With the Mets batting because they had to in the eighth inning of Thursday night’s game, I got out of my seat at Citi Field and took a walk.
The immediate reason was straightforward, but there were other reasons, too. My feet were cold. My legs were stiff. I was upset. And I knew that for various reasons it was unlikely that I’d see Citi Field again in 2024.
I wound up circumnavigating the lower level, going from my seat with the 7 Line low down in 141 past the postseason Fox pavilion and over the Shea Bridge, along the first-base line around to the top of the rotunda, up the third-base line, then through the plaza of eateries and back to my seat. Five innings earlier that would have been a foolhardy mission guaranteed to chew up multiple innings. But now it was easy: Most of the crowd had departed, leaving behind Dodger visitors and Met diehards. It reminded me of a meaningless game in May, one that hadn’t drawn too many people in the first place because it was a little cold and had seen the attendance diminish from that low base because things weren’t going the Mets’ way.
If that sounds like a terrible comparison to wind up making in Game 4 of the National League Championship Series, well, you’re right in some ways and not in others.
The Mets had fallen behind as early as one can on a leadoff line-drive home run from Shohei Ohtani, but tied the game in their half of the first when Mark Vientos cracked a homer of his own off Yoshinobu Yamamoto. But the Dodgers got two more in the third and kept battering away at Jose Quintana and the Mets pen; by the time I took my walk they were up 10-2 and Danny Young was on the mound, left to absorb whatever further harm L.A. had to administer.
As fans our natural inclination is to see losses as failures. The sports-talk radio version is to filibuster about desire and will; the sophisticate’s version is to spotlight various guys on our side who didn’t get it done for various reasons to be explored via analysis. The former is straightforwardly stupid; the latter looks smart but is often misguided.
Out in center field in the 7 Line’s orange domain, there was muttering that Quintana was being squeezed. I couldn’t tell from ~450 feet away, where I was sitting between my father-in-law and Greg (our first game together since last June), but between innings I peered at previous Dodger ABs on Gameday and found no obvious signs of injustice.
What was happening was more telling: Quintana succeeds by not throwing strikes, with his pitches darting or drifting out of the confines of the zone with hitters enticed to follow, leading to swings and misses and weak contact. That worked against the Brewers and Phillies but not against the Dodgers: They refused to expand the zone, either taking free bases or forcing Quintana to relocate those pitches to where they could be squared up.
Calling that a failure of Quintana’s is a stretch; it’s far fairer to give credit to the Dodgers. Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Tommy Edman all had big nights, while Max Muncy set a postseason record by reaching base in 12 straight plate appearances before Young finally (and mercifully) retired him in the eighth. Watching the Dodgers’ relentless lineup reminded me of watching the Mets during their joyous summer run: AB after AB driving up pitch counts and squeezing out an enemy pitcher’s margin for error until the breakthrough felt inevitable.
A few Mets heard it from the crowd, most notably J.D. Martinez, but that was mostly frustration needing an outlet. The team looks tired, and understandably so — I’m exhausted and all I’ve done is watch them. And the nagging injuries look like they’re piling up: Brandon Nimmo literally limped through the evening and delivered one of the Mets’ two runs by beating out the tail end of a double play on basically one foot, which is the kind of thing that will get lost amid bigger storylines but shouldn’t.
But again, turn that around: The Dodgers squeaked past the Padres nagged by worries about their starting pitching, which is in tatters after the kind of season that called for a MASH unit. They’re on the brink of the World Series because of that relentless lineup but also because they’ve had three suspect pitchers — Jack Flaherty, Walker Buehler and now Yamamoto — come up big.
The TLDR of the above, offered by Greg in an aside that was gloomy but clear-eyed: Maybe they’re just better.
All of this was competing for space in my brain when I took my walk. I stopped for a moment in the plaza beyond the home run apple, looking up at the frieze above Shake Shack and remembering it in its old place atop the scoreboard at Shea. (Its reclamation was one of the few things we agreed the Mets had got right while Citi Field was in the growing pains of its first few seasons.)
