Mets Must Get Over The Four-and-a-Half Game Hump

If the Mets want to see this in October, they need to increase their division lead in August and September.  (AP Photo)

No lead in the division is safe in baseball.  If you were a Mets fan in 2007, then you know how true that statement is.  But some leads are more safe than others, and the Mets have proven that in seasons when they've qualified for the postseason.

The 2015 Mets currently hold a 4½-game lead over the floundering Washington Nationals.  New York has built its lead by winning 11 of its last 14 games, while Washington is in the throes of a 4-11 team slump.  But an extra inning loss to the Pirates last night prevented the Mets from increasing their lead to 5½ games.  And earlier in the season, when the Mets rolled off a franchise record-tying 11-game winning streak, they also held a 4½-game lead in the division.  However, they never went over that hump, standing pat at 4½ for nine straight days (April 23-May 1) before a loss to the Nationals on May 2 cut their lead to 3½ games.

Only twice in club history has the team held a lead in the division of more than 4½ games and failed to win a division title.  The 1972 Mets got off to a tremendous start, winning 31 of their first 43 games.  In late May, the team possessed a comfortable 6½-game lead in the NL East.  But when Rusty Staub was felled by a wayward pitch thrown by Braves pitcher (and future Met) George Stone in early June, the team crumbled.  In the three-month period from June 7 to September 7, the Mets went 34-50 and finished double-digit games behind the eventual division champion Pittsburgh Pirates.

Thirty-five years later, the Mets famously held a seven-game lead with 17 games left in the season, only to see the Philadelphia Phillies take advantage of a Mets team that suddenly forgot how to pitch effectively.  Philly won all seven of their match-ups with the Mets in the season's final five weeks and Mets pitchers allowed an unfathomable 131 runs in the team's last 19 games to cough up the seemingly insurmountable lead.

Other than the 1972 and 2007 campaigns, New York has held a division lead of at least five games in four other campaigns.  They won the division crown in each of those seasons (1969, 1986, 1988, 2006).  They also held a lead of five or more games in the wild card race in 2000 and advanced to the World Series that year.

The Mets have had leads in the division of at least one game many times in franchise history.  And since the wild card came into play in 1995, they have been the leader in that race many times.  But just having a lead in the division or wild card race after the season is well underway hasn't guaranteed October baseball in Flushing.  Let's look at five not-so-memorable instances where this occurred.

• In 1970, the defending World Series champion Mets held a two-game lead in the division when the calendar turned from June to July.  They ended the season six games behind the division-winning Pirates.

• In 1984, the Mets were 4½ games ahead of the Chicago Cubs on July 27.  They lost 11 games in the standings after that date to finish 6½ games behind the first place Cubs.

• The 1990 Mets were alone in first place as late as September 3.  But a 14-16 finish doomed them to second place, four games behind the division champion Pirates.

• Eight years later, the 1998 Mets held a one-game lead in the wild card race with just five games left in the season.  They lost each of their last five games to finish 1½ games behind the eventual wild card-winning Cubs.

• In 2008, one year after blowing a seven-game lead with 17 games to play, the Mets were on top of the NL East by a season-high 3½ games on September 10.  They were also 2½ games up on the Milwaukee Brewers for the wild card as late as September 20, when the season was down to its final eight games.  They failed to qualify for the playoffs.

What do the 1970, 1984, 1990, 1998 and 2008 Mets have in common?  Neither of them were able to stretch their division or wild card leads to more than 4½ games.  That's the same number of games the current Mets haven't been able to surpass in their quest to fight off the Washington Nationals.

The New York Mets have rarely missed the playoffs when they've had a lead of at least five games.  Only the 1972 and 2007 Mets know what it's like to watch the postseason on television after having such a lead.  But give the Mets a lead in the division or wild card race of more than seven games at any point in the season and they've never failed to crash the postseason party.

