When the highlight of a Yankees/Mets game is Keith Hernandez giving SNY viewers a riveting on-screen instructional of the intricacies of the cough button, that's when you have problems.The Yankees defeated the Mets 5-0.
The SNY cough buttons defeated the Mets 3-0.
Where two hits at least could have been rubbed together to start a fire, the Mets couldn't even accomplish that, as they only had one all game. In fact, when Alex Cora struck out on a wicked A.J. Burnett (or has he dropped the periods and become AJ like his friend CC Sabathia) curveball in the first, the thought "well, let's get 'em tomorrow" escaped my lips. Seriously. (I'm impressed that it was Cora who got the only hit.) That's when I was told to have some optimism. You know the one thing that's worse than the Mets lineup right now? That's right, optimism.
Consider: Not only are Yankee fans able to get the best seats, but they're knocking pop-ups out of David Wright's glove in the stands. Not that it helped them (Robinson Cano struck out), but their baseball IQ rates higher than that of the Mets on the field. Now seriously, what the hell is that?
The worst part: Who can I really blame? Seriously? I'm going to pick on Jerry Manuel for batting Argenis Reyes second? Dumb? Yes. Difference making? Would putting Argenis in the eight hole or on the bench or in Buffalo have been the difference between zero runs and six ... or even one? For that matter, am I going to blame Argenis Reyes for being a .200 hitter? Man, that's like blaming a fish for being bad at breathing out of water, or Shaquille O'Neal for being tall, or Dennis Cook for having a temper. It's just who they are.
Frustratingly, blaming people would be akin to taking candy from multiple babies. It's just pointless. Burnett was on against a lineup where Brian Schneider had the best statistical chance to hit him. What exactly did we expect? At full strength, perhaps you can overcome a spotty performance by Tim Redding. When Argenis Reyes is batting second, well ...
Now if Monday's game recap contains the words "Chien-Ming Wang rediscovered his Cy Young form ..." then it's time to complain.
***
Speaking of complaining, Mark DeRosa went to the Cardinals for Chris Perez and a player to be named. Indians fans seem to be fairly confident that this player will be pretty good.
Mets fans will probably wonder if DeRosa was on Omar Minaya's radar. Considering what the Indians got, the asking price for Omar probably would have included one Mr. Robert Parnell. Is that a chance you would have taken?
