The Baseball Hall of Fame wants Jose Reyes’ bat and baseball shoes from the Mets’ 20-inning marathon win over the Cardinals. Here are some other things the Hall should ask for:
* The part of the bench where Matt Holliday sat after being removed in a double switch in the 11th inning, which meant that the pitcher’s spot hit behind Albert Pujols the rest of the game.
* The bullpen phone used to have Francisco Rodriguez warm up during every extra inning. K-Rod said he threw over 100 warmup pitches and had a dead arm by the time he came into the game.
* The bat used by Jason Bay to strike out four times, giving him the golden sombrero – and 18 Ks in 45 at bats. I was rooting for the game to end just so we wouldn’t have a chance to find out what metal sombrero comes after golden.
* The contact lenses the ump must not have been wearing in the 19th inning when he called Ryan Ludwick out at second when Ludwick somehow tried to steal when Albert Pujols was up. The Cardinals went on to tie the game on Pujols’ double and Yadier Molina’s single, so the Ludwick blown call (he looked safe on the replays) might have saved the game for the Mets.
* Crumpled program signed by Cardinals pitching coach Dave Duncan, famed for getting great seasons out of mediocre pitchers. But even Duncan couldn’t make great pitchers out of position players Felipe Lopez and Joe Mather (though the Met hitters did their best).
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I did not start watching this game until the end of the ninth inning. Little did I know that I had only missed less than half the game. It was refreshing to see the other manager make the big mistakes for a change, though we did not find out until later about Frankie’s 100 warmup pitches. Guess the “prevention and recovery” sign did not make it on the road trip.
If not for LaRussa’s crazy moves, the Cardinals probably would have won at some point when they kept loading the bases in the early part of the extras.
The Met bats appeared to be helpless against any major league pitcher, needing to wait until the position players came in to mount any sort of rally.
But Johan Santana returned to form and the bullpen for the most part was spectacular.
On Friday, Omar Minaya was justly criticized for saying he’d take one win in St. Louis. Even a game like last night’s doesn’t make one win acceptable. But if you’re going to end up with one win, that’s the one to get. Imagine if the Mets had lost after taking the lead in the top of the 19th and had done so because Jerry Manuel had Frankie warm up too much.
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