I wish I could quote word for word what Howie said last night about the difference between the Mets and the Braves, but he basically listed off everything Atlanta was doing right. He then finished with, "And then, there's the Mets."
It was glaring how far and beyond the National League East leading team is over the "Come get us" Mets right now. That is the line everybody likes to sarcastically bring up these days when voicing their disdain with the state of the team. I cannot fault, however, Brodie's bravado. What else would you want him to say as he is putting together his first offseason at the helm? It's just a very easily mockable thing now as we watch this team fall apart at the seams. Even if the pitching isn't sound because the ball is "juiced," you cannot make excuses and have to adapt to the circumstances at hand. There are obviously plenty of teams having success with the hypothetical tighter wound ball. The Mets have issues all around, but the bullpen is far and beyond their biggest. They would be a pretty good team if they could just hold onto some games. The way Zack Wheeler pitched last night, however, the bullpen only exacerbated the issue. They had no game to blow, only one to let get further away. As I tweeted earlier...
For a hot second, I was sure the #Mets couldn’t have another June as bad as last year. Then their June schedule was all like pic.twitter.com/AlyEm5i5RD
It wouldn’t stop raining. Anyone who currently lives in the New York region knows it has been raining as if the Pharaoh needed to be proven something. The plants all around us had more than blossomed, in some places spilling over into the roads they lined. As yet another day carried onward as drenched as we could be, I wondered whether yet again would the fates tease the Mets as they attempted to get back to the .500 mark.
Wearing my Mr. Met shirt, which plays on the MLB logo with Mr. Met as the silhouette gearing up for the pitch, I worked the rush hour completely spacing on the fact the Mets were on the road in Washington this time. Even though the weather between the two cities can sometimes pair up, a Mets fan who got in the rideshare car just before gametime not only informed me they were about to start, but reminded me that the game was down the interstate this time. Maybe luck was finally in play for the Mets after all.
After I dropped him off at his location, I had some moments to take to Twitter while viewing gameday. A few minutes into first pitch and before I had seen what the batting Mets were up to, I got this tweet off:
It’s time. Ain’t no better moment than the present. Do NOT act as slump busters anymore, #Mets. The #Nationals, struggling mightily right now, are obviously gonna be ripe to show they aren’t who they’ve been as the take on a divisional rival. DO NOT LET UP, @METS! DO THIS! #LGMpic.twitter.com/vHtR4TQWRw
Not much need to elaborate on what I said above. If you're a fan of this team, you know how it can go. It was and is time for the Mets to make those bad habits a thing of the past. They were brewing something in the first inning when former National Wilson Ramos, at the time sporting a .235 AVG, walked to the plate with the bases loaded. Feeling this was a prime opportunity for him to get it going, I tweeted this off:
Sure enough, the next gameday alert I was alerted to read, "In Play, Runs." When the bases are juiced, this could me loads of things. It meant only one thing in this particular instance: a grand slam.
I appreciate the ego boost, but I think the tweet was more words of encouragement than predicting anything. With the inning over, it was time for Noah Syndergaard to hold those runs up. He has struggled mostly this season, but in this game, though I wasn't able to watch any of it, sometimes you can just tell by the gameday results when someone has it. He no-hit the Nationals till the 6th inning, which was his least sharpest frame of the night. Still, it was the only runs he would allow, and he ended up going 8 fantastic innings. By the time the 9th inning rolled around, I had the booth of the Mets in my ears well into a workout at the Fairview, NJ, Planet Fitness. One of my favorite prospects-turned-pinch-hitter-extraordinaire, Dominic Smith, rolled up to the plate looking to get an insurance run on the board. Though he's been great off the bench, his power has yet to arrive. So, I once again went to the twitterverse:
Thing is, gameday is generally ahead of the radio. So, I decided to go to it with the count 2-0. The count became 3-0 and I thought to myself, "Let him rip." Next thing I knew, with the bases empty, "In Play, Runs" flashed across the screen. When there is no one on base, it obviously means ONLY one thing. Echem...
