Kirk Nieuwenhuis might be Rookie of the Month?

Posted on May 1, 2012 by Aaron Yorke


With one month of Major League Baseball in the books for 2012, it’s soon going to be time to bust out the monthly awards. Over at ESPN New York Adam Rubin discusses Kirk Nieuwenhuis’ chances of being the first Met to win National League Rookie of the Month since Justin Turner was honored in May of 2011.

There’s certainly a strong case to be made for Nieuwenhuis. The Mets lead-off man leads all qualifying NL rookies in batting average, on-base percentage and slugging percentage. However, Cincinnati shortstop Zak Cozart has two more runs scored, three more doubles and one more triple than Nieuwenhuis. Matt Carpenter, the corner infielder for St. Louis, leads all NL rookies with 14 RBI despite having 20 less at-bats than Nieuwenhuis.

Of course, the Rookie of the Month is not just an award for batsmen. There are plenty of pitchers eligible as well, but only six NL rookies have pitched more than 10 innings. Of those, only reliever Rafael Dolis of Cincinnati and Arizona swingman Wade Miley have an ERA under four. Dolis has eight walks and only two strikeouts in his 13.2 innings, so Miley appears to be the only realistic candidate, especially because of his recent insertion into the Diamondbacks rotation.

Miley is a talented lefty who has only allowed any runs in one appearance this season. In his two starts, Miley has allowed no runs in 12.1 innings while striking out 13 and walking only three. Overall, he’s got a 3-0 record with a 1.29 ERA and 0.81 WHIP in 21 innings pitched. Those are obviously very strong numbers for any sort of pitcher, so someone will have to decide if Nieuwenhuis’ strong start is more worthy of being honored.

If it was up to me, I’m not sure who I would give the award to. Both Miley and Nieuwenhuis are helped by absurd BABIP numbers, but Nieuwenhuis has played more of a full-time role. Only 12.1 of Miley’s 21 innings have come as a starter, while Nieuwenhuis has been in the lead-off spot for a majority of his 88 plate appearances. I guess I’d have to give it to Kirk. Let’s hope whoever is in charge of this stuff agrees.

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Knicks again inferior to Heat, Amar’e slices hand open

Posted on May 1, 2012 by Aaron Yorke

Last night in Miami, the Knicks lost to the Heat 104-94 in a game that wasn’t as one-sided as Game 1, but was still considered a loss because the Knicks scored less points than their opponents. This time around the Knicks trailed by “only” nine points heading into the fourth quarters, so it wasn’t really a blowout. Plus, New York shot 49.4% from the field and grabbed 31.6% of available offensive rebounds in a pretty competent offensive effort. Carmelo Anthony led the way with 30 points and nine rebounds on 12 for 26 shooting, while Amar’e Stoudemire dropped in 18 points and seven rebounds while going 6 of 9 from the field.

Unfortunately, the Knicks were still lacking on the defensive end and they allowed Miami to shoot 52.1% from the field, including 9 for 21 from three-point range. LeBron James made “only” 8 of 18 field goals and had 19 points with nine assists and seven rebounds. Chris Bosh and Dwayne Wade each shot over 50% and score 20-plus points.

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Jed Lowrie RBI single spells doom for Mets in Houston

Posted on May 1, 2012 by Aaron Yorke


It seems almost too fitting that guys with first names like Jed and Bud would be heroes for the Houston Astros, but that’s what happened last night at Minute Maid Park.

Houston shortstop Jed Lowrie hit a single up the middle off of Manny Acosta in the bottom of the eighth to score Jordan Schafer and give the Astros a 4-3 lead. Acosta was only pitching in the eighth inning because a minor Frank Francisco injury pushed Jon Rauch to the ninth. Terry Collins reckons that Francisco is suffering from dehydration, so in a way, the Mets lost because Francisco didn’t hit the cooler enough.

