The Lovers, The Dreamers, And Asdrubal

Saturday’s Phillies/Mets affair was as wacky as you would expect in a game and a day that was befitting these two franchises.

Zack Wheeler made his first start since his DL stint, and he wasn’t sharp at all, being lifted after 82 pitches as he gave up two runs in the fourth inning. An error and two walks started the trouble, then Wheeler couldn’t complete an inning ending double play and two runs scored on the play. Then a single forced Terry Collins to bring in a reliever for Wheeler with the pitcher due up. That’s how you know you had nothing.

But the Mets scratched out a run in the bottom of the fourth before Lucas Duda powered one into the apple to give the Mets a 3-2 lead. Then Tommy Joseph took over, tying the game in the fifth on a double, and then capping off a disastrous inning by Fernando Salas by hitting a three run home run to give the Phillies a 6-3 lead. It also seemed to cap off a slog of a game which dragged on and on until the very end. With impending storms coming in from the west, this was not the day to have a game that dragged.

The bottom of the seventh began with a home run by T.J. Rivera, making up for an earlier error (the Mets had three on Saturday) to nudge the Mets back to a 6-4 deficit. Then after the first out, Travis d’Arnaud smacked a double off Pat Neshek and Wilmer Flores brought home d’Arnaud with a single down the right field line to make the score 6-5. After Curtis Granderson struck out, Asdrubal Cabrera came to the plate. Cabrera had doubled earlier in the game, but hit into a double play in the fifth with the bases loaded.

Ron Darling had no idea that players have a habit of doing special things on their bobblehead day, but he found out in the seventh. Cabrera smacked a long home run to center field to give the Mets the lead back 7-6. Neshek knew it right away, and Cabrera gave it a couple of extra seconds of vision as if to say “f*ck you, Edubray Ramos“. But there was still a couple of innings of baseball to play, And because these two teams couldn’t finish their business in three hours, which is a reasonable amount of time to finish a nine inning game of major league baseball, the game was delayed by the rainstorm that we all knew was coming but couldn’t avoid.

The radar had the storm lasting until about 9:30, and we thought radar never lied. And this happened on the one year anniversary of the Mets winning 10-2 over the Cubs in a monsoon … another game I had tickets for. I’m not going to lie to you, I had visions of Justin Upton in my head (yet another game I had tickets for). But then something very strange happened. It stopped raining. The sun came out. Then we saw this:

Not just a rainbow, but a double rainbow. Over Citi Field. In the middle of what should have been a two hour rain delay according to the radar. A higher power was finally smiling over the Mets and it felt good. Even the Mets couldn’t possibly lose after this, right? Especially not to the Phillies … right?

Addison Reed came in for the four out save after the rain delay and gave up a leadoff double to Aaron Altherr. But then Reed set the next three guys down harmlessly, including Mikael Franco to end the game with Altherr on third to end the game and give the Mets another victory over the hapless Phils as Asdrubal Cabrera’s bobblehead day was a success. (Cabrera’s bobblehead has rescinded his trade request.) The final game of the series features Rafael Montero so have your oxygen tanks nearby. He goes up against Nick Pivetta who I think used to referee NBA games. Meanwhile the Nationals dropped a 2-1 decision to the Cardinals which means the Mets are only about 90 games behind the Nats for the division. Hopefully there will be no double rainbows in Washington this week when the Mets come to town.

Today’s Hate List

1. Bobby Bonilla
2. Tommy Joseph
3. Nick Pivetta
4. Dick Bavetta
5. Edubray Ramos

P.S. Kudos to the Mets for putting a Cookie Do stand next to Keith’s Grill in right field to alleviate some of the line in the Promenade Club. They listened to me after all. And speaking of the Promenade Club, Dan & John’s Wings and Big Mozz? Excellent choices which I recommend highly.