Obviously, all of these things are just coincidences. I have never had a knack for "predicting things" on Twitter. Most usually, the basket rolls around the rim and hops out, with the asked-for HR becoming a strikeout or something of that nature. Last night, however, was not the case, and I was on my prophet game. What's the difference between the other times and the night the Mets needed to make a clear statement against a struggling Nationals team hoping the Mets could be inspirational slump-busting fodder? The Mr. Met shirt. It is not a 7 Line branded shirt, nor official MLB gear. It is just some random shirt advertised to me on Facebook, and they got me. The funny part of it all is that Mr. Met is never at bat. He is only leader of cheer, truth be told. Even Mr. Met, however, wants to get some swings in from time to time. I sweated rather profusely in it last night so the Mr. Met shirt was in need of being tossed in the hamper once I got home. Today, I am wearing my Robin Ventura black t-shirt and I'm hoping it holds the same powers, especially with a better pitcher on the mound for the team from Washington. Now, I'm also realizing it is time to get all of my Mets shirts back downstate as they are all mostly in my mother's basement upstate. I guess blame me for any inconsistencies the Mets have shown and show from here on out. Or just keep blaming the Wilpons.
As I wrapped up driving rideshare last night, I said on social media, both Twitter and some Mets facebook groups, that I “have to go to sleep soon, but I envision waking up at 5am to the sights of a Mets W…Or the 28th inning.”
I lasted, with the radio on, till about the 3rd or 4th inning. I either woke up right before or was woken up to Howie’s call of Pete Alonso’s home run in the 9th inning. The call was detailed enough to inform me this home run had broken a tie. I smiled as I closed my eyes once more.
I did not last woken up long enough to hear the Mets just hang on to a 7-6 win. I was lucky enough to wake up around 5:40 to the sights of that conjured Mets W. I have not gone into the full details of how this Mets win came to be other than what I took in early in the game as well as that Pete Alonso call, probably falling asleep sometime after the Padres had tied it at 2. A box score, however, can speak a thousand numbers. By the looks of it, the Mets were down 3 but persevered to tie the game. Then Alonso, who made a bold statement by backing up his words the other night that we HAD to win this next game, lead the charge with the game-winning home run.
He willed this team to a W and the words I spoke before going to bed luckily rang true. They showed resiliency by battling back from a deficit that would have led to their 5th straight loss. Now, however, they must carry this momentum into today's day game. It will mean nothing if they cannot use yesterday as a catalyst to stop this pattern of yet again losing steam as April turns into the rest of the season.
I'm sure many people have made that "Familia" joke or a rendition of it, but at least it allows me to use my favorite "badum tsst" gif. Also...oy, I had one-a doze emotional posts yet again. Ironically, the last one like that, coinciding after deGrom ended his crazy-good streak, was written while I waited for my tires to get fixed, and yesterday, after the post was published, I discovered my driver's side rear tire losing air as well. Got it fixed again, but not sure what the universe is trying to tell me... Thankfully, I nipped it in the bud rather quickly so I could keep driving and earning yesterday evening. I decided to end the day just in the nick of time to catch Familia 1 out into the 9th inning. "Alright!" I thought to myself. "Jeurys is going to use this Edwin Diaz offnight to get it together as Wayne and Howie take me home." So, if you're playing the home game, the Mets had a lead and Familia was pitching well before I started listening, and then I listened to it all fall apart. If it weren't for Jeurys's 2019 track record, I would think I was the jinx.
I kept listening, however, and heard the new cavalry of JD Davis, Jeff McNeil and Pete Alonso combine to give us a much needed walkoff win in extras. I'm not quite sure how to approach the JD Davis situation, though. I do understand that he's hit rather well when he gets his chances, but his defense leaves much to be desired. Todd Frazier is a pro out at 3rd base, and keeps running into baseballs with his bat at opportune times. We're not talking garbage time home runs, no matter whether he swings and misses a good amount of times as well. I'm not going to go outrageous about whether JD Davis should be starting over him at this particular junction. If Todd becomes a major liability, it will most likely play itself out. Pete Alonso cannot help but swing hard. Though it was a classic Citi Field warning track shot, it was all we needed last night but man, is that guy strong. His energy is also contagious, and he seems to have taken a quick leadership role in his rookie season. With the Captain David Wright no longer there (single tear) it is nice to see such a young player taking some of the responsibility lost as Wright, head held high, marched into the sunset at the end of last season. Back to Familia, however. I don't know how to dissect what is going on. It seems to be more mental than physical as his confidence is completely through the grass, scratching the bottom of the soil. Do I agree they should continue to put him out there in high leverage situations? On the one hand, he needs to fix these moments somehow, some way, but as players like Drew Gagnon proved last night, proper performances should be rewarded. It may behoove management to let Familia take some of the pressure off himself and pitch in moments when the game isn't on the line, because every time the game is on the line, he has come undone. We need these W's right here, right now, because this East of the NL is proving quite the crap shoot. Here we come to another deGrom start. Luckily, the weather doesn't look to be nearly as volatile this evening as it was the night last week he should have never started in the first place. All of a sudden, Jason Vargas isn't the worst pitcher on the Mets, and I was hoping to not invoke his name in this post, but you know what? His performances lately has left me no choice. The Mets, however, need to put all their pitchers in the best positions to succeed and hopefully deGrom can do so once more going forward as the best pitcher in baseball.
