Oh Dammit

The Mets appear to have been paying Marlin Penance the last two nights after outlasting them in Thursday evening's marathon game. Friday's result was bad enough, but in a vacuum it is of course just one game. Compound that with the results on Saturday night and it feels significantly worse. After Jacob deGrom coolly pistolwhipped the Marlins for seven innings and the Mets bats gave him what should have been a protectable 2-run lead, Fernando Salas shit his pants in the 8th inning, allowing a game-tying Home Run to Hamburgers Yelich and a game-winning Home Run to Mike Stanton and the Mets snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, losing 5-4 to the Marlins.

This is, as always one of those "Damned if you do, damned if you don't" instances for Terry Collins. The haters will of course scream that it was catastrophically stupid to remove deGrom from the game after 97 pitches, in which he'd allowed the Marlins a pair of solo Home Runs sprinkled in between 13 strikeouts. Maybe that's true, but if Collins left him in and deGrom got beaten, then he's an idiot for sticking with his pitcher an inning too long.

The answer? Dammit, I don't know. There is no right answer. You go by feel and Collins felt like deGrom was done. I trust him enough at this point to know the temperature of his players. Frankie Bag-o-donuts in Hicksville is going from his gut, and his gut's been telling him "BACKMAN, BABAY!!!" for the last 4 years, and so Collins is a moron and needs to go. Tonight, Collins was wrong and so it's a field day for Frankie and his ilk. For me, it's just the irritation of seeing Dee Gordon pogo-sticking around the infield—typical Marlin behavior. I don't particularly care enough about a right or wrong move when it's essentially a judgement call. What I do know is that this is the Marlins, and invariably they're going to pull some dumb shit out of their ass against the Mets multiple times in a season. This happens to be one of those times. Maybe it's a blessing in disguise and they'll get their Marlinness out of their system early, so that the Mets can handle them the way they should be handled later in the season. Again, I don't know. But right now the only thing that's managed to get in the Mets way so far this season is the Marlins and I've had enough of this.

Silent Finale

The Mets finished out their 2016 Regular Season campaign with an innocuous 5-2 loss in Philadelphia, the second time in a week in which the game might be more remembered for the emotion displayed by the home team and their fans. This wasn't the abject sadness of last Monday in Miami, this was your more standard Baseball Farewell, as the Phillies gave Ryan Howard the grand sendoff in what would be his final game with the team. So the game itself, which was as Keith Hernandez noted early, being played by teams that have one foot on the bus already, was background to a series of ovations afforded to Howard.

Our stance on Howard here is rather predictable. After hitting 131 Home Runs and driving in 784 against the Mets, we wish him well and hope he signs with the Anaheim Angels, far, far away from us.

The focus now of course turns to the San Francisco Giants, who wrapped up the second National League Wildcard spot by virtue of a rather easy 7-1 win over the Dodgers. This was sort of pick your poison for the Mets. In one respect, I suppose you'd rather play the Cardinals, just based on the fact that the Giants will have Mr. Postseason, Madison Bumgarner, pitching for them on Wednesday night. But the Cardinals appeared to be gearing up for another stupid Postseason run of their own, where they get every break and any team that gets a little peppy immediately is turned to mush by one of Genius Mike Matheny's LaRussian Mind Tricks. So I'm glad that they're not relevant in this story altogether.

That being said, Bumgarner is no treat for the Mets. Noah Syndergaard is no treat for the Giants either, however, and sure, you can point to Bumgarner's track record, but it's not as though Syndergaard hasn't been through the crucible of the Playoffs before. Remember this?

He should be OK.

Meanwhile, the other noteworthy farewell on this day was that of Vin Scully, who called his final Dodgers game this afternoon in San Francisco after 67 years with the team. I talk a lot here about awful announcers, especially those who are feted on a National stage, and part of the reason it's easy for me to pick on bad announcers is because I've been spoiled my entire life, having grown up listening to Bob Murphy, and for a generation having Murph and Gary Cohen on the radio, and now for the past decade, Cohen, Ron Darling and Keith.

But can you imagine what it must be like for the Dodgers now? I would have to guess that for close to 75% of Dodgers fans, this is all you know, absolute and utter brilliance from the booth on a daily basis. And I know that in recent years Vin hasn't done road trips East of the Rockies so maybe that's something, but man, that's really going to be a culture shock.

Vin Scully will of course always hold a warm place in the hearts of Mets fans as he's the one who manned the mic for NBC back in 1986, and so it's his voice that we hear every time we go back to that year. He usually let the pictures tell the story; to wit, he goes silent for about 2 1/2 minutes after Ray Knight scored the winning run in Game 6, but perhaps his ability to sum things up afterward goes overlooked.

Someone uploaded some uncut footage of NBC's Broadcast of Game 7 of the World Series from '86, and we know what went down, but as time passed and NBC eventually signed off the air, back came Vin for one final word. I have no idea if this will start in the right place but if it doesn't, just forward to about 10:00 in and listen.

Now That's what I call a signoff.

Resiliency

So if you can believe it, the Mets, after sitting at 60-62 on August 20th, have now not only clinched one of the National League Wildcard spots, but they'll be hosting the game outright on Wednesday night. A team that was basically spinning into utter 2001-ness somehow reached back and rolled out a 1973 finish, steaming home on a 27-12 run that has seen contributions come from all sorts of strange faces, many of them unfamiliar.

How did they do it? Mostly, it's been resiliency. This is a team that probably could have thrown in the towel at any number of points during the season, but they never did. They lost 4/5ths of their starting rotation and didn't fold. For the clinching game on Saturday, 4 of the 9 players in the starting lineup were there on Opening Day, and 3 of those 4 spent large chunks of time on the DL. Somehow, Terry Collins and company kept this team playing together, and these players kept playing for each other, and now they've been rewarded by earning themselves a trip back to the Playoffs, only the second time in the history of the franchise that they've reached the Postseason in back-to-back years.

It's different from last year. Last season was a second-half groundswell that had been building for months, but didn't take off until Yoenis Cespedes arrived, and once they got going, they just couldn't be stopped. This season had the feel of a slow descent into oblivion, the more players got hurt and the team didn't hit. But the thing was, for as bad as things were going, they were never out of it. And then they were 60-62, and they started getting these injured guys back. Cespedes. Asdrubal Cabrera. Jose Reyes. Who the hell figured Jose Reyes was going to play a key role on this team, especially after his shameful off-field conduct? Steven Matz goes down. Seth Lugo picks up the slack. Jacob deGrom goes down. Robert Gsellman picks up the slack. Bartolo Colon continues to reel off victories like he's 23 again. T.J. Rivera starts getting big hits. Alejandro De Aza gets big hits, one night it's Kelly Johnson, another it's Michael Conforto, another it's James Loney. Curtis Granderson and Jay Bruce start to turn back into themselves. They come from 5 1/2 games back and hop over 4 teams, and now here they are.

