Column A, Column B

The Weekend wasn't a total wash for the Mets, seeing as how they won on Saturday, but in the grand scheme of things, losing 3 of 4 in Pittsburgh isn't exactly the way you want to make your presence known. It was mostly a forgotten weekend of games for me. Saturday, as I have been for the past several weeks, I was out of the house and not near a TV while the game was going on, and therefore I missed the Blue Bombers, behind Jon Niese and an early flurry of hits and runs, beat Gerrit Cole in his much-ballyhooed return from the Disabled List 5-3.

Sunday, I was home and had the game on, and with Bartolo Colon on the mound, certainly you figured the Mets would have a fighting chance. Colon, who gives the impression, of course, that he's far too old and out of shape to do anything of consequence, has been more good than bad this season, particularly recently, where his starts have generally consisted of him pitching very well and very deep into games and coming away with wins. When he's looked good, he's been great, and that's been the case for him over the last several games he's pitched. Unfortunately, when he's been bad, he's been particularly putrid, and he ends up looking less like the Bartolo Colon that plows his way through innings and more like the fat, sweaty, uncomfortable Bartolo Colon that he appears to be (or, more appropriately, Shaun Marcum). Sunday was one of those days for Bartolo Colon. The Pirates whacked him around early, and by the middle of the game I had tuned out in favor of other activities like cleaning my bathroom and doing laundry. The remainder of the game was a blur, the Mets scored a couple of runs late in the game and I don't really know how they did it, and the result was a 5-2 game that had the feel of an 11-3 game.

There seems to be very little in between with the Mets lately. They win boring or they lose boring and, sure, every once in a while they have games like Friday night that get kind of wacky, but then again even those games offer more to get frustrated about as opposed to glimmering good times. Then again, they had a glimmering good time game on Tuesday night this week. But games like that could be counted on one's total digits this season. The upshot to all this is that while the Mets have been mostly boring this season, so has the rest of their division, and we'll get to see that first hand when the Mets voyage down to good ol' Atlanty to play the wonderful Braves. It's scheduled to be about 97˚ all three games. This probably won't go well, but we'll see I guess.

Go Back To Sleep

Following a particularly taxing week, I found myself coming home this evening with a strong desire to just crawl into bed and take a nap for a while. The result was that I slept through a large swath of tonight's game. But I woke up in time to see the latter portion of the proceedings as they dragged further and further into the night.

Given the way things ended up, perhaps I should have just stayed in bed and forgotten about the game altogether.

That certainly feels like a recycled comment, and I know I'm pretty much echoing the sentiments of everyone who watches this team on a day-to-day basis. On the other hand, the artfulness in which the Mets found a way to spit tonight's game up was one of those particular cake-takers.

The Mets scored their requisite two runs for this game in the 4th inning courtesy of a Lucas Duda single. That's now 3 games in a row that Duda has managed to net an RBI, and this time he did it without loafing the ball out of the ballpark, which is kind of nice, it shows he has a pulse in situational hitting situations, but when that's the sum total of the offense for the night, well, you can probably guess how things ultimately turned out.

But for the Mets, who continue to pitch well in spite of often hopeless circumstances, they stuck around in this game. Jacob deGrom once again pitched well, and once again was victimized by one bad inning and a lack of run support. The 2 runs he allowed in 6.2 innings was indicative of another fine outing, but one that could do no better than match his rookie counterpart Brandon Cumpton. deGrom was followed to the mound by Josh Edgin and Jeurys Familia, who brought the game through to the 9th inning, when Jenrry Mejia took over and stopped the Pirates as well, sending the game into extra innings, setting the stage for one of those truly farcical Mets Moments that you look back on so many years later and smack yourself in the head.

The 10th inning began for the Pirates with Josh Harrison, one of those Brandon Phillips-types who has the look of a Met Killer all over him, singling. Fairly benign to start the inning, but then he stole second, although Ruben Tejada seemed pretty certain that he didn't. It looked to me like Harrison was safe, but Tejada got demonstrative enough to cajole Terry Collins into challenging the call, which was predictably unsuccessful. Mejia went back to work and got Gregory Polanco (not Gregor Blanco) to hit a comebacker. Harrison having taken off on contact, Mejia did the proper thing and ran directly at him to get him in a rundown, except that instead of a rundown, some horrible Baseball version of a Marx Brothers chase scene ensued, wherein Mejia gave up on the play too soon, made an ill-advised throw to Daniel Murphy. Murphy chased Harrison towards 3rd, dodging Harrison's helmet, which he may or may not have intentionally thrown off his head in some weird ruse to distract someone. Somehow the ball ended up with Ruben Tejada, while Harrison decided he was better off taking a left turn about 25 feet shy of 3rd base and crawling across the infield to avoid getting tagged out. Somehow, this worked, not because that was a great idea on Harrison's part, but because it's the Mets, and somehow every umpire on the scene neglected to note that Harrison was, in fact, out of the baseline. On the other hand, the Mets may or may not have deserved such a fate since Tejada decided to give up on the play as opposed to simply tagging Harrison, which would have sidestepped all this.

