Purgatorial Aspirations

You never hear good news because it's under reported 'round these parts. For example, remember when the stock market was crashing and that was the lead story every single night? On Monday, the Dow went up by 114.95. How many news reports was that the lead on? Very few, if any at all. The good news is relegated to the business report at 47 past the hour. The top of the news is always reserved for bad news.

Like the Mets.

For as well as the Dow is doing these days (9286.56, for you day traders), if you bought stock in hope and optimism in Flushing, you're a sucker. Because it's dropping like a stone. You'd get more return from selling your Enron certificates at this point. After the latest ignominy of losing three of four to the Diamondbacks, even the sunniest of optimists are seeing that the rain will never stop.

Yup, second easiest schedule the rest of the way, right? Except for one thing: last season this team was swept by the Padres when they were still awful, while the Mets had Reyes, Beltran, and Delgado healthy. So the Mets are the easy schedule.

Don't blame yourself. This franchise makes suckers out of all of us at one point or another. Heck, if there was anyone who was going to bring back sunshine, surely it was Nelson Figueroa, who just a week earlier was in Buffalo giving out hats and signed baseballs to a Brooklyn youth service team and letting them on to the field to tell stories of a long and winding baseball career. (Think of the good you can do when Tony Bernazard isn't around to tell kids to "get the f**k off my field!") So if good karma counted in pitching performance, Figgy would pitch a no-hitter every time out.

But God placed a veto on all good karma for the Mets the moment that Bernazard cursed out the Brooklyn Cyclones' team chaplain. Hence, Nelson Figueroa couldn't deliver another feel good story. Instead, he gave up six runs in five outs including two homers to Mark Reynolds, who had four in his three games here at Citi Field while the highest slugging Met has five in this building all season. So God at least had the compassion to let Reynolds sit for a game while he was here. But in terms of wins, He isn't helping ... don't bother asking. And don't bother asking Satan for victories in exchange for your soul. He's too busy writing Chipper Jones' hall of fame induction speech to negotiate with you. Hence you have the New York Mets ... Once and forever, the official franchise of purgatory.

Purgatory is kind of like a place for a purification process. The Mets apparently have a lot of purification ahead of them, as they seemingly intend to operate next season with a $100 million payroll. Well, if that's true, then by these calculations the Mets are going to bring back Shane Spencer and Karim Garcia to back up and surround Johan Santana. Can't wait for Frankie Rodriguez's trade request after he goes two months without a save chance next season. Makes you wonder if the Mets just shouldn't Piratize the whole thing rather than create the illusion of championship aspirations and finish 79-83 every season from now until the end of time. Just like purgatory.

Oh, and in purgatory, the Dow is always down, the Shake Shack is just so-so, and everyone is 2-3 weeks away from returning to the field. Forever.

Unfair Warning

Former MLB commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti once warned us that baseball is a game that's "designed to break your heart". What he failed to mention to me was that baseball is also capable of ripping out your still beating heart and showing it to you. Then, it has the ability to eat your heart in front of you and your children. And just as an FYI, baseball will think nothing of eating your children.

Bart Giamatti never warned me about those things. Thus, I still watch this stupid game. And I witness things like Mike Pelfrey, like a bolt from the blue, pitch eight brilliant innings (yes, Mike Pelfrey) ... only to watch Country Time come into the ninth and blow it. But not just any blown save, a blown save where the pitch before the game tying three run home run actually hits Mark Reynolds in the toe, clearly shown on replay, yet the home plate ump looked for shoe polish and saw none, and allowed Reynolds to continue his at-bat. Of course, and as I suspected would happen, Reynolds took the next pitch and smacked it towards the back of the picnic area to tie the game while the Mets had them down to the last strike.

It's a game designed to put you in a rubber room.

