That Could Have Been More Fun Than It Was

Well, that one might be shown as a future episode of Phillies Classics.

The rain didn't really show up (I had visions of Gavin Floyd, Xavier Nady and Aaron Rowand), but neither did the Mets' bats. Johan Santana showed up all right, pitching a dazzling game … with the exception of that sixth inning. For all his wonderfulness, Johan seems to have these occasional mini-Leiter episodes, two-batter or one-inning spurts in which his location goes on the fritz and he seems as puzzled as you are by it. (Maybe it was that he was wearing a patriotic-looking cap that clashed hideously with his uniform. Seriously — if you tried to leave the house wearing that color combination, your wife would call you back in a no-quarter tone of voice.)

While we're dwelling on Santana's (very small) faults, he also arrived with a reputation as a Hamptonesque hitter. And when he came up with the bases loaded and none out in the fifth, I was sure his Mike Hampton moment had arrived. He was going to hit a double up the gap, maybe even channel his inner Felix Hernandez, and tomorrow's papers would be all about how Johan had figured out the way to win was also to do the hitting. My baseball radar was off all night. Instead, Santana turned in the kind of saucer-eyed at-bat you'd expect from a pitcher just arrived from the American League. Reyes, Chavez and Wright managed to scratch out two runs when we should have had more (Wright and Beltran looked overanxious all night, I thought), and it was bite-your-nails time. Johan's Leiter episode followed, Chad Durbin was masterful in relief, and Duaner couldn't find that third out. Ballgame.

The other night, in that back-and-forth game against the Cardinals, Wright tripled with one out in the eighth and the Mets up 7-5. Beltran struck out looking and the score stayed 7-5. I briefly mourned the duck who'd been allowed to keep paddling around on the pond, but I figured it was OK. We were going to win, right?

We weren't. We didn't get the run home then, just as we didn't get it home tonight with Reyes on third and one out in the first. There's a valuable reminder in that of the meaning of baseball life, I suppose. If you'll allow me a little Monty Python, every run is sacred, every run is great. If a run is wasted, the baseball gods get quite irate.

And so, I imagine, does Johan Santana.