While the Mets lineup didn’t score 10 runs a game against a Phillies’ pitching trio that was at least two-thirds questionable, the team’s starting pitching carried the team to a series win.

Johan Santana pitched one of his best games as a Met on Tuesday, going eight strong innings and gave up only two earned runs. There was a ton of controversy over whether he should have pitched in the ninth inning, and he probably should have. While he has only six complete games in his career (including one at Shea Stadium against the Mets in 2007), he only threw 105 pitches. He had a comfortable three-run lead at the time, and he should have at least gotten the shot to begin the inning.

Chances are, Jerry Manuel was turned off because Santana didn’t complete his last few innings in a squeaky clean manner, giving up a solo home run in the 7th and a stand-up double in the eighth. Even so, as has been discussed to death, the Mets bullpen should have gotten the job done. What Tuesday ended up was a heart-wrenching loss that he could have easily crushed the resolve of the Mets for this series right there. But it didn’t.

John Maine, the “main” question mark among this series’ starters, went seven strong innings, his longest outing since May 7. He battled and produced that “quality start” in his vintage manner, hopefully getting right against a team he’s historically been good against.

But the real star turned out to be Oliver Perez on Thursday, who pitched about as well as I’ve ever seen him pitch. He was absolutely dominant, striking out twelve and only allowing one run through seven and two-thirds innings. When Eric Bruntlett becomes the offensive standout for the Phillies, the starting pitcher is most likely doing something right against this lineup. The only infuriating thing about the game was that Perez had Ryan Howard, a man with a batting average below .100 against Perez, dead to rights. Howard took two ugly swings to start the count 0-2 and then coaxed a walk to pull Perez from the game.

SNY’s Gary Cohen mentioned on Thursday’s telecast that this was the first time the Mets starters had pitched at least seven innings in four consecutive games since 2005. Doesn’t that stat sound similar to the stats rang off during the Mets winning streak during their last homestand? Maybe getting out of Great American Ballpark was just the ticket after all.

Not knowing how Mets’ pitching coach Dan Warthen has exactly worked differently with the Mets’ pitchers, it seems that, on the whole, Mets’ pitching has produced strong results in the wake of the change. There was no obvious reason for the firing of Rick Peterson, but perhaps, in the long run, Warthen will produce positive results out of some Mets’ pitchers who have struggled.

SNY and Mets fans alike have praised the recent performance of Michael Pelfrey. Admittedly, when the performance is succinctly summed up as “he’s won his last five starts,” his recent performance sounds more than adequate. Since Warthen was guiding Pelfrey during four of those starts, it seems reasonable that he should get some credit. Not to be overtly negative, but new expectations around Pelfrey should be tempered just a little.

There’s no arguing that Pelfrey’s last two starts have been optimum. In both starts, he pitched seven solid innings. Against the Cardinals on July 3, Pelfrey gave up one run on six hits and two walks. On July 8 against the Giants, Pelfrey had an even better start, giving up no runs on three hits and zero walks.

However, the previous three starts weren’t quite as good. He battled against the Yankees on June 27, giving up a lot of baserunners — eight hits and four walks in five innings. While he didn’t give up any earned runs against the Rockies on June 22, he had five walks, a season high, in that game. Pelfrey also struggled mightily in the seventh inning of his win on June 16 against the Angels. Pedro Feliciano ended up allowing two inherited runners to score, ballooning Pelfrey’s line to six earned runs after six innings that night.

Long story short, Pelfrey’s two “battling” starts look to serve as the bridge to his recent dominance, but not all five of the wins in his streak were dominant starts. Therefore, raising expectations exponentially might be a bit unfair to Pelfrey just yet, potentially setting him up for future failure.

Similarly, Oliver Perez was another Met starter who had been struggling at the end of Peterson’s tenure. In his first two starts under Warthen, against the Angels and Mariners, Perez continued to struggle, giving up nine earned runs in 14 innings. However, his last three starts have translated to just two earned runs in 19 innings.

But while Perez pitched well early on Friday, a Met fan cannot be completely satisfied with his last performance. He gave up six walks, the second-highest total he has this season. (His highest total was eight at Colorado on May 23. Gary Cohen said on Friday’s telecast that the Rockies’ lineup was a team that did well against Perez. Perhaps the team is specifically more patient with him.) Regardless, Perez walked the bases loaded in the 6th inning on Friday and then gave up a walk and a single in the 7th inning. While Perez got out of it himself in the 6th, Aaron Heilman really bailed him out in a big jam in the 7th.