After the six years of Met Hell, we've now been rewarded with a pair of golden years. Of course, I have no idea what will happen to the Mets from here. This could be a short-lived period of Postseason euphoria or this could be the greatest story the Mets have ever written. I already went through the long, strange trip the season is last season.  The only guarantee right now is that the Mets have a game tomorrow, which is meaningless. Then, they have a game on Wednesday night, at Citi Field, with Noah Syndergaard on the mound and 44,000 Mets fans that will literally be roaring for more. Just, after the weird, incongruous season that they've had through 161 games, I guess it does make sense that the Mets have managed to pull this feat off. Because that's Baseball. That's just Baseball.

Good Grief

I know that the Mets got their asses handed to them by an awful team for three consecutive days. I also know that for as much as we want to sugarcoat things, the 2016 season is probably in the toilet. With the Mets now caught up in a giant mess of teams and games in the standings, there really isn't much positive to say about what to expect over the final 6 or so weeks of the season. Terry Collins can throw one of his apoplectic shit fits, fans can call for his head (and the "BACKMAN BABY!!!" morons have crawled out of their caves once again—I thought we were done with these closeted Yankee fans) and, well, the rest of us more sensible types can go back to that same level of low-lying depression that seemed to infect us between 2009 and 2014.

What I really get concerned about is what the reaction here ends up being going forward. As I mentioned, I keep likening the 2016 Mets to the 2001 Mets, and really, that's what this season has unraveled into. But the larger issue is that the 2001 Mets begat the 2002 Mets, which were assembled mostly by several reactionary and ill-advised trades and signings that looked good on paper but never gelled, ultimately imploding upon itself in an embarrassing season that set the Mets back 3 years. It was 2005 before they sniffed .500 again and another year before they were a contender with teeth.

And that's just a primary example of how hard it's been, historically, for the Mets to sustain their own success. This is a franchise that has gone to the Postseason in back-to-back seasons once in 55 years. Every time the Mets find some form of greatness, for some reason the following year the air comes out of the sails, whether it's due to injuries, inconsistency, complacency or a lack of desire to improve. I don't know if the Mets, as composed on Opening Day, would have fallen into this pit just as much, but what I can say is that I know they wouldn't have gotten swept, and really embarrassed at home by teams like Arizona, or the Colorados, and they probably wouldn't have gone back to being 4-15 against Washington.

But is that just me trying to draw an excuse for all of this? The 2016 Mets pinned their hopes on several question marks, among them David Wright's ability to play out a full season, Lucas Duda's ability to find more offensive consistency and the continued health and strong performance of the starting pitching. These are three failures that the Mets have only partially been able to recover from, and only because even while injured, both Noah Syndergaard and Steven Matz can still pitch reasonably well. Everything else has just been a disaster, and it seems like it's come to a head here. It may be too late; the Mets seem to be well on their way to another 8-20 August death spiral, but what I'm worried about is that this is just the beginning of yet another descent into laughingstockdom.

Go Home Already

I know that the medically-induced pregame departure of Terry Collins was probably weighing on the minds of the Mets as they went through Sunday afternoon's mess of a game in Milwaukee. That doesn't necessarily excuse them from their performance, which I'd consider something that more closely resembled the Pittsfield Mets than Major League Baseball.

By time I gave up on the game, I'd seen no less than 4 balls thrown not especially close to their intended targets, 2 bungled batted balls that were charitably scored hits and one pitcher visibly lose his shit on the mound. I'd also seen the Mets fall into a 5-0 hole against one of those irritating pitchers that looks like he should be going to Social Studies class, not a pitcher's mound.

But, there are days like this, and sometimes you just need to vomit it out of your system all at once. You knew that trouble was abound when Wilmer Flores butchered Ryan Braun's grounder in the 1st inning, kicking it into Left Field and allowing Braun to take 2nd, and then 3rd when Alejandro De Aza basically fired the ball into the front row seats behind 1st Base. Somehow, this was scored a Double and an Error but the writing was on the wall. Later, Steven Matz would throw away a bunt attempt leading to two runs, Flores would throw away another bunt leading to two more runs, and in the process Matz had a Brad Lesley-level meltdown on the mound and only fortunately did he regain enough composure to keep the score at 5-0 and grit his way through 6 innings.

Not that the offense helped much. Zach Davies, who pitched reasonably well against the Mets in New York, completely stifled them on Sunday, getting out of a bases loaded jam in the 1st inning and then allowing nothing thereafter, so that by time the Mets did mount a cosmetic rally, it was already too late. They'd lost me by that point anyway. After 6 innings, with little hope in sight, I threw in the towel. Sometimes, you've just seen enough.

So, this 10-game road trip ends with the Mets going 5-5. They probably should have gone 7-3 or 8-2 if they'd managed to hit and not just melt down completely yesterday. On the other hand, this road trip felt like they'd gone 3-7. Regardless, this is the second time they've gotten to the end of a long road trip and just fallen completely flat, so that's something I might be a little concerned about going forward. A nice day off today should help. I hope.

Air Out Of Building

As much as I hate to say it, the scene at Citi Field last night kind of had all the makings of a major letdown as far as the game itself was concerned.

The Mets, in something that's often not spoken about, have a bit of a history of having these big, glitzy ceremonies where they roll out the red carpet for past heroes before a big game, and then they go out and shit the bed. It's happened more times than I care to remember.

They went out and did it again last night. After what I'm told was a very moving tribute to the 1986 World Series Champions (And no, I didn't actually see it—thanks to the game being on FOX, the ceremonies weren't shown on TV and I haven't had a chance to stream it yet), the Mets were then thoroughly humiliated by the Dodgers and the Umpires in a 9-1 disaster of a game.

This was another one of those nights where I wasn't actually around for most of the game, so I wasn't witness to the compounding bullshit that the Mets were subjected to, but since the game was on FOX, that means everyone's favorite dickheads, Joe Buck and Ken Rosenthal were on hand. Which means Joe Buck spent the entire game sneering at the Mets and Ken Rosenthal buried his head up the Dodgers' asses. I don't need to have seen the game to know this.

Noah Syndergaard matched up against Kenta Maeda. Last time this happened, things worked out pretty well for the Mets. It seemed headed in a similar direction until the 3rd inning when Syndergaard whipped a 99-MPH fastball behind Chase Utley. You didn't need to be a genius to know that something like this was coming. Even Utley expected it, and I suppose had the pitch drilled him, he would have just taken his lumps and gone to 1st base, because for as much of a jackass as he is, he's still a pro and knows when to take his medicine. Generally, these things are met with a warning and then it blows over. But for whatever reason, Adam Hamari, the home plate umpire, who I wouldn't know from a hole in the wall, ejected Syndergaard from the game immediately. Again, I don't really bring Umpires into the equation unless they make a severely poor error of judgement and need to be called out on it. Hamari was totally out of his element on this one. Give Syndergaard a warning and leave it at that. Terry Collins blew his stack at Hamari and got himself ejected as well, and, well, can you blame him?

Essentially, Adam Hamari nuked this game for the Mets. Instead of Syndergaard on the mound doing Syndergaard things, the Mets now had to bring Logan Verrett in in the 3rd inning, and he did yeoman's work until the 6th when Utley hit a Home Run. Because of course he did. Then, in the 7th, he hit a Grand Slam off Hansel Robles. Because of course he did. Because if you didn't hate Utley enough already, this was going to be the night he made sure he placed his name at or near the top of all-time Mets Villains, depending on who you ask on which day.

