And you thought September 30, 2007 was unique. Apparently, the Mets collapsed on some other day in some other year, though I think if those who dreamed up the chapter titles for 1969’s The Year The Mets Lost Last Place knew what awaited this franchise almost four decades down the road, they wouldn’t have taken an 11-4 loss to the Expos so hard (nor might have the late Karl Ehrhardt [1], whose final sign raised that Friday evening read SAME OLD STORY).
History tells us this first so-called Mets collapse — they had only two days earlier [2] risen high enough to perceptibly plummet — was quite ephemeral in nature. By October 16, 1969 [3], whatever went wrong on July 11 was completely corrected. Likewise, maybe the most recent Met misstep, even if it was a stumble for the ages, will be swept into the dustbin of history soon enough. Given that Pitchers & Catchers report today, why the hell not?