- Faith and Fear in Flushing - https://www.faithandfearinflushing.com -

We Lost, But…

It’s dangerous to saddle wins or losses with caveats. Wins are good, losses are bad. You depart from this simple equation at your peril.

The Mets put themselves in an eight-run hole tonight against the A’s, as Zack Wheeler [1] had no feel whatsoever for his curveball and iffy location with everything. (He also claimed the A’s had his signs.) Brandon Moss [2] hit a ball into the Pepsi Porch that wound up bouncing up to the plaza above it, which I don’t believe I’ve ever seen at Citi Field before and don’t particularly want to see again. Then Yoenis Cespedes [3] whacked a three-run double and Wheeler was done as soon as his spot in the lineup came around. The Mets didn’t do much against reclamation project Brad Mills [4] until it was too late, and that was all she wrote [5].

Except I detected silver linings — or at least aluminum alibis — in a hopeful number of places.

This isn’t to say the Mets are suddenly good; they still have a bevy of problems. But they’ve been playing without the little black cloud of doom that accompanied them earlier in the season. That makes them a heck of a lot easier to watch, and to root for. Even after a loss, that seems worth noting.