I always feel like everyone needs spring training.
Photo via https://wtop.com (AP PHOTO/NICK WASS)
The players need it, the manager needs it, the umpires need it, the SNY truck needs it...and us fans? We need it too. We have to work that muscle in again, what baseball feels like, what baseball looks like, how it paces, how it goes. You would think by now with as many games as we die-hards take in year in and year out, we'd be so familiar with it, especially considering it is on 24/7/365 in this day and age. Still, I think one has to feel it out year in and year out and sidle back on into the rhythm, the play and that sense in your brain. This day and age for me personally, however, I feel so overwhelmed by everything in my life that I haven't had time to just sit, relax and watch a ballgame, much less listen to a spring game on the radio. I am both in a heightened state of being overwhelmed yet finally am practicing, or at least attempting, to train myself to take it easy, take everything step-by-step, go easy on myself while holding myself accountable. I'm trying to both train new muscles and work out older muscles I've hardly used over the last few years, writing included. Whether it is our physical strength or theoretical muscles, we all need training to get ourselves to where we need to be. You generally don't just show up "In The Best Shape of (Your) Life," without having gotten to that point by doing what they say you need to do to get to that place on the corner of 57th and 7th: Practice. When it comes to the sounds of baseball on the radio, however, they sidle on in so eloquently and naturally to compliment the sounds of the city of the ballteam we all so adore. On Opening Day, though the "City" was the one with Jersey in its name, I had the game on the old fashioned way with the AM dial...yes, THAT frequency set-up...tuned into the new home of the 2019 New York Mets, WCBS 880. All of a sudden, I could breathe. Combined with the warming temperatures and sunny disposition of the tri-state that day, I didn't feel I had needed ear training to appreciate the feeling of baseball being back in my life. I had just gotten right back on the bike after all this time. All weekend, it was how I took in this new incarnation of the New York Mets. Part of the beauty of listening to the game is that you imagine what is going on visually based on how smoothly the announcers, in our case Howie Rose and Wayne Randazzo in his first year officially as Howie's right-hand man, describe the scene to our ears and brains. Part of listening to the game is the anticipation of seeing the moments visually later on in your day. In today's media landscape, us fans can see the highlight of what we heard in a matter of moments if we so choose. My job, however, renders me unable to take my eyes off the road (as, really, is everybody's job while driving...) so I must wait till I am not working Lyft to take it all in at once. Here are some things I liked seeing from our team this first weekend of baseball in 2019:
The Mets MO is winning on Opening Day. They get their fans' hopes up, but ironically have never won the World Series thereafter in seasons they win the first game of the year (a trend I hope they change this year.) There are many incarnations of Mets teams that have won on Opening Day, so we are trained to take the results with a grain of salt. In the moment, however, it is nice when the plan comes together TO A TEE: get a couple runs for your ace, play crisp defense and have your bullpen hold the lead. The Mets took advantage of a HR prone Max Scherzer (he gave up 23 of them last year, folks) got an insurance run late and did what they hardly could do in 2018 for our horse: give him a W.
The Mets offensive approach looks much more professionally sound than in recent past seasons. They have a clear idea of what they want to do up there and are executing it so far. They are laying off some junk a good amount of the time, taking what the pitcher gives them and gliding the ball the other way. Players like Jeff McNeil and rookie Pete Alonso are doing a great job, with some tough pitches, of getting the barrel on the ball and making solid contact. All good so far, keep it up.
They showed resilience and resolve to take advantage of a so far weak Nationals bullpen and even though lose the last game, gave themselves a chance to win...they've given themselves a chance in every single game they've played so far. No way, obviously, to go 162-0, but if you continue to put yourself in positions to win, you will do so more often than not. Keep executing, fellas.
I was also lucky enough to talk Mets, burgers and BBQ with Metstradamus himself, John Coppinger, on his Burgerball podcast, on-location from the Barnwood Restaurant parking lot as I ciphered off their WiFi which I paid them back for with the purchase of a pulled pork sandwich afterwards. Along with plugging a burger I had had the night before at Rathbone's on 88th and 2nd in Manhattan, this was a fun time I highly recommend you take in.
Welcome back my friends, to the show that never ends. Though that isn't the song I'm going to go with to close us off. As I'm trying to train and retrain my physical and mental muscles, I'm going to go with a song I keep going back to lately: Mind Power by James Brown.
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