The Mets Meet Anibal Sanchez

Days like today prove that the best results are sometimes the most unexpected ones.

The Mets have about a gazillion regulars on the disabled list and are playing for 2010. The Marlins have a slimmer of playoff hopes and sit pretty at second place in the National League East. Anibal Sanchez isn’t great (4.72 FIP and 5.38 tRA in 41 innings this year) but against the Mets lineup, it looked like an easy victory. I mean, really, look at this morbid crew:

Angel Pagan CF .343 wOBA
Wilson Valdez SS .248
Daniel Murphy 1B .307
Jeff Francoeur RF .299
Cory Sullivan LF .330
Fernando Tatis 3B .314
Omir Santos C .300
Anderson Hernandez 2B .278
Tim Redding P .056

Of the eight batters, two can be called league average hitters or better. That’s it. Three-fourths of the Mets lineup consisted of below average hitters, and yet, they went out and scored 10 runs on the Marlins.

Hernandez contributed three hits on the day and scored twice, Valdez knocked in a run and had two hits, Murphy had a pair of hits and three RBI, Sullivan had two hits, Tatis popped a solo home run, and so on. Every Mets starter A) had a hit, B) had two.

For Anibal, his final line after 3.2 innings pitched: eight hits, two earned runs, three walks, two strikeouts, and one bewildered glance at the scorecard to see whether such a pathetic looking group actually knocked him around. Cristhian Martinez relieved Sanchez and didn’t fare much better as he allowed six hits and four earned runs in three and a third innings.

Fans of the Mets don’t have much to look forward to when batting nowadays, but for once they weren’t the ones vomiting at the results.