The Most important thing about the Mets 9-8 loss to the Cards yesterday was the first two pitchers. Before the game even started, these two pitchers were vital for the game. Why? Well the first pitcher was fifth starter hopeful, and longshot, Livan Hernandez and the second was the new favorite for the fifth starter spot, Freddy Garcia.
Well, if t the rankings of the starters was murky before the game, now it could be a wide competition.
Livan went out there and had really good stuff. His breaking stuff was spot on. Even though he had only one strikeout, he was getting hitters to swing at bad pitches. If that is the form he is going to be in this season, then I can easily see him being the fifth starter on this squad. Then it was Garcia's turn. He has already been scrutinized over his intrasquad performance with his flat fastball, and he didn't impress anyone yesterday. He was just bad pitch after bad pitch. Granted there was an error in the inning, but he could not pull it together. Before further analysis, lets check out some highlighted good and bad boxes from yesterday:
The Good:
Hernandez 2.0 IP, 0ER, K
Church 1-3, R, RBI, 2B
Kielty 1-1, HR, R, 3 RBI
The Bad:
Garcia 0.2 IP, 4R, 2ER, 3BB
Knight 1.0 IP, 4 H, 3ER, BB, 2K
Garcia's line is really terrible and it is a good reflection on how he performed yesterday. Althought Knight had some K's, he really struggled yesterday as well. He is a really longshot to make this team, but if he wants any chance at the bullpen, he has to perform every chance he get. On the other side of the plate, the Mets didn't have too much to write home about. As a team they got a lot of walks but they couldn't do anything with it (including twice allowing the bases to get loaded via walks and hits). However, Church continued to impress this Spring and Kielty came up in a situation where he needed to perform and just knocked one out of the park. Next up for the Mets is the Tigers today, the only way you can really catch it is Game Day Audio, or if you live close enough to Detroit to pick up their AM signal.