So, you tell me. You think Utley goes apeshit like that against Syndergaard? Yeah, me neither. Thanks, Adam Hamari. You basically screwed the Mets out of this game. I'm sure Joe Buck and Ken Rosenthal sent you flowers this morning. They must have loved watching this shit show unfold. I turned the game on sometime around the 8th inning—lord only knows why since I knew it was done with—and you could hear the glee dripping from Buck's voice. After the game, they threw it to the studio, where they have a real announcer named Kevin Burkhart—remember him?—and he was clearly incensed at what he'd just been subjected to. It seems like most everyone feels the same way. Sometimes, you just need to let the players police themselves, because outside of this, it's not as though the Mets and Dodgers have some stewing animosity toward each other. Instead, the Mets end up looking like clowns on National Television once again. Thanks, Hamari. You Ass.

Revenge of the Torres

I didn't actually see Saturday night's game, or at least I didn't see much of it as I was out and about doing a vast assortment of deferred errands and therefore I caught about an inning or two of the game while eating dinner at an establishment somewhere in the midst of Suburbia but nothing beyond that. Only later did I Find out that the Mets not only lost in another debacle of a game at Coors Field, but that Logan Verrett had a 3rd inning meltdown that was precipitated by an egregious blown call that resulted in Terry Collins getting thrown out of the game.

And, of course, I then found out that the Umpire that ejected Collins was named Carlos Torres. Which seems fitting, because even though the Mets now have a Torres-free roster, they're still finding a way to get screwed over by a Torres.

The play, which I still haven't seen, involved C-level backup Catcher Tony Wolters, who's probably in the Major Leagues about 2 years too early, striking out on a pitch in the dirt with the bases loaded, 1 out and the pitcher on deck in an eminently-salvageable 3-1 game. For whatever reason, Torres insisted that Wolters tipped the ball. Mass chaos ensued, Collins got ejected, Verrett then subsequently gave up a 2-run double to Wolters that blew the game open and the Mets had no particular recourse. Eddie Butler, another one of these young-ish starters for the Colorados that pitches well on the road but is a mystery at home, mastered the Mets for most of the night and for the second game in a row, the Mets lost in Colorado, this time 7-4.

The Mets, it could be said, at least hit a little bit, or at least more than they had in the past few days by plating 4 runs, but still, 4 runs on most nights doesn't cut it in Colorado, so if you want to point your finger, sure, Carlos Torres is the easy target for your ire for this night, but the lack of offense on this West Coast swing that's mercifully almost over is really the best group to be annoyed with.

This series so far has just been another annoying series in Colorado against the irritating Colorados, a team that they should be handling easily but haven't done so. Handling the lesser teams is something that the Mets had been doing well in the early going this season but this has deserted them recently. As a result, their slim stay in 1st place is now over, and they've been leapfrogged by both Washington and a resurgent Phillies team that I told you was going to be a problem. They've already shit the bed for the road trip, now they have one more chance in Colorado this afternoon to prevent it from being a total debacle.

Remember The Feeling

Losing hurts worse than winning feels good.

-Lewis Grizzard

That pretty much summed up what I was feeling as the clock struck midnight both literally and figuratively on the 2015 Mets season. Though the Mets nearly closed out Game 5 of the World Series behind a Heroic effort by Matt Harvey, the Kansas City Royals once again proved to be far too relentless, too determined to let the Mets keep that door open. The Royals broke our hearts when they tied the game and ultimately won in an absolutely gut-wrenching 12th inning explosion, forcing Mets fans to flee and Royals fans to take over our building as they closed out their first World Series Championship in 30 years. 

I was, once again at Citi Field on Sunday night, fortunate enough to have been a ticket plan holder, prescient enough to go all in on a full package of Postseason tickets and wind up in possession of seats for all 3 World Series Home Games. Sure, I'd batted around the idea of selling some of these tickets and running to the bank, but my heart won out. How often do the Mets make the World Series period, let alone how often does a schmuck like me end up with tickets basically dropped in my lap? I couldn't pass up the opportunity. Sure, ultimately, it's just a game. But a game at this level of the Playoffs, on November 1st of all days is pretty intense without the teams even setting foot on the field. This would have been the final game of the year at Citi Field regardless. I and the other 45-some-odd-thousand people there were just hoping it wasn't the final game of the year period.

And it started off good, it really did. We all know what happened. Curtis Granderson homered in the 1st. Matt Harvey set out intent on pitching the game of games. Some games, Harvey pitches angry and you can tell from the moment he sets foot on the field. I don't know if pitching angry really does enough to justify how he was pitching. His intensity was palpable throughout the entire stadium. Or maybe everyone was just so anxious because the entire season was on the line. He knew that runs were going to be at a premium. He had to be as close to perfect as the circumstances would allow him to be. Yes, the Royals nicked him early, but they only nicked him, not cut him. Three early baserunners never made it past 2nd base. In the 4th, he struck out the side, something he didn't accomplish in his Game 1 start when he struck out two batters in total. After finishing off the inning by whiffing Mike Moustakas, Harvey pumped his fist and started screaming as he ran off the mound. The further he went, the more intense he got, feeding off the energy of the crowd. Three more strikeouts in the 5th. Worked around a 1-out single in the 6th. The Mets got him a second run off of Edinson Volquez in the bottom of that inning, in a rally where it seemed like they had to do an awful lot of work to just scrape out one run. A third run would have been enormous, but it never materialized.

All this mattered little to Harvey. In the 7th, he gave up a leadoff single, but then coolly set down the Royals, expending all of 9 pitches, and when Alex Rios grounded out to finish the inning, there was more yelling, more pumping of fists, more "LET'S GO!"s. By now, pitch count was immaterial. This was his last shot. He had all winter to rest, so just leave it on the field. Conventional wisdom, I suppose, would have said let him go until he ran into trouble in the 8th, and then bring in Jeurys Familia. But I wasn't thinking that. When he ran off the mound in the 7th, I turned to my friend and said, "He's finishing this shit."

Harvey cruised through the 8th again on only 9 pitches. Ben Zobrist finished by flying out and the crowd was roaring with approval. Then, of course, there was that half inning of trepidation, where we in the stands had no idea whether or not he'd finish what he started. We wanted him to, of course. I felt he should. Harvey obviously felt he should too, and of course when Dan Warthen came and told him he was out, he flatly said "No Way," and ran down the dugout to state his case to Terry Collins.

Obviously, Harvey was persuasive enough, and perhaps had Collins not relented Harvey likely would have taken his Manager's head off, but that set the stage for what would be a legendary finish to a legendary performance. It was sort of an odd scene. After the last of the 8th inning ended, none of the Mets came out on to the field. The song "Seven Nation Army" began playing over the PA. One by one, the Mets position players came out of the dugout from one end. As they entered, an absolutely deafening roar began to rise from the 3rd base side of the stadium as Harvey ran up the steps and charged on to the field, still screaming, still pumping his fists, and Citi Field shook like Shea. He had this. He Had This.

