Those who aren't baseball fans…I don't get them. They can be polite about how it's just not their thing or they can be virulent to the point of obnoxious over “it's so boring” and “who cares about millionaires trying to hit a ball with a stick?” I generally pity them more than disdain them, for they don't know what they're missing.

Monday night they knew. And they weren't missing anything.

We who pride ourselves on our love of the game would, if given the choice, sign on the dotted line for a 2-1 game over almost any other kind of baseball. A 2-1 score implies tautness, tension and professionalism. Think of the great 2-1 games in Mets history:

• Jerry Koosman flirts with a no-hitter en route to evening the 1969 World Series at a game apiece. Mets win 2-1.

• Tom Seaver overwhelms the Big Red Machine all by himself (13 K, 1 RBI) until Pete Rose in the eighth and Johnny Bench in the ninth reach him for a solo homer apiece to take the first game of the 1973 NLCS. Mets lose 2-1.

• Nolan Ryan duels Doc Gooden. Darryl Strawberry outguns Nolan Ryan. Gary Carter avenges Charlie Kerfeld. Fifth game of the '86 NLCS goes to the Mets, 2-1.

• Melvin Mora and friends win the epic of must-win epics, October 3, 1999, 2-1.

Then there are 2-1 games between a crappy team and a crummy team, such as that played Monday night in Washington. The crappy team beat the crummy team 2-1. Each side lived up to its billing. It wasn't taut. It wasn't tense. It was barely professional. It was not a recruiting film for luring the uninitiated into our obsession. It was poor defense, anemic hitting, nonexistent fundamentals, idiotic strategy (YOU'RE BOTH A THOUSAND GAMES OUT OF FIRST, IT'S THE LAST WEEK OF THE SEASON AND YOU'RE BUNTING?) and pitching that was just decent enough not to get in the way of the ineptitude in its midst.

Jerry Koosman and Dave McNally engaged in a pitchers' duel. Tom Seaver and Jack Billingham engaged in a pitchers' duel. Nelson Figueroa and Ross Detwiler were simply fortunate enough to be facing each other's teammates.

Signature moment of this 2-1 exercise in playing out the string? Justin Maxwell singles to lead off the eighth. Ian Desmond bunts him to second (STOP IT! JUST STOP WITH THE BUNTING!). Ryan Zimmerman grounds routinely to short.

And Maxwell takes off for third.

The play is right in front of him, and he takes off for third anyway. Not only that, he waits to make sure the ball was hit in front of him so he could be certain that if he runs to third he'll be out by a mile. Well, he was playing against the Mets, so he was only out by a few meters, but it was perfect for this game. Nobody there could play it and there was no evidence anybody there was even familiar with it. Two teams richly deserving of their position in the standings (the Mets are in a hundred and twenty-seventh place; the Nationals are far behind them) displayed exactly the ability that got them where they are. From the look and sound of things, they attracted about 20 people to their dismal affair. I assume half of them were waiting for a bus.

For those who still keep track of such things, the Mets lost their 90th game of 2009 Monday night. With five games remaining, here's the history that's at stake.

• If they go 0-5, they will finish the season 67-95, which they've done once, in 1980. 1980 began and ended badly yet was way fun in the middle with the whole Magic Is Back theme coming to life via a surprising 47-39 stretch. 2009 has been no fun whatsoever and its only surprise is that these Mets have generated as many as 67 wins.

• If they go 1-4, they will finish the season 68-94, which they've done once, in 1983. 1983 had a very awful first two-thirds, but an incredibly respectable final third. For two months, the 1983 Mets played with joy and verve and poetry, even if it added up to a prosaic 31-29 finish. Would you accuse these Mets of producing joy? Verve? Poetry beyond the dirtiest of limericks? (“Luis Castillo once went to Nantucket…”) Would Annie Savoy want anything to do with any 2009 Met?

• If they go 4-1, they will finish the season 71-91, same as they did in 1974, 1996 and 2004. Those were all lame-ass seasons with almost nothing to recommend them (though the '04 Mets were mysteriously a game out of first in early July before Art Howe reminded them who was managing them). These Mets are lame-ass and have almost nothing — perhaps less — to recommend them, but who wants to have the same record you've had three times before, unless it's of the 108-54 variety?