“You’ve got to keep yourself hydrated,” Collins said. “Everybody thinks they drink one of those little things of water and it’s going to do it, but it doesn’t.”

Anyway, Bud Norris kept the Mets from scoring runs for most of the evening. The promising young righty struck out seven batters and walked just one in 6.2 innings while allowing three runs and seven hits. Through six innings, it looked like Norris might have a truly spectacular night in store for us, but things unraveled in the seventh.

With the Astros up 3-0, David Wright and Ike Davis got the inning started with singles, and then each moved up a base on Mike Baxter’s fly to right field. Andres Torres, in his first game back from injury (Zach Lutz got sent down) hit a chopper between first and second that was misplayed by non-regular first baseman Matt Downs. The “hit” allowed Wright to score from third and gave the Mets the opportunity to score more runs. Although Thole grounded out weakly, Lucas Duda followed with a walk to load the bases. Then, the beloved rookie Kirk Nieuwenhuis lined a single into right field to tie the game and end Norris’ outing.

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Do the Knicks have a prayer tonight in the MIA?

Posted on April 30, 2012 by Aaron Yorke


Saturday’s 100-67 New York Knicks loss to the Miami Heat was incredibly embarrassing. LeBron James outscored the entire New York starting lineup 32-30 while Carmelo Anthony was completely shut down by the Heat defense. The “star” forward for New York scored just 11 points on 3 for 15 shooting while the team shot just 35.7% from the field overall.

Heading into Game Two, the New York perimeter defense takes a big hit because Iman Shumpert tore his ACL in the second half of Game One and will require six to eight months to recover. The good news is that the Knicks still have their most important defensive player, Tyson Chandler, ready to play. The bad news is that he is still not feeling well because of the flu. While playing through the illness in Game One Chandler went 0 for 3 from the field with zero points, three rebounds and zero blocks in 21 minutes. He somehow managed to turn the ball over seven times.

With Baron Davis suffering from a tight back, the Knicks are looking at major point guard problems. If not Toney Douglass, it looks like it will be Anthony running the point, which could result in really bad things if he can’t shake the Miami defense. I suppose Anthony can’t play much worse offensively than he did in Game One, but it will be even tougher for him to get a decent jump shot if he’s starting from beyond the arc instead of just outside the paint.

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Rangers, Kreider host Caps in Game Two tonight

Posted on April 30, 2012 by Aaron Yorke


In a big way the suspension on Carl Hagelin for his elbow to the head of Ottawa Senators captain Daniel Alfredsson changed the playoff fortunes of the New York Rangers. The incident that occurred in Game Two and took Hagelin out of the next three Rangers playoff games was supposed to slow down the New York offense. Instead, it introduced the hockey world to Chris Kreider.

Kreider was forced into action as a result of the Hagelin suspension and has so far played brilliantly for the Rangers. In Game Six of the Ottawa series with New York facing elimination, Kreider scored on a pass from Derek Stepan in the last minute of the second period to give the Rangers a 3-1 lead. Thanks an Ottawa goal in desperation time, Kreider’s tally would stand as the official game-winning goal.

The rookie’s heroics did not end there, however. In Game Seven, Kreider stole the puck away from Ottawa forward Nick Foligno to start an odd man rush that ended with a Marc Staal goal that gave the Rangers a 1-0 lead. Then, in Game One versus Washington, Kreider took a long pass from Stepan and drove the puck past Washington goaltender Braden Holtby to give the Rangers a 2-1 lead that they would not relinquish.

That’s three games in a row that a rookie who wasn’t even supposed to be in the lineup has played a pivotal role in. If hockey was nearly as popular as basketball, Kreider would be a Jeremy Lin-type legend right now, but instead he’s only revered by Rangers fans. I’m sure the kid will take that, but with the way he’s come straight out of college to rescue the Rangers in the playoffs, all of New York should know Kreider’s name.

