Metsapalooza

I still remember the game down the stretch in 2007 when the St. Louis Cardinals, who were dreck that season, had to come back to Shea Stadium to make up a rainout in the last week of September. The Cards, who had zero to play for, sent Joel Piniero to the mound against a team with everything to play for including dignity. Piniero shut them out, and of all the games you could point to that killed the Mets, including the final one, that shutout by Piniero is the one that probably sticks in my side more than most.

As the Yankees are leading an unexpectedly close chase by the Oakland A’s, Monday’s Mets win might be the one they look back on and regret. The Mets, making a detour from Miami to Baltimore to make up this game, seemed to be manageable fodder for the Yankees, fighting hard to keep a hold on the home field advantage for the wild card game. Of course, Joel Piniero is no Jacob deGrom, but certainly Yankee fans had a notion that their own ace, Luis Severino, would get well against this Mets lineup which is packing weary travel, and offset whatever paltry output deGrom would allow New York (AL).

However, that did not happen. The Yankees might have dominion on everything else in this town, but where there was once a debate as to deGrom vs. Severino, Monday was game, set, and match for this seaosn. Severino gave up a home run to Amed Rosario to lead off the game, and immediately gave back the lead after Jeff McNeil helped the Yankees tie the game with a throw that almost hit Keith Olbermann’s mother in heaven. Luis couldn’t get to the fifth inning while deGrom attritioned the Yankees to two earned runs in six and 2/3’s with 12, count ’em, twelve strikeouts en route to an 8-5 Mets victory which gave them … and you’re going to love this … three series wins in a row!

And if the Yankees do have to travel to Oakland for the A.L. Wild Card game and lose to Jeurys Familia and the Oakland A’s, I hope the picture of Brandon Nimmo standing on home plate for an extra beat after his seventh inning home run off A.J. Cole is the one that sticks in their minds all winter.

Yeah, that’s the one. For all of Yankee fans’ bitching and moaning about how he’s too happy and shouldn’t be an all-star. That one.

(And don’t worry about Yankee fans getting all upset over this … they’re not reading this blog anyway. I know this because after I crafted a post called “Why Everyone Hates The Yankees” after the Yanks put out a press release regarding Bobby Cox making the Hall of Fame and didn’t once mention any aspect of his career besides being the third base coach for the ’77 Yankees, Yankee fans on twitter proclaimed “I’m never reading this blog again.” So not to worry.)

Another reason not to worry: after this game, everybody was equally upset. Yankee fans because of the obvious, Mets fans because Olbermann existed. If you were at the game and wondered why Keith was trending, well it wasn’t about politics. Keith was the play-by-play guy for a baseball game for the first time on television in almost 25 years, and everybody wanted to send him back to his time machine during the game. I personally was aggrieved after Olbermann said that Jose Reyes had a “great year last year”, not realizing that three good months out of six does not a good year make (with apologies to Bess Armstrong in Barefoot in the Park). Keith tried to SportsCenter his way through the game hoping that Dan Patrick would be nearby throwing in a few well timed “en fuegos” to save him. Instead he had Eduardo Perez mispronouncing “Nimmo”.

Perhaps other nineties staples would have been more well received like James Van Der Beek, Lisa Loeb, and a bottle of Crystal Pepsi. Hey, I’d almost like to hear those three call a baseball game. “You say …” “all the answers to life’s questions can be found in the Mets bullpen.”

“Fizzzzzzzzz”.

Today’s Hate List

1. Brett Gardner
2. J.A. Happ
3. Aaron Hicks
4. Miguel Andujar
5. Shane Spencer