NL East

Oliver Perez has certainly been a bit of a project since he became a Met. There have been some days in which he looks ike an ace, and there have been others that make people think that he shouldn’t be in the major leagues. So far this season, there has been more of the latter.

He has only lasted five or more innings once, and that was when he earned his only victory of the season against Dan Diego on April 15. He has already walked 15 batters in just 19.1 innings, and he is going to need to get his act together if he wants to stay in this rotation.

In the second edition of the Jordan Schafer PlayerCast, I will profile the three-game series against the St Louis Cardinals.

I will include pivitol at bats (runners on, leading off, etc.) and his statline for the series.

Statlines will be AB/H/BB/K/R/RBI/SB/pitches seen.

Game One (4/27/2009)
(batting eighth)

Filed: April 30, 2009

Mike Fontenot and Aaron Miles turn two against the Marlins Thursday (Cubbie Nation/file)

Click here for the photo gallery of last night's game.

What did we expect?

BY MICHAEL GANCI
EDITOR

Today, the Mets will start a series of epic proportions against their biggest rival, the Philadelphia Phillies. The Mets will be going into the bandbox of a stadium and there will be no smiles unless the Mets come out on top. In order to do so, they are going to need big performances from their big-time players, including Jose Reyes and David Wright, both of whom are in big slumps at the moment.

I can feel the excitement already.  This weekend the New York Mets come to town to renew what has become a heated rivalry in the past few years with the Philadelphia Phillies.  The rivalry may not have the storied past of the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry yet, but in recent years you can find fans just as passionate about it. 

Right now, I am sitting in the Editing Suite for my college, and my group members and I are working on a documentary on farming.

Even on an off day, and while working on something that has nothing to do with it, I am still thinking about the Mets—and with a big weekend series with the Phillies coming up, all of the rage of the past couple of seasons has risen from the depths of me.

So I got myself thinking: Who do Mets fans dislike the most when it comes to the Philly Players?

As the first month of the 2009 season ends, with a two game losing streak to division rival Florida and our first nine win month since 2004, we're forced on a day off, to look at this club that we thought was a playoff team and discuss what's wrong.

Last season, the Washington Nationals lost 102 games, and their accompanying statistics bore that out. They were 13th in runs per game, 15th in home runs, and dead last in slugging percentage.

This year, the Nationals are on track to lose 108 games, but this time, their statistics seem to make their bad start an aberration.

After 20 games, the team is scoring a league-average 4.5 runs per game, is sixth in the league with 22 home runs and a .270 team batting average, and tied for second with 87 walks.

With things being a bit in flux in Queens, there are plenty of people that think some sort of roster shakeup may be on the cards.

Jerry Manuel has been quoted as saying he would like to see another reliever in his bullpen, but that would probably be at the expense of somebody on the bench.

With Alex Cora and Fernando Tatis being the virtual locks to stay, one would think that the two men who would have the highest likelihood to go in favor of a pitcher would be Jeremy Reed or Gary Sheffield.