Sunday, May 27, 2007

Psych Out? Or Just Plain Psychotic?

It's amazing what teams will try these days to psych out the Mets. The Marlins came out on Sunday wearing their eye black like they were the Ultimate Warrior in the middle of a rainstorm. Perhaps they would have been better served pulling the extra head trick that Felix Unger tried against Bobby Riggs. Maybe the extra head could have been Tyler Clippard's head or Kyle Davies' head (both pitchers having looked like Sandy Koufax while facing the Mets, yet spent their next starts looking more like Sandy Duncan).

But this weekend, the Mets put away any hitches and glitches and triskadekaphobias they might have had and put away the Marlins, with the back end of the sweep coming at the expense of Scott Olsen, making the Marlins look more like the Brooklyn Brawler than the Ultimate Warrior.

Meanwhile, in Atlanta, the Braves were busy getting their heads handed to them by the Phillies, and the Mets now have a 4 and 1/2 game lead in a division that just three days earlier was slipping away as everyone wondered if the Mets going 3-6 against Atlanta spelled doom. But let's throw this out there: The Mets record against the rest of the division is 12-5. The Braves, meanwhile, are 11-12 against the likes of Philadelphia, Florida, and the Washington Nationals.

What is striking me about the recent exploits of the Flushing nine is the resurgence of the middle of the order, albeit a reshuffled deck. David Wright and Carlos Delgado have taken their rightful places in the top three on the team RBI list. And Carlos Beltran was heating up against the Fish. What made the Mets so good last season was that for long stretches, every single lineup spot was hot...or at least not in a slump. The Mets have the best record in the National League without hitting on all cylinders in the lineup. They had Reyes and Beltran without having Diesel and Sugar Pants. Now Delgado and Wright are coming around without the help of Reyes. When they're all clicking...well let's just hope the pitching holds up when that happens.

Happy Memorial Day, remember the troops, grill those burgers, and enjoy your day off.

5 comments:

JAMMQ said...

Kind of easy to beat up on a team that kicks the ball around like the Marlins did this weekend, isn't it? Where was this shit against the Braves?

Anonymous said...

Sugar Pants is the funniest fucking shit I've read all day. I like D-Wright, but I can't imagine holding a conversation with him for more than about 30 seconds.

Metstradamus said...

Just to clarify: "Sugar Pants"...Not mine.

Jaap said...

The absence of the D-Train was noticeable. Might have meant taking "only" two out of three...

Anonymous said...

the marlins truly looked like the triple a team they are this weekend.
am still ticked that willie got jobbed last year for girardi, whose club didn't even play .500 ball let alone make the playoffs yet somehow got canonized.