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Resilient Mets blow leads, win anyway

Posted on April 30, 2012 by Aaron Yorke

The Mets won the rubber game in Denver yesterday 6-5 over the Rockies in a wild game that saw the Mets lose leads of 4-0 in the eighth and 5-4 in the tenth before finally pulling through in the eleventh inning.

Johan Santana pitched a fine game for the Mets with just three walks and two hits allowed in six innings, and after Miguel Batista pitched a perfect seventh inning, it looked like the Mets were about to cruise to victory. However, they say that no lead is safe at Coors Field, and that turned out to be true for the 4-0 advantage that the Mets held going into the eighth.

With set-up man Jon Rauch on the mound, the Rockies loaded the bases with a single from Dexter Fowler and walks issued to Carlos Gonzalez and Michael Cuddyer. With two outs and a chance to tie the game with a home run, Colorado manager Jim Tracy pinch hit for reliever Edgmer Escalona with Todd Helton (it was meant to be a day off for the veteran first baseman). Terry Collins responded by bringing in lefty specialist Tim Byrdak, but Helton hit the jackpot anyway when he pulled a fastball down the right field line and into the seats.

All of a sudden the score was tied 4-4 and Colorado had all the momentum. The Mets had a chance to strike back in the top of the ninth when David Wright walked and later moved to third on a balk, but with one out Scott Hairston struck out and then Ike Davis roped a liner right into second baseman Marco Scutaro’s glove. In the bottom of the ninth, Bobby Parnell took down the Rockies in order, and we were off to extra innings.

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Mets bounce back, defeat Rockies 7-5

Posted on April 29, 2012 by Aaron Yorke


I didn’t see a lot of last night’s Mets game because I was out doing some real socializing, but I did hear that Dillon Gee pitched a great game. In a spot where the Mets need Gee to go deep in order to give the bullpen a break, the right-handed birthday boy delivered. Gee threw a career high 116 pitches to get through seven innings and put the Mets back in the win column.

“We needed some innings, there was no question,” Mets manager Terry Collins said. “Dillon was going to have to throw 100 pitches today, because we were just short in the ‘pen.”

Gee had to power through a troubling fourth inning in which he allowed the Rockies to come back from a 3-1 deficit and take the the lead 4-3. The first four batters of the inning all got base hits, including Todd Helton with an RBI double and Michael Cuddyer with an RBI single. Later in the frame, after Gee had recorded a couple of outs, starting pitcher Guillermo Moscosco gave Colorado the lead with a clutch RBI hit of his own.

However, Gee would settle down to pitch three more solid innings after getting out of the fourth. The Mets offense helped out by taking the lead right back in the top of the fifth. After Gee and Kirk Nieuwenhuis both struck out, Ruben Tejada and Daniel Murphy set the table with a pair of singles. Then David Wright lined his own single to right field to tie the game and move Murphy over to third. After Wright stole second base, Lucas Duda bounced a seeing eye single up the middle to score both Murphy and Wright and give the Mets a 6-4 lead.

“I think balls are starting to fall a little bit more,” [Duda] said. “A little bit of luck. And I’m just kind of relaxing.”

The Mets would get an insurance run in the ninth when the increasingly useful Mike Baxter hit a pinch-hit double and later came around to score on an Edgmer Escalona wild pitch. Although Frank Francisco allowed a Dexter Fowler home run and a Tyler Colvin triple in the bottom of the inning, he eventually got pinch hitter Jason Giambi to fly out to end the game.

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Hairston hits for cycle, but Rockies steamroll Mets 18-9

Posted on April 28, 2012 by Aaron Yorke

The only good news from last night is that Scott Hairston became the 10th Mets player to hit for the cycle, and unlike the whole no-hitter deal, all 10 players have actually hit for the cycle while wearing a Mets uniform.

In a game with no shortage of offense, Hairston was able to reach the accomplishment in the sixth inning, when his two-RBI double to left brought in a pair of runs and made the score 13-8. It was actually kind of a big hit, because Colorado had just put up an 11-run fifth inning and it looked like the Mets might actually be able to bounce back.