• If they go 5-0…they're not gonna go 5-0. But for spits and giggles, let's say they do. They'll have matched the 1992 Mets as the only 72-90 club in Mets history. The 1992 Mets were loathsome. The 2009 Mets are just lame-ass. It figures a five-game winning streak would carry with it some kind guilt by statistical association.

Rah-rah, win all five and so on, but what we want is 3-2. Three wins puts us at 70-92. We've never been 70-92. Seventy wins is so much better than 69. We've never been 69-93 either, but gads that's an ugly ledger. And who wants to mark the fortieth anniversary of '69 by winning 69 games? How many lazy pile-on fuckers would run with that Hacky Hackerson angle? “Not only did they lose a zillion dollars to Bernie Madoff, but get THIS…”

No, don't go 2-3 to finish 69-93. Finish 70-92. Be original. Get a C instead of a D. They should probably get an F, but we want the 2009 Mets to pass their baseball finals and be advanced to the next grade. We don't want them left back for another year.

Social promotion is the way to go here, trust me.

As unrecommended as Mets baseball comes right now, watch tonight, and pay close attention, because at some point, Gary Cohen is destined to work a reference to the great state of Oklahoma into the conversation. How do I know? On Sunday, Gary mentioned the Marlins' total attendance for 2009 was larger than the population of Wyoming. Last night, he pointed out the Mets' 1986 World Series nemesis Bruce Hurst hailed from St. George, Utah. It thus follows — based on the Best evidence available — that we'll hear something about the humble beginnings of Bob Murphy, the hometown of Butch Huskey, the coaching acumen of Bud Wilkinson or maybe just a weather report that includes wind sweeping down the plains.

Oklahoma tonight, New Mexico tomorrow. Bank on it.

The Mets used to hit home runs. Mets Walkoffs offers proof that they've hit at least sixty by continuing its series on the Sixty Greatest Homers in Mets History here.

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Exactly one year after we left it for the last time, I think I miss the enormity of the place most of all. It was big. I don't think I realized how big until I noticed how relatively small the new place is. You wouldn't think a humongous stadium would be something you'd miss in an era when intimacy is supposed to be prized. But I knew that when I was there I was somewhere.

I miss the grandeur, which I consider a different quality than sheer bigness. I miss the sense that I'm sitting before a grand stage, about to be party to something magnificent. Even though I understand what felt magnificent going in often wound up mundane coming out, I loved the anticipation. And I miss that.

I miss, in a way, not knowing where I was staring when I stared into the crowd. These days I can identify everything and everybody at a glance. There's no mystery to it. The transparency is nice, I suppose, but it's another reminder of how small everything feels. I didn't know, without counting off blocks of seats, which section was which. It was a little game I'd play with myself. “I was in Section 36 when Matt Franco singled off Mariano Rivera — if Section 48 is the last one, let me work my way back from there and see if I can find where I was sitting.” Silly, I know, but I did it now and then.

I miss linking the spots I found to the great games I saw. Of course I haven't seen any great games in the new place. None have been played.

I miss the symmetry. Symmetry went out of style the same time as bigness, but it just made so much more sense. If a ball was heading out, it was heading out; no guessing games regarding fence height and effect on play. If it was in the gap, the gap was ascertainable. I miss the honesty of the symmetry. 410 to center, 338 down the lines, 371 in the gaps…it was true every time.

I miss watching the game. There weren't distractions everywhere, though I admit I could decide not to be distracted if I really didn't want to be. I miss there being little temptation to get up and wander around, though I could decide not to get up and wander around if I really didn't want to. I miss the focus a symmetrical, few-frills facility filled with memories could give you, even on a lousy night.

I miss the sightlines. I don't think we ever appreciated the sightlines. Even before the new place, there was always this “it wasn't built exclusively for any one sport, therefore it isn't ideal for any” meme we all accepted as gospel. I realize now that was nonsense. If not ideal, it was suitable for following a ball and a fielder and a runner. The new place is not. I've sampled all kinds of seats in the place — titled seats, no less — and unless you hit the jackpot, it absolutely sucks for watching a baseball game. I miss taking for granted that I could watch the game pretty easily. From the back of Loge and Mezzanine you would lose sight of a fly ball. From the corners of the Upper Deck, you were watching ants at play. From down the lines on Field Level you could find yourself at a bit of a neck-craning loss. But ultimately you were, if not “on top of the action,” on top of the game. I'm surprised how much I don't see in the new place. I'm surprised how much I saw in the old place.

