I had a sales manager years ago who would start off every meeting by insisting that it was doing the little things right that made the difference between a successful career and a mediocre one. He was right. It is the same in baseball. You do the little things right; make productive outs, work the pitch count, hit the cutoff man, etc,etc, and that is the difference between winning the division and coming up just short.
There was a lot of good things the Mets did in their 9-6 victory today in San Francisco---like, say, finally give some run support to Johan Santana (by the way, he got the win despite the worst outing of the season for him----that is poetic justice, he deserves it).
The main thing that jumped out at me was this; the Mets entered the ninth inning clinging to a 7-6 lead. I, and I am sure Johan Santana, were sitting there thinking "here we go again". How many times the past few seasons have we watched the Mets fail to tack on insurance runs late, then watched the bullpen blow a one run lead?
Well, not today. Today the Mets did the little things right; Carlos Beltran worked out a walk to lead off the ninth. The Mets managed to get the bases loaded with no outs and actually tack on a pair of runs! Fernando Tatis did the little things right as he flied out deep to right to tack on a valuable insurance run---making productive outs!
Then, in the bottom of the inning, J.J. Putz came on for the close. No drama. No BS. Just strikes and three quick outs to seal the deal! Textbook stuff!
Speaking of doing the little things "Wright", David had another big day---three hits (including a single in the all important ninth) and three RBI! He is on fire at the moment.
So, the Mets are now an impressive 3-0 so far on this ten game road trip----lets hope they break out the brooms tomorrow night!
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Original Story:
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