Entering Saturday's game against the Pirates, the 2015 Mets have been in first place for 64 of the season's 131 days.  They've held a 4½-game lead in the division for 11 of those days.  They've yet to hold a lead of at least five games.  History tells us that increasing that lead would subsequently increase the Mets' odds of making the playoffs.  If the lead were to grow by just three more games, the Mets would be in rarefied air - air that has only been breathed in by the 1969, 1986, 1988 and 2006 Mets.  Those were the only four teams that held a division lead of more than seven games.  You may recall those teams by their other name - NL East champions.

If the 2015 Mets want to join those squads as division champs, they just need to get over the 4½-game hump.  The longer they wait to get over it, the more nerve-wracking the final seven weeks of the season will be. 
  

The Terrible Twos Befall The Mets Again

They were fun, they were lovable, but this was as high as the 1962 Mets got in the National League standings.

The New York Mets got their start in a year ending in a '2'.  In 1962, no one expected much from the expansion team.  They were fun.  They had a colorful manager.  And they were the worst team in baseball history, losing 120 games, a number that could have been higher had it not been for two rainouts that were not made up.

But the 1962 Mets actually had a decent recovery after their 0-9 start.  For approximately one month (April 23 - May 20), the Mets did not play like an expansion team.  Their 12-10 record over that time period vaulted them ahead of their expansion counterparts in Houston and even pushed them past the more established Chicago Cubs in the National League standings.  But soon after, reality caught up to the 1962 Mets and never let go, as they went 28-101 the rest of the way to finish buried in the Senior Circuit cellar.

Although the original Mets were never expected to do much, their limp to the finish after a crisp stretch of baseball is something that has befuddled the team in every year ending in a '2'.  Saturday morning cartoons taught us that 3 is a magic number, but for the Mets, '2' was their black magic number.  Every year ending in a '2' started off so well for the Mets, then with one stroke of the magic wand - presto, change-o - the team morphed into a shadow of their first-half selves, dashing our heightened hopes with loss after loss.  It all started in 1962 and has continued throughout the decades without fail.

In 1972, the Mets got off to the best start in franchise history.  After defeating the Braves on June 3, the Mets were sitting pretty in the NL East, with a 31-12 record and a five-game lead over the defending World Series champion Pirates.  But that June 3rd game did not end well, as a wayward George Stone pitch struck the hand of Rusty Staub, injuring the Mets' rightfielder and best offensive threat.  Although Staub was not placed on the disabled list immediately, the hand injury caused him to miss a total of three months.  The Mets went 36-46 in his absence and finished in third place in the NL East, 13½ games behind the Pirates.

Ten years later, the Mets thought another outfielder would lead them to the promised land.  In 1982, George Foster was acquired by general manager Frank Cashen in a trade with the Cincinnati Reds.  The Mets had just come off a campaign in which they competed for the 1981 second half division title (the strike-shortened 1981 season was divided into two halves, with the first half division winners squaring off against the second half winners in an extra round of playoffs) and Cashen thought adding a slugger to the mix would push the Mets over the top in 1982.  It turned out to be one of his rare misses in an otherwise outstanding tenure as Mets' GM.

In 1982, George Foster spoke softly but left his mean stick in Cincinnati.

Foster was awful in his first season in New York, but the Mets were winning despite him.  After an extra-inning victory on Father's Day, the Mets stood only three games out of first place with a 34-30 record.  After June 20, every team in the National League East had a winning record.  The Mets, on the other hand, went 31-67 after the Day of the Dad to finish in the NL East cellar, 27 games behind the eventual World Series champion Cardinals.

The 1992 Mets were full of hope after loading up their roster with veteran players and a former Manager of the Year Award winner.  Bret Saberhagen, Eddie Murray, Bobby Bonilla and Jeff Torborg were all part of a Mets team that was trying to erase the memories of a poor 1991 campaign, the first losing season for the Mets since 1983.  Instead, they became "The Worst Team Money Could Buy". 

