Where Are the Runs?

Now I know what you're thinking. Probably the same thing I was yesterday. How does this team not even scratch out one stinking run while our ace is up there? Not one! Well, Josh Johnson was just that good yesterday. Until running into a little trouble in the 9th (which shouldn't have been trouble for him at all considering a bad call on a should have been third strike on Delgado), Johnson held the Mets to just 3 hits through 8 2/3. He was even able to dial his fastball up to 98 and maintain good location through the 9th. It was just an impressive pitchers duel.

However yesterday got me thinking. "This seems to happen a lot doesn't it? Why can't the Mets ever score runs for Johan?" I want ahead to the always trusty baseball-reference.com and looked up said statistic. Of Johan Santana's 34 starts last season, the Mets failed to put more than 3 runs on the board 11 times. The worst of these stretches was between June 6th and July 2nd where it happened a whopping 5 out of 6 starts.

Now if we add those numbers to the 2 times it has already happened this season, and you have it happening 36% of his starts as a Met. What else is troubling about it? His ERA is at an astounding 2.41 in the starts the team can't score more than 3 runs (10 of 13 QS). His record? 3 - 8.

So what does this all mean? The margin of error in the field is minute every third time Johan takes the hill if he wants a win. Our ace is almost guaranteed a loss every 2 weeks because our bats go silent. Not to make a pun on yesterday's error, but Murphy's Law is applicable in more than one-third of Johan's starts. Anything that can go wrong, does.

*****

Battle of the Mets Blogs FBL Update!

Week one saw some blowouts and close calls. Here are the weekly scores with the blog's current place in the standings in parentheses:

Metsmerized Online (2) defeated We're the Team to Beat (11) 10 - 1
The Daily Stache (1) defeated Eddie Kranepool Society (12) 10 - 1
Amazin' Avenue (5) defeated Brooklyn Met Fan (9) 8 - 4
Priced Out of the Citi (6) defeated The 'Ropolitans (7) 5-4
Mets Lifer (4) defeated Hot Foot Blog (8) 8 - 4
and finally 213 Miles from Shea (3) took down Metstradamus (10) 8 - 4

This week I take on Mets Matt over at We're the Team to Beat. Frankly I think he's been in the vicinity of too many cheese steaks to even begin thinking about taking on my powerhouse squad. Another FBL update with proper graphics and whatnot to come next week!