Reborn on the Third of July

Jacob deGrom pitched to six minor league batters on Sunday night. Five of them turned into smoldering holes in the dirt adjacent to home plate. I didn’t notice what became of the sixth. As far as we can tell, nobody was actually harmed, neither the young Jupiter Hammerheads whose future still remains ahead of them nor deGrom, he whose shoulder was pronounced as feeling “100%,” by the only person with authority on the matter, deGrom. Just as Max Scherzer declared he didn’t wish to any longer be a Rumble Pony after his first rehab start and was therefore ready to move on from facing fodder for his recovery, it’s not surprising Jacob would intimate he speeding along the road to the majors once more.

Grains of salt all around, but Max will be competing in a New York Mets uniform Tuesday night and Jacob, after testing his scapula in St. Lucie, is suddenly visible on the long-range radar. If exchanging Fourth of July presents was how we celebrated Independence Day in this country, happy red, white and blue to us!

The Third of July left us with a nice gift beyond the apparent upward turn in fortunes for the two absent righties. The Mets stopped looking sluggish and returned to slugging against the Texas Rangers. Starling Marte lined a ball out of Citi Field in the first. Eduardo Escobar, who suddenly can’t stop homering, launched one with Jeff McNeil on second, in the fourth. McNeil being on second was particularly sweet because the double to deep right that landed him there felt exactly like what the Mets have been missing of late (besides their two aces). Peaks and valleys notwithstanding, I don’t worry about the top four in the lineup. Nimmo, Marte, Lindor, Alonso…splendid. Things felt dicey from there as June ended and July began. Everything after the cleanup spot dropped off a cliff.

McNeil is well again after nursing his tight hamstring. He was batting fifth Sunday. It’s a good fit. When Jeff doubled, it showed he was in pouncing form — he and the Mets. The fourth had commenced with Pete Alonso striking out, but the pesky third strike got away from Ranger catcher Jonah Heim, which Heim deserved to have happen to him for having homered in the third and making me aware of who he was (like I don’t have enough players to bristle at in the National League). Alonso hustled to first. Heim’s throw went awry. Somewhere J.C. Martin smiled. The ball ricocheted away and Pete vamoosed to second. Opportunity knocked. Jeff knocked it in. Eduardo knocked twice.

Those are the Mets I knew the previous time I’d been at Citi Field, at the end of May. Then came June, with the Mets very much holding their own on the West Coast (5-5), taking care of schedule-mandated business against Miami and Milwaukee (7-3) and appearing sparkless versus Houston (0-4), all while Atlanta swallowed invincibility pills. Splitting the first two with Texas had me, on the eve of my return to the ballpark, if not uneasy, then just a touch antsy. We’d be in first place on the Fourth of July, everybody’s favorite mythical marker, but even the optimist that I’ve become in 2022 acknowledged a division lead that had reduced from 10½ to 2½ represented a disturbing trend. Yet that was OK, I told myself and anybody who’d listen. Take two of three from Texas, then we’re doing what we need to do. We’re winning series. We’re beating who we should beat. We should’ve beaten the Astros at least once, but no season played within the confines of the mind exactly matches reality.

The Mets did take that series from the Rangers, winning on Sunday, 4-1, and sending Texas back to wherever they came from (Arlington, I believe), while Atlanta coughed up a ninth-inning tie in Cincinnati. Three-and-a-half ahead on the Third of July would do nicely. Watching the visitors leave the field in Queens, I thought how much I enjoyed how defeated they looked. Then I thought how odd it is that for three days these Texas strangers were my concern. Interleague play, of which there’ll be more in 2023, continues to strike me as a less than optimal use of time, but what do I know? I’m just a lifelong baseball fan who tunes into every game except for the ones I attend.

Blue skies shining on Mets fans, whatever section they were supposed to be in.

I was in Promenade Sunday courtesy of my triviameister friend Mark Simon, who Saturday posed one of his best questions in ages: “Any interest in going to the game tomorrow?” A deceptively simple query, as “no” wouldn’t have necessarily been wrong (you mean I have to get my ass of the couch?), but yes was definitely the right choice. Rising, shining, commuting…it was all worth it for a beautiful day of talking and watching baseball at Citi Field. We talked more than watched, as is usually the case. This time we didn’t watch the big sign that identified the section that aligned with our tickets. A couple showed up around the bottom of the second and politely implied we were sitting in their seats. That was nonsense, we politely responded, as we’re the kind of people who get here before the first pitch and nonchalantly work references to J.C. Martin into our game recaps. We were just about to ask them to name the two statistical milestones* that would occur if the Mets beat the Rangers when we realized we were one section over from where we were supposed to be and humbly apologized for our mistake. Yet it was too nice a day for that to go down as a costly error. We climbed one largely unoccupied row up, benefited from the extra shade and everybody returned to holiday weekend splendor.

Nobody lived up to Bobby Darin’s ideal of Sunday in New York more than Carlos Carrasco, who experienced neither back tightness nor a surfeit of a baserunners, each of which doomed him in his two previous starts (both against the doomy Astros). Jacob deGrom taught us to not stare at won-lost records. Carlos Carrasco can point to his 9-4 and we can still nod appreciatively at his comeback season. We can also enjoy, as Mark and I did when not yakking, the smooth bullpen work of Joely Rodriguez, Adam Ottavino and Edwin Diaz. Only that pesky Heim, who singled with a man on, got us squirming in the ninth, but Edwin wriggled out just fine. It’s so odd that Edwin Diaz appears and we don’t feel dread. Really, my only gripe with our elite closer coming into nail down saves is that Mr. and Mrs. Met continue to pretend to blow into trumpets on “Narco” when Diaz enters. They’re faking it. Blasterjaxx is for real. Timmy Trumpet is for real. Diaz is for real. And these Mets are for real.

*Buck Showalter secured his 1,600th regular-season managerial win and the Mets notched their 4,600th regular-season franchise win. Now I’ll get out of your seat.