But before they became the team that inspired Bobby Bonilla to become author Bob Klapisch's Bronx tour guide, the Mets actually looked like a contender.  After their 15-1 drubbing of the two-time defending division champion Pirates on June 6, the Mets found themselves in second place, a mere two games behind the Pirates.  But then, everything came crashing down on the Mets.  Bobby Bonilla (.249, 19 HR, 70 RBI) finished his first season in New York as the winner of the Player Most Likely To Be Booed award.  Eddie Murray managed to hit a measly 16 HR, his lowest home run output since he became a major leaguer in 1977.  And Bret Saberhagen spent most of the season on the disabled list, winning a career-low three games in 15 starts.  Needless to say, the team suffered after June 6, going 44-64 the rest of the way to finish 24 games behind the Pirates.

If the 1992 squad was the worst team money could buy, then the 2002 team was its kissing cousin.  After a disappointing 2001 campaign, in which the Mets followed up their pennant-winning 2000 season with a mediocre 82-80 record, general manager Steve Phillips decided to go shopping.  A lot.  Phillips completely restructured the team, bringing in Roberto Alomar, Mo Vaughn, Jeromy Burnitz, Roger Cedeño, Pedro Astacio, Shawn Estes and Jeff D'Amico, to name a few.   The new faces helped the team do well in the first half.  The Mets were tied for first place on May 29 and were still above .500 as late as June 29.  But the wear of tear of the season (as well as the declining talent level of the new acquisitions) caught up to the team in the second half.

Why so glum, Mo?  Did someone get to the post-game spread before you?

The Mets were in third place, 7½ games out of first on June 25 with a 39-37 record.  From that point on, they had the worst record in the division, going 36-49 to finish in last place for the first time since 1993, a year that featured the haul from the last big shopping spree conducted by a Mets general manager.

That brings us to 2012.  This year's team started off so well.  The Mets surprised everyone by winning their first four games of the season.  On June 3, the Mets found themselves eight games above .500 (31-23) and in a share of first place.  As late as July 7, the Mets were 46-39 and holders of the second wild card spot in the National League.  Then poop happened.  And it hasn't stopped happening.

Since July 7, the Mets have lost 13 of their last 15 games.  Their strong starting rotation has taken a hit, with Johan Santana becoming the first Met since Pedro Astacio in 2002 (naturally, it had to happen in a year ending in a '2') to allow six or more runs in three consecutive games.  In addition, R.A. Dickey has looked like a mere mortal (5.36 ERA in seven appearances since June 24), and Jonathon Niese just took a page out of Fred Wilpon's book, as he was "snakebit, baby" in Arizona last night.  That loss left the Mets a season-high 7½ games behind the Braves for the final wild card spot.  The Mets were already 11½ games behind the first place Nationals in the NL East.

This year's Mets might not have as many high-priced free agents and overpaid malcontents as their predecessors had in other years ending in a '2' (the 1962 and 1972 teams played in an era before free agency), but the one thing they do have in common is their second half performance after a decent to strong first half.

Although the Mets showed so much potential in April, May and June (who didn't think the first no-hitter in team history was a sign of things to come), the terrible twos have befallen the team once again.  It's a trend that inexplicably befuddles the Mets every ten seasons.  It's a trend that will hopefully end before 2022 comes around.

Sweet 16: Mets Set RBI Record You Didn't Know About

The New York Mets did something this year that they had never accomplished during their first 49 years of existence.  No, it wasn't a fourth place finish in the NL East (they're getting quite used to that spot in the division by now).  Let's peruse the team's final RBI totals for 2011 to see if you can figure out what I'm talking about.

Despite being traded in late July to the San Francisco Giants, Carlos Beltran led the Mets in RBIs with 66.  He was followed by David Wright (61), Jason Bay (57), Angel Pagan (56) and Justin Turner (51).  But let's take a look a few other Mets and their RBI totals.

