Where to start… rough fundamentals? Anemic offense? Poor managing? Defensive errors/miscues? Morris’ roster replacement?

How about this…

We lost a one-run game in the 11th inning after getting to Billy Wagner for a run two innings earlier. Now if that isn’t a bone-numbing, confidence blowing event, I’m not sure what would ever qualify.

But perhaps these events do?

Five innings the Pirates had at least their leadoff man on base and five times the next batter failed to move the runner into scoring position.  In fact, John Russell didn’t even call for a sacrifice bunt other than asking Nyjer Morgan - who we all know is an extremely poor bunter - to try and move both Bautista and Paulino over in the seventh with no outs.  As you might expect, Morgan failed. 

Of the five batters who failed, Bay is the only one I would excuse Russell for, but Bautista, Morgan, Gomez, and McLouth are all bat men who could/should have been asked to sacrifice, and got the simple job done.

That’s poor managing, and a poor AB by Morgan.

Or how about Russell using Doumit to pinch hit in the 9th leaving the Pirates without a backup catcher? Mientkiewicz was also used in the 11th leaving just Rivas on the bench, although it didn’t much matter after we saw…

Russell bat Mientkiewicz for Osoria leading off the 11th after he had recorded six outs in the seven batters faced on just 17 pitches.  Curiously, Osoria had only thrown 39 pitches the last nine days.  With Russell pulling Osoria, that only left recent callup Van Benschoten to come in and pitch who had been warming up in the pen for the last three innings. And, as you might expect…

JvB recorded just one out in the five batters faced and ended up losing the game having thrown just 17 pitches himself.  He was also called for a balk that was marginal at best, but he did balk all the same. The balk wasn’t the problem - JvB’s lack of MLB quality stuff and being thrust into a ridiculous position by his manager was the real problem.

Now why Russell would set JvB up to fail like that is anyone’s guess. No manager in his right mind puts JvB into a high leverage situation like that in his first game back (5th appearance as an MLB reliever since 2004 - ERA around 15), much less on the road at God forsaken Shea Stadium with a noise level higher than 10 on your boom box and an overwhelming atmosphere.

Very, very poor managing decisions.

And hey let’s be honest, JvB is essentially the Morris/Dumatrait replacement player so chock one loss up, not to mention a 27.00 ERA, to the “let’s release Morris” saga which is yet another bizarre tale we won’t go into here and now.

Fundamentally, we executed a few plays very nicely.  Bixler ran for Doumit who reached on an error starting the 9th with the Pirates down a run and he took second on a wild pitch by Wagner which he anticipated well. After McLouth struck out, Gomez ground to short and Bixler took off for third and would have been dead meat if Reyes decided to make a play on him, but he didn’t.  Sanchez then mashed a liner into right center to score Bixler and the game was tied. As I mentioned, it was the first run scored off Wagner this year and you could see the Pirates with a little extra step in their walk after that happened.

But other fundamental mistakes/miscues cost us runs. Snell threw hitter’s count watermelons several times up to the plate like a 3-1 pitch to Ryan Church (one HR last 78 at bats) who crushed it over the left field wall to put the Mets up 2-0 in the 4th.

Then there was a bizarre 3-2 change thrown to Castillo in the 5th which missed the plate walking Castillo and putting men at first and third with one out.  You would have to suspect Snell was thinking he wanted to setup a double play possibility if he did walk Castillo but, funny thing, Castillo was 1-9 career vs. Snell so you have to wonder why Snell didn’t attack Castillo and get the out? Especially considering David Wright was on deck who was also 1-9 career vs Snell.

Well as you might expect, it backfired. Wright hit a groundball to Gomez at short who made a perfect toss to Sanchez for what should have been a tailor-made double play, but Sanchez dropped the ball, a run scored, and men were left at first and second with one out.

Sanchez was charged with an error of course but he played it fundamentally wrong by waiting for the toss from Gomez while standing on the bag instead of holding his position and timing his run to the bag to catch Gomez’s toss and relay to first. It’s a play we see Sanchez routinely make at second and numerous times he’s failed to get the double play because of it and, for some bizarre reason, the Pirates refuse to make him, or teach him, how to adjust and play the position properly.

Snell was beside himself after the Sanchez error and ended up walking Beltran to load the bases when Russell went out and pulled him at the 92 pitch mark with the bases now loaded.

