Mets 6, Blue Jays 1
Blue Jays 7, Mets 4
Mets 7, Blue Jays 4

Despite taking place in a strange and foreign land and on a bizarre artificial surface, this weekend series closely resembled early season Mets baseball. The back of starting rotation was ineffective and the offense scored enough runs to compensate. Apparently the American League East can't compete with the Mets any better than the NL East.

Tom Glavine had his best start in weeks on Friday, allowing just one run in seven innings. He allowed eight hits and one walk and struck out four. Chad Bradford and Pedro Feliciano each pitched one scoreless inning of relief. Duaner Sanchez had to leave after throwing just two pitches in a scary moment, but his injury turned out be nothing more than a pinched nerve, so he could pitch again soon.

Orlando Hernandez was terrible on Saturday as he couldn't even finish the second inning. He allowed four hits and one walk and he hit two batters, all of which added up to six runs. Darren Oliver was excellent in relief, pitching four and one-third innings and allowing just one hit and one walk. But the Mets couldn't score enough runs against Roy Halladay to stage a comeback.

Sunday brought more inadequate starting pitching, but the offense had an easier time. Steve Trachsel got the win despite allowing four runs on six hits and three walks in five innings. He struck out two and allowed two home runs.

Jose Reyes continued to defy explanation, racking up nine hits in the series including four in each of the last two games. He hit a triple on Saturday and his eighth home run on Sunday. He is now hitting .302/.361/.495, having raised his OPS more than 100 points in the month of June. He is batting .561 over the course of his thirteen game hitting streak and .409 for the month.

The rest of the Mets had a pretty good weekend as well. David Wright and Lastings Milledge homered on Friday. Carlos Beltran and Jose Valentin did the same on Sunday. Carlos Delgado had three hits on Saturday but was otherwise hitless in his return to Toronto. He did draw a walk and score a run on Friday.

Paul Lo Duca had three hits, two of them doubles, on Friday but had to leave Saturday's game due to a bruised left thumb. Ramon Castro started Sunday and had two hits including a double. Castro continues to outhit Lo Duca, hitting .256/.347/.427 as compared to the starter's .280/.321/.394. Hopefully Paul will get all the time off he needs to recover from this injury.

The interleague road trip continues for the Mets (47-28) as they begin a series with the division-leading Red Sox (44-28) on Tuesday. Alay Soler (2-1, 3.32) and Jon Lester (2-0, 2.76) will be the starting pitchers. If the Mets were in a tight race, I might be annoyed that they had to play the three good teams in the AL East on the road consecutively like this. But given that their division lead has stretched to 11.5 games, it's not so bad that they get to take a early look at some potential World Series opponents. Is it too late to get some games with Detroit or Oakland on the schedule?  ¶ joe | 11:27 PM |