them this season, and are 23-3 against them over their past 26 meetings. That's why I said it before, and I'll say it again - the Mets don't have to worry about the Phillies. They have to worry about the Braves and the Marlins...and this weekend brings three huge games against the Braves. Ideal situation, the Mets sweep the Braves, get back to .500, and move to within three of Atlanta. They really can't afford to move further back in the division.

I'm telling you, Thursday's game was fun. The Mets were having fun, and they went out, and killed the Expos. I have a feeling we'll be looking back at this game as the turning point. The broadcasters actually made some very good points about the team's chemistry and why Mike Cameron is such a valuable member of the team. Hopefully they do build off this game, and they start a winning streak. The bad seeds of this team are gone (Karim Garcia, Shane Spencer, and Scott Erickson...OK, maybe not bad seeds, but the guys who didn't belong), and depending on who comes aboard before the deadline, these guys really enjoy playing together. I have a feeling the next few weeks are going to be fun to watch.

The latest report out of Peter Gammons is the Mets are going to trade Matt Peterson and a player to be named later to the Pirates for Kris Benson. Not a bad deal - as long as the Mets don't give up more than one of their minor league pitchers before the deadline, I can handle any trades. The Mets have a real chance to make a move this weekend...or see their season come to a crashing end. I'll recap it Sunday night. Let's go Mets!!!!

And a quick Get Well soon to THE GREATEST (AND MOST FRAGILE) BALLPLAYER WHO EVER LIVED, Jose Reyes. We need you!

Mets 9, Dodgers 5 (8-12, 5 GB)

Tuesday, April 27, 2004

A bunch of good things came out of last night's game. First and foremost, Mike Piazza is closer to getting that home run record out of the way. I thought he'd get it at Wrigley, but then again, I also thought he'd get more than 0 homers in his previous 16 games. But anyway, he's now tied with Fisk for most home runs by a catcher. One more, and I think he'll start hitting homers at a regular pace, like the Mike Piazza of old.

Good thing #2: Jason Phillips got a hit. That o-fer streak (0-for-29) was becoming a huge mental issue. He'll get hot now. That's a johnnymets guarantee.

Good thing #3: Tom Glavine (3-1) didn't have a great outing, but still got the win. The Mets bats owe him a few of those (as does the bullpen). Glavine gave up 3 runs in the first 2 innings, and the Mets offense picked him up. That's what good Major League Baseball teams do.

Good thing #4: The Mets put this game away. They didn't just protect their lead, they added to it. The Mets scored six runs over the final four innings to give themselves a cushion.

All the Mets' problems are not solved...yet. But it's definitely a step in the right direction. Besides Piazza, Shane Spencer and Todd Zeile also homered - all three were off Hideo Nomo. He is bad this year, so take that for what it's worth. There was an extra batting practice session held before the game, after an off-day, to get guys back on track. The guys that worked out played well. Five position players did not show up, but they hit the ball last night too. Taking two out of three against a team like L.A. would be great. Steve Trachsel goes for the Mets tonight against Odalis Perez.

Notes: While you were (probably) sleeping last night, Kaz Matsui picked up his first stolen base. He's still struggling at the plate, but he reaches base and makes things happen...I really like Eric Valent - I hope he sticks around after the Mets get their injured players back. Did you know he set the all-time Pac-10 Home Run Record? Me neither. He also set a UCLA record for career RBI...Speaking of getting players back from injury, stop me if you've heard this one before. Jose Reyes is very close to a return. Yeah, I'll believe it when I see it. Reyes will play in a minor league game today, and could be back by next week when the Mets return to Shea. Cliff Floyd is still on target to re-join the team on the West Coast this week.