Lucas Duda had a strong second half to finish with 50 RBIs.  Finishing one RBI behind Duda was Daniel Murphy (49), who missed the last seven weeks of the season with an injury.  After Murphy, we had National League batting champion Jose Reyes (44), Josh Thole (40), Ruben Tejada (36), Nick Evans (25), Ike Davis (25), Scott Hairston (24), Willie Harris (23), Jason Pridie (20) and Ronny Paulino (19).

That gave the Mets a total of 16 players with at least 19 RBIs in this just completed season.  (Dang you, Ronny Paulino for not getting an extra RBI to make this a list of the sweet sixteen players who reached the round number of 20 RBIs in a single season.)

So why is 16 players with 19 RBIs or more worth writing a blog about?  Because it's never happened before in Mets history.

In 2007, the Mets had 13 players with 19 or more RBI, led by Carlos Beltran (112) and David Wright (107) and rounded out by Ruben Gotay (24) and Luis Castillo (20).  The 2005 Mets also had 13 players reach that RBI figure, as did the 2004 team.  To find a Mets team with at least 14 players reaching that not-so-round RBI total (seriously, Ronny Paulino, it was just one stinkin' RBI.  Was that too much to ask for?) you have to go all the way back to 1972.

In the first season after the untimely passing of manager Gil Hodges, the Mets had a roster that included 14 players who drove in a minimum of 19 runs.  That 1972 team, which finished 83-73 in the NL East (six games were wiped out due to a players' strike), were led by Cleon Jones and his 52 RBIs, which represent the lowest RBI total for a team leader in that category in franchise history.  The other 13 players following Jones in the RBI department were Tommie Agee (47), John Milner (38), Rusty Staub (38), Duffy Dyer (36), Ed Kranepool (34), Ken Boswell (33), Jim Fregosi (32), Wayne Garrett (29), Bud Harrelson (24), Jerry Grote (21), Ted Martinez (19), Jim Beauchamp (19) and some guy named Willie Mays (19).

Prior to the 2011 season, no Mets team had ever had at least 15 players with at least 19 RBI.  This year's team wasn't satisfied with having just 15 players reach that figure.  They went out and made it a sweet sixteen.  (Do you see the photo below, Mr. Paulino?  Wouldn't that have looked better with a "20" where the "19" is?)

It's very rare for a team to have that many players accumulate enough at-bats to drive in as many as 19 runs in a season.  After all, most teams carry 11 or 12 pitchers at any one time, leaving 13 or 14 spots on the roster available for the starting eight and the bench players.  Many bench players only drive in 10 or 12 runs because they only pick up 100-200 at-bats per season, mostly through pinch-hitting appearances and spot starts whenever a regular player needs a day off.  That wasn't the case for the 2011 Mets.

Because of injuries that kept a number of regular players out of the lineup for months at a time (see Davis, Ike and Wright, David) and one particular trade (Carlos Beltran), the Mets had a number of their players accumulate more at-bats than expected.  Ten players had 300+ at-bats and three others had over 200.  The more at-bats a player gets, the more likely he is to drive in a few extra runs.  That was certainly the case for the 2011 Mets.

However, the Mets didn't set this team RBI record just because they had so many players getting an inordinate number of at-bats.  Players such as Nick Evans (25 RBI in 176 at-bats) and Scott Hairston (24 RBI in 132 at-bats) were both excellent with men on base, with Evans hitting .308 in those situations and Hairston clubbing nearly half of his extra-base hits with runners on (7 XBH of 16 came with men on base).  Putting Hairston's performance into perspective, Ike Davis (who was on his way to a fabulous sophomore season before his day-to-day injury kept him out for the remainder of the season) had four more plate appearances (149) than Hairston did (145), but only had one more RBI than the utility player.

The 2011 Mets might have had an unusually high number of players getting more at-bats than expected, but those players who would have normally spent the majority of the season on the bench or in the minors came through when given the opportunity.  This record is not a fluke or a statistical aberration.  It is a testament to the team put on the field by Terry Collins.  The Mets' manager might not have had the best players to work with, but he did have players who contributed when called upon to do so.  A team like that deserves to have a record such as this one, don't you think?