Dana Brand's Mets Fan Blog

I just got the cover of my book from McFarland.  Here’s what it will look like.  I love the cover, very New York.  To read about the book, please check out my website:  Mets Fan

Okay, so we’ve played 54 games.  We’re exactly one-third of the way through the season.  That makes it nice and easy to multiply things times three.  It’s a good time to take stock. 

The Mets have won 35 games and lost 19.  That projects to a total of 105 games won and 57 games lost.  If they keep up at this pace, this will be the second-best season in Mets history, second, obviously, to 1986.  Last year, after 54 games, the Mets were 33-21, which would project to a season’s total of 99-63.  They ended the season with a record of 97-65.  That’s actually pretty impressive when you consider what happened to the starting pitching in the second half of the year.

The Mets have scored 267 runs and they have allowed 202.  That would project to a season’s total of 801 runs scored and 606 allowed.  Last year, the Mets scored 834 runs and allowed 731 to the opposition.  Even if you didn’t know these totals, I think it is fair to say that this is what anyone following the team might have expected.  We’ve scored fewer runs this year because the middle of the lineup has underperformed thus far, compared to last year.  But the overall numbers are not down by that much because the ends of the line-up so far have performed as well or better than they did last year.   Reyes is having a year that is roughly similar to what he did last year (more doubles, triples, and stolen bases, but dramatically fewer home runs; almost equal runs scored and rbis; average up slightly, slugging percentage down slightly.)  Paulie LoDuca has been his fabulous Mets self in both years.  But the difference has been in the fact that Alou and Green gave us much more than we had expected until they got hurt and Chavez, Easley, and Gotay have produced runs at a rate one cannot normally expect of the tail end of a lineup.

The relief pitching this year has been superb and it was superb last year.  The main reason why the Mets, despite a small offensive drop-off overall, are doing even a little better this year than last year is that the five current members of the starting rotation have a combined record of 25-11 and a combined E.R.A. of about 2.90.

What can we expect from this point forward?  Well, all of us expect the middle of the lineup to be better.  Beltran is actually having a season we should all be happy with.  Last year’s amazing home run production may have been a bit of a fluke.  Delgado looks as if just an ordinary summer streak will be enough to bring him up to his usual level over 30 home runs, over 100 rbis, and a batting average between .260 and .280.  Wright is the key here, but he has been so consistent over the past two seasons that I don’t think it is unreasonable for us to expect him to hit .300 by the end of the year, with a home run total in the twenties and over 100 rbis.  This expected offensive surge from the middle will almost certainly balance an expected decline in the production numbers of the lower end of the batting order.  Overall, I would guess, our slugging percentage is going to rise.  It’s now at .427.  It was .445 at the end of last year.  I think that it will end up in a similar place.

And this will compensate for a possible decline in the very high level of performance by the starting pitching.  My prediction is that if that level declines, we’ll end up with a win total like what we had last year.  If that level stays where it is, if Glavine doesn’t weaken in the second half, if the resurrections of Perez and Sosa are for real, if Maine is for real, and if Hernandez doesn’t get hurt, and who knows, if Martinez comes back and still has something, then we will have a historic season, one of those seasons for the record books, a season like 1986.  It could happen.  And it might not.  But I wouldn’t even dream of trading our roster for that of any other team in the league. 

One third of the way through the season, I have nothing to complain about.