And then he didn't. Instead of crafting the kind of game reminiscent of Jack Morris in '91, or Curt Schilling in '93, or Josh Beckett in '03, Harvey's game melted away into an ending closer to Al Leiter in 2000. Though he was ahead in the count against Lorenzo Cain, he lost him to a walk. It seemed like that was all the Royals needed. Like clockwork. Stolen base, RBI double, lead cut to 2-1, Harvey out of the game and instead of the roaring hero's sendoff, it was more of a horrified murmur. Jeurys Familia came in the game and, of course, things went from bad to worse. The Royals continued to push buttons and cajole the Mets into careless mistakes. Familia got Moustakas to ground out, moving Hosmer to 3rd with 1 out. Salvador Perez followed and with the infield in, hit a ground ball to David Wright. Wright looked the runner back, but Hosmer broke for home as Wright threw to 1st. Lucas Duda secured one out, wheeled and threw towards the plate. A good throw and Eric Hosmer is out by 20 feet.

A good throw is what Lucas Duda didn't make. The ball sailed to the backstop, Hosmer scored, Royals players were skipping all over the place and the game was tied.

More appropriately, the game was, for all intents and purposes, dead.

It really was only a matter of time before the Royals figured out a way to force home the winning run. The Mets had been able to muster 3 hits to that point, and the way the Royals bullpen had been performing, anything beyond that didn't seem especially likely. Meanwhile, the Royals kept grinding. You could probably say this about any At Bat they had in the series. Mets pitchers would get ahead 0-2 or 1-2, and then the sequence of pitches would go something like this: Foul, Foul, Ball, Foul, Foul, Ball, Foul, Ball somewhere in play. Watching the Royals at bats in the top of each Extra Inning was a study in pure torture. Familia set them down in the 10th and Jon Niese, who did yeoman's work out of the bullpen this series, worked the 11th. By the 12th, sitting around, catatonically shaking my legs and chomping on my fingernails became too much. I had to get up and move around somewhere, and my friend did as well. At that late hour, with things playing out as they were, I was doing myself no favors staying where I was. So we got up and moved around, down towards 3rd base. And, of course, that's when the Royals struck.

When that first run scored, a few people started to get up and leave.

When the second run scored, more Mets fans headed for the exits.

When Lorenzo Cain cleared the bases, turning the inning from a debacle to a total bloodletting, the mass exodus occurred. Could you blame them? This seemed to be an almost predictable finish. Just to expedite our exit, which had become a painful process during this Postseason run, we moved down to the Field Level. Unfortunately, we found ourselves directly behind a mass of Royals fans, ready to kick off the celebration of a lifetime in our house. With two outs, I could see Royals players literally hanging over the dugout railing.

I couldn't take it any longer. I couldn't watch them celebrate on our field.

I had to leave.

Oh, I heard that final roar as I reached the plaza. It seemed as though many Mets fans had left before me, perhaps wisely. For as loud as the Royals fans were inside, that's how quiet it was outside.

The ride back from Citi Field on the 7 train can either be a long ride or a short one depending on the circumstances. This night was a particularly long ride. I spent most of the time reflecting on this 2015 Mets season, and really, it's hard to not consider the season among the most memorable in the history of the team. I mean, who the hell though that this was even a Playoff team, let alone a World Series team? I picked the Mets to go as far as the NLCS before the season, but I can be overly optimistic at times. Usually, when that happens, the Mets end up falling flat on their faces. And they did plenty of that this season, but man, when they got it together, they really got it together and for once, the Mets actually overachieved. This wasn't supposed to happen this year, but it did. Somehow, the Mets caught that lightning in a bottle and rode it all the way down to the World Series.

Yeah, things ended up badly, and the Mets ultimately turned to mush at some key moments, but the Royals really forced the Mets into making these mistakes. The Royals played every game as though it were their last. They took the horrible bitterness that came from losing the 7th game of the World Series last year and used that to fuel them through to a World Series Championship this year. And perhaps the Mets could learn from that. Remember this feeling. Remember how awful it was to watch those guys celebrating on our field. Remember how they ran all over us, stealing bases, working pitchers, picking up cheap hits and pressuring the Mets into mistakes. The Royals played like Champions and they earned their Championship. The Mets still have to do that yet.

Remember this feeling, because it's hard to get to this point. But getting back isn't quite in the forefront of my thoughts right now. It's sort of hard to articulate, perhaps because the sting of losing, and losing the last two games the way they did is still fresh. Time passes, though, and the losses fade, or at least I hope they will, and I'll begin to reflect on this 176-game wild ride the 2015 Mets took us on, and how I made it to 27 games this year—my highest total since 1999—and how I made it to 6 Postseason games, and how the Mets Actually Made It To The World Series This Year! I went to a Mets game in Freaking November!

It actually happened this year! Who the hell saw this coming? Sure, there's a lot of bitterness right now. But I'm awfully proud to be a Mets fan.

Break On Through

So, we can finally say it. The Mets are Champions of the National League East for 2015. It actually happened. I saw it. And I probably watched it about 44 times afterward. You know, just to make sure.

The clinching game was won on Saturday afternoon very much in the same spirit the team has played with all season, and that's been a full team effort. No one player stands out above anyone else. Yes, there are players with more flair and some lesser pieces but for the most part it's been the formula of a different hero each game. And then go from there. And even before the team turned it around in August, that's how it's been. After Friday's efforts by Noah Syndergaard and Lucas Duda, Saturday it was Duda, with help from Matt Harvey and an exclamation point by David Wright. And fittingly, it was Jeurys Familia on the mound at the end, striking out Jay Bruce and sealing the Mets first Division title since 2006.

A lot, of course, has happened since then, and this Blog has been around for basically all of it, since we first laid down our shingle in 2007. At the time you wouldn't have thought it would take 9 years for the Mets to get back to the Playoffs (and we can now use the "P" word) but it did. It was 9 years of a lot of bad, fandom-testing things. Collapses. More Collapses. Humiliating moments. Indignities. Being regarded as a laughingstock. Injuries. More injuries. Oliver Perez. Luis Castillo. NNNNEEY STINK!

The List could go on forever. History can't be erased, unfortunately, and these are still things that we as Mets fans will continue to live with. But without struggle there lacks ultimate joy in success and that's why this Division Title means more than most, probably. Yes, every Division Title in Mets history has come on the heels of some years of struggle. I can't speak to '69 and '73 since I wasn't alive but '86 had been brewing for a few years and '88 came right on the heels of that. '99 and '00, beloved as they were, were a total departure from the bad years leading up to it. And '06 was just a team of assassins built in similar fashion.

This 2015 team is different. It's mostly built from within, but it's taken a long time to come together. This is a team that's young enough to not know any better, but also veteran enough to have bridged eras. There's still 4 players on the roster that go back to the last game at Shea Stadium, and 3 of them haven't even come close to sniffing a Postseason. And sure, I've derided Daniel Murphy, Jon Niese and Bobby Parnell plenty over the years but in reality they've been solid, devoted Mets the entire time and they deserve the spoils of victory just as much as anyone. And, of course, David Wright, the only player left from that last era in 2006; a baby in those days and now of course the guy driving the bus from an emotional standpoint.

