The Thin Blue Line

We've had kind of unplanned hiatus this week here at the Ballclub, whilst the Mets dropped a series on the road to Atlanta (dropping a series in Atlanta? Why, that never happens!!). I caught some of the game last night (which I'd boldly stated to Mets2Moon that I would live-blog; riiiight) between switching over to the Cavs-Pistons game (don't get me started) and an old Office repeat.

From what I did watch, the Braves just made all the plays, especially in the infield, right up until that Kelly Johnson boot in the ninth. It was a game where early on in the proceedings you get that feeling that it's just not one of those games that you're going to win. The Mets couldn't cash in baserunners, the Braves refused to screw up on D, and there you have it.

It was a night of bullshit officiating, which of course you can never blame your losses on, but still. Wright got rung up, I don't need to remind anyone, checking his swing with two strikes and the bases loaded in the third. And it was great to see him get mad. The whole golden boy thing is all well and good, but it's heartening that in proper circumstance he'll stand up for himself to an umpire, short of getting tossed, and "show a little fire," as the cliché goes.

I wasn't nearly as upset at the bogus strike on Wright as ESPN's Chris Sheridan was on the LeBron non-call:

The non-call was so egregious, I'd expect Jimmy Clark, Bernie Fryer and Mark Wunderlich to be told by the league office that they can watch the rest of the playoffs from Joey Crawford's man cave, since they don't deserve to be working at this stage of the postseason if they're too scared to call a foul on the biggest play of the game. But I'm not sure whether those three referees will be taking calls from the league office on Friday, since all three must be scheduled for surgery to have the whistles they swallowed removed from their stomachs.

Whoa! Easy there, Chris. But I basically agree. And if anyone's still trying to claim Hamilton didn't commit a foul, even Rip tacitly admits it, as Sheridan reports, "cackling" before and after saying "Nah, you know. I just put my hands up." How frustrating. Complaining about officiating is the second most boring conversation to have about sports, right behind talking about the TV ratings (as ESPN commentators did ad nauseum after Portland and Seattle went 1-2 in the Oden/Durant sweepstakes). There are times, however, when you can't ignore it, and many NBA refs have long since been terrible.

Anyhoo, tonight it's on to Florida and the vaunted pitcher's duel of Jason Vargas (late breaking update: It's El Duque, son!) vs. Sergio Mitre. I'll be up in Westchester with the fam, where I can watch the game with my grandmother, who says things like "Why do they have to spit so much?" and "That beard looks terrible," and is still a better color commentator than Tim McCarver.

Elsewhere in the blogosphere
Just noticed this today: Regis on Mets Heads posted a great YouTube clip by someone who painstakingly (I mean, it must have been!) recreated The Catch on a video game. In case you didn't see it there, here it is: