I should feel more disappointed. What's wrong with me?
I dunno. Is it that we all figured that between Brown and Zambrano, we and they would take turns cringing at the sight of our starter? Was it that while we played horrible baseball, they played only slightly less horrible baseball? Was it the momentary cheer from Heath Bell making like Jaime Cerda? (Heath, please let the comparison end there.) Was it accepting that Roberto Hernandez was due for a bum note again? Was it thinking that, what the hey, now we've got the same record and we can get this thing on in earnest?
Maybe. But I think it's that we've done this every year for a good long time now, and it's just hard to get up for it the way I once did — which means (luckily right now) that it's also hard to get down the way I once did. (Gotta get up to get down. I think George Michael said that. Let's just move along.) I think it's that while we don't look like shoo-ins for the division or even an 82-win season, we also look nothing like the walking disaster of the last two seasons — while at the same time, the Collapse-o-Meter may or may not toll for them, but they're clearly not the same how-dare-you-get-blood-on-my-wheels juggernaut they've been. It's a three-game series in May. I'm a lot more worried about those Braves and Marlins next week.
Or maybe it's that when your scuffling, infuriating but persevering starter gets into trouble in the 6th and gets the perfect, tailormade, kiss-your-sweetheart-and-pump-your-fist one-hop grounder he needs for the double play, and then it clanks off the second baseman's glove, some of the fight goes out of you. And when on the next play, your now slightly perturbed-looking starter gets a one-hopper to a Gold Glove first baseman who's ready to throw home, and then it clanks off his glove, you know that God's turned His back, and while you can come back and play tomorrow, tonight's not ending well.
Proper perspective on things, left numb…. Hmm. Proper perspective on things, left numb…. Ah hell. Ask me tomorrow.
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