Speaking of Heilman, he’s another man who has become more successful as of late. During Friday’s telecast, Ron Darling said Heilman was using his slider more during the last month and a half, as well as locating his pitches down more. The reliever has been excellent over the last month and a half, a period mostly under new coach Warthen.

Another pitcher who may be benefitting from the change is Duaner Sanchez, though his reaction to the change has largely not been speculated upon. Since the managerial changes on June 17, Sanchez has only allowed one earned run. This could be credited not only to new Warthen philosophies but also Jerry Manuel’s decision to finally define bullpen roles. Perhaps, the stability of always knowing he has the eighth inning has steadied Sanchez. Since June 10, he’s lowered his ERA from 5.26 to 3.57.

The only Met pitcher who has visibly taken a downturn since Warthen came on has been John Maine. While Maine still “limits the damage,” three earned runs given up in his last three starts, he has pitched even less innings than usual. The Cardinals just kept hitting Maine early on June 30. He gave up seven hits in just four innings and afterwards complained of lack of movement on his pitches. Maine gave up five walks, amidst eight strikeouts, against the Giants on July 10. This caused him to not be able to go five innings for the second time in his last three starts. Since these problems are the same as before Warthen came on and since Maine had struggles in the second half of the season last year, it would suggest that the pitching coach change might not be it. One shouldn’t completely shut the door on the possibility, though.

What has been said most often of Warthen during his early tenure with the Mets, both by Met pitchers and commentators, is that he allows the pitchers to do “what brought them to The Show.” Peterson supposedly tried to mold pitchers to his vision, whereas Warthen is the type to “accentuate the positives.” This certainly seems like a more positive approach on the whole. Then again, I could swear that Peterson’s philosophy of molding pitchers was held as a positive during the initial success of Perez.

In his latest column for ESPN.com, Jayson Stark takes a look at the Mets managerial position and that the latest name on the rumor mill regarding a potential vacancy for the team is Yankees first base coach Tony Pena. Stark adds that Jerry Manuel still has the inside track to get the job full-time in 2009 if he is capable of turning it around. He also notes that Omar Minaya is completly safe for the foreseeable future as well as that the Mets are not planning to make any significant personnel changes until they give Manuel a few weeks.

Pena was 198-285 in 483 games with the Kansas City Royals as a manager between 2002 and 2005. He was named American League manager of the year in 2003 after he led the Royals to an 83 win season after losing 67 in the previous season. He resigned as manager in 2005, 33 games after starting the season 8-25.

Finally, Stark states that an official with one team has spoke with the Mets regarding starting pitcher Oliver Perez and that the Mets are frustrated with his inconsistency on the mound since coming to the Mets in mid-2006. The Mets are about ready to listen to offers for him and intend to replace him in the rotation with Tony Armas Jr. if they can find a taker.

I don’t mind Manuel so far as manager and I think he has done a good job with the cards that have been handed to him. There is not much you can do when you have to resort to guys like Fernando Tatis, Trot Nixon and Damion Easley in your every day lineup every other day due to injuries to the veteran starters. How do you fix that? Get rid of the guy that assembled this team.

Despite being just 4.5 games out of first place in the division, I still believe that the Mets should be sellers at the deadline, not buyers. This team simply just doesn’t have the look of a winning team. You can go on and say that once you make the playoffs, anything can happen, but with what little the Mets have available to trade if they become buyers, it would make no sense for the future. This team is as old and brittle as they come. The best thing to do is sell what you can, bring back anything in return, and wait out the enormous contracts to these overpriced, slacking veterans on this team.

I am normally a glass half-full person, but after yesterday’s loss and the Mets pathetic showing in their series at Shea against the Washington Nationals, I’ve had it. I’m dumping the glass.

This team has no heart. Yup, I said it… NO heart.

Wags, DWright, Moises, Johan, Mainer, Ryan Church and Brian Schneider are the only ones on this team who have shown they are gamers; so let’s get that out of the way. I’d even put Nelson Figueroa in there.

However, guys like Carlos Beltran, Carlos Delgado, Jose Reyes, and Oliver Perez aren’t getting it done. Reyes has become a shell of his former self and has reverted to that pre-2006 player than hacks at everything. He had a week and a half where he appeared to be getting on track, but now he’s off again.

We all know that Delgado has been hit or miss; it’s been mostly miss this year. I can’t say I’m too surprised after last year’s swoon. He told everyone that would listen in the spring that he broke down everything this off-season and re-taught himself how to hit. Unfortunately, his re-teaching has made Carlos Delgado into Wilson Delgado.

