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Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Jerry's Juice

After last night’s loss to the Marlins, Jerry Manuel said the following:

"Statistically you can find some things that say, 'Hey we're this, we're that,' but I think the last road trip showed that we can play on the road.”

You can’t argue with that one.  The Mets went 7-2 on their last road trip, putting to rest all talk about them being a bad road team.  Critics will still argue that six of those wins came against two of the worst teams in baseball, the Orioles and the Indians, but they are still major league teams that play in major league stadiums.  And we have already established that Puerto Rico is a strange place to play, so you can disregard this lost series.

For those who are still not convinced, here is the good news.  The Mets have 13 more road series this season, and six of those are against teams that are guaranteed to finish well below .500 (Nats twice, AZ, HOU, PIT, CHC).  If they can sweep each of those series, which is basically a given if the last road trip proved anything, that’s at least 18 more wins.  If the Mets can win just half of the road games against the better teams and continue their torrid home pace, we are looking at a 90-plus win playoff team.

The math is admittedly fuzzy, but the bottom line is the Mets are in great position.  They have proved they can win on the road, something that looked impossible just a few weeks ago.  If you still don’t believe that road wins against two terrible teams mean anything, you need to drink more kool-aid.   


This post was written by Mike Simon.

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