The Night's Hatreds, Ranked

I hated the fact that on Saturday night the Mets lost to the Diamondbacks, 2-1.

I hated that the Mets lost largely because they’ve once again forgotten how to hit. Brett Baty drove in Marcus Semien with a double in the second inning, and if you reached back to Friday night’s 10th inning uprising you might have imagined the Mets had turned some kind of corner offensively. But no, they did nothing else against Merrill Kelly, who’d been pinata’ed by pretty much all comers in 2026, or against the relievers that followed him.

I hated the fact that the Diamondbacks collected their two runs off a very good Clay Holmes on a two-out single by Ildemaro Vargas, one assisted by Geraldo Perdomo, who was on second and very clearly, one even might say blatantly, looking into Holmes’ glove and giving Vargas the pitches. Once upon a time that would have led to Perdomo wearing one between the numbers, and when Perdomo came up with two out and none on in the fifth, Francisco Alvarez went out to the mound for a conversation with Holmes and I figured we were about to see some honest-to-goodness old-fashioned baseball justice. But no, there was no such thing — at least not tonight, and maybe not ever. I would have loved to hear what Keith Hernandez thought of that.

(One of the only things I did love Saturday night? Lourdes Gurriel Jr. getting erased by a Holmes sweeper, challenging it in disbelief, and having to watch as ABS showed that the ball was not only a strike but in fact completely inside the strike zone. New rule: Face-plant that badly on a challenge and you get an 0-1 count for the rest of the night’s plate appearances.)

I hated the fact that the Mets were put down in the ninth by Paul Sewald, who thoroughly demoralized us during his years as a Mets Jonah and yet has a chip on his shoulder about it. Look, I’m sure Sewald was indeed ill-served by Mets instructors back in the day, as too many of that era’s young Mets pitchers were. But his beef is with some long-gone coach, not us. It’s not like we were in the stands holding up Bill Veeck-style placards ordering Sewald to throw his third-best pitch or hang another slider — we were just the ones throwing up our hands after that happened yet again.

To be clear, I hated all of that. But it’s not what I hated most about this latest dishpan-dull loss.

What I hated most is that I’m this upset about it. This misfiring ragamuffin team has give me ample evidence that it’s not to be trusted with even the smallest part of my heart, and yet here I am muttering and fuming and trying to fan new grudges while disinterring old ones. I hate that I care, and I hate that I’m apparently powerless not to.

* * *

Bobby Cox is dead at 84.

Man did I ever hate Bobby Cox.

I hated the way he always looked like he was sitting in a puddle, even when his team was in first place with no credible pursuer. I hated his endless showoffy maneuvering. I hated his cranky chiseling for the smallest edge with umpires.

Most of all, I hated that most everything he did worked. His quarter-century as manager of the Braves (plus a brief interlude managing Toronto) was marked by 14 straight division crowns, five National League pennants, one World Series title, and a record 162 ejections. In too many of those years, the non-credible pursuer of Cox’s Braves was the Mets. His Braves were the car we never could catch, and my visceral loathing and fear of Atlanta — pierced by Francisco Lindor‘s heroics but not truly slain — largely exists because of getting our heads handed to us by Bobby Cox’s charges year after year after year.

I was talking with a friend the other day about how baseball hatreds are the best hatreds, because they’re simultaneously harmless — part of the kabuki of sport and not the real world, unless you’ve lost the plot — and yet so deeply pure.

So yes, I hated Bobby Cox, in a baseball way. Not being a psychopath, I never would have told him that. But if for some reason I had, I suspect he would have been pleased. Because that would have been another sign of how well he’d done his job.