Of course, the Mets failed to bounce back completely, and thanks to Ramon Hernandez’s seventh inning grand slam off of Bobby Parnell, the score ended up looking more out of hand than it needed to be. Colorado got all the runs it really needed in that fifth inning.

It all started out innocently enough. Chris Schwinden, who at that point seemed to be doing a decent job recovering from a two-run first inning, got Eric Young Jr. to bounce one back to the mound. However, Schwinden’s throw went awry and Young dove under Zach Lutz’s tag attempt. The flood gates had opened.

After a walk and a Jonathan Herrera RBI single, Gonzalez blasted a lazy Schwinden offering over the right center field wall to tie the game. The Mets 6-2 lead had completely gone up in smoke, but there still appeared to be a ball game to play. That illusion also vanished when Manny Acosta came in and completely melted down.

Acosta allowed the first three runners to reach, then finally got the first out of the inning when Ruben Tejada tagged out Todd Helton in a run-scoring fielder’s choice. The Mets appeared to be able to actually get out of the inning alive. The score was 7-6 with runners on first and second and one out.

Then Dexter Fowler crushed one out to right field to make the score 10-6. What a disaster. It hardly seemed to matter that Acosta would load the bases again and allow Gonzalez to drive in two more runs with a single. A third run scored when Zach Lutz committed the Mets fourth error of the inning while trying to cut down Herrera at the plate.

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Hockey! New York Rangers survive Sens, move on to conference semis

Posted on April 27, 2012 by Aaron Yorke


Yeah, I haven’t written about hockey for this website yet, but it’s been quite a while since I was a full-time hockey fan. Nowadays I still keep track of the Rangers, but I don’t watch a ton of their games like I do the Mets. I don’t really know why. Hockey is a lot more exciting than baseball. There is constant action instead of a 20 second wait in between pitches. During a hockey game, there are only a few more breaks in the action than during a soccer match, yet the increased amount of speed, violence and scoring in hockey more than makes up for it. The wild scramble to score at the end of a hockey game is much more fun to watch than watching a basketball game in which a timeout is called every five seconds.

Despite all these wonderful things about hockey, it sits at the periphery of many a sports fan’s universe. Maybe it’s because none of the stars are American or maybe it’s because there is less obvious athleticism apparent (although the amount of athleticism and skill involved is substantial). I don’t know. I’ve spent a lot of time wondering what makes people like some sports and dislike others, and I never come up with a rational answer. I laugh at baseball fans who think soccer is boring, and yet I watch a lot more baseball than soccer.

Anyway, the point is that hockey is awesome, and it would be awesome even if the Rangers did not beat the Senators 2-1 last night in Game Seven of their Eastern Conference Quarterfinal match-up. After a furious first period in which each team did just about everything except put the puck in the net, the Rangers forced a turnover early in the second period to enter the attack zone with a three-on-two rush. Derek Stepan made a perfect pass to Marc Staal, who snapped the puck past the excellent Ottawa goaltender Craig Anderson for a 1-0 advantage.

Just a few minutes later, the Rangers again stormed into the Ottawa zone, and this time Brandon Dubinksy found Dan Girardi, who had scored just five goals in the whole regular season, wide open right in front of the goal. Anderson was helpless to stop Girardi’s shot and the score was now 2-0. The party was on.

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Mike Pelfrey is probably going to have Tommy John surgery

Posted on April 27, 2012 by Aaron Yorke

Mike Pelfrey says that there is a 99% chance that he will undergo the procedure and if that happens, his season is done. I wrote about it over at The Daily Stache. We already knew that there was a tear in his ulnar collateral ligament, but this is still sad news for Pelf and for the Mets.

Here’s to a speedy recovery for our homegrown hurler Mike Pelfrey.

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