You could see this one coming a mile away

Short one tonight. Let me say only that if I bet the house against the Mets every time they faced a rookie or unknown starting pitcher, I'd be a rich man today. Vance Worley? Of course.

Probably worse was the way Mike Pelfrey fell apart after three scoreless innings. Perhaps it was too much coming off a week when he lost 11 pounds to the stomach flu. Then he shouldn't have started. Dillon Gee didn't fare much better, though Howard's grand slam was not exactly crushed. What a joke of a ballpark.

Totally agreed with Howie and Wayne regarding walking the anemic Brian Schneider to face the pitcher wth two outs. Yes, Pelf struck out Worley, but the Phils had the top of the order in the next inning, and of course scored two runs. Bad move. Igarashi walked three -- ugly all around!

Loved the homer by Ike Davis. And Pridie showed some pride with his two-run shot in the ninth.

Now we have Jon Niese against Halladay Saturday afternoon, and then Chris Young against Cliff Lee in prime time Sunday night. That .500 road trip? It's gonna be tough now.

Daniel Murphy dropkicks the Nats

We said early on last season that we loved us some Daniel Murphy. And while Ike Davis has been tremendous at first base, we still felt bad for Murph, who got hurt, went to the minors to learn second base, and then got hurt again on a dirty takeout slide.


At the time, it seemed like that was that for Murphy, at least as a Met. But give the Mets credit for seeing value in Murphy's offense and his work ethic. They held onto him and plugged him into the second base mix, figuring he could at least be a lefthanded bat off the bench. Lo and behold, the guy has played decent defense and has shown that he knows how to swing a bat.

The latest proof came Wednesday night in game two against the Nationals, a game that could have turned on an absolutely awful blown call by third base umpire Marvin Hudson. Jose Reyes was clearly safe at third on what should have been a triple, but Hudson somehow saw him come off the bag and called him out. As Keith and Gary pointed out on air, neither Reyes nor Collins were thrown out despite vociferous arguing, a sign that Hudson knew he blew it.

Murphy was the next guy up, and he battled Tyler Clippard in an eight-pitch at-bat that ended when Murphy blasted a 3-2 changeup for a home run that should have given the Mets the lead; instead, the game was tied, 2-2.

The Reyes call was the kind of play that would have doomed the Mets two weeks ago. The fact that they bounced back showed guts. The fact that they had to bounce back again — after giving up a run in the bottom of the eighth after a failed diving catch by Bay, Murphy failing to cover second, and a passed ball by Thole — and succeeded proved that this team knows how to fight and win.

Give Murphy credit again, making up for his defensive lapse by ripping a two-run double that gave the Mets a three-run lead in the top of the ninth. But it was only part of a huge inning that saw a leadoff hit by Bay, a bloop single by Davis, a bunt single by Harris and then a pinch-hit sac fly to deep right by Chin-lung Hu.

So many contributors. Igarashi with another huge inning out of the pen. K-Rod closing it out. Beato getting the win and pitching well again despite the hard luck in the eighth.

But the biggest thing was seeing the passion of Reyes and the will of Murphy lead to a Mets win, their first after trailing in the ninth inning since Sept. 25, 2009. The Mets never win those games, right?

They do now.

Fundamentally unsound

Keith Hernandez loves to talk about the "fundys," but on Monday night, the Mets didn't exactly put on a clinic in a 7-6 loss to the Rockies, the first of a four-game set at Citi Field.

The biggest mistakes were made by the bullpen, and involved throwing and catching. First, recent callup Ryota Igarashi walked the leadoff batter, and then later blew a potential 1-2-3 double play by throwing wide to catcher Josh Thole. The inning continued and sure enough, a broken bat single past a diving Jose Reyes scored two and allowed Colorado to tie the score at 4-4.

Then it was Bobby Parnell's turn to screw up. He allowed a leadoff single in the eighth to Fowler, then a wild pitch with one out moved the runner to third. He got Carlos Gonzalez to hit a comebacker, but his throw home to get Fowler was wild as well. The meltdown was complete when the next batter, Troy Tulowitzki, hit a two-run homer. (Tulo also made a terrific play on a Daniel Murphy grounder in the seventh, stealing a hit that would have given the Mets a 5-4 lead.)

Of course, the Mets, down three, rallied for two. Wright homered, Beltran doubled and Ike "Mr. RBI" Davis singled to cut the gap to one with nobody out. But the Rockies retired the next 6 batters and that was that.

Good things: Wright's homer, Reyes with two triples, a two-run double by Willie Harris. You like to see the team continue to battle. And Mike Pelfrey was good, if not great. He settled down, but there were still too many pitches; he didn't make it through the sixth.

The bullpen has been bad so far and has already cost the team a couple of games. Doesn't mean it's going to be this way all season. Igarashi has plenty of talent. Parnell, though, is a bit of a concern. He's thought of highly, espeically by fans, but all he's really proven is that he can throw hard. He's also shown he's not ready to be the closer, or even the eighth-inning guy.

Memorable, but not in a good way

I couldn't understand why the Mets-Padres game was a night game on Memorial Day.

No baseball games should be played at night on Memorial Day. Same with July 4th. It's a holiday. Lots of people have off from work. Games should be played during the day, not only because it's a throwback to a time when most games were actually played in sunlight, but because that's the time to have a ballgame on a holiday.

Who wants to spend their day doing other Memorial Day activities, then when the day is over, sit down and watch a game? We've got work the next day, and we're toast after spending the day at the beach/pool/park/barbecue. Who has the energy to watch a night game, especially if it's on the West Coast?

Monday's game should have been a 4:10 p.m. PT start at worst. Then, you could either watch/attend the game live, or DVR it and watch it at a reasonable hour when you're home. Instead, I was stuck struggling to stay awake for a game at 10 p.m. at the end of an exhausting three-day weekend.

So I should be glad that the Mets chose this game to implode. I didn't miss much.

I know all about regression to the mean, but I thought we got that out of the way in the 8-6 loss to the Padres on Saturday. This was ridiculous.

Did we really expect Hisanori Takahashi to do something -- three straight six-inning scoreless starts in his first three starts -- that no one has done since 1906? No, and we knew he was going to get hit at some point.

Takahashi had a chance to escape, but hung a breaking pitch that was hammered for a grand slam. He clearly didn't have his up-to-now normal stuff, having trouble locating for strikes. But six runs was surprising, as was the beating absorbed by Raul Valdes, who had been pitching pretty well. You get two of those performances in the same game, you just write it off.

More concerning was the work turned in by Ryota Igarashi, who again was hit and hit hard. He has not shown the same ability as he did before he got hurt. He needs a couple of scoreless appearances before Jerry Manuel allows him to come into a tight game late with a lead.

The road record is also a concern, but if you look beneath the 7-17 record, you'll see that 11 of those games have been decided by 2 runs or less, including 6 one-run games (with several walk-off losses). That's a bunch of close games.

Sure, close losses usually mean the bullpen failed, or the team couldn't get a clutch hit, but at least it shows they're not completely helpless on the road. Hopefully the Mets can start getting some of those to fall in the other direction, and move toward a .500 road record by the end of the season.

Pelfrey and Santana will face off against LeBlanc and Richard to try and win the series and salvage a split. Both should enjoy pitching in Petco, which should be like a home away from home.