When You Wish Upon What The Mets Call "Stars"

At the beginning of the day, I stopped at a fountain, and made a wish that the Mets would gain a game on the Phillies tonight. I was desperate. With that, I took a penny out of my pocket and hurled it towards the fountain with my eyes shut tight.

As I opened my eyes, there was Willie Harris diving in the fountain and catching my penny before it could hit the water.

But you know what, even after Harris' latest defensive gem which helped put a nail in the Mets 2008 season (which is currently in a hand basket on Hell's front porch), I'm beginning to think that it could have been Lenny Harris out in left field, and it wouldn't matter.

In fact, screw that. The Nationals could have fielded nine Lenny Harrises tonight. It didn't matter. It's not going to matter. Not when you can't get hits off a guy who gave up six runs in three innings in his last start against ... oh, wouldn't you know it? The Mets!

So let's review: The Mets are out of first place, Fernando Tatis is out for the season, and Endy Chavez couldn't save AIG. So for tomorrow's meeting, let's try reading from the passage of "Maple Bats, The Heimlich, and You".

A Nadir At Every Turn

Is this the way the season is looking?

Keith Hernandez said at the head of tonight's game that last night (Wednesday) was the nadir of the season.

Keith failed to realize not only that nadir is much too fancy a word for me, but that a nadir is only as low as your next game, when you go to the hill with your ace and still lose.

So this is the nadir now, right? Sure it is. Until Friday.

So ... team, is it all right to boo now? Now that Ryan Howard is heating up, the Marlins (a team that makes less than Carlos Delgado and Luis Castillo) are steaming towards June in first place, and the Mets are closer to last place than they are to first place while everybody is calling last rites on you and you've given us no reason to believe otherwise, please do us all a favor and lay off the "boo hoo why are we being booed so much" rhetoric until you can get Larry Jones and Mark Teixeira out, or perhaps string together a few hits off of Odalis Perez, Tim Redding, and f***ing Jorge Campillo?

It Just Makes Sense

The Washington Nationals came into Monday's game against the Mets third from the bottom in the N.L. in batting average, second from the bottom in batting average, and at the very bottom in hits.

So of course they come in to Shea Stadium and drop ten hits and ten runs. Sure. Makes perfect sense.

Also makes sense that the hit that broke the game open belonged to the ghost of Lastings Milledge, a two run double off the top of the left field wall which turned a 6-3 lead into an 8-3 blowout (After which he high-fived the coaches, the fans, the ushers, the security guards, Gary Cohen, the parking attendants, the hard hats at Citi Field, the drivers stuck in traffic on the Grand Central, and the bellhops at the LaGuardia Airport Marriott. And then Bob Raissman wrote a 3,500 word essay on how Lastings Milledge hates babies and makes small animals cower in fear.)

You know what else makes sense? Odalis Perez. Lost his last eight starts? Hasn't had an RBI since 2004? No problem. Come to Shea and not only get the win (while giving up 11 hits in six and a third innings ... eleven hits), but get three knocks and two RBI's. Outstanding.

Odalis Boggs.

And you know what else makes sense: a Met complaining about another team's ... celebrating! Oh the sweet, delicious irony.

"They were cheerleading in the dugout like a bunch of softball girls," Figueroa said, ignoring gender equity to get his point across. "I take offense to that. ... That's why they are who they are."

But it didn't come back to haunt the Washington Nationals tonight ... did it, Goose? Is that what true Nationals do?

Of course, you know that Nelson Figueroa's comments will fire up the Nationals to win the next three games of this series. And then the bastions of our society ... known as talk radio hosts ... will all say that Figueroa shouldn't have said anything to fire the Nationals up, just like his team's dancing fires teams up, his team's celebrations fire teams up, and basically all forms of eating, walking, and breathing fires teams up. It's all your fault, you evil Mets! Why can't you be more like Joba Chamberlain?!?

Makes perfect sense to me.