No fire

[wart57]

I know good pitching can make a team look flat, but the Birds are just looking dead. Maybe the road trip to Houston will help.

[jim]

It was the Mets pitching. The Cardinals hustled and played hard.

[wart57]

It was the Mets pitching. The Cardinals hustled and played hard.

I think I mentioned the pitching can make you look flat.....I think....

[jim]

It was the Mets pitching. The Cardinals hustled and played hard.

I think I mentioned the pitching can make you look flat.....I think....

Saying a team that gets beat 10-0 looked flat is like saying the pope looks Catholic. Kind of stating the obvious, and since you qualified it with the pitching can make you look flat BUT I assumed you were going beyond that.

[wart57]

It was the Mets pitching. The Cardinals hustled and played hard.

I think I mentioned the pitching can make you look flat.....I think....

Saying a team that gets beat 10-0 looked flat is like saying the pope looks Catholic. Kind of stating the obvious, and since you qualified it with the pitching can make you look flat BUT I assumed you were going beyond that.

Ouch, I am hurt Jim......maybe you have a flat head.....
The defense did not look good.
Looper looked good, bulpen was not last night.
I would have liked to have seen Beltran get one up and in, just to keep him honest.(Not saying hit him, just one up and in.)
The Mets wanted these games more.
Larussa looked like he was asleep half the game.

[jim]

It was the Mets pitching. The Cardinals hustled and played hard.

I think I mentioned the pitching can make you look flat.....I think....

Saying a team that gets beat 10-0 looked flat is like saying the pope looks Catholic. Kind of stating the obvious, and since you qualified it with the pitching can make you look flat BUT I assumed you were going beyond that.

Ouch, I am hurt Jim......maybe you have a flat head.....
The defense did not look good.
Looper looked good, bulpen was not last night.
I would have liked to have seen Beltran get one up and in, just to keep him honest.(Not saying hit him, just one up and in.)
The Mets wanted these games more.
Larussa looked like he was asleep half the game.

Sorry, but you kind of had it coming with your response... I think

I'll agree with you about the defense, Looper, and bullpen. Don't agree about the Mets wanting the game more or TLR being asleep (maybe he was, but I didn't notice).

I saw effort and hustle on both teams, and I also saw one team beat the living bejesus out of another for 3 straight nights. Better all the way around.

If lack of fire means lack of execution, then I'll agree. If it means what I think it means I'll disagree.

[wart57]

It was the Mets pitching. The Cardinals hustled and played hard.

I think I mentioned the pitching can make you look flat.....I think....

Saying a team that gets beat 10-0 looked flat is like saying the pope looks Catholic. Kind of stating the obvious, and since you qualified it with the pitching can make you look flat BUT I assumed you were going beyond that.

Ouch, I am hurt Jim......maybe you have a flat head.....
The defense did not look good.
Looper looked good, bulpen was not last night.
I would have liked to have seen Beltran get one up and in, just to keep him honest.(Not saying hit him, just one up and in.)
The Mets wanted these games more.
Larussa looked like he was asleep half the game.

Sorry, but you kind of had it coming with your response... I think

I'll agree with you about the defense, Looper, and bullpen. Don't agree about the Mets wanting the game more or TLR being asleep (maybe he was, but I didn't notice).

I saw effort and hustle on both teams, and I also saw one team beat the living bejesus out of another for 3 straight nights. Better all the way around.

If lack of fire means lack of execution, then I'll agree. If it means what I think it means I'll disagree.

It's all good, except for the Cards getting swept.
I still think the Mets were jacked up for this series and the Cards were not. But it was the first series of the year, and the Mets are really good, so I am not even close to panic mode.

[skmsw]

Saying "no fire" implies that you've assessed their attitude and effort, and determined them to have contributed to (or caused) the outcomes. Saying that the Mets were "jacked up" and the Cards "were not" implies a) that you can know that, even about people you've never met and have not recently spoken to; b) that you not only CAN know those things, but that you DO know them; and c) that being "jacked up" or not affects performance and outcomes.

As fans, it is fun to think we know those things, and it is common to relate to the players and think we know how they feel, and how we'd feel if we were them, and how we'd do if we felt that way.

With all due respect, we don't. Sometimes even THEY don't.

There have actually been some pretty good attempts at research to measure some of these kinds of things. To the extent that it can be done, it suggests tiny or no impact on outcomes.

I will not say that they do not exist, nor that they don't matter. I'll just say -- when it comes to trying to understand the motivation, attitude, personality, and character of people we've never met, and the impact those things have on how they do their jobs (which most of us have never done) -- best to be agnostic. Assume that it is impossible to know whether or not those traits were present, that there is no logical or coherent way to demonstrate whether or not they have any impact on outcomes, and that therefore they are mostly irrelevent to an accurate understanding of performance.

[heyzeus]

Even great teams, that play hard and care about winning, will lose a lot of games in a season.

These Cardinals may not be a great team. They may be a good team, though. So I'll add: even good teams will lose a lot of games and sometimes look bad.

[bleacherbum]

Call it whatever you want guys. But when the Cards are in 30th out of 30 teams in hitting% and 26th place fielding% and 27th worst team pitching ERA there is a lack of something going on.