Blues are Bluer, and Oranges are Tasty

Wasn’t it earlier in the season when Terry Collins said that the Mets needed to cowboy up against good pitchers?

Well Yovani Gallardo, Tim Hudson, and Dan Haren are a good three to start with.

Haren hadn’t lost on the road since early May.  Yet the Mets, helped by four hundred stolen bases, a couple of hits by Jason Bay (the other Juan Pierre), a moon shot by Carlos Beltran and a complete game by Mike Pelfrey did Haren in for a 6-1 victory. Among the excruciating losses are enough wins to keep the Mets afloat, but the difference between this season and last season seems to be that when there’s been a good pitcher on the mound for the opposition, and I pegged them for a loss, I was usually right.  Now, the frustration is about the same but at least this team comes up with enough wins against good pitching to make you think that maybe, along with the wins they’re getting that they’re supposed to get, that there’s enough there to keep this team from falling into complete irrelevance until September.

Granted, I think this after smoking an entire box of frosted mini-wheats, and then smoking the actual box.  But hey, the colors are pretty.  The blues are so much more bluer, and the oranges … well I could taste those.

Most heartening thing about the game was the crowd.  Fairly packed with the blue hat giveaway having something to do with it (a hat they ran out of at the rotunda entrance, but still had plenty of at the right field entrance so I got one there … after the folks manning right field got on their walkie-talkies and confirmed that my “no hats at the rotunda” story was correct … what, my face isn’t trustworthy?) But more than that, a robust “Let’s Go Mets” chant by the crowd on the way out of Citi after the game was over. I can’t remember when the last time that happened was.  Maybe it was Game 6 of the ’06 NLCS. Maybe it was just blue hat giddyness, but hey … nobody was chanting “Let’s Go Mets” after getting orange hats (perhaps because they all rushed out early to go quail hunting in those hats). The crowd was into it enough that I didn’t even complain that loudly about the wave (a counter-clockwise wave at that … yeesh.)

Also heartening was that Willie Harris smashed Pelfrey with a celebratory pie without putting himself, Pelfrey, or Jose Reyes on the disabled list. Maybe Harris has a role on this team after all.