Well, who didn't see that coming?
It's one of those weeks. They occur from time to time in the life of a contender. Your starters carry you, you can't score at every dripping-wet opportunity and your bullpen conspires with a vengeful opposition to screw you over but good. It happened and happened and happened again this week.
It happens.
When did you know it was a done deal? In the first when Wright pissed away second and third? The second when Lo Duca desperately turned a single into a non-double? When we had four hits after two innings off Cole Hamels but no runs? When Beltran cleared Ben Johnson off the basepaths with a double play to short-circuit the top of the sixth? When John Maine pitched his heart out yet trailed 2-0 in the middle of six?
All that was easy to see. It takes a seasoned eye to have figured out that what followed wasn't going to do us much good by evening's end.
• Delgado wallops Hamels 450 feet. Impressive, but it's only 2-1. Solo home runs, except when strategically delivered, are almost uniformly useless.
• Wright triples…no, homers…yeah, homers. Definitely homers. That's pretty good news, even though it's a solo homer. It should be a very positive sign that the Mets were credited with four bases instead of three since David went to the trouble of driving the ball over the fence. The umpires caucusing after Lo Duca noticed on DiamondVision that they blew it in the first place (are there enough badly spaced advertising signs out there?) was also an encouraging development and their decision to tell Charlie Manuel to stuff his illogical reasoning that getting it right was wrong because they're not supposed to take irrefutable video evidence into account — that was just plain fun.
• Lo Duca homering on the first pitch after all that? After Wright trotted home all golly-goshous? After Reyes greeted him with a time-lapse body slam of congratulations? After Valentin tested his knee or leg or whatever was wrong with him that caused him to be out more than a month (I've actually forgotten) by jumping up and down in the on-deck circle? Three consecutive batters sending the Mets from 0-2 to 1-2 to 2-2 to 3-2?
That should have been the turning point from all the alleged turning points of the last two nights. The Mets took a 3-2 lead in satisfying and dramatic fashion, Maine marched to the mound and threw a scoreless seventh, all was swell with the world.
Yeah. Right.
The Mets didn't lose the game in the bottom of the sixth. They lost it during the 19 other half-innings. They lost it in those early innings when they flat out refused to score. They lost it in the bottom of the seventh when Johnson and Beltran couldn't convert two baserunners into anything. They lost it in the top of the eighth when Pedro Feliciano began the parade of hapless hurlers who could not honor John Maine's effort just as they brought shame on the houses of Hernandez and Glavine. They lost it in the top of the ninth when Billy Wagner proved that the Sandman can Enter but he can't be expected to hang around for very long. They lost it in the bottom of the ninth when, as has become their late-inning custom, they stranded the potential winning run short of home plate.
The tenth was just the predictable pile of Schoeneweis that was bound to follow.
The Phillies were due this week. We embarrassed their ass in the Home Opener and we wrecked their Wild Card chances all through August '06 (remember that foul ball that wasn't?) and we steamrolled them out of the division race last June and we even spoiled their playoff aspirations at the end of '05. They owed us one. Or three. How long are you going to keep Pat Burrell down at Shea Stadium anyway? We have cranes beyond the outfield wall. They brought a wrecking crew.
Not the end of the world, just the lousy homestand. Everybody's pressing, nobody's succeeding. It's annoying and distressing but it's still June and we're still in first place by 3-1/2 (or did you not notice the Braves have been losing all week, too?).
2007 may not bear ample resemblance to 2006, but look at the bright side: the Mets are going to Detroit at last.
After the three home runs, I had to go to the grocery store, and I was thinking about how, after the first two games of this series, a Wagner blown save would be the perfect, seemingly scripted, most painful way possible to lose.
Sure enough, as I was grabbing a cart right after the bottom of the 7th (I was listening in the car to muy frio Beltran continue to do his best 2005 impersonation), a guy walks into Wegman's wearing a Phillies #13 Wagner t-shirt.
And that's when I knew. Even though Wags fooled me with that Rowand K in the 8th to make me think everything might be OK… I knew.
For the first time in about two years I have that thunkity…thunkity…thud feeling in my stomach. And I don't much like it.
