Sorry gang. I neglected to mention in the promotion of Amazin’ Tuesday that the Mets tend to lose on Amazin’ Tuesday. Well, they didn’t lose in March, because the season hadn’t started yet, but otherwise, there’s reading, there’s pizza, there’s Met camaraderie like you wouldn’t believe every time we hold one of these things…but there’s also a loss [1].
It’s the opposite of me at Citi Field wherein I go to a Mets game and the Mets almost always win [2]. On these Tuesdays, I attempt to read aloud about the Mets during a Mets game, and they always, always lose.
The Mets are 0-5 on Amazin’ Tuesdays. I fear it’s a trend. Didn’t seem like such a big deal in 2009 when the entire season was a total loss, but I hate having potentially karmically contributed to the recellarization of the 2010 club…though I’m not taking the heat for this one alone. I’m not the one who couldn’t deliver Luis Castillo from third with one out against Billy Wagner in the top of the ninth to obtain a lead, and I’m not the one who couldn’t throw a chopped baseball properly to first base to stave off a loss.
The one behind both of those misfortunes was David Wright, who should have enough goodwill accumulated in the Met bank to allow him a doubly bad ninth inning and maybe even another batch of strikeouts. But we’re a last place team again, David Wright fanned three times in Atlanta and goodwill’s in short supply. As we speak, Steve Somers’ callers are proposing trades whose core principle is let’s exchange David Wright for a starting pitcher. This, mind you, is happening after midnight. So don’t blame Amazin’ Tuesday for Anxiety-Riddled Wednesday.
Tuesday was Amazin’ as long as Amazin’ Tuesday lasted. The Grand Central version of Two Boots [3] was ideally situated — I ♥ Grand Central Terminal as I ♥ few public spaces in New York City. The only thing we were missing as we shared our Metsian testimony (besides utterly optimal acoustics) was a dead-on view of the game. The TV was at the bar and our little Speakers’ Corner was set away from it. It became quite low-tech in our physical niche when we learned nobody’s digital devices could find enough of a signal to click up a score. Hence, we had to do stay informed the old-fashioned way, calling out toward the bar for periodic help:
“HEY! WHAT’S THE SCORE?”
Semi-accurate word would filter back to us from time to time. We knew the Mets had tied the Braves 2-2 in the fifth. We knew Jeff Francoeur had homered. We thought (or maybe it was just me) that Frenchy’s homer was a two-run job, but it was a solo shot, matching Ike Davis’s from earlier in the same inning. Didn’t matter. 2-2 is 2-2. We divined Johan was doing his thing, keeping it 2-2 for a long while.
Yet based on precedent, I sensed it wasn’t going to end well at Grand Central via Turner Field. It never does for the Mets on the road when we do these things while they’re away. The game screeched to an unsatisfying halt while I was on the Long Island Rail Road, David throwing away Melky Cabrera’s chopper, Brent Clevlen scampering home with the losing run. That much I heard live. The part where David didn’t drive home Castillo and struck out three times I learned during the recap.
The recap’s never happy in the aftermath of Amazin’ Tuesday, save for wrapping up Amazin’ Tuesday itself. Amazin’ Tuesday is always great fun. It was great fun to hear from Taryn “Coop” Cooper as she brought My Summer Family [4] to life. It was great fun to get a dose of Cardboard Gods [5] spirituality from Josh Wilker (a Red Sox fan who possesses the soul of a true Metophile). I always enjoy co-hosting these events with MBTN [6]’s Jon Springer, and I really like when the “official” festivities begin to break up and I get to acquaint and reacquaint with other Mets fans who are kind enough to drop by. I met one guy, Frank from Connecticut, who said he’s surrounded by Red Sox and Yankees fans all day long, making a night like Amazin’ Tuesday a revelation for him. He had no idea there were so many people like us.
There are. And we’re all a little miserable right now.