Now, it's players like Matt Harvey, Noah Syndergaard, Jacob deGrom and Steven Matz who are like the Wright and Reyes of that former era, and it's these 4 that stand central as the key to this team's success. The Mets went through this season being able to throw a pitcher who could potentially dominate the opposition just about every night and that went a long way in not only winning games, but helping to bring the winning attitude that this team had been lacking for so many years. Not that it was smooth sailing every night but how long has it been since the Mets had pitchers that they sent to the mound and you always felt confident you were going to get a strong outing out of them? Even in those most "recent" playoff years, the Mets never had pitching quite like this. It makes all the difference in the world.

This, of course, is just one step towards the Ultimate Prize and the Mets will have a tough road ahead of them to get to that point. The Dodgers are likely the first team to get in the way, but the NLDS won't begin for them until October 9th, which may as well be 6 months away. But until that time, the Mets and most especially their fans will be basking in the afterglow of this Division Title, I can guarantee that. It's been a long time in coming and it's required an awful lot of patience, and an awful lot of trust. But we believed in Sandy Alderson and we believed in Terry Collins (and maybe the Backman people will finally shut up because there's no way he would have done the job with this team) and finally, the pieces came into place and finally, the Mets are once again a winning team. Whatever happens from here, 2015 is now a Pantheon Year, up there with 1969, 1973, 1986, 1988, 1999, 2000 and 2006 in Mets Lore.

Of Course They Did

The Mets have had an overwhelming number of things go right for them to this point this season, and that's been the primary reason they sit in 1st place here in early September. I've already talked this week about the Mets handling teams in their own division, and how the Mets needed to continue to do so on this road trip. One thing the Mets had been able to avoid was the "Stupid Marlins Game," which they usually fall victim to once or twice every year. You know what I'm talking about because it always happens. The Mets come into Miami, whether it's in the old Football Yard or now the Puke Green Hell Hole, fall behind early, battle back, usually peck and scrape and claw their way into a tying hit with 2 outs in the 9th inning, and then lose the damn game anyway on an annoying kind of hit by an annoying player and then the Mickey Mouse Marlins start running around having their little Pizza Party on the infield and act like they just won the World Series. Probably because when you're forever destined to be a third-rate franchise, beating a team that's in 1st place may as well be your World Series. Or because the Marlins always seem to take some absurd delight in beating the Mets, no matter who's on the team. I don't see Hanley Ramirez styling on a 3rd inning single or Cody Ross crying over inside pitches anymore but the Marlins are still the Marlins, and their existence serves to bug the shit out of me. I've now sidetracked myself out of general annoyance because that's what happens when I talk about the Marlins, and also because this kind of "Stupid Marlins Game" that the Mets had managed to avoid all season just happened to them tonight, because of course it did.

I got home slightly after the game started and instead of putting the TV on, I put the radio on and promptly fell asleep for a significant majority of the evening. So I missed Jacob deGrom's outing, in which he pitched well but had one bad inning that screwed everything up for him. When I did eventually wake up, Addison Reed was busy walking home the lead run in what had been a 3-0 Marlins lead and then a 4-3 Mets lead, and was now a 5-4 Marlins lead. Once again, the Mets were apparently having a 7th inning bullpen problem. This is now becoming a real cause for concern, not so much because every pitcher the Mets have is terrible, but because we all had to live through 2008 and the PTSD we're all suffering from has made us think that every relief pitcher the Mets have is terrible. That's not quite true, but every time something like this, or like what we had on Tuesday happens, alarm bells go off all over the place.

So, the Marlins led 5-4 going to the 9th, and A.J. Ramos, their hyperactive, annoying, Carlos Zambrano-like closer was in the game, and I've already talked about how he just seems like the kind of arrogant prick you just want to see have his face beaten in every time out. It did take the Mets a while to get it going, but eventually they did get to Ramos and after he got 2 outs, the Mets rallied and Kelly Johnson tied the game with an 87-hop single to center. But the Mets could draw no further and the game remained tied.  

Hansel Robles and Tyler Clippard held the line for the Mets as things moved into extra innings, and Erik Goeddel, who probably deserves some high-leverage work just to see what he's made of, pitched a clean 10th inning. But the Mets could do nothing against some no-name Marlin relievers (all I could tell you is that they weren't named Vic Darensbourg or Chris Seddon). Goeddel gave up a hit to start the 11th inning, and managed to induce Dee Gordon, who I believe is hitting .873 against the Mets this year to cement his place as a True Marlin, to pop up a bunt attempt. Then Goeddel was removed in favor of Eric O'Flaherty. I understand that O'Flaherty was in there simply to face Christian Yelich. And I realize that Collins is going to keep going to O'Flaherty in these spots because he has no other battle-tested lefty specialist available (Dario Alvarez I guess is just around to chew the scenery), and he's just hoping that one time he's going to throw O'Flaherty at a wall and he'll stick, but to this point it hasn't happened. So after O'Flaherty actually does his job and gets Yelich to ground into a Fielder's Choice, and we'll say he's lucky the ball didn't get past Johnson for a hit, Collins probably should have just removed O'Flaherty and counted his blessings. Right? Wrong. Collins LEAVES O'Flaherty in to face Martin Prado, Prado hits a screamer into the Right Field corner, Yelich comes running around the bases like a pimply-faced moppet running home on the last day of 7th grade, and break out the Pizza Pie boys, the Marlins win!

This is an annoying loss no matter how you look at it, considering that the Mets had every opportunity to win, and considering that they were playing the Stupid Marlins. To make matters worse, the Nationals now seem to have gotten themselves in order, because you knew that was coming. The fact that Washington is playing the Barves, who have basically lay down completely, helps, but when you beat up on teams you should beat, it begets some confidence. The Mets have been doing this all season. So Washington has now picked up 3 quick wins in a row and the Mets lead is now down to 5 games, and Washington still gets to play two more against the moribund Braves while the Mets have to play the Marlins who are a constant pain in the ass. On the upside, after the Mets/Nationals showdown next week, the Mets then play the Braves, but then again when has anything ever gone right for the Mets in Dixieland? Ugh. One series at a time. Maybe.

Overextended

After a couple of weeks in which the Mets basically laid waste to everyone that deigned to get in their way, the Mets came home and sort of muddled their way through Friday night's game against the Boston Red Sox. This was, of course, another one of those randomly placed Interleague series, and one that had a bit of panache to it, since it was in fact the first time the Red Sox had played a regular season series at Citi Field, and also the first time the Mets and Red Sox had met in Queens altogether since 2001. Though the Red Sox are in last place and boast a record to rival the teams that the Mets had basically steamrolled over the weekend, they came into Citi Field looking somewhere awkwardly in between a team playing out the string and a team looking to get in the way of a contender. They did both rather well. In spite of running through 8 pitchers and handing the Mets 12 walks, they bunched several hits together in key moments and managed to burn the Mets 6-4 in a 10-inning sweat-fest.

