Severe Conditions

Things were a bit hairy at Citi Field this evening, and it wasn't because it was Free Shirt Friday and I wasn't there, and it wasn't because of a major June Thunderstorm that rolled through the area at around 7pm, forcing about an hour's delay. What was hairy was that once things got started, the Mets won a game by virtue of the performance of a pair of guys more suited for significant contributions in 1998, not 2014.

That would be, obviously, Bartolo Colon and Bobby Abreu.

In what's spiraling into another lost season for the Mets, Bartolo Colon has emerged as pretty much everything the Mets wanted him to be: a Marketable Trade Commodity. Colon obviously wasn't brought in here for his bright future, he was brought in here with an eye to, if the team struggled, be easily flipped for more prospects. Though Colon has had his share of implosions, as he was usually wont to do in his more "salad" days, of late Colon has pitched rather well, and beaten teams he probably should be beating. The punchless San Diego Padres, who arrived in town with an offense to rival the Mets, were little more than an annoyance for Colon. Following a 2nd inning Home Run by Rene Rivera, Colon then retired 18 Padres in a row, bridging the game straight to the 8th inning, while the Mets offense set out and actually scored a few runs in his support.

In addition to Abreu, who scored twice and drove in two runs, Taylor Teagarden contributed with an RBI hit, and even Lucas Duda, who hasn't had a hit all month, chipped in with an RBI double. These are nice signs, but they unfortunately seem like isolated events all too often. Even more unfortunate is the fact that a Mets victory seems like an isolated event all too often. I can't even say with great confidence that playing a team that's clearly worse than them, like the Padres, is a winning proposition.