Perfection

About two years ago, somewhere in the middle of reading most of my baseball collection, I stumbled upon a beautiful book titled "27 Men Out." Each chapter was designated to a perfect game in MLB history as they broke down those special games in great detail. There were only 15 chapters—the book does not count the two thrown in the 1800s. Fifteen chapters for 15 perfect games in more than 100 years of baseball.

Ever since reading that book, no-hitters never really excited me that much. Of course it's still an unbelievable feat and rare accomplishment to fire a no-hitter, but I've been waiting for that next perfect game since Randy Johnson's in 2004. It's probably the rarest single-game occurrence that can happen in baseball.

Yesterday afternoon on the South Side of Chicago, Mark Buehrle wrote his own chapter of perfection with the 16th perfect game in baseball history. He mowed down the Tampa Bay Rays by retiring all 27 batters. No hits, no walks, no errors, nothing except history and the record book.

Buehrle didn't come out of nowhere either. He's already thrown a no-hitter prior to his perfect game, he owns a World Series ring and he's been one of the most consistent, steady pitchers in the past decade. This just adds to his resume of a great Major League career.

I don't think the average fan understands how greater a perfect game is from a no-hitter. In a perfect game, no one from the opposition reaches a base as everyone is retired in order. Consider this—there's been 263 no-hitters in MLB history, which is more than two a season. Compare that to 16 perfect games, which comes out to about 15 percent chance to see a perfect game a season. It just doesn't happen. That's why Buehrle's game Thursday was so special and easily goes down as the highlight of 2009.

The Mets Stink

One thing that became very obvious over the recent weeks was showcased tonight on Sunday Night Baseball—the Mets are a mess. Their 7-1 loss to Atlanta was only one game, but if you've seen them in the past month then you know they stink. Despite the second-highest payroll in baseball (just under $150 million), the Mets are 43-48, just lost three-out-of-four to the Braves and are 15-29 since June 1.

Of course fans and baseball people will point to the amount of injuries that continue to pile up for the Mets. Carlos Beltran, Jose Reyes, Carlos Delgado, J.J. Putz and John Maine have all missed a significant amount of time already this season. Injuries are a part of the game and sometimes they dictate the fortunes of a season. But doesn't it seem like it's always something for the Mets in recent years? Last year, it was their bullpen falling apart, blowing games. So they go out and spend a ridiculous sum of money on the pen, only to see injuries derail the team in 2009. And there's always the late-season collapse the past two years, which is difficult to explain other than they simply buckled until the pressure.

If you looked at the Mets lineup lately, you wouldn't recognize half of them. And then there's the Mets pitching. They've had to rely on some of these names: Elmer Dessens, Tim Redding, Casey Fossum and Jon Niese. Ouch. Then there's Livan Hernandez who sucks, Oliver Perez who still sucks and Mike Pelfrey who's been awful this year.

Overall, it's added up to a bunch of nothing for the Mets. It's actually a surprise they have hung around as long as they have. But that's changing fast thanks to the Phillies kicking it up a notch along with the Mets continued struggles. I'm writing this team off once again. At least we won't have to watch or hear about their epic collapse in the last month of the season because come September, the Mets won't be anywhere near the playoff chase.

The Wheelhouse is Now Tweeting

This post is probably two weeks overdue, but it's official—The Wheelhouse is now tweeting on Twitter. You can find the home link here at http://twitter.com/IntheWheelhouse to follow all of the tweets.

I'm not entirely sure how this new online phenomenon will be used in relation to The Wheelhouse, but know that we'll be tweeting away on various topics, comments about sports and life in general. Oh what world we live in where thousands of people now tweet on their twitter and people actually knows what that means. Couldn't they have thought of a better name for this online communication?

Anyway, continuing with the housekeeping, look for a gadget on the right column that shows the live Twitter feed as I'm currently trying to work on the kinks in it. I will also be adding a couple of new links to the blog and website list on the right as well as possibly overhauling the layout and design of The Wheelhouse. Nothing official as of yet, just playing around with it to see all the options.

That's it for now. I promise to get some new baseball posts in the next couple of days with the All-Star game rapidly approaching next Tuesday.