Those Mets had been on my mind all night, partly because Robin Ventura and Edgardo Alfonzo had returned for the first pitch and John Franco had led a pregame hollering of LET’S GO METS. But looking up at the old frieze with its remembrance pin over the outline of the World Trade Center, I realized I wasn’t disparaging the 2024 Mets by comparison. I found I wasn’t angry at them, or dismayed at seeing their season shoved to the brink. All of a sudden it really did feel like a May game, one that hadn’t unfolded the way you wanted but still meant a night at the ballpark, which always feels like getting away with something.
I know myself well enough to grasp that some of my acceptance is me trying to outfox the baseball gods: During my walk a fan yelled “Mets in seven!” to no one in particular and I smiled and thought, “Well, why not?” And some of it is stubborn faith in how often this edition of the Mets has delivered a surprise; on the subway I nodded at Francisco Lindor‘s postgame declaration that “if you have no belief, you shouldn’t be here.”
I won’t be there Friday afternoon — not with the 7 Line, and not on my couch. I’ll be on an airplane heading for Seattle, investigating seatback channel options and hoping I don’t have to spring for in-flight Wi-Fi. But if I have to, I will — and you better believe I’ll be wearing my Mookie shirt under my 7 Line jersey, with Derpy Flag in my lap and talismanic utterances on my lips.
In other words, I’ll be there in the way we always are, in the way that matters. There’s clear-eyed assessment of one’s chances and there’s belief. I’ve got room for both.
I’ll be there today. It’s an NLCS game, and I have a ticket.
I know this is dumb, but after everything that happened this season, I feel like I owe it to the players to show up and support them as this crazy magical rollercoaster ride comes (maybe) to a conclusion.
I was ready – hell, I posted it on here – to throw this team away with both hands in May. And now, here we are. I was trying to explain to our daughter the other day about 1999 and how it ended and how that team still burns bright in my memory and always will. About how, yes, the main idea is to win, but only one team ends the year that way, and so you take your memories where you can find them.
I’ll always remember how they started, and “man, this is really bad, another year gone” and then Lindor showing up and staying there and Manaea becoming something and OMG how about Iglesias and I hope Vientos can hit and when will JD be ready and the end of the season and Pete and Brandon and Little Acuna and Lindor, always Lindor, if we can just get to Lindor it’ll be all right.
So, sure, I’m disappointed. But soon, I’ll put this team in the good memory box. Thanks guys, no matter what, it was a great ride.
It’s been fun, but I think the Dodgers are just a bit too much for this happy little band of Grimaces.
Yeah. Tommy Edman, who’d a thunk it?
Yep, can’t pitch around their whole line-up like the Mets’ game strategy to work around the Dodgers’ stars in the regular season.
I think the Dodgers having our pitchers figured out re getting batters to chase is spot on. Four games in and these are the walks we’ve given up: Game 1 – 7, Game 2 – 8, Game 3 – 7, Game 4 – 9. They’re making us throw strikes and none of our guys have that sort of blow you away stuff plus that’s not how starters go deep into games. And then there’s the batting – two shutouts and 9 runs in 4 games.
I’ll tip my cap and admit they’re better when the time comes but not today. Maybe tomorrow. We’ve had our backs against the wall too many times for me to do that now. I’m glad we’re starting Peterson. He was our best pitcher during the season (based on ERA, not WHIP) and he’s a lefthander. I think he gives us our best chance to win and I sure don’t want them celebrating on our field. Leave the Senga experimentation at least for the WS we probably won’t reach, or 2025.
“none of our guys have that sort of blow you away stuff”
Senga does have that kind of stuff, but he was awful in game 1. Peterson’s the right choice to start game 5.
“Leave the Senga experimentation at least for the WS”
The Dodgers have beat up the bullpen worse than the starters. The Mets need another reliever with “blow you away stuff”. That points to taking a chance with Senga as a mid-game fireman if needed, and hope he pitches like NLDS game 1, sans Schwarber lead-off HR, not NLCS game 1. Maybe Manaea too.
Is there a point when there might be some accountability for a pitching staff that walked the most batters in the National League, and the third-most in baseball behind the tanking White Sox and Angels?
The Mets have a pitching coach who has been there for three different managerial tenures. The team won 89 games despite an atrocious bullpen, not because of it, but I guess we’re not supposed to point negative stuff like that out lest we be pilloried on social media as the worst fans in baseball.
Nah, let’s just adopt the theme of a failing political campaign and just proclaim “joy” despite getting boat-raced in three out of four NLCS games.