I miss the crowd as it was. I hate to admit it since quite often I couldn't stand the booing and the drunkenness and the forays into fighting, but without the booing and the drunkenness and the forays into fighting, it's missing something. Is it possible the 13,000 missing seats all belonged to the people you wouldn't want sitting near you yet were part of the tapestry of what made a ballgame a ballgame? Let's be clear: There are still idiots. It would be hard to gather the most modest sea of humanity and not have idiocy break out in some pocket, but the current lagoon doesn't have the flair it once did. I don't really miss the people who booed, drank and fought, but I miss, on some intangible level, their presence.

I miss there being a game and nothing else. I miss that except for the beer, bathroom and chow lines, there was nowhere else for people to be. I miss the game being the magnet that attracted people.

I miss the backdrop that was perfect scenery before it began to be obstructed by the new place. I miss that sense of place, that sense that we didn't have to be shielded from the outside world. We see some stuff now, but those feel like incidental, accidental sightings. I miss the integration of the foreground and the background.

I miss the ramps. Those were grand, communal exits. I miss how the ramps wound and the game that just concluded continued as long as you were winding your way down and around them. You were still talking and chanting and living the game. It stayed with you. It doesn't as much anymore.

I miss the letter-perfect scoreboard, no matter how imperfect its letters and lightbulbs made it sometimes. Everything you needed to know was always there. It's something that was set up beautifully at the beginning and it was something that worked wonderfully right to the end, save perhaps for some final scores.

I miss the color scheme. It was unapologetically tacky. It was us.

I miss the pathways in the middle of the levels. I miss reading the t-shirts and the uniform tops. I miss the signs and the banners carried forth. I miss being able to spot the vendors and calculating how long it would take their journey to reach my row. I miss that you could be getting up and leaving and still be watching the game.

I miss the network of runways, section after section, that revealed to you, as you walked through one, the shocking green grass below and the utter grandeur of the stage that awaited you. One minute you were on the cusp of a ballgame. Next minute, you were immersed in it. It wasn't dainty. It hit you right away.

I miss knowing I can, on a whim, show up at almost any time to a box office window, hand over a relatively small amount of money and get a perfectly representative ticket for three hours of enjoyment. I understand I can do something similar on a computer, with a credit card, with a touch more advance planning, but it's not the same.

I miss the name. I miss that it was quick and easy, one syllable that said it all. I miss that even without knowing what it stood for, it stood for us, for our team, for our experience. Once you found out the name belonged to somebody who moved mountains to make sure you had a team and a stadium to call your own, you felt even better about it. I miss the name and not having to think about it. I miss the name from when it wasn't a contrarian statement, from when it was just the name.

I miss its being. I regret that no matter how much of it I remember, my memories of it will inevitably get fuzzier. Its existence grows ever more remote from the present. I miss it existing in the present, being the place I go to.

Exactly one year after we left it for the last time, there's plenty I don't miss. I don't miss the distance from the subway to its nearest available entrance. I don't miss the escalators that broke down once per homestand. I don't miss the epic floods in and around the men's rooms. I don't miss the food that wasn't up to third grade cafeteria snuff. I don't miss the iron bars in the box seats. I don't miss the lack of lateral movement in those same sections. I don't miss the furtive cigarettes sneaked among the seated patrons long after that sort of thing was prohibited. I don't miss the vertigo in certain spots. I don't miss the lunatic policies that kept you with a ticket from anywhere else away from the Field Level. I don't miss the sense we were being left behind while everybody else's fans were moving ahead.

Then we moved ahead, and in many ways it was fine, even improved, but in many ways, the concept proved overrated. Progress wasn't what it was made out to be. I couldn't be convinced progress was producing for me a better experience than I received in the past. I felt pulled into a future I didn't ask for.

