link - R.A. Dickey won with both his arm and bat Wednesday afternoon as the Mets defeated the Nationals 3-2. Dickey held the Nationals to five hits and two runs over six innings, while he knocked out two singles and scored a run on offense. He’s hitting .233 for the season. Dickey is one of 11 pitchers with 40 or more plate appearances who is hitting over .200.
link - It's been quite the summer for Cyclones outfielder Cory Vaughn. The son of former Major Leaguer Greg Vaughn, the 21-year-old was selected by the Mets in the fourth round of the 2010 First-Year Player Draft and assigned to Class A short-season Brooklyn in the New York-Penn League. Vaughn wasted no time getting acclimated in his first professional season, and now his team is headed to the playoffs. "It's been so great," Vaughn said. "It's just a great bunch of guys. I've had to make my adjustments just like anyone else, but I feel like I made them. It's fun to come to the ballpark every day when you're winning." Vaughn, who signed quickly after the Draft, has been a big part of the Cyclones' winning ways this season. Though the organization knew of his power potential, via his big league bloodlines, Vaughn's shown himself to be quite the slugger in his first season, setting a Cyclones franchise record with 14 home runs, one ahead of Frank Corr's 2001 total. Vaughn's blasts have led to wins in 11 of the 13 games in which he's gone deep.
link - Jose Offerman played for 15 seasons in Major League Baseball, but is maybe best known by today's fans for an incident that occurred in the Minor Leagues. On August 14th, 2007, Offerman, who Willie Randolph described as a "calm, mild-mannered guy," was hit by a pitch in an independent league game. Offerman charged the mound with his bat, injuring the pitcher and catcher in the process and landing himself in jail. Offerman has yet to play or manage in the United States since. He was also banned for life from the Dominican Winter League after assaulting an umpire earlier this year.
link - You don’t have to be tall to throw one of the all-time fastballs — it’s a beautiful part of the deal. Wagner is only 5-foot-10. But he was clocked at 101 in 2003, and he has probably thrown faster than that. Michael Bamberger’s story on Wagner from 1999 is excellent, though I think my favorite single story about him revolved around his reaction a few days ago when he broke the record for most strikeouts by a lefty reliever. Yeah. Most strikeouts by a lefty reliever. I know. But here’s the thing: So does Wagner. It happened in a 7-1 Braves loss, and they tried to get Wagner to throw out the record-breaking ball for safekeeping or whatever, and he flat said: Um, no.
link - Ike Davis has been a very pleasant rookie surprise. Even though he did not start the year with the Mets, he is still second on the team in homeruns. The homerun pop has returned to David Wright’s bat. He leads the team in homeruns with 23. Angel Pagan has proved an adequate replacement for Carlos Beltran and has resulted in the obsolescence of Jeff Francoeur. Josh Thole has done well in his late season callup and may emerge as the Mets starting catcher for next year. R.A. Dickey has perfected the knuckle ball and been the Mets most effective pitcher, putting up better numbers than Johan Santana. Santana has been putting up solid numbers but he has no support in the starting rotation other than Dickey.
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