The Mets sent Mike Pelfrey, who had yet to record a win, to the mound tonight to try to make it two in a row at Citi Field. The Diamondbacks countered with Joe Saunders who never faced the Mets before and has not won a road start since June of last year. Mike Pelfrey had not only little success against this team from the West but hadn’t pitched into the 6th inning this season. Can you say pitchers duel?
And surprisingly enough, it was. Joe Saunders would pitch into the 7th inning allowing 2 hits to the Mets and Pelfrey would allow only 5 hits and one run in 7 innings of work.
Jason Pridie who played center as a call up for DL’d Pagan, had a tough time. It’s not like he had any errors tonight but had an adventure covering some ground on two rockets hit beyond his reach that would result in doubles.
Arizona would score the first run of the game in the top of the third inning. Pelfrey gave up back to back doubles, one, a shot beyond the reach of Jason Pridie and another, a dumped single the Beltran failed to make a sliding catch.
Saunders scattered 2 hits over 6 innings of work of the Mets. The Met batters would work his counts and hit him deep, including a near warning track fly ball by Pelfrey, but they just couldn’t score off of him. You can make the call whether Saunders pitched great or whether the Met batters just struggled.
Mike Pelfrey had his best outing. He actually hit 95 on the gun and kept his pitch count somewhat reasonable and for that, was rewarded with the win.
It would be the bottom of the seventh that the Mets would finally break through, Wright would draw a walk and stole second and with 2 outs, Ike Davis hit a umpire reviewed home-run that would put the Mets in the lead for the first time in the game.
Jason Isringhausen would come in a pitch a 1-2-3 eighth inning.
The Mets added 2 insurance runs when they had the bases loaded in the ninth with no outs. Beltran would hit an RBI single and Ike Davis would force a run in on an error.
K-Rod got the save.
Gee gets the ball tomorrow looking to make it three wins in a row.
Side notes: I liked the way Pelfrey pitched tonight but I won’t be impressed until he repeats this performance again against a better hitting team. But it was a step in the right direction. David Wright made an error in the infield and I almost made me threw my PC into the TV. Overall, the Mets beat a team their supposed to beat and for that, they are one more game closer to .500.
10 comments
metsfan4decades
4/22/2011-10:29pm at 10:29 pm (UTC -4)
Pelf + Nickeas = quality start. Coincidence?
I think after the first couple of innings Pridie was probably wondering where the hell the wall was behind him.
Ike has some serious power.
Two game win streak. Keep it going, boys.
Dirtysanchez
4/22/2011-10:34pm at 10:34 pm (UTC -4)
I thought the same thing…it sounded like pelf had some disguised shots at thole awhile ago, would like to know what he said after this game
TRS86
4/22/2011-10:48pm at 10:48 pm (UTC -4)
Again, unless he just lost something with Pelfrey this year he and Thole worked fine together last year.
fne2864a
4/22/2011-11:32pm at 11:32 pm (UTC -4)
IN my living room Mets won 2 in a row yeahhhhhh!!!!!!
fne2864a
4/22/2011-11:36pm at 11:36 pm (UTC -4)
I missed the game; i did however, see the previews it appears pelf pitched a gem!!!
gategem
4/23/2011-12:06am at 12:06 am (UTC -4)
It’s been rewarding seeing this team play quality baseball. Obviously Pelfrey had his best game. However, his relationship with Nickeas will be short lived when Ronny Paulino returns. I can’t see them keeping Nickeas as he can’t hit at all.
metsfan4decades
4/23/2011-11:15am at 11:15 am (UTC -4)
You’re right about Nickeas. Too bad he can’t hit b/c he can throw runners out and he’s got some experience calling a good game. After reading the news about Paulino and the oblique injury last night, we’ll probably have Nickeas for 2-4 more weeks.
I know Pelf had success pitching to Thole last year. I didn’t hear his post game comments last night but I know during one of his last starts he did say he hardly ever shakes off his pitcher. He throws what he calls for. So if it’s not Thole’s problem with pitch selection then it has to be Pelf’s with locating the pitch.
Here’s hoping last night’s game is the start of him getting back on track.
hazmet
4/23/2011-11:25am at 11:25 am (UTC -4)
Or maybe’s Pelf’s performance was because he was pitching sick last night so:
When healthy he’s been terrible
When sick he pitched 7 strong
Bizzaroworld season continues….
Or, possibly, since he was sick he didn’t have the capacity to over analyze everything and just threw what Nickeas put down. Also he did only focus on 2 pitches last night with a heavy emphasis on his fastball. They had an interesting spot about how Hank Blanco called him last week to give him a pep talk and to believe in his stuff. Also, Dickey telling him he’s got to focus on what type Pitcher he has to be and to focus on his 2 best pitches first before going to more breaking off speed stuff later in the game. Sounds like that’s what he did last night. What I saw was a load of fastballs thrown harder then he has all season for the first 4 innings of the game. Or maybe, he was just sick and threw what the catcher asked without thinking about it.
metsfan4decades
4/23/2011-11:44am at 11:44 am (UTC -4)
I just read that article about Pelf being sick last night.
From Pelf’s own admission he always throws what the catcher calls for, hardly ever shaking him off.
You know, for as much confidence issues that Pelf appears to have it’s hard to call him ‘soft’. He apparently pitched hurt most of last year and takes the mound last night even though he was sick. That alone, coming off 4 pretty bad starts, would be an excuse for him to bow out, if he was looking for one.
He didn’t and comes out the victor in his first quality start. Here’s hoping he feeds off that for his next start.
hazmet
4/23/2011-12:07pm at 12:07 pm (UTC -4)
Yeah, Big Pelf is defintely not soft that I agree 100% and hopefully this is a start he can build on.
One thing I’ve alway’s thought of with Pelf is that he’s the original poster child for Omar’s approach to fast track young players to the majors. Drafted in June 2005 and first big league appearnace in July 2006. Really, looking back, was it necessary to rush him to the bigs in 1 year. Just crazy to me. He’s been learning on the fly in the bigs his entire career including having to add 2nd pitches against big league talent. I hope he’s got an approach in mind now that he can carry the rest of the year and we can move on and count on him every 5 days.