After the rundown and the Terry Collins bitch-fit that followed, Mejia was then tasked with having to get out of one hell of a jam, with runners on 2nd and 3rd and no outs, and he was very much up to the task, striking out Travis Snider and Neil Walker, and even getting Russell Martin (Mr. Low-rent Paul LoDuca himself) to fly out in a situation that seemed ripe for Martin to get a hit and rip off his own jersey while doing a Superman Dance across the infield. But, no, Mejia got LoDucu to pop out and end the threat. And after getting out of that particular jam, you might think the Mets would be energized enough to put together a rally. Vic Black took over for Mejia in the 11th, and he seemed primed to cruise right along until he walked Clint Barmes with 2 outs and Harrison came up again and I think we all know what happened from there.

In some other era, the Mets probably would have pushed a run across in their half of the 11th, and Black would have gotten a Save out of the proceedings. That's the same kind of era where the Mets are a perennial contender and have the intestinal fortitude to not only get out of impossible jams, but also get the necessary hits to win games afterward. Unfortunately, this isn't one of those eras, and the result is that games like this end up being those sort of games you can only chuckle about years later in happier times. You know, whenever those happier times may come.

Other Things To Do

I tend not to make much mention around here about my life outside of the Mets, because a) It's not especially interesting to an audience like this and b) Who cares. But it's worth mentioning that in 10 days, the woman I often refer to as my other half will officially become Mrs. Mets2Moon, an occasion that is certainly cause for great personal joy. 

I bring this up for a variety of reasons, the largest of them being that much of our evenings of late have been spent making preparations for the event that's going to be pre-empting Cereal Bowl Day at Citi Field, and as such, I don't pay as much attention to games as I might were things a little less hectic at the moment. 

What I've missed, clearly, hasn't been much noteworthy. Tonight's game in Pittsburgh featured very little in the way of action on the part of the Mets, which has been an unfortunate common theme of late, except for a pair of anomalies earlier in the week where their batters decided it would be nice if they hit the ball. After scoring 21 runs in 2 games, the Mets scored 5 runs last night after the game was well out of reach, so let's just say they scored 0 tangible runs, and tonight, they scored 2 runs, and that at least kept the game within a 3-Run Home Run's reach of being tied. Last night, Lucas Duda hit a 3-run Home Run with the Mets behind 8-0. Had he saved such a thing for the late innings tonight, the game might have ended differently. Sadly, Duda appeared to have mixed up his Solo Home run situation with his 3-Run Home Run situation, and therefore the solo Home Run he hit—to the opposite field no less—in the 4th inning merely meant that they lost to the Pirates 5-2 instead of 5-1. 

Daisuke Matsuzaka, who continues to make starts at the Major League level, had another start this evening and pitched a majority of the game for the Mets, but at some point where I wasn't paying much attention he gave up several runs, most of them at the hand of the Pirates' hotshot Rookie Gregory Polanco, whom I at some point confused with Gregor Blanco and after a few minutes of being incensed that Matsuzaka was getting burned by a slop-hitting journeyman, I realized that he was getting burned by the flavor of the Month. That's not to say that it makes this loss feel less bad. The Mets are always getting burned by someone of late, it seems. Every day it's someone else. That's why it's easy to stop paying attention and work on other things.

Not What You Were Looking For

Too many things happened too early in this game that are worth mentioning, simply as thoughts and coincidences. As has happened on many an occasion, I was late in getting home and when I finally did arrive and put the game on, I was greeted with a line that read OAK 6, NYM 0 in the bottom of the 2nd inning, Zack Wheeler already removed from the game.

My first thought: Well, I'm glad I went last night instead of tonight.

My second thought: Well, so much for Zack Wheeler going out and using his brilliant shutout performance in Miami as a springboard to bigger and better things, because he just regressed right back to his usual inconsistent dreck.

I didn't actually see any of what Wheeler did, but it seems he basically had nothing from the get-go. Brandon Moss, the former castoff-turned-#3-hitter reached him for a Home Run in the 1st, and the 2nd inning consisted of some bloops and blasts and Oakland players circling the bases. So, basically, by time I got home and put the game on, there really wasn't much of a game worth watching.

Games like this are terrible, not just because the Mets are hopelessly out of the game before the entire audience has reached their seats, but because after a day of work, I often look forward to coming home and putting the game on, and when I get home and put on a game where the Mets are behind 6-0 in the 2nd inning, it's like why even bother? I don't want to see Dana Eveland come in and work mop-up, I don't want to see the Mets just swing through Brad Mills' array of slop, I just want to shut the game off and go find something else to do with myself. This, of course, is complicated since there's a limited amount of things I can bear to watch on TV, and none of them are on on Wednesday nights. Thus, I ceded things to my other half, who happily put on a reality show of insidious nature, which didn't make me feel any better.

