B-Mets:
KIRK NIEUWENHUIS, CF - Team: high Class A St. Luice (Florida State)/Double-A Binghamton (Eastern)
Why He's Here: .452/.514/.774 (14-for-31), 5 2B, 1 3B, 1 HR, 5 RBIs, 4 BB, 10 SO, 1-for-1 SB
The Scoop: Nieuwenhuis has to be upset that the season is ending, because at this rate of improvement, he'd be flirting with hitting .400 by mid-November. He was plugging along with a solid but unspectacular season until August arrived. Since then, he's hit .363 with 15 doubles, three triples and eight home runs—he had 10 home runs heading into August. What's the explanation? One possible reason for the hot streak is a new approach. Nieuwenhuis had showed opposite-field power early in the season, but he was vulnerable to being pitching inside. But the St. Lucie staff worked on cleaning up his swing. Not he's able to turn on inside fastballs, taking a vulnerability and turning it into a strength.
Binghamton's Ruben Tejada (Mets) has recorded more putouts and participated in more double plays than any Eastern League shortstop this season. He started for Panama in the World Baseball Classic and didn't hit a whole lot for the Mets until August, when he batted .319/.358/.416 over 27 games, collecting seven extra-base hits and compiling a 5-to-10 walk-to-strikeout mark. Tejada went 9-for-26 (.346) this week, chipping in a double, a triple, four walks and two steals in three attempts
The spate of debilitating injuries aside, the Mets' season has been undermined by other developments, not the least of which have been the shortfall performances of Mike Pelfrey and Daniel Murphy. Neither has provided as much as the club had forecast in March when it characterized Pelfrey as the No. 2 starting pitcher and identified Murphy as the everyday left fielder. The club overstated its expectations, and since then, the players have underproduced.
Each had his moments, though, in the Mets' first 137 games, and in the 138th, both provided glimpses of what the club had anticipated.
It all made for a mostly stress-free Sunday afternoon at Citi Field and a victory that all but assures that this unkind Mets season will not produce 100 losses. With Pelfrey pitching effectively for eight innings and Murphy driving in four runs, the Mets disposed of the fading Cubs in a 4-2 victory. Now they have won 62 games, and one more victory in their remaining 25 games will spare them from the three-digit indignity.
http://newyork.mets.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090906&content_id=6820584&vkey=recap&fext=.jsp&c_id=nym
Marty Noble, in his column for Mets.com, says that Brian Schneider has become a mentor for Josh Thole and is working closely with Sandy Alomar Jr. to develop Thole’s skill behind the plate.
Schneider recognizes his reduced role with the Mets but still feels that he can help the team by teaching Thole, telling Noble:
“He just needs experience. He’s young in catcher years…Maybe I can tell him something that will cut down how much he needs. He works hard, and when you tell him something, he doesn’t blow it off. He does ask questions, and you can tell by what he asks what he knows and that he wants to learn.”
For more on Schneider and Thole, check out Noble’s article.
-Brian doesn’t have to do this. He’s on the way out and there is no other reason to help the kid that’staking your job away other than the fact that he’s a good person. I lived Schnieder fro the get-go and I’m sad to see it hasn’t worked out for him. Good luck, Brian…
Looking ahead to the off-season, the Mets will have to solve unsettled situations at catcher, first base, left field and in the rotation, all while trying to sort out what to expect from injured players like Oliver Perez, Jose Reyes, Jon Niese and Fernando Martinez. Some, if not most, of those solutions will come from outside the organization, through creative deals or (likely) smaller, less splashy free-agent acquisitions.
One internal option continues to be Daniel Murphy, whose offense is now catching up with his defense. He went 3 for 4 in Sunday’s 4-2 win against the Cubs, finishing a double short of the cycle, to raise his average to .259. The Mets feel he could be at worst an average defensive first baseman, and his adjustment — and improvement — has been one of the few pleasant surprises this season.
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