Mickey Callaway

New York Mets: Mickey Callaway Shows His Lack of Knowledge Again

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New York Mets, Mets

The Mets suffered a grueling 2-1 loss in 14 innings against the Braves after a dominant start from Jacob deGrom. They had plenty of chances to win the game but failed to get a clutch hit. Those type of games will happen in a long season, but the horrible decision making of Mickey Callaway is inexcusable in late August.

Deciding to Pitch to a Hitter Instead of a Pitcher

The decision to bring in Jeurys Familia for a third straight day over Chris Flexen is a reasonable one. Flexen has been dreadful at the big league level and Familia could not do worse than him. He struggled with his control but still found his way out of the inning with only one run allowed, which could have been prevented if Callaway had an idea of how to manage a game.

It was a great move to challenge Adeiny Hechavarria’s RBI triple, which ended up taking away the Braves run. With second and third with none out, the Mets had to pitch to the seven hitter Rafael Ortega. Familia did a terrific job of striking him out to get to Billy Hamilton with the pitcher on deck since the Braves were out of bench players.

Why Even Mess With Hamilton?

It would be a no doubt intentional walk situation to load the bases for the pitcher. The middle infielders can attempt to turn two up the middle and the corners can come home for the force, if Max Fried did not strikeout. Callaway decided to pitch to Hamilton with a drawn in infield. His whole career is based around him slashing ground balls and he did exactly that to give them the lead.

The only possible reason to pitch to Hamilton was the hope they could get him and Fried out to avoid facing Ronald Acuna Jr., but that is an unwarranted aggressive move. If the play backfires like it did, now you more than likely will give Acuna a chance to widen the Braves lead. Thankfully they got Acuna out, but anyone would much rather face Acuna with the bases loaded and two outs.

Mickey Will Be Gone Next Season

It is unbelievable that someone with the lack of knowledge that Callaway has, is allowed to manage a Major League Baseball team. He has shown countless times that he is a fool and does not have a grasp of how to manage. Callaway covers up his stupidity with his positive speeches after games to avoid giving a real answer. Thankfully, no matter how successful the Mets are this season Mickey Callaway will be out of a job one the season ends. Unfortunately he will be the only thing that can stop the Mets from a wild card birth.

New York Mets: Mickey Callaway’s Mismanagement of the Pitching Staff

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New York Mets, Mets

There comes a time in a manager’s career where it is better to simply do nothing instead of over manage. Mets manager Mickey Callaway did not get that memo when he pulled Steven Matz out of the game with only 79 pitches after letting him hit for himself.

Callaway’s trademark is his extremely questionable moves during his tenure as manager. Throughout the Mets hot streak he did not make many tough decisions as the starting pitching went deep into games, making it automatic to use Seth Lugo. Callaway did not even have a tough decision to make with Matz. He could have fell asleep and done nothing, which he should think about doing more often.

100 Times Out of 100?

Callaway’s defense of his move is the same idiotic thinking that will push him out of a job next season. Matz cruised through 14 straight batters prior to his departure. He even started the two out rally which gave the Mets a 2-1 lead at the time. Allowing Matz to hit when they were down one was a good move. Partly because he had settled in nicely and partly because he is a better hitter than anyone on the Mets bench.

Callaway was also unprepared heading into the seventh inning. He should have warmed up Lugo before the rally even started, if he had ideas of bringing him in. He waited until Pete Alonso, who was the last hitter of the inning, came up to hit. Callaway has been very hypocritical throughout his time in New York and proved it once again. He claimed he wanted his “best pitchers to carry us” then only needed a week to prove he lied.

Remember the “Pitching Guru”?

To Callaway, it made sense to push Marcus Stroman to 115 pitches in 6+ innings when he did not need to, but not to stick with the 79-pitch Matz. Even if everything worked out, Callaway did not have a real plan following Lugo. Granted, Lugo has been one of the best relievers in baseball over the last month, but most of that happened because they did not overuse him.

Was Edwin Diaz actually expected to close out a potential one run lead against the Atlanta Braves? If that was the case, Callaway should never be allowed to manage again. You do not need to be Gil Hodges to figure out what the best move was.

Making Matters Worse

Once it was clear Lugo was no where near his best, Callaway decided to leave him out there long enough where he becomes unavailable for Thursday’s game. Then he used Jeurys Familia for the bottom of the eighth, which likely made him unavailable for Thursday since he threw in back to back days.

Familia did keep the Mets in the game but now they have to rely on the combo of Brad Brach and Edwin Diaz to close out a win. The Mets have the talent on their team to make a deep playoff run, but it is a shame their manager is not fit to run a little league team.

Tell Me If You Have Heard This One Before…The Mets Bullpen Blows Another Win

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Zack Wheeler was spectacular again for the New York Mets last night. He hurled seven shutout innings against the Pittsburgh Pirates and retired 10 batters in a row at one point. Unfortunately for the 21st time this season the Mets bullpen took another loss, 5-3. The game once again showed the questionable decisions Mickey Callaway makes.

The downfall started with Robert Gsellman allowing Starling Marte to leadoff the eighth with a double then steal third. Marte was driven in on a sac fly then Gsellman allowed another hit to Josh Bell. Callaway had a quick hook and pulled him after three batters. He has struggled in his last 9.2 innings allowing 10 earned runs. Gsellman has lost the hard sink on his fastball and has been overworked because of the lack of good pitchers in the bullpen.

Give the Man a Break

Jeurys Familia was called upon to get the save in the ninth, a day after throwing 28 pitches. Familia proceeded to allow three straight base runners with two strikes and did not record an out in the rough outing. He had the same problem as Gsellman, his pitches did not have the same bite and looked overworked. Familia has struggled to get back in a groove since his return from the disabled list.

Anthony Swarzak was brought in to clean up Familia’s mess but ended up with a blown save. Swarzak had less than two minutes to warm up and when Callaway was asked about it he let out a sarcastic response. “So how it works in baseball in the ninth inning, or in any inning, is you get a guy going and they call down when they are ready…so they are ready when they go in.” Callaway showed some fire there, but if he put the same amount of thought into his in-game strategy as he did for his postgame remarks, this team would not be 14 games under .500.

Ride the Hot Hand

Tim Peterson was the only reliever who pitched well last night. He retired both of his batters to end the eighth inning in nine pitches. Callaway, in plain terms, said he was not ready to the “high leverage” moment in the ninth. There was not too much pressure on Peterson if he were to pitch the ninth. The Pirates were dead, the Mets are already way back in the standings and there was about 10,000 people left in the ballpark.

Callaway needs to throw the “reliever roles” out the window in that spot. Familia threw a lot of pitches the night before and the Mets simply do not have a dominant reliever they can trust right now. There is nothing to lose with keeping Peterson out there and if he struggled then you move on to the next guy. A bullpen can revolve around the same two or three guys. We still do not know what some of these new relievers can do in big spots and that was a great time to find out what you have.