The most disappointing person, to me, is Carlos Beltran. He was very boastful in the spring, telling reporters that the Mets were this year’s team to beat. They sure are (as my Phillies fan brother keeps telling me); teams just keep beating them and beating them.

Beltran has done absolutely nothing this year, aside from his spring declaration. I especially enjoyed watching him yesterday; he swings at the first pitch with runners and first and third and two outs. Perfect opportunity to hit in the clutch and work the count; of course, that didn’t happen.

I’ll keep it short on Perez. I have zero confidence in him when he’s on the mound. Someone, anyone want to tell me where the passion is? Where is the hard work that this team was built on when Willie Randolph took over as manager in 2005?

I know Gary Grund has called for an overhaul of the coaching staff, but I can’t put all of the blame on Willie and Co. Is he the one that hits a wall in the 4th inning? Is he the one that can’t play fundamental baseball? The answers are no.

Sure Willie will take the fall, but you can blame Reyes, Beltran, Delgado, et al, for his ouster.

There will be some that believe that since it’s May 16 that there is plenty of time. It’s an excuse. This team is running out of time… and fast. Losing two of three, or getting swept by the Yankees, and

Billy Wagner said it best after Thursday’s game:

“We’re not earning our money.”

That is an understatement.

The word out on the cyber street is that Oliver Perez, or at the very least the Angel of Darkness Scott Boras, would like a nice little pay day come free agency. A nice little five year, $60 mill payday. Now many will say, Dan who are you to judge whether or not Ollie deserves $60 mill and a five year contract? Luckily, I don’t listen to those people. If I were a Wilpon (the DNA tests said no), I’d laugh. Like a long, hard, deep laugh. Probably till I cried. When I finished, an hour later, I’d pick up my phone and call Omar in. He’d laugh too. We’d probably even let Willie come in, cause if there’s anyone thats in desperate need of a good laugh lately, its Willie.

Now like many people smarter than me, I think for the most part long term contracts for pitchers is a bad idea. There are too many deals similar to that of say Mike Hampton or Barry Zito, where it seems extremely good at the time but rapidly becomes extremely bad. One bad throw and suddenly your season is gone quicker than you can say Kerry Wood. So five years alone just seems too long, and thats when you’re talking about someone closer to the front of the rotation. Chances are, the closest Ollie’s coming to being a top of the rotation starter is that Johan Santana jersey I bought him for his birthday. Then there’s the price tag. $60 mill. Ollie has a 4.63 ERA. Its above 6 at Shea. He’s either walking or hitting a batter almost as often as he’s striking them out. He’s yet to go more than six innings, even if you combine his two shortest starts. All this, and he’s supposed to have shown improvement since last year. The picture doesn’t get any better by looking at the past. You’ll see only three visits below 5 for his ERA, and thats if you split up his seasons when he spent time in more than one place. Of those three, only two of them were joined by a winning record. He’ll walk his 500th batter this season, and if his current level of erraticness continues, he’ll hit his 50th batsmen.

The point, is that he’s unpredictable. Olliepredictable. Its guaranteed that there will be games every season that he is pulled from extremely early. His meltdowns are epic. Walking in runs. Grandslams. But, its also safe to say that he will at times go seven or eight seemingly effortless innings. The bad inning followed by six of no hit ball. The no run, 7 walk games. Chances are one way or the other, Ollie is epic. He will not be one of those guys who has an extremely bad eight run first innings, and then says ‘chances are we lost the game, so just let me pitch another five innings to give everyone rest.’ He is, and will always be, Ollie.

Now I don’t think come seasons end we should just wave goodbye, show him his door, and tell Charlie to reassign his locker and number. As far as 4th and 5th starters go, there aren’t a lot of options. Run down end of their career guys who will probably break into pieces (Duque). Younger and not fully trained (Pelf). Or the Wild Cards (Ollie, Figgy). For a more reasonable price, I could talk the stress of watching Ollie pitch, and hoping its the good one and not the bad one. But at five years and sixty mill, you need something more definite. And more definite is something Ollie will never be.

Took a look around the interwebs and some sports talk radio and this is what I found.

First up, Brian Schneider visited with Benigno and Roberts on their midday show on WFAN. Scheider told them even though he “hasn’t swung a bat yet” if they need him in an emergency he would “go out there”.

