Chapter 1: What recent announcements were made about the Mets' opening day?
We have not spent any time on baseball today, and not that we need to spend a lot of time, but there were a couple of things over the weekend that were interesting, for as interesting as baseball can be, on February 28th, March 1st, and March 2nd. And that would be, and we talked about this before the show, it's not a huge deal, but I do think disappointing.
The announcement that you got Friday after we had left that... It's not going to be Nolan McClain in the home opener or the season opener against the Pirates, but instead the Mets are going with Peralta. Again, not a huge deal. You're paying the guy to come be the ace. Totally understand it. But, boy, it would have been neat to see a McClain-Skeens opening day Mets-Pirates at Citi Field.
You know what? If Jackson darts the starting quarterback for the Giants and Matthew Schaefer's leading the Islanders, I want Nolan McClain to be the number one pitcher. I want him to be the leader of the Mets going forward. He's coming out of your system. He pitched here last year. He was outstanding. He's having an outstanding spring. There is no reason why he shouldn't have been the starter.
Now, once we get past opening day and we're a month into the season, nobody's going to care. But I also think that it sends a message as to who you send out there. Game one, especially when you have a guy like Nolan McClain, who I think fans really want to see. Yeah, and we always talk about last year he was a rookie, but he's not a 19-year-old. We're talking about Matthew Schaefer.
Chapter 2: Why is Nolan McClain considered a key player for the Mets?
This is not an 18-, 19-year-old kid. He's 23, 24 years old. He's mature. I think last year pitching down the stretch, they didn't make the playoffs, but they were right there. He was the one guy that I really feel like Mets fans relied on and were hoping was going to take the ball every fifth day. Because when they were struggling, he would go out there and pitch a gem.
So he's been through it in some, I would say, some pretty high leverage situations. I'm with you. If it was me, I would have picked him for opening day. They don't. Not going to get crazy, but it would have been... I think the right thing. The thing about it is they're opening at home. That's why. I mean, that's even more of a reason to see McClain and Skeens. That would be awesome. Right.
If you would say that they were opening on the road, but he was lined up to pitch the home opener, you could make that case. This is the season opener, the home opener. It's everything in front of your fans. It might be cold, but the place is going to be packed, and that is the pomp and circumstance of opening. Could it be David Stearns' way of controlling? Maybe. Like...
hey, I'm signing this guy. We're not giving everything to this young pitcher just yet. We think he's going to be great, but we're not giving him the opening day start because he hasn't earned it yet. It's possible. You don't know how negotiations are, how people are. I don't know. Maybe he was told when he signed here, you're going to be our guy.
We're going to have you out there on opening day, and you're not going to take it away from him. I don't know.
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Chapter 3: What factors influence the decision for starting pitchers on opening day?
And like we said, does it matter? No. What really matters, who's pitching game one of the first playoff game. If they're lucky enough to get there, that's what really matters. But it would have been cool. That's all I would say. You know what it is, though, Jerry?
Like we were just talking about, when a team has a young kid, and he comes in, and he lives up to the expectations or exceeds those expectations, that kid... raises the level of everybody else that's playing. There's an excitement to it. There's a real genuine excitement to it, whether it be, like I was telling you off air, that Jackson Dart and Cam Scadaboo brought to the Giants.
Both of those guys brought that to the Giants. Changed the whole feel of the organization. So now you add those two guys, you got the head coach, you got Malik Nabors coming back. I mean, there is a genuine excitement, and I would say...
energy around the team and i i would want to just just i don't know why teams don't understand this i you know you want to put these kids out there let them go right now once you see that they can handle it and then build everything around them and get fan base excited like ride the wave So there is a Nolan McClain wave. There is no question about that. You can feel it.
I think if you polled 100 Met fans and asked them who the ace of the staff is, I think you'd get 90 responses, Nolan McClain. Yeah. I really do. And the other thing, this guy Peralta, it's not like he goes into the eighth inning every time he goes out there. Five-inning pitcher. That's exactly right. Five and a third, which is fine. As long as he goes out there and he gives you five and a third.
The problem with him, and it's not a problem, but the reason why he doesn't pitch longer is not that he can't. It's that he's a strikeout pitcher, which is exciting to watch. So he throws a lot of pitches. Yes, it's going to drive your pitch count up. We know we get to 100 pitches and the guy's done, so he's going to be a five, maybe a six-inning pitcher. That's what it is.
The other thing with the Mets, too, quickly, did you catch the whole Ron Darling-Mendoza thing? So I guess Mendoza's talking about, from the quotes I read over the weekend, we have six starters. Does that mean we're going to see a six-man rotation? Maybe. Six-man. And it may be actually smart.
I mean, there was a point in time where, on this show, when we were here with Craig, we were talking about one pitcher, one inning. Which has come to fruition. Well, yeah, but we laughed at the time. We've seen those reliever games, yes. And now what is very popular in Major League Baseball, bullpen games are a real thing so much that we've seen them in playoff games.
So we might have laughed at the time, but he was kind of on to something because teams do employ that maybe once every fifth game or even two out of every five sometimes, depending upon the team. But we all know that there's going to be at least eight to ten starters starting at some point this year. Well, there'll be injuries. Yeah, there's always going to be injuries.
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Chapter 4: How does Freddy Peralta's performance impact the Mets' strategy?
4 p.m. on Saturday. Okay, you don't care. No, I don't care. You like Evan. I love Evan. The poor guy's walking around with a cane. I'm a loser. He's doing better. He's walking around. He's 42. He's got a cane. By the way, we better kick Great Britain's ass. Have you checked that? Are they any good? They got a couple guys and a couple systems. A couple of guys and a couple of systems? Yeah.
Can you bet on this thing? Yeah, well, if you can bet on everything. We were betting on ping pong during the pandemic. Yes, we were. Of course we can bet on it. You're right. They got a couple guys. Where? By the way, Jazz Chisholm Jr. Oh, Jazz Chisholm Jr. He's on the Great Britain team.
Chapter 5: What are the implications of a potential six-man rotation for the Mets?
He is on Great Britain. Why? Why would he be on the Great Britain team? I have no idea. He was born in the Bahamas. I guess that's got something to do with it. Yeah, they're sort of loosely affiliated with the British Empire. Sort of loosely affiliated? That's a weird one. That's it. Boomer, that's it when you look at this. Oh, Trace Thompson. Heard of him. Isn't that Clay Thompson's brother?
They're saying the co-captains are Jazz Chisholm Jr. and Harry Ford. Oh, the great Harry Ford. Yes. Okay. Good luck with Vance Worley. We know Vance Worley. Vance Worley, okay. There's another one. I ain't got much else after that. We better not lose to them. No, can't lose to them.