I missed, by giving up on the proceedings, something of a cosmetic comeback by the Mets. Down 8-0, Lucas Duda hit a Lucas Duda—a 3-run Home Run that had absolutely no consequence except to prevent the Mets from being shut out altogether—and Chris Young also hit a Home Run in the 8th, so instead, when you look back at this game and see the Mets lost 8-5, you might thing, "Hey, Barnburner!" instead of knowing the truth about this shit show. In the present, it might have actually kidded a few hearty souls into thinking comeback, although given the Mets propensity for 8-run comebacks is more or less non-existent, thoughts like that are born out of wishful thinking more than actual intuition. But, then again, when you have a game like this, wishful thinking is more or less all you've got. At least I went the night before. I know I said that already but it needs to be reiterated.

Sit Back And Enjoy

In around the 6th inning, as the Mets had already put the finishing touches on a runaway 10-1 victory over the Oakland A's, George turned to me and said "You know, I don't think I can remember the last time we were at a game that was an actual laugher."

I had to pause and think for a while, and I couldn't remember the last laugher I'd been to either. It's a nice feeling, seeing the Mets stick it to their opponent early and often and just cruise the rest of the way home, unimpeded by any sort of drama or delays that might happen in a close game. The Mets lit up Scott Kazmir to the tune of 7 runs on 8 hits in 3 innings, on the strength of a trio of Home Runs, and more or less coasted from there behind another masterful performance from Bartolo Colon.

It was a somewhat festive atmosphere at Citi Field for my 11th game of the season. The Mets and Oakland A's meet rarely; those more senior than I might have some ill feelings from the 1973 World Series, but in reality, the Mets and A's don't have much in the way of a heated rivalry. That being said, the A's right now are more or less everything the Mets aspire to be; a team comprised mostly of youngsters and castaways who have somehow meshed into a cohesive unit that hits and pitches with fierce consistency, to the point where they hold a fairly solid lead in the AL West.

Scott Kazmir, who we all know as the great prospect that wasn't, is one of those players who's rediscovered some prior magic in Oakland, coming into the game with a league-leading ERA of 2.08. But the Mets treated him with little regard. After spotting the A's a 1-0 lead in the first inning, the Mets exploded for 3 runs in the 2nd inning, courtesy of back-to-back Home Runs by Curtis Granderson and Chris Young. This from an offense where 2 Home Runs in a game is noteworthy. Happily, the Mets were just getting warmed up. In the 3rd, the Mets rallied again, stringing together some hits and an RBI Groundout from Granderson to set the stage for the recently recalled Travis d'Arnaud. d'Arnaud, who didn't hit at all in the Majors, and then got sent down to AAA and immediately started hitting .400, stepped to the plate with a golden opportunity to prove himself, and I couldn't help but think "if he could just park one right here, that would be great." And sure enough, he did, smoking a pitch well out into the seats in Left Field for a 3-run Home run that opened up a 7-1 Met lead and spelled the end of the night for Kazmir.

The remainder of the game moved along at a brisk pace and featured a number of odd highlights that make laughers enjoyable. For one, Oakland's manager, Bob Melvin, began employing double switches in the 4th inning, swapping out Kazmir and Jed Lowrie for Jim Johnson and Nick Punto (prompting George to muse "Wait a second...Nick Punto is an A!?"). He did it again in the 6th, and then in the 7th inning, he outdid himself, putting Eric Sogard in the game at 2nd base and removing Coco Crisp, and in the process shifting Alberto Callaspo from 2nd base to 1st base, Brandon Moss from 1st to Left Field and Yoenis Cespedes from Left to Center in a gordian knot of confusion that only happens in Spring Training games, or games where your team is down by 9 runs.

Chris Young, of whom rumors of an impending release were swirling, chimed in with a second Home Run in the 5th inning, and almost hit another one later on in the evening, driving a pitch out to the warning track in left center. For someone as maligned as Young has been of late, a 2-Home Run game is great, but 3 would have been pretty far out. Especially 3 at Citi Field, where the Mets pretty much never hit Home Runs.

And, of course, there's Bartolo Colon, who once again coolly worked his way through 8 more or less effortless innings, tying the A's up in knots after allowing a 1st inning run and finishing his night with 8 strikeouts to go with 1 walk and 4 hits. He also proved himself a showstopper with a bat in his hand, as he drew cheers following a 2nd inning Sac Bunt and a standing ovation after flaring a single to left to start the 4th inning. Colon batted again in the 6th after Ruben Tejada was hit by a pitch and eschewed the bunt, instead swinging away (and why not with a 7-run lead) and ripping a good foul ball before hitting a slow roller out to 3rd base, and despite the urging of everyone in attendance, he proved not swift enough to beat it out.

All in all, this was a rare night at Citi Field where there was nothing to complain about. The weather was splendid, the game was over in a brisk 2 hours, 24 minutes, the Mets scored early and often and the outcome wasn't in doubt. George and I even got to bear witness to a true meeting of the minds late in the game, as both Cow Bell Man and Pin Man convened in front of us for a conversation of true hard-liners. Pin Man had met up with some friends and received gifts of more pins, while Cow Bell Man was simply making his rounds as he is wont to do. But there they were at game's end, high-fiving George and myself and everyone else around and reveling in one of those rare relaxing Citi Field evenings.