Asked if he had any thoughts on Oliver Perez, Brian said

“I just want to see an adjustment” when struggling with control. “I’ll go out there”, to the mound, “and tell him I don’t care if you throw the next two pitches in the dirt or if you hit this guy”… “He has to make an adjustment and I didn’t see that”.

Then I found these two nuggets that could kinda make you of scratch your head. First Adam Rubin of the Daily News tells us how higher-ups in Mets management mulled over the idea of replacing Rick Peterson this past off-season and Ed Ryan of Mets Fever points us towards a ESPN Jayson Stark article that reads:

So can Barry Zito ever get straightened out? We surveyed a half-dozen scouts and executives, and we found only one who thought he could. And that was a scout who said his only hope was to get reunited with Rick Peterson, “the only [pitching coach] Barry Zito ever had success with.”

So, baseball “experts” mull over whether Peterson was the problem with the Mets last year. Then six months later he might be the answer to one of the biggest flops in baseball free agency history…jeez.

Tim Marchman of the NY Sun has had enough of Willie Randolph an writes there’s nothing that Willie can do to change his mind:

It’s time for the Mets to fire Willie Randolph. They should fire him if his team sweeps the Arizona Diamondbacks this weekend. They should fire him if his team wins all three games by a total score of 27-0. They should fire him if his team puts on such a display this weekend that the greater Phoenix area literally burns to the ground around them, lit by nothing but the intensity of their passion and brilliance. The man’s time is up, and nothing can change that.

Jason at Faith and Fear in Flushing could not agree more.

NY Times Ben Shpigel gives us a pre-preview of the Arizona series in a small post he titled The Mets Past, Present and Future in Arizona.

Mets.com Marty Noble tells us about some bad memories Billy Wagner has from a ball that ricocheted off his head ten years ago in Phoenix.

Jeff Bercovici of Portfolio.com has a story about ex-Met Lenny Dykstra and some trouble he’s having with his publishing venture.

Lastly, Matt Cerrone over at Mets Blog writes about a story from the NY Post’s page six regarding Carlos Beltran’s 31st birthday party at Sofrito. Among other guest’s Jennifer Lopez was in attendance. Matt goes on to quote the page six story:

“Just when you thought it couldn’t get any wilder, Jennifer Lopez grabbed the birthday boy and shook her world-renowned booty. Then, the crowd improvised a song with the lyric, “We’re going to win the World Series.”

Then Matt totally cracked me up with this remark to finish up his post:

…take note, as this may be the first and last time the term world-renowned booty appears on MetsBlog…

Newsday’s Jim Baumbach breaks down Billy Wagner‘s 1050 ESPN Radio interview yesterday and grabs a few interesting quotes and observations.

Baumbach wrote that Billy said he and others approached Oliver Perez before Wednesday’s game and told him they needed length.

“If he goes out there and battles and comes up short, you know what, we’re not going to have a problem with that,” he said. “But you have to battle. You have to go out there and find a way.”

“I’m probably the least favorite guy in the clubhouse,”

Wagner expects Mets manager Willie Randolph to request a private meeting before the yesterday’s flight.

“I want to win and I know everyone in that clubhouse wants to win,” Wagner said, “but sometimes you’ve got to say something. You might have to stir the pot.”….I’ll be in the locker room, and if Oliver wants to say something, fine. I love the kid … If he gets mad at Billy Wagner for saying this and then goes out there and wins ballgames, great. I’m all for it.”

“I have no problem with someone coming over and saying they didn’t like what I said or why I said it. But when you sit with him and say, ‘We need this; we need you to step up right here’ and guys are coming to him saying, ‘Hey, I see this’ and he’s not responding, then you know what, if this — – you off, if you don’t want me to say anything, then go out there and pitch and compete.”

I think this is good, there are plenty of even keel personalities on the Mets to offset Billy’s approach here. Even Peterson could find a middle ground with Ollie if Wagner’s remarks are somehow counterproductive with Perez’s personality or psyche. Some in the media disagree with a pitcher taking on a leadership role. But I think a closer, rather than a starter, is in there almost daily and can be looked upon as a “regular”. Plus, just about a week ago Eddie C pointed towards Johan Santana disappearing in the clubhouse and with the investment the Mets have in him he should, according to Eddie “be more vocal and take on more leadership”. Well, like it or not this is “leadership”, but from Wagner. I’m curious to hear if Willie does have some sort of meeting and what, if anything comes of it.

After yesterday’s ugly loss to the Bucs the story had to be the worrisome performance of Oliver Perez. Even though Willie Randolph did criticize Perez after the game on WFAN’s Mike and the Mad Dog, he was mostly tempered.

