How much longer should the Mets give Jerry Manuel?
With the very slow start to the year, the blaming finger is already pointing towards Jerry Manuel.
Met fans seam to think that Manuel is on thin ice, if the club doesn't turn things around he may be shown the door.
Last year Jerry Manuel was blamed for making a few very questionable calls. And this year, it seams like part of the club doesn't have his back.
So how long should the Mets give Jerry?
I think the Mets should give him at least until the end of May, maybe he can get a shot to turn things around with Carlos Beltran in the lineup.
Lets face it, the Mets are not a great team. And if you want to beat the Phillies. Marlins and Braves for the NL East you need to have a good team.
You can't blame Jerry Manuel for the lack of talent the Mets had to open the year. Even with Jose Reyes the Mets have a lot of holes in there team.
In the lineup the Mets have a very weak center fielder with Beltran out and first base has been really ugly to watch in the lineup as Mike Jacobs was hitting .208 before the Mets sent him away.
Now, if you give Jerry Manuel until the end of May, you may see him with a lot more talent as Ike Davis is coming up to the bigs smoking hot from AAA and spring training and Carlos Beltran may be back in a few weeks.
I am not trying to take all the blame off Jerry Manuel, if he does not have many friends on the roster then he is to blame. But we need to remember, this is baseball- not football or basketball. The manager does not make that much of a difference.
So lets give Jerry Manuel a little air, and not blame him for the Mets not playing 100%.
How Good is John Maine?
MetsGeek recently posted an excellent piece by Danny titled How Inconsistent is Oliver Perez. I hope to post a response to that some day, but here I want to focus on John Maine. Danny compared Perez to Maine and showed that they were very similar in terms of inconsistency.
But let’s study John Maine’s inconsistency. He didn’t just scatter good starts and bad starts. His career includes 2 great stretches, and 2 horrendous stretches.
- From his Major League debut with the Orioles on July 23, 2004 through his 3rd start with the Mets on July 8, 2006, John Maine was 2-7 with a 6.18 ERA.
- From then through July 29, 2007 Maine was 19-7 with a 3.03 ERA.
- From then through September 23, 2007, Maine was 2-5 with a 6.87 ERA
- From then through today (May 16, 2008 ) Maine is 6-2 with a 2.42 ERA.
As a Met, Maine is 27-17, 3.62. Since finding his form on July 15, 2006, he’s 27-14, 3.55.
Maine said that he was playing hurt through his horrendous stretch last August and September. If you exclude that stretch, Maine is 25-9, 2.92 since July 15, 2006.
Obviously every pitcher looks better if you take out the bad parts, and you can always play with numbers to make a bad pitcher look like Cy Young.
But I think the numbers give strong reason for optimism. In July 2006 Maine became a very good pitcher. If you exclude the stretch where he says he was playing hurt, he’s been a great pitcher.
And to think we have Anna Benson to thank!
Feel free to edit How good is John Maine? over at WikiAnswers, to add your own Q&A, or to answer other people's questions.
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