There was a moment this season when I couldn't have been more disconsolate about what the future had become. I sought solace in a DVD recording of the final game ever played in the old place. Before I was overwhelmed by the result of the game itself, I took in the bigness and the grandeur and the life that was in the old place. Upon that viewing, I made my mind up. If I could do it, I'd make the trade in a literal heartbeat. I'd trade the new place for the old place. No questions asked — just bring me back what I had, shortcomings and all. I had resisted this reaction for months, wanting to be fair and open to change and progress-oriented. But I was done with that.

I wanted the new place out of my life. I wanted the old place returned to me.

That was while I watched the DVD and sulked. The next night, upon my next visit to the new place (which, for something I didn't like, I sure found my way to a lot), I expected my remorse to envelop me. Yet it didn't. It felt OK that where I was now was where I was now. It's what was here and would be here going forward. The old place wasn't here. It was gone and remains so. I like to remember and explore the past, but living in it has never appealed to me. The old place was the past. I couldn't move back in. It sunk in that the new place, whatever flaws I found or perceived in it, was here to stay. I already knew that on every logical plane, but spiritually it took a while to click. I could let go of the old place at last.

Which doesn't mean I don't miss it.

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I confess that I turned on the TV this afternoon more from duty than devotion. There were things to do, the memory of Saturday night's game was freshly dispiriting, and to my surprise I was curious to see what the transformed Jets were all about. Watching Pat Misch trying to escape the perils of the second inning didn't seem like the best way to ensure a pleasant Sunday afternoon.

But duty called, and so I watched, at first flipping over to the Jets-Titans every minute or so. (The fact that both teams were out of uniform confused me; the sight of referees in orange made me briefly terrified that our expensive big-screen TV was broken.) But by the second inning I was spending more time in Miami than the Meadowlands, and by the fourth I had basically forgotten about that other sport entirely.

What happened? A few things. First of all, Gary Cohen and Ron Darling were having an infectiously good time. Cohen is fearless yet fair about exploring subjects that interest him even if they may not paint the home team in the best light: In recent nights he's led discussions of whether the 2009 Mets had quit, if Jerry Manuel has been negligent in not playing Nick Evans, who might be at fault for the Mets' avalanche of baserunning mistakes, and the unwritten codes of brushbacks and hit batsmen. Darling, for his part, is battle-hardened and sadly wise, particularly about all that can go wrong for simple human reasons in a baseball season.

Second was remembering that come another week, the baseball ranks will shrink to non-Mets and ex-Mets and soon after that to nobody at all. Watching the Mets has certainly felt like torture for much of the season, but as the year withers to nothing I'm forced to admit that watching the Mets lose is slightly better than nothing. What really brought this home was watching the middle infielders retreating onto the Dolphins logo as they lined up pop flies. I grew up in the heyday of shared, multipurpose stadiums, and as a kid it always made me sad to see offensive and defensive lines colliding on the dirt of the not-yet-grassed-in basepaths in November.

And then, of course, there was Pat Misch pitching gallantly on a day when it had seemed unlikely that he'd pitch at all. He was lucky early, and then he found himself and was good, and his teammates were actually good too — particularly Jeff Francoeur, who for all his statistical shortcomings plays baseball with the kind of verve and abandon you wish could be bottled and given to a good 20 or so of his teammates. Misch's staredown of the hated Hanley Ramirez to start off the eighth was riveting, and the ninth inning was the first time in an unhappy number of weeks that I found myself leaning forward with every pitch and hollering encouragement at the TV. Misch looked like the mound had steepened on him for those final outs, but he found his way through and I let out a whoop of happiness that sure didn't feel like 22 games under .500. (Though I would like to request that complete-game shutouts be more than an annual affair.)

Let's not get carried away. Misch scattered eight hits and never cracked 90, and the scouting report about pitchers who need to change speeds and hit their spots to win rather tactfully omits that most of the time such pitchers can't do that. (There are Greg Madduxes and Jamie Moyers and Rick Reeds in the world, but not very many of them.) Still, Misch is 28 and left-handed, and sometimes the light doesn't go on for left-handers until their late 20s. Stranger things have happened, at least.

Of course on days like today all glasses seem slightly full. I found myself thinking that Wilson Valdez or Anderson Hernandez could be valuable reserve players next year, that Cory Sullivan could become the new Matt Franco, that Daniel Murphy's final statistics won't really look that bad, and that I can't remember a stupid thing Angel Pagan's done for a while.

