For future installments of The Parallel Universe Fake Mets, I hope to have little screencaps and so forth. That was not possible for these entries, because as I mentioned earlier this week, this week has been a bitch and a half. For now, you’ll have to make do with this realistic animation of Luis Castillo getting forced out at second.
One aspect of the unfairness of MLB10:The Show I forgot about in my first post: If you throw a breaking pitch, there’s a 50 percent chance it will skip past the catcher. Regardless of the pitcher, regardless of the catcher, there are a huge amount of wild pitches/passed balls in this game.
Game 1: Fake Marlins 4, Fake Mets 2
The Fake Mets jumped out to an early lead on Josh Johnson, when Jose Reyes led off with an infield single, moved to second on an errant throw, and scored on a David Wright RBI single. But the Marlins stormed back with four straight hits against Johan Santana in the top of the third, sparked by a leadoff single by Johnson of all people (pitchers in this game are way better hitters than their real life counterparts), and the Fake Marlins went up 3-1. Carlos Beltran thrilled the crowd with an inside-the-park homerun (aided by Chris Coghlan bouncing off the left field wall), but Cody Ross hit an out-of-the-park homer of his own, and the Fake Mets could not catch up, getting just one more hit the rest of the way.
In real life: Amazingly, the Real Mets managed to beat Josh Johnson for the first time. Wright hit a two-run homer in the bottom of the first, Santana was his usual sharp self, and the Mets capitalized on some typically shoddy Marlins defense to cruise to a 7-1 win.
Game 2: Fake Mets 2, Fake Marlins 1
Fake Mike Pelfrey was sharp through 7 innings, and David Wright clubbed a two-run homer off of Ricky Nolasco to provide all the offense the Mets would need. The one run Pelfrey “allowed” should not have scored at all. John Baker hit a ball up the middle, and I tried to make Jose Reyes dive at the ball. But what often happens in The Show is that the computer switches your fielders very quickly. By the time I was diving, my fielding capabilities had already transfered to Carlos Beltran. That meant Carlos was sprawled out on the turf instead of chasing down Baker’s grounder, and he got a gift double, then moved to third on another grounder and scored on a sac fly. Pedro Feliciano and Kelvim Escobar combined for a scoreless eighth, and Frankie Rodriguez set down the Fake Marlins 1-2-3 in the ninth for his first fake save of the year.
In real life: John Maine struggled through five innings, ceding four runs and falling behind every batter he faced, and the bullpen let up two more (including Jennry Mejia in his MLB debut). The Mets somehow “rallied” to tie the game at 6, thanks to a leaky, wild Marlins bullpen. But the Marlins took a lead in the top of the tenth, and the Mets went down quietly in the bottom half.
Game 3: Fake Marlins 5, Fake Mets 3
Fake Oliver Perez was pretty much what you might expect, and struggled through five innings, giving up three runs. The Fake Mets rallied against Anibal Sanchez, taking advantage of two walks in the bottom of the fifth to score two runs, then tie it up on a Jeff Francoeur homer in the sixth. But set-up man Kelvim Escobar got slapped around for two runs in the top of the eighth, and the Fake Mets could not recover.
In real life: Jon Niese had a decent debut, which might have looked even better if he had any defense behind him. He gave up three runs over six innings, but the anemic Mets bats couldn’t catch up and never mounted any threat against Nate Robertson or the suddenly unhittable Marlins bullpen.
Parallel Universe Fake Mets record: 1-2
Real Mets record: 1-2