FUCKPISSWANKBUGGERSHITTINGASSHEADANDHOLE!
I knew things were getting to Willie when he turned to Wagner with two out in the eighth.
This losing streak is really messing me up here at Fordham – with the Yankees having won six of eight with us doing the reverse, my collegues are getting even with me for my little jabs the past few weeks. Am sure this is just a small traffic bump in the road to October.
I'm not worried, Wagner has sucky timing, but it's alright. They didn't look flat last night. They struggled, but they cared. That's going to translate into 17-6 for the rest of the month, I can feel it. I'm going to be there to outshout the Phillie fans in Philly on June 29th as they plummet out of contention.
As much as I worship the water Billy Wagner walks on, I knew exactly what was coming the moment I realized who was striding to the plate. There was not a shred of doubt in my mind. It was going to happen.
(And the Mets in Detroit does not exactly fill me with great confidence… as you ought to know better than anyone, Greg… *shudder*)
So Wagner gave up a homer… he wasn't going to convert every save situation. But how about some guys coming up with a clutch hit once in a frickin' while?
What do we do with Schoenweiss? The story goes he has some sort of detached tendon and there's no surgery for it, it has to heal on its own. And while he can throw, he says he has no stability, it's like “pitching on ice skates”. Well, maybe he should do his ice skating at home. Willie can't possibly think throwing him out there when games are on the line is still a good idea, can he?
I don't think I remember that many Phillie fans being at Shea in a long time. Very annoying. Lot of yelling and finger pointing and taunting. We're like “You guys over .500 yet?” Chants denigrating various Philadelphia icons were fun for a while (“Mike Schmidt sucks! Steve Carlton sucks! Brad Park sucks! Ron Jaworski sucks! Cheese steaks suck! The Liberty Bell sucks!”). “Donovan McNabb is hyped by the liberal media!” wasn't as catchy, but we sure found it amusing. Then there was this tool with a Phillies shirt, long bushy hair, scraggly beard and commando cap who spent more time yakking at Met fans than he did watching the game. The look he was going for was obvious, so the “Che Guevara sucks!” chant was a huge hit.
Brad Park?
I remember him as a Ranger and a Bruin (sob!) but not as a Flyer…
Unless you've copyrighted that, I think we have our next t-shirt.
Yeah…but we would have gladly taken that trip last October.
Whoops, I mean Marsh.
I hear Marsh is very big in the Meadowlands.
I haven't, but I'm sure a British scriptwriter has.
It's from the film Love Actually, and it was spoken by mythical pop star Billy Mack — as played by the wonderful Bill Nighy.
Christmas is all around us. And so the feeling grows.
With relish.
BINGO!
It was after the 2nd time he sang “love” instead of “Christmas”
I prefer mustard & onions…
When it looked like Wright wouldn't get credit for his home run, I started screaming about Verizon. Yes, I'm insane.
Guess I shouldn't have taunted Pat Burrell repeatedly.
Fuck.
And I know…I Know Joe Smith is a rookie and all, but I was screaming at the TV that he should put one in Burrell's ear in the 10th.
Smith couldn't hear me.
Every time Jamey Carroll's presence was noted by Gary Cohen in the last Mets-Rockies series, I found myself instinctively affecting the voice of the niece of Colin Firth's Love Actually character Jamie Bennett upon her disappointment that he wouldn't sing Christmas carols with the family and calling out:
I HATE Uncle Jamey!
I had done that for about five innings before I remembered where the hell it came from.
It hardly seems worth mentioning at this point, but with Charlie Manuel's ejection in the 6th, it extended my streak of four consecutive Mets-Phillies contests (including one in Citizen's Bank), over a space of several years, in which he has been thrown out of the game with me in the stands. It's uncanny.
It was one of if not the greatest half-innings I have ever attended. It's such a shame it'll be a suppressed memory…
Why Schoenweis? Why would Willie bring him in? Didn't he pitch the night before and suck? Makes no sense. Like Wagner absolutely grooving one to Pat Burrell.
I hope we remember how to hit with runners on base one of these days.
LOL!
Are you singing carols?
Pleeeeeeeeeease, sir…