Our Morning in 4th Place

Well, it was fun. Now here we are in more-familiar confines: Last place, .500 record.

We were heading out to dinner and wound up behind a gaggle of depressed Brooklyn Heights Met fans who'd obviously just returned from the game: They'd stripped off their gear and were holding their Beltran bobbleheads glumly, like they wanted to discard them but were still holding out hopes of making the ticket price back on eBay. Kind of said it all.

What a nasty sixth inning. Bobble by Cameron. Benson has to put a ball in his pocket. Horrifying error by Offerman. (How many times did Red Sox fans get to say that? Why is he on this team?) Reyes doesn't get the tag down on a rare good throw by Piazza.

Come to think of it, the ninth wasn't a lot of fun either: Graves hit Encarnacion (whom we can't get out no matter what we do) and Anderson failed to execute an ill-advised behind-the-back flip. (I may be wrong, but to me it looked like he had time to turn and fire a conventional throw.)

In our half of the ninth, I officially gave up hope when Offerman strode to the plate and Gerald Williams moved into the on-deck circle. If you told me in March I'd see that combination in July, I would have assumed I'd be watching an old-timers game out of boredom. Nope, just the Mets letting the rotting corpses of last millennium's average players clog up roster spots that might otherwise be used to evaluate players under 30 who might actually have some use beyond this summer. (Such a shame Brian Daubach didn't get a chance to hit, while we're on the subject.)

We're nine behind the Nationals. It's getting harder and harder to say they can be caught. Though maybe if we bring up Benito Santiago and coax Mike Sharperson out of retirement….