And look it from the Marlins' perspective. Fighting for their postseason lives, they took the field against a picked-from-a-hat lineup of Plan C Mets and a journeyman who got eviscerated in his last start, and they came up empty — today eliminated them from NL East contention, and their tragic number in the wild-card race is now 2. We didn't get the sweep I wanted, but we did take two out of three from Hanley & Co.

So now to Washington and then home and then nothing. There's a week left; here's to enjoying what it is rather than regretting what it might have been.

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You'd figure everybody had all the evidence they needed to prove just how inept the 2009 Mets were. They've filled gag reels and faux Monopoly boards with pops that were dropped, bases that went ungraced, fielders who fell and everything that went comically wrong — right?

But wait! Another clip has revealed itself. It's footage from September 26, the 155th game of this besotted season. We pick up the action in the fifth inning of the Mets at Marlins, two outs, David Wright, All-American superstar who always plays the game correctly, on second. Jeff Francoeur lashes a liner into the left-center field gap. Francoeur takes off. So does Wright…sort of. After breaking back to second for a moment through reflexes that would seem antithetical to the situation, David runs for home. Then he jogs. Then he trots. Then he strolls. It's not like there's going to be a play at the plate.

There is, however, a play at second, where Francoeur is digging for a double. Cameron Maybin's throw nails Jeff for the third out of the inning, but that's OK, because David drove in the lead run to make it 3-2 and now he's scored on Francoeur's hi…

What?

It is, isn't?

Yikes, yet again.

The maw of the 2009 Mets that sucked the competency out of everybody at one point or another finally got to David Wright. He hadn't been hitting well since he came back, but look what he came back from. He stood at the plate the night before and tried to argue the Mets out of a run — the one Brian Schneider scored on the passed ball David thought he fouled off — but you could admire him wanting another chance to swing with two runners on. This, though? Breaking back to second and turning it off before reaching home? How is that not anything but more embarrassing 2009 footage?

This decade's first year all but ended with Timo Perez slowing down at a critical interval and not scoring. This decade's last year has ended a bazillion times, but Wright not scoring on a hit when his run was etched into scorebooks everywhere…do the Mets ever learn anything at any time in any era?

Timo Perez, most recently (and somehow appropriately) a New Jersey Jackal, is no longer our cause save for the myriad what-ifs he left behind in his not quite cloud of dust. David Wright, however, we worry about in the here and now. But David needs the rest that is coming his way a week from today. David needs this season to end more than any of us do, which is saying a ton. We need David — who just passed Howard Johnson as our most oft-used third baseman of all time — bright-eyed and immensely alert in 2010. We were nowhere with him before he was beaned, but we were beyond nowhere without him. We're not much with him the way he is at this moment.

Season's not over yet but the Mets packed it in Saturday night minutes after Wright's non-run. John Maine, who had the decency to hit Cody Ross and Brett Carroll in the fourth, flattened out his pitches an inning later and the Mets stopped competing thereafter. Oh well, we'll always have the victorious fluke of Friday night when the Mets overcame the Marlins for once and a couple of Mets calmly said, yes, it is good to exact a bit of payback for the last two Septembers…which is something no Met seemed to think was important in their previous Marlins series at Citi Field, when we were easily swept. It struck me that the two Mets who copped to this human instinct were Cory Sullivan, who drove in the winning runs, and Frankie Rodriguez, who recorded the final outs. Neither Sullivan nor Rodriguez were Mets in 2007 and 2008. But Sullivan was on a team that won a pennant fairly recently and Rodriguez helped another team win a World Series. Maybe this is how winners respond in the face of constant losing.

Hard to tell. We've seen lots of losing lately but very few winners.

We also haven't seen much in the way of good old-fashioned bopping. Fernando Tatis smacked his eighth homer of the year last night, putting him one hot streak from the team lead. Of course there have been no hot streaks from Mets power hitters in 2009, which is why you can have eight home runs and be so close to having the most on the club at the end of September. With seven games to go, let's check the leader board:

Murphy: 11

Beltran: 10

Sheffield: 10

Wright: 10

Francoeur: 8

Tatis: 8

Santos: 7

At this stage of the 2001 season, for what it's worth, Barry Bonds had 68 home runs, or four more than the Mets' top seven sluggers have in 2009. The more salient, less juicy comparison for our troop of fencephobes would be the 1977 season when their predecessors in blue, orange and futility were led by a trio of boppers who could bake no more than a dozen dingers.

