1) The best team won. Kansas City, as Joe Buck said was "tenacious and relentless". My biggest memory of this series is all the time the Mets got 0-2 or 1-2 counts and just could not get that third strike. They were the better fundamental and more opportunistic team by a good margin.
2) The Mets have decisions to make about Murphy, Cespedes and Wright with his spinal stenosis. They need to improve their infield defense and get some offensive speed on the team. They also need to improve their bullpen, (I like Niese out there). But as long as they keep the four "young guns together, (and don't forget they'll get Wheeler back next season), they will be perennial contenders.
3) Those games were titanic struggles. A series doesn't need to go 7 games to be a great series.
4) The Mets led in every game. Their failure to add to their leads meant even more than the Royal's late game heroics.
5) After playing like an MVP down the stretch of the regular season, he became a liability in this series. He misplayed the first pitch of the series into an inside the park home run. He booted a ball in game 4 and then committed an unforgivable base running error to win the game. And he contributed nothing with his bat.
6) My issue is not with leaving Harvey in: it's with leaving Cespedes in. What was he going to do? He could barely stand there. He couldn't run. He couldn't play center field. Even getting a good swing seemed unlikely. Collins should have put in Legares at that point, not in the next inning.
7) Keith Hernandez just said something that should have been stressed by the Fox crew: Wright should have been at third base, holding Hosmer on. he wouldn't have gone anywhere if he was there. That was Flores ball.
8) I'm baseballed out. I love the game but the tremendous tension that builds up during a game is wearing. So is the sherr number of games. I like the fact that when you have a disappointing loss, there's almost always a game the next night: win that and you're OK. But I've been watching Mets games night after night really since Flores's crying jag. I want to wait a week before the next game, like in football. I want to see the low-stress start of the SU basketball season. I want to watch the old movies and old TV shows I love. TCM, here I come!
Great post. I especially agree with you last point. I was telling my wife this morning that I'm glad the season is over it was getting a bit much for me. But I will always remember this season as the one that helped me rediscover my love of baseball from when I was a kid. When I was in my 20s and 30s I didn't really have the patience to watch a full baseball game but now as I'm about to hit 40 and have a kid of my own I get so much joy out of the rhythm of the game... how every pitch and every game isn't life or death. How the season is a story and over 162 games you get to know every player and the announcers so well.
With regards to the Mets. I stick by my earlier post... their weaknesses were totally exposed in this world series. They are a team with amazing pitching which will keep them in every game. However their fielding is mediocre at best and their hitting approach is all or nothing. When the Mets hitters were hot the team was unbeatable, when it was not the pitchers had to pitch shutouts to win games. This is not an approach that is going to lead to a consistent run of playoff baseball. I was thinking about it and outside of Grandy, and Conforto there is no a single MLB average hitter + fielder on the team and I'm being generous to Conforto as he hasn't proven anything yet but the potential is there.
Wright: Can't hit the fastball anymore unless he speeds up his swing which makes him susceptible to offspeed stuff. Seems to not be able to handle a curve ball anymore either. He's basically a singles hitter these days. Still seems to be a good fielder.
Duda: Very iffy on D... extremely hot and cold as a batter. I think the Mets can live his bipolar hitting if the rest of the lineup can cover for him because when he's on he can carry the team on offense. I would try to trade him to some AL team looking for a DH.
Murph: Terrible fielder, baserunner, great hitter. His power numbers during the NLDS and NLCS are a mirage. It scares me to let him walk as we need at least one guy who will hit .280ish over the course of the season. He really needs to be at 3rd or 1st though as his D at 2nd has lost us almost as many games as his bat has won over the course of the season. Not sure what to do with him, if the Mets are committed to Wright at 3rd and Duda at 1st I'm okay with giving him a qualifying offer and letting him walk. However they really need to jettison either wright or duda and let Murph play one of those two positions instead.
d'Arnaud: The bat could be there but he needs to prove it over the course of a season. He like most of the Mets seems to be another all or nothing hitter. He seems like he's a plus guy at framing pitches and handling the staff but he's a liability at holding runners. I think KC has the blueprint for beating the Mets... get guys on base and run on them as d'Arnaud will do nothing to stop that.
Cuddyer: I think there is a giant fork in his back. See ya later dude. Unfortunately the Mets are paying him a LOT of money next season so he's going to stick around in some capacity. But his bat seems done and he seems like he's too slow for outfield anymore
Cespedes: Way too free swinging. Great D. I'd love to keep him but not at 6 years $100MM plus which is what he'll get.
Flores: Seems like he could be a great 2nd baseman. Still don't trust him at short. Another guy who's bat is way too inconsistent to play. I think next year will be huge for him to prove he's going to hit enough to overcome his fielding issues or not. He needs to turn into a .280 hitter with 15 hrs.
Collins: I love Terry Collins the man. I am not a fan of Terry Collins the coach. The Mets seem to play checkers when everyone else is playing chess. For example Hernandez, asking where Wright was on that play when it was Flores's ball. This seems to happen to the Mets way too often. Terry kind of feeds into the all or nothing approach for the Mets... he never did the little things to generate runs and play station to station baseball like hit and run or steal 1st to second. He improved on this a bit in the playoffs but most of the year was pretty bad. He also has no feel for when to use his relievers. The players love him so I'm happy for him to come back but I would be happy with a Ned Yost type guy too.
I know I am being pretty critical but I think it's a testament to the big 3, bartolo, Niese and Familia that this team went so far with all of the other limitations this team had.