So even as the Mets came back and won it on a stirring walk-off home run by Carlos Beltran in the 13th, somehow this still feels like a loss. The Mets used to have a way of making losses feel like wins for whatever reason. Now, they win on a walk-off home run in the 13th and all I can think about is how the bullpen is now unnecessarily gassed for Thursday's afternoon game, and that David Wright should have hit one of the five strikes he saw from Edgar Gonzalez in the 13th inning in play and not foul. Maybe I'm only thinking that way to keep myself from writing some dribble about "this is the win that will get our team going", and then going and shouting it from the rooftops in my underwear while offering my Mike Piazza bobblehead as a sacrifice to the baseball gods. But that's how I'm thinking.

It's a game designed to make you use plastic bags as toys.

And of course, I'm also thinking about how Moises Alou can't stay healthy for nine innings, and how his latest calf injury has reduced him to a bumbling mess:

"I'm embarrassed to walk in here and look at my teammates with what they're going through right now," Alou said. "I wish I could stand here talking about getting a game-winning hit instead of, 'I'm hurt, I'm hurt, I'm hurt.'

"It's the story of my life. It's not what I want to talk about, it's not what the fans want to hear."

Shakespeare once said that "the fault lies not in our stars but in ourselves". Moises, you're a star ... hence it's not your fault. Your star is simply fading. Dude ... you're 41. These things happen to 41 -year -old ballplayers. So the fault lies not in our stars, but in our general managers for realistically expecting 41-year-olds to play 130 games.

It's a game designed to tighten your calf during rain delays.

Thanks for the advance warning, Bart.

***

But on the bright side, looks like the whole punctuality thing will not be an issue anymore for our friend, Fluff Castro.

Flu-ffy Fluuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuff!

New York Mets: 2007 Division Champs!

That was an awesome scene last night at Shea, wasn't it? Man, if you would have told me that the Mets would have clinched the division in June, I would have told you that you were nuts. But this team is on a mission, and nothing is impossible for this team. Damn, I'm impressed. Now we just get to sit back and wait to see who we're going to get in the first round. Maybe Los Angeles? Maybe Milwaukee? Ooh, the Padres? Their pitching is kind of scary. But with four months to go until the playoffs, the Mets can set their rotation. Heck, we can even give Mike Pelfrey some starts.

What?

You mean the Mets didn't clinch the division last night?

That's impossible. The Mets have to be division champs. Did you see the lineup thrown out there tonight? That's a lineup of a team that had all it's regulars doing a little too much celebrating the night before.

Damion Easley batting third?

Come on, you're kidding me. The Mets won the division last night! Can't be any other explanation. Paul Lo Duca batting fifth? Julio Franco batting sixth and playing third? David Newhan batting...anywhere?

We didn't clinch? Really?

Damn.

All right, seriously. If the Mets had won this game, we would have clinched the division right then and there. There's no way the Mets could have gone out there, with a lineup featuring Damion Easley batting third, against Brandon Webb of all people (who uses Shea Stadium as his own personal playground so much it's a wonder his uniform doesn't read "Atlanta"), then there would have been no use for anybody else to show up the rest of the season. It would have been over.

And with John Maine going the way he was going early, it almost happened. It was looking like one of those games that could have ended 1-0 where the winning run scored on a balk or something (sorry, couldn't resist another Benitez flashback) in the ninth inning.

But then came Chris Snyder and his golf shot into the bleachers off of John Maine and that was that. The way Webb was going, the Stephen Drew bomb off of Guillermo Mota wasn't going to matter. It is a situation worth monitoring with Mota, who got rocked in New Orleans during his "rehab" stint before coming up here. If it doesn't stop, Mets fans will start booing him causing the rest of America to call Met fans hypocrites like we need another label. But Webb was freakin' awesome, despite feeling like jelly.

"The humidity here always helps the sinker and the curve, gives them a little more bite...It's a great pitcher's park with a deep outfield and thick grass." -Brandon Webb

So it's not the heat, it's the humidity. Great.

***

Quick Fantasy Note: The Diamondbacks have just called up this awesome third baseman named Mark Reynolds who's hitting well over .400 in his first 50 or so at bats. I picked him up for my fantasy team, so expect this production to stop immediately.

My expectation of disaster with Reynolds after picking him up prompted one longtime friend to wonder:

"How many careers have you ruined?"

Truthfully, I lost track after Kerry Wood.