The Extender

When we think of the role and importance of an ace, we often think of his position as the team's "stopper", the guy who doesn't let a 3-game losing streak turn into four games.When Johan Santana goes to the mound today, he'll assume a different mantle. His role will be to act as the team's extender, not their stopper.The Mets have won consecutive games only once in the month of June. On it's face it's a pretty remarkable stat, but when you consider how badly the Mets have played this month, it becomes a lot easier to believe.The Mets desperately need some positive momentum. For the past month all the talk has been of injuries and losses, one day the story is Johan getting shelled at Yankee Stadium, the next it's Carlos Beltran going down with an injury.We hear soundbites from Alex Cora that kind of encourage you, then you hear others from Jerry Manuel that are a bit more realistic.We've been hearing all season about this difficult stretch of...