But according to Adam Rubin from the Daily News Billy Wagner was not gonna let Ollie’s poor effort go by without making his opinion heard. Billy came out swinging putting the blame on Perez for not having more “willpower” and “desire”. He felt that Perez should have realized that the bullpen had been overworked and to take it upon himself to log some innings. Here’s what Wagner said:

“You’ve got to have that willpower and that desire to go back out there and fight,”. “This guy (Pirates starter Tom Gorzelanny), he wasn’t throwing the ball that well to shut down our offense. Perez has honestly got to step up and know that we’ve just used every guy in our bullpen the night before. He can’t come out there and decide that gee, he hasn’t got it today, and so be it.”

Also, in Bart Hubbach’s game story for the NY Post when Wagner was asked if talking to Perez about his notoriously short attention span was like trying to talk to a wall, Wagner pointed his finger and said: “Pretty much.”

For more notes and quotes about Wagner, Reyes, and Figgy, go to Adam’s Daily News Blog Surfing The Mets.

According to Ed Ryan’s blog Mets Fever the Mets have signed 29 year old 1B/OF Valentino Pascucci who was recently released by the Phillies.

Pascucci will join the Mets triple A affiliate New Orlean Zephyrs along with Brady Clark who was sent down when Gustavo Molina was promoted.

In his column at Newsday Kevin Davidoff writes that only time will tell if the Yankees made a mistake by not giving up Phil Hughes in a deal that could have landed them Johan Santana. Davidoff goes on to write:

Omar Minaya performed an excellent job in waiting for the Twins to settle for what still looks like an uninspiring package of players. Have you seen Carlos Gomez’s numbers? Yeesh. As you can see here, Kevin Mulvey is pitching decently for Triple-A Rochester, while Phil Humber is not. Deolis Guerra is pitching all right at Class A Fort Myers.

But you can bet that Minaya, who is set to ignore baseball’s slotting system for the amateur draft after adhering to it the last couple of years, wants to build his organization to a point where it doesn’t have to invest nine figures in a pitcher from another team in order to pick up an ace.

Davidoff went on to write that that the Santana trade will allow the Mets to close Shea Stadium with their first World Series title since 1986.

Over at my favorite Mets blog name Church of the Fonz they decided to look “On the Bright Side” of yesterday and focus on Aaron Heilman’s two perfect innings and this quote from former Met Doug Mientkiewicz on Johan Santana:

“Let’s put it this way: When that team needs him the most, he’s going to be there. Come August and September, he’s going to be dominant.”

The NY Post’s Joel Sherman from his HardBall blog thinks Willie might be overusing the bullpen and he has some pretty startling numbers to back up his assertions. Sherman also has some thoughts on Oliver Perez and his probable free agency problems.

Former Met and now SNY studio analyst Darryl Strawberry is writing a book about his life. According to this AP report Strawberry will collaborate with John Strausbaugh on his memoir.

In an article about how rainouts are handled in MLB I saw this interesting tid-bit that may come in handy to Mets fans who may not know about it, I know I didn’t. At CNBC.com referring to the Monday’s rain out vs the Pirates:

The Mets have an extremely generous policy. If you really wanted to see the Pirates and can’t make this homestand, you can use this exact ticket for the makeup game on Aug. 11. If you want, you can also exchange your ticket for a seat of a similar value or use the money towards a credit towards a seat for this year (the final season in Shea Stadium) or next year (in the new facility).

Lastly, back to the Willie Randolph interview with Mike and the Mad Dog. Willie was asked about Carlos Beltran’s sluggish start at the plate and Willie said that he doesn’t think that Carlos is 100% yet, coming off surgery on both knees. He’s still having problems with strength, pushing off his back leg in the batter’s box. But he’s working hard with Howard Johnson and he will be fine.

This is classic Wagner here, I love it. Some tough love for Ollie, hopefully it helps. I get the the feeling he’s the type of guy who wants to be liked so maybe this will be the push he needs… My only concern regarding Beltran is playing on weak knees. I hope he can continue to play and strengthen his knees simultaneously. He has hit a ton a shots right at guys and he has played a flawless centerfield.

Today at Fox Sports.com Ken Rosenthal writes that if Oliver Perez wins 15 games like he did last year because of his age, only 27, Perez could really cash in on the free agent market this off season.

Rosenthal also adds some insight into Jose Reyes and his head first slides, Manager Willie Randolph said of Jose style, he dives into bases "like a missile."

Hat tip to MTR.com for the link.