In sports there's always records that are made to be broken, usually that is something to celebrate. Last night that is not the case for the New York Mets. Saturday night vs the Rockies, the Mets pitchers have set a new benchmark in hitting futility as they have now started this season 0 for their first 46 at the plate. Its a record that had stood for exactly 100 years in the major leagues. You have to go back to the 1914 St Louis Browns, not Cardinals,the Browns who had that year their pitchers collectively start the season with an 0 for their first 45 at the plate.
by Michael Hanley
Its not as if the Mets count on these pitchers to give them consistent offense with the bat, thats why they pay players like David Wright, Daniel Murphy to prove the run production. For the sake of the pitcher’s sake, it would be nice if one ground ball they hit back snuck through the infield and found its way safely to the outfield grass once in a while. Since these pictures do play in the National League, one that requires pitchers to take at bats on the night they start, it makes it even more perplexing how they cannot figure out how to muster a hit. Its not as if they are going against the aces of each staff every time at bat,they run into a bad pitcher every so often yet they make them look like Cy Young everytime he pitches to one of them.
If this streak was happening to an American League team, though it would make it not much easier to swallow, we could understand it a bit more if they were not the best at hitting since they never bat in the lineup.
There are multiple offenders in this achievement of futility as you could imagine. The one pitcher that tops that list is Jenrry Mejia who is the leader in the clubhouse with a personal 0 for 14 streak, including 6 strikeouts within that streak, which ties Bartolo Colon for the lead in that category. Dillon Gee and Zach Wheeler are next at 0 for 9 and 0 for 8 respectively.
The only silver lining for this pitching group in Jon Niese’s four walks and one RBI which came via one of those walks.His .OBP is .500 as a result of his patient approach at the plate. Hard to recall another pitcher who has a.000 batting average and had this high of an on base percentage at any point within a season.
This streak is one that bears watching only to see how much more extreme this hitless drought could last for. For the Mets pitchers and their fans one can only hope that the elusive first hit is out there one of these games. So a historical night for the Mets franchise but one they would just as quickly like to forget about.