Henderson: 12

Milner: 12

Stearns: 12

No Mets team ever had a lesser total from a home run leader than the '77 crew — and it took the three of them combined to fall sixteen short of George Foster's league-leading 52 home runs. The question now becomes — other than “Is there anything left that can go seriously wrong with seven games remaining?” — will anybody here hit a twelfth and even thirteenth home run? Will our 2009 gift bag include a new standard for absolute impotence?

Sheffield seems done. Wright has dug a hole. Beltran got one very good swat in Saturday night but doesn't yet seem to have the going-deep knack back. Murphy? Daniel needs just one to tie and two to pass Hendu, Hammer and the Dude. It would seem appropriate that the guy derided widely for a) not living up to his post-2008 hype and b) being passed off as any kind of answer at a traditional power-hitting position despite not hitting with much power would wind up with the team lead in home runs. Then again, on the 2009 Mets, Daniel Murphy's eleven home runs stand as a tower of power rising nearly as high as the old Keyspan sign.

I'm going to miss baseball season when this one is over. But I'm not ever going to miss this baseball season.

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I got in a fair amount of trouble earlier this summer for admitting I don't hate the Phillies. (Link omitted on purpose.) It only took me about half an inning tonight to remember how much I hate the Marlins.

I hate their horrible stadium, with its sacks of Soilmaster, acres of teal and football scars.

I hate their useless fans, all 2,200 of them.

I hate Cody Ross, that glistening stillborn newt.

I hate Jorge Cantu, from his beady eyes to his squashed, pocky cheeks to his knack for beating us.

I hate their interchangeable but invariably loathsome managers and closers.

And I hate Hanley Ramirez. My God, how I hate Hanley Ramirez.

I hate Hanley Ramirez for large, semi-admirable baseball reasons and I hate Hanley Ramirez for small, mean personal reasons. I hate his bouts of laziness afield. I hate his selfish refusal to play hard when his team needs him. (I'm willing to bet Dan Uggla hates him for those two things as well.) I hate that he takes the greatest interest in applying his considerable skills to playing baseball when that baseball is being played against us. I hate that the chip on his shoulder about not getting New York attention makes him better, not worse. I hate his styling. I hate his strutting. I hate his teal glove. I hate his teal shoes even more. I hate songs he likes. I hate puppies whose bellies he scratches. I hate sunshine if it's also shining on him. After Hanley Ramirez laughs, for several minutes I hate laughter.

So it's not a huge surprise that I spent a good chunk of tonight's game simmering with anger. The baseball gods had changed the casting call around somewhat from 2007 and 2008, with the Marlins trying to find their way to postseason play and the Mets given a chance to spoil things. Except one thing was staying the same: The Mets were blowing it.

Worse than that, though. The Marlins were playing hard, and the Mets were showing their bellies and whimpering.

Predictably, Hanley Ramirez was in the center of it all. He blasted a three-run homer off a suddenly mortal Tim Redding to tie the score. Seeing how he was Hanley Ramirez batting against the Mets, he posed like the model for a sculpture class, circled the bases at the approximate speed of continental drift and did a little more posing at home plate just to remind everybody what he'd done. The Mets being the Mets, they showed no sign that this bothered them in the least. And that's when I really began to fume. What, exactly, would make this dead team protest being the Marlins' bitch? What would make them say enough?

Maybe if Jorge Cantu ran out to the mound and pulled Redding's beard? Maybe if Cody Ross peed in the visiting-dugout Gatorade? Maybe if a Marlin actually hit David Wright instead of just aiming at his chin every at-bat? Would any of those things do it? As Gary, Keith and Ron danced around discussing how the 2009 Mets had quit without actually saying that forbidden word, I concluded that in fact, there was no indignity a Met would not suffer passively at Marlin fins. I wanted them to sweep the series, get help elsewhere, turn the Marlins' tragic number to zero and then celebrate on a half-visible Dolphins logo like they'd won the division. (Remember that? And the second time?) But there was no sign of it. Just grim trudging through innings, with Luis Castillo indulging in his idiot fetish for bunting and David Wright disintegrating before our eyes and Mets sitting numbly in the dugout like their bus was late.