Marte came in and got Church to strikeout looking on an obvious ball four pitch home plate umpire Hunter Wendelstedt just totally blew the call on, and that cost the Mets a run. Then while Delgado was at the plate, Gomez came in to talk to Marte and Paulino telling them that David Wright was tipping location by the direction he bounced as Marte wound up (all the Mets were tipping when parked at 2B), so Paulino changed the signs and told Marte what to throw on the next pitch.

Hilariously, Paulino faked setting up inside, Wright bounced back toward second to tip Delgado, and then Paulino shot outside as Marte released a slider away and Delgado weakly swung through it for strike three. Delgado just sat and looked at Wright as Marte walked off the mound bouncing and skipping. It was great.

Two innings later in the seventh, Bautista singled leading off, Paulino walked, Morgan couldn’t execute the bunt then popped out to short left failing to advance the runners, and Schoeneweis replaced Santana getting McLouth to ground weakly to second which Castillo bobbled, but they got the force of Paulino leaving Bautista at third with two outs.

Schoeneweis threw a wild pitch with Gomez at the plate and Bautista broke for home. Mets catcher Casanova played it well and tossed back to Schoeneweis who was covering and Bautista slid under the tag scoring.

But remember Hunter Wendelstedt who took a run from the Mets in the 5th? Yep, he took one from the Pirates too by calling Bautista out. I suppose that’s what you call an-eye-for-an-eye umpiring lesson. The Mets announcers tried to play it off by saying Bautista’s hand slid above the plate not touching it but I looked at it in slow mo and you can see his hand on the plate dragging dirt with it. Still, it was bang-bang and we didn’t get the call.

I can’t say the unconventional managing style of John Russell lost us this game (as well as many others so far this year), but it sure didn’t help. His lack of small ball play, bizarre in-game roster management, and poor timing all helped to remind me of his days as our third base coach when we used to say things like “why in the heck did Russell send him there?” The saga continues.

Plus, our anemic offense - what were we, 1-7 with runners in scoring position leaving us hitting something like a puky .250 now for the year? - didn’t help matters much. Gomez at short was a welcomed surprise, and watching Paulino get call after call out of the zone was also sweet, but the Gomez flip to Sanchez error reminded me too much of the way Wilson started becoming error-prone with Castillo. That’s a bad nightmare.

Jason Bay made a couple of nice catches, LaRoche made a gold glove-type stop at first, Paulino threw out Reyes in the first, and McLouth ranged a good 50 yards to the warning track to make a good catch in the second.  So there were some positives too.

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With the rainout, Neal Huntington has the opportunity to skip Tom Gorzelanny in the rotation to rest his arm but it looks like he’s not going to do it. If he had, Gorzy would have had the 30th off then pitch the 3rd, 8th, and 13th and been eligible to be skipped again the 19th as an off day.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like Huntington is going to make a move to do that.

I think he should reconsider.

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“Nutting is known as a man who closely watches his dollars. So — in the name of accountability and to put the Matt Morris deal behind us — please tell us, Mr. Nutting, what was it that persuaded you to give Dave Littlefield permission to throw about $14 million down the sewer?” — Bob Smizik, April 30, 2008

Good stuff there but it should be expanded to include the reality of 2008 - Nutting/Coonelly/Huntington also just threw the money down the sewer because nobody knows for sure if Morris might have come around. Nobody.

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Wow, watching Heilman struggle on the mound against us, I’m sure glad our pro scouts didn’t do a Nady deal with him in the package. He’s not the same guy I remember. Yuck.

And what’s up with Tyler Yates and the Mets? This cat walks the first two batters he sees, goes to 3-2 on Wright who then swings thru ball four, Beltran popped out to Bay who made a nice catch to save Yates, and then Church is first pitch swinging for the fence, but flied out harmlessly.  Yates was very lucky.

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Let’s see, that’s now a career 22 earned runs for JvB on the road in 21 innings?

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Asking Bay to swing long in the four hole is just ridiculous. He’s a #5 guy. You have to wonder why the Pirates refuse to move Nady to the three hole? If they want to keep batting Doumit #4 (why they do that should be the subject of another story one day), put Nady #3, Doumit, Bay, and LaRoche and watch LaRoche take off. If Doumit isn’t in, bat Nady fourth right now and let Mientz hit third.

Just some random thoughts.

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The Pirates have now lost 10 of their last 13.