This game did have all the makings of a Mets romp, particularly early. I was on hand with my better half for this Free Shirt Friday (and those loyal readers who know my wife's disdain for Free Shirt Friday will no doubt be pleased to know that she deemed this shirt unwearable and asked if I would be selling it on eBay approximately 30 seconds after receiving it), as were a whole host of Red Sox fans who unfortunately turned out to be as annoying as I feared they would be in spite of our particular solidarity. Though I will always hold a soft spot in my heart for the Red Sox for what they did 11 years ago, their run of World Series Championships has turned their fans from a more New England Literary BS version of Mets fans into a bunch of chest-puffers. They've become so popular and their fans seem to travel so well that it seems unsurprising that this weekend is very close to being sold out if it's not already. Easily the largest crowd in a game I'd attended this season since Opening Day was on hand as a well-rested Matt Harvey was on the mound. The skipped start heard round the world turned out to be a non-issue as Harvey cruised his way through 6 innings and although he was less than economical, he was still effective. The offense got him two runs off of Henry Owens, who should not be confused with the Henry Owens of lesser acclaim that surfaced with the Mets in another era. It could have been more. It probably should have been more.

By the time the 7th inning rolled around, we all wished it were more, because Logan Verrett, after looking so good against the Phillies on Thursday, came in the game and was immediately greeted by David Ortiz hitting a laser beam of a Home Run into the seats in Left Center. Verrett then got the next two batters and it seemed like an isolated instance, but then he gave up a single to Blake Swihart and was a pitch away from getting the 8 hitter, Jackie Bradley, Jr, but then Bradley hit a ball rather similar to Ortiz that found its way to the seats as well, and just like that, the lead was gone, Harvey's win was gone, and Red Sox fans were whooping it up. 

The Mets, however, battled back in the last of the 7th, thanks mostly to Alexi Ogando and his general inability to find the plate. Ogando's outing was basically the baseball version of a triple-decker sandwich, as he walked a guy, got a guy out, gave up a hit, walked a guy, got a guy out and then walked Travis d'Arnaud to force in a run and tie the game back up. Ogando was then removed for fat-faced former Giant Jean Machi, and of course Machi stopped the Mets cold, and then Tommy Layne worked out of trouble in the 9th, and it was off to Extra Innings, which was about the last thing the Mets needed after what happened on Thursday night.

By this point, the Mets had gone through single innings from Verrett, who wasn't good, and then Tyler Clippard and Jeurys Familia, who were good, and now Terry Collins tried to squeeze a little more magic out of Carlos Torres, but this didn't work. Swihart led off the 10th with a screamer that at first looked like it might be run down by Juan Lagares, except that it kept sailing and it appeared to me to be a Home Run outright, but it caromed off the wall and about halfway back to the infield. Nobody made a signal, and so Swihart just kept on running while Lagares and Tejada then had to chase down the ball, and by time anyone was able to make a play on it, Swihart had basically circled the bases for the Inside-The-Park Home Run that probably wasn't an Inside-The-Park Home Run. But it was and that's how it stands. Torres then proceeded to allow two more runs on top of that, turning a bad situation into a completely untenable one, as not only were the Mets down 6-3 in the 10th inning, but Red Sox fans were now dancing in the aisles and weeping over their good fortune. 

It probably would have been easier if the Mets had just gone down in order against Junichi Tazawa, who has mysteriously become the Red Sox closer for reasons I forget, and after Tazawa gave up a hit to Flores and a Double Play to d'Arnaud, it seemed like we'd get out of here quick. But instead, Tazawa decided to prolong things and walk 4 guys in a row, which served no greater purpose than to fill us all with false hope while Red Sox fans buried their heads in their hands. Still, with the bases loaded and now a run home, all it would take was Yoenis Cespedes to just knock a single and the game would be tied, and a long hit could potentially win the game. Boston, having had enough of Tazawa's Follies, opted to bring in another pitcher, except that the only pitcher they had left was Left handed Yale graduate Craig Breslow, hardly the matchup they wanted but of course the only matchup they could make. Certainly things looked hopeful at this point but Cespedes just missed a pitch and ended up flying out.

This was a rather meek and anticlimactic ending to this game, which seemed to drag on forever and wound up an excessively sweaty 3 hours and 59 minutes, which should tell you that the Red Sox were the once who dictated the pace of the game, and should also tell you that they really can't pitch very well. The Mets had 20 men on base in the game and could only muster 4 runs, which means their situational hitting decided it was June again and didn't do anything helpful. Say what you will about Collins' use of the bullpen but the fact is the bullpen probably shouldn't have been in that situation in the first place. When a team hands you 12 walks, you probably should score more than 4 runs. But then again, after a 9-game, 12-day road trip that finished with a 13-inning slog, maybe the Mets needed a nap more than anything else.

The Right Roles

A problem the Mets had earlier in the season, and in fact a problem that's reared its ugly head several times over the course of the past several years has been a lack of reserve depth, particularly on the offensive side of things. The Mets have managed to field lineups that are decent, but tenuous and when someone inevitably goes down, a suitable replacement is nowhere to be found. So, what ends up happening is that guys like Alex Cora, or Jason Pridie, or Omar Quintanilla, or Andrew Brown end up playing way, way more often than players of their caliber should be playing. Not surprisingly, the team suffers for it.

When the Mets are performing at an optimal level, as they appear to be over the past 5 games now, it's these reserve guys that are playing about as often as they should be playing that come up with necessary hits. Such was the case of Eric Campbell in the 8th inning last night. Campbell has been one of my leading flogs this season (slightly above Jon Niese, but way behind the leader in the clubhouse, Daniel Murphy) because he's not good enough to be an every day player, nor will he ever be, and even when he's pushed into action on a semi-regular basis, he's exposed. But with these new faces on the roster, Campbell's face time has decreased and so what you end up with is he has less chances to look bad, and it exponentially increases the chance that he might do something useful with the playing time he does find. In the 8th inning on Tuesday night, with the game tied 1-1, Campbell came up to pinch hit for Niese with 2 on and 2 out, after Flores had popped up a bunt attempt and Tejada had struck out. And all he did was stick his bat out and knock a little floater over the shortstop's head, just enough to score Lucas Duda with the lead run and open the floodgates for Juan Lagares and Curtis Granderson to drive home 3 more runs afterward as the Mets came away with their 5th win in a row.

Campbell's case is the most obvious example, but for the moment the entire team is functioning at an optimal level. Were this 3 or 4 weeks ago, Campbell would probably have started in left and gone 0-for-4, Niese would have taken the tough-luck loss in spite of allowing 1 run in 7 innings and the Mets would have spent the night smacking themselves in the head with their bats wondering how they lost a 1-0 game to a team that looks like they're already on the 5th Green. Instead, the Mets waited out David Phelps, eventually tied the game in the 6th thanks to a clutch hit from Ruben Tejada and an equally clutch slide from Wilmer Flores (whose fan club has traveled all the way to South Florida), and eventually pull away late.

