Johan pitches Mets past Braves

After an 11-0 drubbing the previous night, Johan Santana did what he does best: Stop the bleeding. Santana pitched 7 innings of scoreless baseball while striking out five batters in earning his first ever win against the Braves. Johan also earned his 11th win of the year to improve to 11-7, but more importantly helped the Mets win their first game of the 2nd half after dropping the first two at Turner Field.

The Mets did not get on the board until the 6th, when they scored runs on a walk and a fielder's choice to go up 2-0. Things got a little dicey in the 8th inning when Pedro Feliciano served up a long ball to Chipper Jones to cut the lead in half. New York broke things open with a three run 9th courtesy of an Angel Pagan triple, Luis Castillo sacrifice bunt, and a Jeff Francoeur single to center to go up 5-1. After being hitless the first two games back in Atlanta, Francoeur was 2/5 with an RBI.

Johan Santana was a dominant force on the mound yesterday. Ever since a rough June, he has had three outstanding starts in July, going seven innings in each start and only allowing two runs in his last 21 innings of work. He did a great job going after hitters yesterday with his fastball and change up, and he looks primed for another amazing second half of the season. Whenever this team needs a big start, the 151 million dollar man always comes through. With the season on thin ice for the Metropolitans, falling 8.5 games behind the Phillies after a lifeless 11 run loss in Atlanta, Santana just came out and gave the Mets a vintage Johan performance.

Right now with all the injuries to the lineup and a very inconsistent rotation, Johan is the one sure thing the Mets have every fifth day. Mike Pelfrey has been extremely inconsistent as the number two starter, and you have no clue if he will give you seven innings of one run ball or get an early shower after three innings. Oliver Perez has pitched well since coming back, but he can walk seven guys in three innings or pitch eight innings of one run ball. After that you have Fernando Nieve and Livan Hernandez, and while Nieve has pitched well, Hernandez has been dreadful his last couple starts.

If the Mets want to hang around to make a late season run at the Phillies and the wild card, Johan is going to need to be the ace every fifth day and give the Mets a chance to score enough runs to squeak out a win. So far so good for Johan. He was 8-0 with a 2.17 ERA in the second half last year. This year he is 1-0 with an ERA of 0.00. He is the reason any Mets fan would have hope they can stay in this thing until the big hitters come back.

(AP Photos Courtesy of John Bazemore)