Gettin' Iggy With It: Mets Kick Ass In Philly

Hi!  This is Iggy Beartran, your expert on all things Cole Hamels.  On Friday, the Mets traveled to Philadelphia to face the richest ass in the world.  Naturally, they were on like Donkey Kong, scoring six runs on ten hits off the smarmy southpaw.  But that's nothing new for the Mets, who can be seen beating up on Hamels almost as often as Mo Vaughn can be seen at the head of the line at an all-you-can-eat buffet.  (Almost.)

Cole Hamels, who was gunning for his 100th career victory on Friday, has lost 13 of 20 decisions to the Mets in his career.  His 13 losses are the second-most defeats by a Phillies pitcher against the Mets.  Meanwhile, sixteen Phillies pitchers have defeated the Mets more often than that smiling ass has.

But wait, there's more.

• Including Friday's game, Hamels has been touched for ten hits or more in eight of his 243 career starts, meaning that he allows double-digit hits approximately once every 30 starts.  But of those eight games with ten-plus hits allowed, four of them have come against the Mets.

• Since the beginning of the 2011 season, Hamels has allowed six or more runs in a game half a dozen times.  Three of those six games came against the Mets.

• David Wright is one of three players with 40 or more career at-bats versus Hamels to have a batting average over .340 against him.  (In 63 at-bats, Wright is hitting .349 against Hamels.)  The other two are Wright's former Mets teammates, Scott Hairston (.395) and Jose Reyes (.393).

• Cole Hamels has never allowed more than five homers to any one batter.  He has also never allowed any hitter to collect more than 15 RBI off him.  What has Wright done against him in those categories?  Five home runs, 15 RBI.

The Mets have not performed particularly well over the past five seasons.  But that's just because they haven't been able to face Cole Hamels 162 times a year.  Because of his comments about the Mets being choke artists following the 2008 campaign, Hamels has been viewed as a gigantic ass by Mets fans.  But the Mets have done nothing but knock him around for loss after loss since then.  In essence, they have been quite literally kicking ass every time they face him.

It's enough to make even his identical twin brother smile.