But then, somehow, things went wrong for the other guys. Brian Schneider paid attention and snatched a run out of a Wright strikeout, which would leave David threatening Hack Wilson's RBI record if it were only a reliable strategy. And then, in the ninth, somehow, single, single, walk and a huge two-run single by Cory Sullivan.

I was pretty sure that was more Leo Nunez screwing up than the Mets showing fight, but I was sure as hell willing to take it. And in the aftermath, the camera surveyed the field, performing its usual duties of capturing reactions and replays and defensive alignments and giving me a chance to call the roll. And to drain a rather enormous reservoir of venom. It came gushing out in a display I knew was childish and unimaginative but still made me feel so, so good.

“Fuck YOU, Leo Nunez!”

“Fuck YOU, Fredi Gonzalez!”

“Fuck YOU, Wes Helms!”

“Fuck YOU, uh, John Baker!”

(C'mon, I'm not even halfway done here. New camera angles, please. Ah, there's an important one.)

“Fuck YOU, Jorge Cantu!”

(C'mon, still need more. I've got a Billy Idol sneer stuck on my face. Outfield defense, hooray!)

“Fuck YOU, Whatever Your Name Is Coghlan!”

“Fuck YOU, Cameron Maybin!”

“Fuck YOU … ummm … HOW DID I FORGET YOU? FUCK YOU, CODY ROSS!”

(That's better. Ah, and here we go back to the infield.)

“Fuck YOU, Dan Uggla, even though I kind of like you.”

(And last but certainly not least … savor it …)

“Hey. Hanley Ramirez? Fuck you too.”

The Marlins' tragic number to be eliminated from the divisional chase is two. The tragic number that would end their postseason aspirations is four. We have a tiny something to play for. It would the smallest of things, a microscopic footnote in the final chapter of an amazingly awful season. But it wouldn't be nothing. And it would make me happy, to the depths of my shriveled, bitter little heart. Whaddya say, fellas? Make me happy.

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Winter Training shifts into high gear with an exhibition of nothingness tonight, one more a week from tonight and then, starting the following Monday, we have nothing for real.

I'm picking the Mets to go 0-0 starting October 5, but I don't want to be overconfident.

Until then, nine games of baseball remain, all of it probably like last night's version, which could easily be mistaken for nothingness. But you go to enough Mets games — and at 33 and counting, nobody can say I haven't done that — you still see some things worth noticing. Provided you're of a mindset to find them worthy.

First, the 1969 World Series trophy. If you're wondering where she spends her days now that there's no Diamond Club or physical Hall of Fame, I couldn't tell ya. But the Mets did mysteriously bring her out to get some fresh air Wednesday night, perhaps in honor of the Mets' first division title turning forty years old today. For whatever reason, when Rich and I walked in through the Bullpen Gate (he parks fearlessly amid the potholes and stray dogs of the Iron Triangle), there she was, one of our two shiny baubles. I'd read they brought her out for '69 Reunion Night, which made sense you don't have to think about. I guess it always makes sense to remind us there have been better days than these.

A couple of security men guarded her, though not as many as those who guarded Pedro Feliciano the night before (we can always get another middle reliever, however). One of those Fan Photos guys stood by to snap you and the trophy. Or you could take your own from the side. We didn't photograph with her. We just wanted to bask in her aura. I took particular pleasure in eyeballing her Seattle Pilots flag. Earlier this year it was pointed out that only the '69 trophy has a Seattle Pilots flag, which is one of those facts that is both obvious and astounding when you think about it.

Second worthy thing: The return of the Las Entradas Angels of Flushing, our area's answer to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. Those Angels earn their wings by hopefully halting American League playoff madness if so called upon. Ours wear a halo based on their creating new and exciting accommodations for diehard fans like myself. These Angels see you night after night, know you somehow deserve better than a deserted left field Promenade and magically reseat you in the Field Level. I don't know how they do it, but isn't that what makes magic magical? Thanks to the Las Entradas Angels of Flushing, Rich and I were a lot closer to the action than we'd planned.