Niese was the beneficiary tonight and outside of the one start against the Dodgers when he probably shouldn't have pitched, he's rather quietly been just as good as the other starters on the team, which I have to consider appreciable. Niese was one of the guys on the hot seat at the beginning of the season and for about 2 months he looked like he was pitching with one foot out the door. I've talked many times about how he continues to trade high on a good year he had 3 seasons ago but he's started to recapture that form, probably because there's now too much competition around him and he feels pushed. On the one hand, that's not always the sort of thing you want to do to motivate a player, but then again, some players just need to be kicked in the ass a little bit. I guess you could say that about most of the team but some examples are more stark than others.

Disorganized Confusion

Last night at Citi Field was my 12th game of the season (or, my 13th if you feel I should count the 7 innings of Saturday's suspended game that I sat through—I haven't decided yet). Of those 12 games, I have seen the Mets get shut out and No Hit, and yet the utter shit show of a game I sat through last night could very well have been the absolute worst Mets display I've witnessed in a few years.

This particular game, one of my plan games, happened to be the first time I'd attended a Mets/Cubs game since 2010, the longest current duration of time I'd gone without seeing a National League team (that onus now falls to the San Diego Padres, whom I have not seen since the first week of the 2013 season—although I do have tickets for when they come to town in late July). Neither of these teams were very good the last time I saw them, and they don't look great now, although they both seem to have some sort of aspirations. The Cubs, who have become the darlings of ESPN thanks to Anthony Rizzo and the Baseball Jesus Kris Bryant, along with a host of other prospects, happen to be one of those teams with a fan base that I really dislike. This started way back in 2008 with an incident involving a Cubs fan that happened to me on the 7 train, followed by my attendance at a Mets/Cubs game at Shea Stadium where Cubs fans were all over the place walking around with their chests puffed out like they'd won 3 championships in 5 seasons. That year, they got bounced in the 1st round of the playoffs and I really enjoyed watching them lose. Since then, my exposure to Cubs fans has been minimal, because I'd only attended two Mets/Cubs games in April of 2010 and while there were Cubs fans there, they didn't seem to make much of an impression on me. My guess is they were annoying and since the Mets won both games I wasn't bothered so much.

Now, it's 5 years later and the Cubs have all these prospects and all this promise, and the Mets have all these prospects and all this promise. But while the Mets fan seems to approach this with wariness, the Cubs fans seem to be a little ahead of themselves. I knew I'd see some Cubs fans at the game last night, but certainly I wouldn't get a repeat of 2008. Well GODDAMN IT, IT HAPPENED AGAIN, BEFORE I EVEN GOT TO THE DAMN STADIUM! Standing on the platform of the 7 train, minding my own business, when some Jackass of Asian descent wearing a Cubs hat and a Cubs shirt comes up to me and says "Sorry, but the Cubs are winning tonight."

Seriously?

You guys are that cocky?

Maybe win something this Century before you start talking shit, guys.

That put me in a mood. Even the Cardinals fans, who really think their shit doesn't stink and bring selfie sticks to games don't act like that. Philly fans might, but only when their team was winning. Now that they stink again, their fans have crawled back into their caves. This shit from a team that's not any better than the Mets and sits 11 games out of 1st place, and they're going to disrespect us in our own building? That put me in such a mood that I wanted the Mets to beat the Cubs so badly last night. I wanted Bartolo Colon to throw a shutout and hit a Home Run to boot. I wanted to see the Mets stick it to the Cubs so bad that their fans would flee the building by the 7th inning stretch.

But that didn't happen. Of course it didn't.

Because this is the Mets, and the Mets can't hit to save their own lives.

I mean, sure, I got part of what I wanted. Bartolo Colon was simply brilliant for his 7 innings of work, allowing the Cubs nothing of consequence other than 3 hits, he struck out Baseball Jesus twice and put the Cubs in their place. Unfortunately, the Mets played like a bunch of assholes and not only did they not hit, they also did an outstanding job of screwing up the meager opportunities they had to score runs and ultimately were done in when their fielding abilities abandoned them in extra innings.

The Mets managed to load the bases against Jon Lester in the 2nd inning, but they didn't score. Problem was Bartolo Colon had to hit and while he did put his bat on the ball, he only flew out, not deep enough to score a run, and Curtis Granderson followed by flying out as well. There were other instances where opportunities arose; Juan Lagares had a leadoff double one inning and at some point there were other leadoff hits, but nothing that would come close to getting a run.

In the 8th inning, the Mets finally had a decent opportunity to score against Pedro Strop. Ruben Tejada reached on an infield error and then Daniel Murphy doubled into the corner. Perhaps Tim Teufel was being overly cautious by holding Tejada at 3rd base, but it seemed to me that if he tried to score, he would have been out by a good 15 feet. Then again, the way the rest of the inning played out, maybe they should have just tried it. Darrell Ceciliani followed, and certainly he ought to have been able to lift a fly ball somewhere, but instead, Terry Collins had the brilliant idea of trying the ol' Suicide Squeeze. And then when that didn't work, Tejada and Murphy both found themselves standing on 3rd base with their jocks in their hands while Starlin Castro tagged everyone. Joe Maddon then thought he might sell the umpires on getting both runners called out, but he wasn't quite that slick, although it would have been fitting for this game if he did. Nonetheless, he didn't need to; Ceciliani struck out anyway, as Cubs fans waved their glo-sticks and Strop celebrated like he'd just closed out a Championship Series.

After that, I figured it was only a matter of time before the Mets screwed themselves out of this game. The Mets fans were getting irritable and defeated. The Cubs fans were squealing and bopping and putting me in an even fouler mood than I already was in. It probably should have happened in the 9th inning. Jeurys Familia came in and gave up a ringing double to Anthony Rizzo that nearly sailed out of the park, or at least the Cubs fans thought it was out. But Familia muscled up to strike out Baseball Jesus. He then walked Denorfia, which set the stage for a double steal attempt where Kevin Plawecki threw a perfect strike down to Daniel Murphy at 3rd, except that Murphy had one of his spastic fits and fell for Rizzo's trick slide. Had Murphy done what he was supposed to do, keep his glove down and slap the tag, Ratso would have been out. Instead, Murphy did some stupid "Olé" tag, and when Rizzo slid, stopped and then stuck his feet into the base, Murphy was somewhere in la la land. And, of course, in a moment that typified the evening for the Mets, Collins challenged the call just to be certain that he was wrong. At that point, I wouldn't have blamed Familia if he'd just grooved one to Castro out of frustration, but instead he sawed Castro off and his looper to Center wasn't deep enough to get the run home. Familia then got Mike Baxter and somehow had gotten himself out of the inning.

Still, the Mets had to do something they hadn't done since Sunday and score a run in order to win this game and shut up the Chicago Pizza Party. But they couldn't. A succession of relievers, Hector Rondon, then Jason Motte, did the same thing every other Cubs pitcher did to the Mets and retire the side with a minimum amount of effort.