When your luck is batting zero
Get your chin up off the floor.
Mister you can be a hero
You can open every door.
There’s nothing to it
But to do it.
You Gotta Have Heart!
All we have to do is win ONE tonite, and then it’s a whole new ballgame.
The odds were similar on MAY31, and “the boys,” as Pete calls them, really came through, to finish 6th (much lower bar nowadays). We had the best record in baseball with our revamped roster since then, so we probably ARE really better than the Dodgers.
I would rather have an opposing team celebrate on MY field, because it is MUCH more fun for them to celebrate in front of their home crowd. I know I would rather celebrate at my home stadium.
Regarding the opposing view, I guess human nature plays less of a role in an AI world.
During the regular season, I appreciated that the Mets disallowed the Phillies celebrating their division clincher at Citi Field. I don’t want the Dodgers to celebrate winning the pennant at Citi Field either.
On the other hand, if the 2024 season ends tonight at home, the fans in attendance will get a chance to show their appreciation for the team taking the season as far as they did.
When the Mets left on Sept 22, there was no guarantee they’d play at home again in 2024 and they earned their way back home. If they win today, maybe they’ll fight their way back home again.
My wife and I will be there tonight. Ya Gotta Believe!
I just ask that Mets fans stay to the end no matter the outcome, so that if the Dodgers end the Mets’ season tonight, the home crowd shows the team all of our appreciation for this extraordinary season.
Of course, if the home crowd gets to cheer the Mets onto games 6 and 7 in LA, that’s better.
Winning the clinching game is always hard, I don’t care who you are. LGM!
Agreed on all of this. It’s not that we’re a bad team, it’s just that the Dodgers are crazy good. The first three losses were all of the hat-tip variety. And that Dave Roberts somehow staggers his bullpen so that we keep seeing pitchers for the first time–even after a bullpen game–is some kind of wizard shit.
I hate to say it but this series has brought back memories of the 2015 WS, and the narrative leading into that that “the Royals don’t strike out, they put the ball in play and put pressure on the defense.” It gave me a pit in my stomach, and the assessment turned out to be 100% correct. These teams are resistant to our pitching strengths.
But, as always, LGM.
“It’s not that we’re a bad team, it’s just that the Dodgers are crazy good.”
It shows what I know. Going into the playoffs, I had the Phillies at the top of my list on the NL side. Then the Mets beat the Phillies handily, which raised my hope for the NLCS. I knew the Dodgers were good–they won their NLDS after all–, but I didn’t think the Dodgers would be this much tougher than the other NL division winners.
Beyond the obvious reasons I want the Mets to win game 5 today, I still recall the hurt of the Mets losing game 5 at home to the Royals in 2015 when I was all set for deGrom and Syndergaard lined up for games 6 and 7. Not again, please.
Game 4 was most frustrating for 0-10 with RISP (after 0-4 with RISP in game 3). 12 LOB. Bases loaded with 1 out, 1 (barely scored) run. Bases loaded with 0 outs, 0 runs. Like game 3 but worse, the Mets had good chances to score and keep up with the Dodgers in game 4. They just failed in the same spots that the Dodgers cashed in. I don’t think the Dodgers have outplayed the Mets this series as much as the score differential implies, except for the Dodgers’ RBI in the same spots that the Mets’ RISP LOB.
was there last night and at first, it had the makings of a good to great ballgame, ohtani’s leadoff hr answered by vientos and the mets getting plenty of baserunners off yamamoto.
but never quite enough timely hits. (bases loaded and no outs, yet unable to bring in a single run?) the bullpen couldn’t seem to hold off the dodgers and the rout was on.
we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that many on the team are playing hurt or not playing. yes, every team has its sick bay – the dodgers, among them – but beyond nimmo and his plantar fasciitis (which meant when on third, he did not try to beat a throw home on a sac fly while the game was still up for grabs), i have a hunch several others are not quite right: lindor with his back, alvarez with his grip, maybe thomas got a bit concussed from that catch in game 3.
as eric noted, if this is in fact the last game at citi this season, i hope the fans in attendance stay til the end to applaud this team and thank them for the extraordinary run they have shared with us. i was at the last home game of the regular season and since other meaningful games had to be played, no one came out from the dugout to soak up any ovations. they sure deserve some.
LFGM!
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