Grazing in the Grass

Between innings on Wednesday night, after a shared reluctance to shvitz our assorted body parts off on Thursday afternoon had pushed up by eighteen hours Stephanie’s and my vague plan to fulfill our even vaguer ambition to go to a game this week, I stared out at Citi Field’s well-manicured lawn with admiration. It had that freshly mowed mien it doesn’t always display. No indentations from a concert or soccer match. Smooth and serene. The grounds crew must be doing a heckuva job, I thought.

Then, when the game resumed, I realized coming to see the Mets play baseball is akin to watching grass grow. Given that the Mets were en route to losing to the Cardinals by seven runs for a second consecutive evening, the grass’s progress elicited greater satisfaction.

That was Wednesday. Interesting night to attend a sporting event in the city of New York, if not this sporting event. The Mets at least had the decency to efficiently get their loss over in time for people to make their desired train at Woodside, therefore allowing them to arrive home swiftly and take a gander at any other game going on in town. Grass, ironically, was not growing underneath the feet of those playing in a place known as the Garden.

Thursday, with my wife and I not in attendance, Christian Scott started his assignment on the mound looking like some combination of shrub and schlub, giving up a home run in the first, then another couple in the second, negating whatever momentum Met bats had gathered in the bottom of the first, when Bo Bichette and Jared Young each went deep. St. Louis led, 4-3, Sinatra’s fickle friend the summer wind and its cousin June Humidity doing what they do to make the afternoon uncomfortable from multiple perspectives.

Killing time, watching the grass grow.

As the Flushing grass continued to grow, the action settled down. The Cardinals stopped scoring. The Mets stopped scoring. A dog chased a cat and they were both walking. That kind of day, it appeared. Baseballs went from flying out of the park to not much bothering anybody. Good news for Scott. Less good news for his teammates permitted to hit. They were permitted to hit on Wednesday night. Most of them declined, as reflected by the lineup going a collective 3-for-30. Perhaps one through nine in the order were as enthralled by the grass’s growth as I was.

A television viewer couldn’t be blamed for believing Thursday’s bottom of the first, when Bichette and Young stirred, loomed as an aberration. In the bottom of the fifth, however, Juan Soto commenced doing Juan Soto things, upside edition. Juan stung a double into the right field gap with one out and decided to become a full-fledged baserunner when Young followed that with a single to center. Not content to stop at third, Soto chugged all the way home, where he was about to be out by if not a mile, then a couple of blocks. Fortunately the throw to the catcher took too much of a bounce to be handled cleanly. The Cardinals corral almost everything they get their mitts near, but not here. The Mets had tied the game at four.

Summertime sleepiness returned for a spell longer, thanks in part to the usual lack of Mets aptitude on offense, partly because Scott’s legion of successors induced the Redbirds into a good, solid nap. Enter Soto again, this time making his seventh-inning trip around the bases academic with a solo shot over the wall in right. Two very authoritative at-bats, two runs the Mets desperately needed. That is if one infers there is desperation to the Mets’ season rather than killing time, watching the grass grow.

From A.J. Minter and Brooks Raley deploying their veteran lefty wiles for two-and-a-third, to Luke Weaver crocheting yet another shutdown inning in the eighth, to Devin Williams closing matters out sans drama, the Mets came away 5-4 victors, hot enough on a day when temperatures soared and people who chose to go the loss night before instead of this matinee win didn’t much regret their decision. A win’s a win, whenever and wherever you take it in.