Whatta Relief!!

For a Mets fan, nothing could be better than this opening to the season. The first game could have been straight from the desk of Omar Minaya. Santana gets his 6 or thereabouts, Green gets it to Putz and Rodriguez. All was right in the world of blue.

After a day for us Mets fans to contemplate our good fortune,we got to witness a game that was probably indicative of many games to come. The starter was good but not great, or not careful, and Pedro Feliciano was his old self; that is to say he gave up two more runs before handing it over to any competent reliever. And then the competent guys, Putz and K-Rod again, were either tired or just unlucky and ran into lots of adventures before the game mercifully ended.

Luckily for the Metsies, they got some tremendous production on the other side of things, especially from the two Carloses. Nine runs is awfully hard for any team to overcome and certainly the Reds were not equal to the task last night. But they put a real scare into K-Rod. In fact, I thought he was giving us his best Aaron Heilmann impression. He looked as if he was afraid to put the ball anywhere near the plate.

Yeah, all you have to be is a little off, and a little unlucky, and you can easily lose. The first base umpire made a bad call, or a homey call I tend to think, ruling that Delgado had left the bag too early, before he had the ball, before pegging a throw over to third to try to nail Cinci’s new star Brandon Phillips. Replays showed the umpire was dead wrong and my letter to the Commissioner is on its way.

So, in lieu (does anybody say instead anymore) of two outs and a man on third with the score 9-7, it became one out and a man on first and third. Big difference! Especially for a K-Rod who was struggling to say the least. He went 2-0 on half the Cinci lineup, seemingly following the John Franco school of avoiding the plate at all costs, hoping the batter either swings or the umpire gives him the ol’ 6-inches off the plate strike.

K-Rod got neither the wild swings from the batters nor the corner calls.. Soon the bases were loaded. But K-Rod showed his toughness and smarts by striking out Gonzalez on a high hard one and then getting a little lucky when Nix blasted a pitch to the deepest part of centerfield.

So the Mets can win even when their starter doesn’t pitch well. And even when their relievers don’t knock anyone’s socks off, and that was definitely the case last night. And even when the horrible umpires in MLB do their best thing, which is to miss obvious calls.

And that will be important because the Mets starters just aren’t that good, despite some things I’ve heard to the contrary. For example, I’ve heard that Pelfrey could be a number 2 starter anywhere. That’s baloney. A number 3 or 4 starter maybe but not a legitimate 2. He may be the best of the rest though.

Just how bad are the rest? Given a choice of pitchers on a particular day, of the three, John Maine, Oliver Perez and Livan Hernandez, I’d pitch Livan. I have very little confidence in Maine, he’s with his head in the clouds all the time and Perez is just crazy, especially after the fourth or fifth inning. I’d gladly select Ollie to pitch a playoff game but not those regular season yawners, yawners to him anyway.

The bats won’t always be as prolific and the pitchers won’t always be good, but given last night’s game as an example, opponents will still have to either score a lot of runs or get by those last two stalwarts, Putz and K-Rod. And that won’t be too easy.

Yankee fans are dying right now, of course, what with CC’s inauspicious opener and Wang’s bashing last night. You can almost bet that A.J. Burnet will have trouble too, if not for the season, at least for Game 3. There’s a lot of pressure pitching for New York and none of these fellows will find it terribly easy to finally get comfortable.

As I’ve said before, Sabathia starts slowly and if the papers (I hate media, don’t you) beat him up in April, there may not be much of CC left for May through September, even as big as he is. And if he should have an extended bad period, which he has had before, it’s all over but the shoutin’.

Texeira’s done nothing yet either, and Colby Rasmus is not the stuff that dreams are made of. And I don’t like their batting order either.

Jeter is not a leadoff hitter. He’s not fast enough. He’s no real threat on the bases. Damon isn’t The Flash reincarnated either but he can lead off. Jeter should bat 2nd. He’s got that good bat control and he’s smart and unselfish. The 3-4-5 of Teixeira, Matsui and Posada is the best the Yankees can send up there right now, but it certainly isn’t an awe-inspiring middle. For example, I’d prefer any combination of Wright, Beltran and Delgado.

Then there’s the 6 spot though the 9 spot. Cano’s at 6 but he should probably move up in the order, Nady’s been at the 7 spot but he’s a bigger threat to me than Posada at 5, in the long run anyway. Then there’s Ransom and Gardner at 8 and 9 and I’d certainly have to agree with that for now.

But, until Arod returns, I’d like to see Gardner, Jeter, Damon, Teixeira, Matsui, Nady, Posada, and either Cano and Ransom or the other way around depending on who has less speed. Arod’s return will not only solidify the center of the lineup but tend to extend the strength through the order.

And how ‘bout some relief?