The Best Part of Stayin’ Up

“Give me the name of a baseball player.”
“Darryl Strawberry.”
“No, a real one!”
—Frasier and Martin Crane, Frasier, “A Cranes’ Critique,” Season 4, Episode 4, October 22, 1996

Dr. Frasier Crane and his brother Dr. Niles Crane, haughty denizens of Cafe Nervosa that they are, would probably shudder if the jingle for what they’d likely consider a pedestrian consumer product morphed into their private earworm (Frasier leaned more toward orchestral arrangements, certainly when it came to the theme for his own radio show). Yet after spending late Tuesday night with several of my senses focused on the Mets’ visit to their Pacific Northwest hometown, all I can hear in my head is the theme for a very unchic coffee, albeit with lyrics reflecting what I’d been watching with my own eyes.

The best part of stayin’ up
Is fly balls in their gloves!

Unlike the Crane Boys, I’m no connoisseur of coffee — never touch the stuff — but I have been beset by the recently revived Folgers tune. Saw a commercial featuring it, been humming it yet not regretting it, because I have repurposed it into an appreciation for the only element keeping me awake as the Mets otherwise continue to snooze in Seattle.

“No, Niles, not the Met. The Mets. I don’t know what they are, either, but Dad seemed agitated by their presence.”

It’s the fly balls and line drives hit to center and right, the fly balls and line drives that stay in the air just long enough to stoke dread, the fly balls and line drives ultimately chased down by A.J. Ewing in center and Carson Benge in right. I’m getting to the point where I’m stimulated as if by a burst of caffeine following those youngsters as they rush after them; home in on them; and place them in the out column. I count five such episodes from the Mets’ 8-3 defeat at the hands of the Mariners Tuesday. Three Ewing caught. Two were reeled in by Benge. Five vignettes of Whoa, that could be trouble, but wait, here comes a dashing, heroic figure determined to thwart impending doom. Suspense. Climax. Denouement. Prosaic on the scorecard, poetry in motion.

That’s for the balls that demonstrated the good graces to remain with the unfamiliar confines of T-Mobile Park. The fly balls that impolitely soared over its fences, ones that none among Ewing or Benge or, for that matter, Juan Soto could do anything about…well, they were a problem. Three problems altogether, accounting for six runs. And sublime outfield defense was of no use when, on the infield, a throw from Marcus Semien at first went “KABLOOEY!” and a stab by Mark Vientos at first went “CLANK!”, and Randy Arozarena went “CLOMP!” as his feet crossed home plate shortly thereafter.

The sound effects were not working in the Mets’ favor. The pitching was not working in the Mets’ favor. Benge’s two homers, each a solo blast, weren’t enough to overcome those definitive shots produced by Patrick Wisdom, Jhonny Pereda, and Julio Rodriguez. The worst part of stayin’ up was most of the game, actually.

Still, those kids and their fielding. Some nights that’s enough to keep ya dreamin’.