In the 11th, the Cubs again rallied. Carlos Torres walked Dexter Fowler to start the inning, which is basically asking for trouble. But he got Ratso to bounce one to Tejada, which should have been a Double Play, except that Flores' throw was bad and Duda's scoop was also bad and the whole thing didn't work and Rizzo was safe. So then Baseball Jesus, who'd struck out 3 times already, singled, and then Chris Coghlan singled, but Rizzo was held at 3rd. And fortuitously, Baseball Jesus didn't realize this and steamed through 2nd base, and was promptly tagged out in the sort of break the Mets needed at that particular point of time. Instead of the bases loaded with 1 out, instead they had 2 outs, and Torres just had to get Castro...

But he didn't. Of course he didn't.

Maybe if Collins still had his challenge, he could have gotten that call at 1st overturned, I don't know from where I was sitting but it looked close enough to give it a shot if he had a shot.

The one run was enough, at that point everyone knew the Mets weren't going to score, but just to be certain Miguel Montero singled home another run to make it 2-0 and about 90% of the Mets fans abandoned ship, leaving me to sit and stew among a smattering of Cubs fans slapping each other with bratwurst. True to form, the Mets managed to make some stupid cosmetic rally in the last of the 11th, bringing Kevin Plawecki to the plate with a chance to win the game if he could somehow get a hold of a pitch from Mother Grimm, but you knew that wasn't going to happen. Grimm could barely get a pitch over to Flores, but he got it up for Plawecki and that put this debacle to a merciful close, and at 10:50 I couldn't have moved fast enough to get out of that ballpark.

I mean, I like a good pitcher's duel and I like a good, close game, but what does it mean when the Mets can't get out of their own way? The Cubs didn't do anything particularly good to win this game. The Mets handed it to them, except that they didn't do it by making a bunch of errors and pitching badly, they did it by either not hitting or screwing up every single opportunity they had to score a run. The Mets offense has reached a level of comic absurdity because every single game, their pitching has given them a chance to stay in the game and give them a chance to win and they just can't do anything about it. If this were another era, the pitchers would all band together and make the hitters clean the latrines after a game like this. In fact, I wouldn't put it past them to try something like this now. It probably wouldn't fix anything, but maybe it would give the hitters a wake-up call that maybe they ought to try and get their act together.

Done Before It Started

I missed the beginning of the game on Wednesday night, so when I did put the game on, in the top of the 3rd, the game was over. Bartolo Colon had already given up 2 runs to the Brewers in the 1st, and the Mets, with their lineup consisting of Johnny Monell, Ruben Tejada and Eric Campbell were at best going to only score 2 runs against Jimmy Haynes Jimmy Nelson and his 8.43 ERA. They got their run in the 4th inning, thanks to a Curtis Granderson Home Run, which accounted for 1/3rd of the hits they would accomplish for the evening.

If you're keeping score, God Help You because you don't need me to tell you that that's 3 runs and 7 hits for the Mets in this series so far.

It didn't matter that Lucas Duda and Bartolo Colon staged an Alphonse and Gaston routine in the 5th inning, botching a 2-out ground ball by Ryan Braun that should have ended the inning and allowed the Brewers to somehow parlay that into a run. It didn't matter that Colon gave up a Home Run to a guy named Scooter. These runs had no bearing on the outcome of the game because the game was already over. This team doesn't hit because I don't know why.

Terry Collins looks stupefied right now. I know he was talking about a team meeting today and I'm not sure if it actually happened or not. Collins will probably be the fall guy if the Mets can't pull themselves out of this funk and maybe it's about time he's let go. This isn't necessarily his fault; he's only been able to do as well as the pieces he's given, and over the 4 1/2 years he's been here he just hasn't had much to work with. But sometimes a team just needs a new voice and maybe that's what the Mets need. However, please do not construe this to mean that I've joined the band of clueless cretins that continually insist that WALLY BACKMAN HAS TO BE THE MANAGER. I've already said that if Backman were going to be the Manager of this team or any team, it would have happened already. But I think I need to take this argument a step further. Sure, Backman is going to be full of piss and vinegar and be entertaining, and I think that's what gives him "pop appeal." But that's the sort of act that works with Minor Leaguers and when you get in front of the big boys, that doesn't quite fly. Also, Wally Backman isn't going to miraculously get this team to start hitting, and he's not going to get Daniel Murphy to stop having his hiccups, and he's not going to get Johnny Monell to stop hitting in to Double Plays, and he's not going to improve anyone's fielding. Some Managers (read: Bobby Valentine) got lesser teams to overachieve because they were specifically brilliant at being in-game tacticians and able to outsmart the opposing manager in key spots. Terry Collins doesn't really have that, or at least he hasn't had a real opportunity to prove he does, I don't think, but I'm quite certain that Backman doesn't have that quality. Backman seems to me to be more of a John Stearns-type clown who's going to make a lot of entertaining one-liners and argue with the press while managing the team to a 75-87 record. That's not the answer here.

All that being said, I really don't know what the answer is here.

First Cut

So, the Mets won't go undefeated in 2015. I guess that was sort of inevitable since no team is going to go 162-0, but it's always a little cathartic to get that first loss hung on you.

The script that the Mets flipped on the Nationals on Monday got flipped back on them last night. Following their first rain delay of the season, the Mets went out with another one of Terry Collins' bizarro lineups that featured David Wright hitting 2nd, Juan Lagares hitting 6th, Jacob deGrom hitting 8th and Wilmer Flores hitting 9th. This lineup was able to muster all of 1 run in support of deGrom. This was not enough to offset the 2-run Home Run that deGrom allowed to Ryan Zimmerman in the 1st inning, and thus, the Mets lost a 2-1 game that featured no runs scored past the top of the 2nd inning.

deGrom certainly pitched just fine outside of the Zimmerman Home Run; I'd think on any night we'd happily take 2 runs, 6 hits, 6 strikeouts and 2 walks over 6 innings out of him, but if I were to venture a guess the story of the night is Terry Collins and his lineup bonanza. I've already gone through my spiel about how Collins needs to stop thinking he's Inventive and Creative like Tony LaSchmucko and hitting his pitcher in the 8th spot in the lineup, and breaking up his lefties by putting Granderson in the leadoff spot and Wright 2nd. Somehow, Collins lucked into a couple of wins last year before abandoning the charade, but now it's only taken him two games before he's started trying to reinvent the team. I know 4 runs in 2 games is a small sample, but the Mets offense was gangbusters in Spring Training with a "normal" lineup (Lagares, Murphy, Wright, Duda, Granderson, Cuddyer, d'Arnaud, Flores or some variation thereof) and then come Monday things got flipped around. It's a good way to confuse your players and get them out of a particular rhythm.

Then again, two games into the season, I'm not sure how crazy you can get. Particularly when you lost to a team that throws an ace pitcher at you every game and will be your chief competition over the course of the season. I think, and maybe on some level I hope that this is how most Mets/Nationals games will play out this season. Well-pitched, low scoring games where it takes a good break to get the win. Last night, the Mets didn't get it. It's a hell of a lot more attractive than the 14-3 bludgeonings the Nationals have a habit of inflicting on the Mets.