I'm guessing we can all agree that the Washington Nationals are the worst team on paper, correct?And according to Jimmy Rollins, the Philadelphia Phillies are the best team on paper. Right?
Well, I've picked up the paper. Guess what it says:
Nationals 1-6
Phillies 1-6
The Nationals win the tie-breaker and thus are listed on the higher line....Because as we know, the first division tie-breaker is not head to head record, but less errors by players who make silly predictions. Jimmy Rollins' error brought home the tying run for the Mets today in their home opener, and opened the floodgates for the Phillies bullpen to give up six thousand more runs as the Mets won by a score of 6,005-5.
All right it was only six runs in an 11-5 victory. For the Phillies, it only seemed like 6,000 runs. For the Mets, it didn't seem like enough.
Here's my startling admission of the night: I never hope for sweeps. Sweeps, to me, are a lot to hope for. I've got one of those friends who wants to go 162-0 every season. Tells me on the phone: "You know, if we can win 19 of the next 20..." as if that kind of thing happened all the time in baseball. I'm always the one reigning him in, trying to keep his expectations somewhat reasonable so that he doesn't give himself a coronary episode if heaven forbid the Mets only win 6 out of 10.
That being said, I've gotta tell you: I want two more from these guys. I want this team demoralized immediately. I want the entire city of Philadelphia getting out of their houses at 2AM wandering around Logan Square wondering what the hell happened to their team. I want people at Pat Gillick's door with bats and billy clubs waiting for answers. I want Pat's and Geno's to be so disgusted with the Phillies that they pack up and move to New York. I want the Phanatic to wear blue and orange. I the city of Philadelphia to know that the defending division champs are not to be trifled with via cheap motivational speeches.Yes, I'm hoping for a sweep.
A word about The Amburglar, if you will. You may disagree with me...no, check that: you will disagree with me. But I don't mind the decision to pitch to Ryan Howard in the sixth. Yes, there was a base open, but if you intentionally walk the struggling Howard, you bring up a Met killer with the bases loaded (a Met killer currently hitting .385, it should be noted). Damned if you do and damned if you don't...but Howard hadn't hit anything all season. And up until two strikes on Howard, Burgos proved that you can make him look silly.
But once Howard fouled off the first pitch after the second strike, I started to get a little nervous because Howard was starting to battle, and starting to time Burgos. Amburglar went to the well once too often, and there's no way that an off-speed pitch should have been anywhere near the strike zone...it was like he caught the Mota disease as he kept going to the junk instead of going upstairs with the heat, or throwing the splitter down by his ankles. Except that wasn't Scott Spiezio with his warning track power, that was Ryan Howard with his "I'm in a slump and if I get a pitch to hit it's going to the flippin' moon" power. So instead, we got what Keith Hernandez called "a helicopter slider" or some similar nonsense.
I was upset after the Burgos Bomb, and knew that it would be talked about for a while. But once the SNY crew was discussing the Gary Carter HR from Opening Day '85 I thought "you know what, it's the home opener. Deliciously evil things happen during home openers at Shea (unless it's 2003 and you're down 27-3)"...and I cheered up. And once Matt Smith took over for Wonderboy Cole Hamels, I cheered up some more.And when Geoff Geary came in for Smith, the smile on my face grew wider than Sidney Ponson's pants size...because we all know the deeper you get into Philadelphia's bullpen, the better the odds that Charlie Manuel's face will turn beet red like his uniform (or those things the Braves wear on Sundays). It was fun to watch Geary walk a 78-year-old man, no? It was fun to watch Jimmy Rollins boot a Jose Reyes grounder to tie the game. And it was lotsa fun watching David Wright blast one off the top of the wall to put the game away in a grand eighth inning which bore seven runs of fruit for us.
And it will be just as much fun to pick up the paper tomorrow and see the best team on that paper in last place.
