Christmas In August

It started innocently enough, with two outs and nobody on base in the sixth and the FOX announcers talking about how the Phillies may have found the right chemistry on their team after trading Bobby Abreu and Cory Lidle to the Yankees (as if that was the plan all along).

Jon Lieber had the Carlos Beltran tapper in his hands...all he had to do was toss it to a waiting Ryan Howard to end the inning. Instead, the Mets scored three runs to take the lead without looking back as all talk of Pat Gillick having a master plan ended right then and there as all attempts at revisionist history was stopped in its tracks. Lieber's errant throw and Pat Burrell's inability to catch a fly ball I(on Wright's and Endy Chavez's fly balls) contributed to the Mets' comeback. I'm touched that Lieber and Burrell would be so thoughtful as to send the Mets some early Christmas gifts.

Of course, Country Time Wagner had to give us all more palpitations by putting runners on first and third with two outs after Ryan Howard and pinch hitter Chase Utley put themselves on third and first base, and Mike Lieberthal sent a 3-2 pitch screaming down the left field line, but before you could get the words "tie game" out of your mouth, there was David Wright to save the day, as he did once before against these very Phillies in their park, with a diving backhanded stop. And although he only needed one out this time, it didn't make the moment more spectacular.

On June 22nd, David Wright was hitting .338. On June 23rd, Tom Glavine got win number 11. It hasn't quite been fun times since then for those two. Wright's average had dropped 30 points going into today, and Glavine was stuck on 11 victories. Today, it's Wright's refusal to let his slump follow him to third base that secured win number 12 for Glavine, who is currently sending a gift basket to the Wright residence for this very special Christmas in August.