Monday night’s game against the always delightful Marlins in always delightful New Soilmaster Stadium unfolded as your recapper and family made their way from coastal Maine to an ancient inn outside of Boston, and the game kept morphing and changing shape along with our situation and surroundings.
While we were bombing down 95 south of Portland it was anonymous and a little dull: The Mets laid into Yonny Chirinos, with a seemingly resurgent Jeff McNeil connecting for an early two-run homer, Francisco Lindor hitting the first of two on the night and Jose Iglesias not connecting but getting connected with, giving the Mets a 5-1 lead via a bases-loaded HBP.
We missed some of that while eating dinner in Kittery; my kid conveyed the at times slapstick doings via Gameday updates, accompanied by shakes of the head at the indignities involved. The Marlins were up to typical Marlins things, which is to say they were not fielding balls as one ought to or throwing them as one ought to or sometimes both. The Mets were also doing recently Metsian things, though, never quite landing the big blow and letting the Marlins hang around being detestable, which always makes you worry that they’ll transit over to being Detestable.
(Seriously, the other night I asked, “Why would a benevolent God allow there to be Marlins?” and I wasn’t entirely trying to be funny.)
The Mets increased their lead to three runs courtesy of Lindor as we exited 95 and headed through the Massachusetts night on our way to Sudbury and the Wayside Inn, which has been around in one form or another since the late 1600s and is widely reputed to be haunted, but it’s OK because the ghost is my third cousin eight times removed. (No, seriously, she is.)
They were doing construction on the old Boston Post Road, which meant a detour off into the dark, with Google Maps trying to catch up with where we were and where we needed to be. That was about the time Edwin Diaz came in for the save, and pretty soon I was a lot more worried about Marlins going bump in the night than whatever scare the lonely spirit of my cousin might bring to some hapless traveler. The car twisted and turned down increasingly unlikely roads as Diaz, having secured one out, gave up a single and then a walk and then made an awfully casual throw on a grounder to the pitcher that didn’t get anybody.
The bases were loaded, the tying run was a double away from scoring, and Josh Bell was at the plate. We were fumbling through the darkness and so was Diaz, and it wasn’t entirely clear if any of us were going to reach our destination.
But then Diaz got Bell to ground out (making the score 6-4 but who cared) and got Jake Burger (so many detestable Marlins!) to pop a ball up, and a few minutes after that a winding ribbon of barely two lanes merged with the Boston Post Road and there was the Wayside Inn, a literal light in the darkness.
Whews all around. Should my ghostly cousin appear and seem bent on spectral mischief, I think I’ll say boo right back. Hey, if it works on Marlins, why not try it elsewhere?
Great story – rarely have a recapper and a relief pitcher had such a synchronous journey. Time for the Mets to get the heck out of Miami.
Uh-oh. Jason, according to an aunt of mine who’s interested in such things we’re related. One branch of my family also springs from Richard Warren. Guess with what – 24 kids? – there are a lot of branches. Including one of Taylor Swift’s.
Should have been 6-2 – they scored their first run on a foul ball and Diaz gave up a run (and is probably unavailable tonight) because nobody could be bothered to cover 2nd. Actually should have been about 9-2 having bases loaded, nobody out and bleeding just one run across on a HBP. But it’s a win.
Howdy cousin! And howdy to 9,999,999 of our fellow Richard Warren cousins. Who, as you note, are also Taylor Swift cousins. No wonder she sells so many records.
That 9th inning was an adventure.
With the botched play at 2B, it looks like McNeil saw that Diaz was going to field the dribbler and thought Lindor was running to 2B, so McNeil went behind 2B to back up and get out of the way. Whereas Lindor saw the ball going to the SS side and was running in to make a bang-bang play at 1B, not to 2B like McNeil thought. Didn’t their ‘rat-raccoon’ argument happen over a play like that?
It’s hard to criticize Diaz on the play because his 1st move to throw to 2B was the right one. He had to get over his surprise at seeing 2B unmanned and reset his feet, body, and arm 90 degrees to throw to 1B. A fastball strike to 1B would have been better, but that Diaz got off an on-target toss to 1B is still commendable.
The ball that McNeil very nearly lost on the transfer could have been worse. Check out the slow-mo replay. McNeil did well to reach the ball in the first place. But he was falling away and turned towards 2B when the ball squirted out of his hand behind him. Plucking the ball out of the air and getting the out at 1B was athletic. That ball could have gotten away from McNeil with no outs and the runners moving up another base.
2-2 out of the all-star break against the worst team in the NL–should have been better, could have been worse. They left Miami still holding onto the 3rd wildcard.
We’ve reached the Yankees, Braves, Twins, and the trade deadline, a defining stretch of the season that we’ve been looking forward to since the Mets climbed back into contention.
The Braves are teetering on the edge of falling into the wildcard scrum and putting up the 1st wildcard for grabs. How many major injuries can they sustain?
The Dodgers DFA’ing Paxton is interesting, but he’s not better than what the Mets have now. He’ll get a chance with someone, though.
Was listening on the radio, so appreciate the clarifications on the 9th inning from you both.