July — Not Kind to the Mets

My first three monthly updates were happy affairs.

On May 1, the Mets were three games over .500 and a game and a half out of first place.

On June 1, they were five games over .500 and the same game and a half off the pace.

On July 1, the team was seven games over .500 and two and a half games out of first.

But here we are on August 1 and the progress has come to an abrupt halt. After suffering through a 7-18 July, the Mets are four games under .500 and a whopping 12 games out of first. They are also 9.5 games out in the Wild Card chase after either being the Wild Card team or trailing by a game or so at the end of the other months.

So how did we get tot his point? Pitching, of course, both starting and relieving.

Johan Santana and Dillon Gee went down, and their replacements were not very good (although Matt Harvey looked superb in two starts). R.A. Dickey came back down to earth. Jonathon Niese was 1-4 in the month. Chris Young has been, well, Chris Young.

The bullpen had meltdown after meltdown, blowing several games during the month. The surprising crushing blow was losing Frank Francisco late in June. No one has been able to take up the challenge of being the closer. Things are so bad that Manny Acosta, along with his 73.67 ERA, is back on the team.

Overall the hitting has been all right, although Lucas Duda and Kirk Nieuwenhuis were sent down to Buffalo to work on their troubles. Jason Bay came back with his troubles intact — he is hitting .122 for the month, yet somehow it is surprising that he’s even hitting that high.

July 2012 was just a month to forget for the Mets. Hopefully August will be better. Perhaps Harvey can lead them out of the wilderness and get back to where the team was before. We can dream, can’t we?