In a lost season, the least the Mets could do was not get beaten by Freddy Fucking Peralta.
That wasn’t quite the only thing I wanted from the dregs of 2026, but it was pretty close to it: Sure, lose eleventy billion games while playing dull, uninspired baseball. Just don’t get beaten by the failed Met acquisition whom I’d come to loathe with a mildly worrisome intensity.
And hey, for a few minutes things looked promising. Francisco Lindor led off the game with a home run. Three of the first four Mets to face Peralta tallied hits, a familiar sight that left me cackling on my couch in rainy Brooklyn.
But I recall a warning about laughing last. Those three first-inning hits were all the Mets would get for the night. (Yes, seriously.) Peralta settled in, allowing a number of drives to the warning track but nothing beyond it. Meanwhile, an increasingly disconsolate Sean Manaea was throwing decreasingly effective pitches to the Rays. The game was tied and then the Mets were behind by a little and then they were behind by a lot and I’d gone from fuming to numb.
Numb, but not shocked. Because I’d known the Mets would get beaten by Freddy Fucking Peralta. In fact, I’d had this series circled on the calendar as certain to deliver that humiliation. The starting rotations would wind up just so, Peralta would be far more effective than he’d been in orange and blue (or orange and blue and black, or creosote and purple), and the Mets would lose.
(Still left on the calendar: Pete Alonso storming into town like the wrath of God and clubbing luckless Met pitchers like seals. Though — key difference — there’s no animus there. I’d prefer the Polar Bear not do terrible things to us, but it won’t feel like a personal affront when he does.)
The lone bright spot of the night was Dylan Ross escaping ectoplasm. Ross was briefly on the Mets’ roster in 2025 but never got into a game, joining the ranks of the Met Ghosts — and with the asterisk of never having played in a big-league game. There are now five of these doubly unlucky Mets among our 17 spectres: Billy Cotton, Terrel Hansen, Connor Grey, Dan Hammer and Bryce Conley. On Tuesday Ross evaded that fate and became a real boy, earning his place in The Holy Books with a 1-2-3 inning — and on his birthday, no less.
That was nice, even if nothing else was — well, unless you count my opportunity to relearn a lesson I thought I’d already known. Don’t look to baseball for justice — its taste runs more to maddening ironies.
I haven’t decided if the best thing about this season is Benge and McLean or Lavender and Ross. One means something in baseball terms, the others are a couple of feel-good stories, always welcome when you’re floundering in a cesspool.
Predictable, wasn’t it? How about this for “justice” – Peralta is one of the reasons the Mets are in last place. What’s his reward? He gets traded to a pennant contending first place team. Shutting down the Mets was the giant middle finger on his way to the playoffs.
I am dreading the Baltimore series. It will justifiably be all about Pete, who really was treated poorly by the Mets. Especially if the Orioles are still fighting for a playoff spot, the Mets will be an afterthought. I trust Pete to handle the roil of emotions by pounding the baseball and honoring the Mets fans, who will honor him, I’m sure. To Mets fans under the age of 40, this is their Trade and their Midnight Massacre, and the anger, the indignation and the love will all be righteous. (I was there in 1977 when the Reds came to town; at the age of 19 I somehow thought it would make me feel better to cheer my heart out for the Franchise in person. I guess for at least a moment it actually did).
And speaking of the wrath of G-d, I would like to know the genius at MLB who scheduled the Subway Series over the entire holiday of Rosh Hashanah, beginning at sundown on September 11, and culminating on Sunday September 13. Of course, scheduling games between the two teams in New York City, in the city with the largest number of Jews in the entire country, conflicting with one of the two most major holidays in the Jewish calendar, is the way to go here. What could go wrong?
I’m only being half facetious; it is certainly not the fault of anyone at MLB, or anyone else, for that matter, that this major holiday begins on the evening of the 25th anniversary of September 11, and then continues directly over the weekend. Of course the Mets, the Yankees and MLB all want to commemorate that milestone appropriately on the exact day. But did anyone at MLB look up from the schedule and think, “Hmmm…how can we avoid having all three games directly conflict with this major holiday? What if we moved the Friday game to a day game, or even moved the Sunday game to an evening game? Observant fans would definitely understand then that we made an effort to allow them to watch or maybe even attend one of these games, and possibly to view the solemn ceremonies adjacent to 9/11? Gee, maybe we should do that.”
I have no doubt that even if this modern-day MLB Theodoric of York (Google it, kids) even momentarily entertained this idea, they immediately concluded with a sneering “Naaaaah” that it wasn’t worth the trouble. And to be fair, I am not an observant Jew, and I wouldn’t necessarily expect this kind of accommodation. But it would be considerate and fan-friendly. Baseball needs all the fans it can get.
I am not an observant Jew, and I wouldn’t necessarily expect this kind of accommodation. But it would be considerate and fan-friendly. Baseball needs all the fans it can get.
Agree. At least, perhaps, an explanation from MLB as to why this series is scheduled this way. Of course, in “the current climate”, MLB may not want to deal with the social media insanity that would follow such an explanation.
Could be worse, imagine being an Angels fan. And that’s a pretty large city, too. And if their record hasn’t been bad enough, they’re under the shadow of the Dodgers.
Creosote? I think that was in my old crayola box next to ‘Thistle.’