Rich and I, Giants nostalgists that we are, make a point of going to see the Mets every September 23 to commemorate the committing of Merkle's Boner. Watching a lineup that features Castillo, Pagan and Murphy, it seemed a particularly appropriate setting for our observance.

Not that the action was worthy of the ire of a John McGraw or the stylings of a Cait Murphy, but it was active. From the lower precincts of right field we could see clearly all those balls find all those holes between first and second, and all those baserunners get acquainted with their bases (so much so that most on the Mets' side never wanted to leave them). We could also see that the new age Field Boxes are actually one of those segments of Citi Field that works as well as promised. That ballyhooed tilting of seats toward the infield, a negligible factor when you're upstairs wondering where the ball went, really helps you watch a baseball game. It's a big improvement over the Shea equivalent (where one person would get up, a thousand people would get up, you would get up, and nobody would see anything anyway), one of the few Citi sightlines that, save for balls heading toward the corner, rocks. Nobody ever said Citi Field wasn't adorable to stare at, but from most angles, it's an abomination for baseball. Not in those very good seats that normally go for a very good price, but instead came to us from those spirits looking out for our best interests. As Charles Townsend used to tell Sabrina, Kelly and Jill, “Good work, Angels.”

You also notice how bright the lights are when you're planted in right field. Too bright for comfort. I've just given Jeff Francoeur a worthy alibi, darn it.

For modestly worthy entertainment, we had fidgety Mike Pelfrey as Peter Tork. He pitches as if taking part in a Monkees video: comic anxieties, buckets of flop sweat, pratfalls and a little of everything but professional calm. Plus the whole thing's often sped up for hilarious effect. Sometimes Pelf/Pete gets out his mess, but this season the Mets have been short on daydream believers. Last night, no one came to Mike Pelfrey's rescue, not even Mike Nesmith. Oh well, you tell your Pelf: tomorrow's gonna be another day.

You know who was poised last night? Chad. Chad's the ball boy stationed down the right field line. I wouldn't know that without having sat there. Chad's got a following. He's got three teen boys who have decided Chad is that twelfth man on the basketball team you call for when your team is up (or down) by 30 with three minutes to go. They do “CHAD!” for “CHARGE!” and wear “CHAD!” t-shirts. The section seemed familiar with the call. And Chad took it in stride (of course he did — he's no Mike Pelfrey).

How much do you notice when you go to 33 games? You notice a hair out of place. You notice the Mets Foundation billboards down the lines have become ads for Victorinox Swiss Army watches, whatever those are. You notice the blank space to the left of the out-of-town scoreboard that became an MLB Network ad in July became revolving divisional standings over the weekend, but that by last night they featured only the National League East. Was there really a need to emphasize for nine hard innings that the Mets were 23 going on 24 games out of first?

Brian Schneider batted .158 in July and .149 in August. I looked at up the scoreboard and he was suddenly scraping .220. Brian Schneider's hitting .474 in September. Somebody sure heard that salary drive horn sound.

Being that it's Citi Field, you notice the food. I notice the food far too much for my own good. Gone from the World's Fare is the stand that sold quesadillas and specialty sandwiches themed to a given homestand's opponent (R.I.P. the incredible Cuban and more lightly mourned D.C. Wreck) and in its place is a selection of Korean and Chinese delicacies. How delicate I'm not sure; I went with the lo mein since I could identify it on sight. Not a bad idea implementing the Asian theme at Mets games since word is Flushing is sort of known for that kind of cuisine.

This has been a disjointed post. But I root for a disjointed team.

I feel I've seen this guy…perhaps in the mirror.

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Well, good morning everybody.

No, your bloggers have not taken a page from the New York Times and decided that watching the Mets play out a frayed string isn't always worthy of coverage. The problem, rather, was your correspondent putting his head down for what he presumed would be the briefest of respites after the top of the 9th. Sure, I might miss a casino warning me that someone is telling my tiramisu story (by the way, what jackass has a tiramisu story?) or Derek Jeter nagging me to go to his Web site, but I'd be up and around and refreshed for the bottom of the 8th and the Mets' comeback.

You can guess what happened next. Heart of the night, randomness on SNY, deep confusion followed by realization. But what had happened? Had the Mets come back to win? Had they come back but lost 39-38 in extra innings, with Daniel Murphy leaving another 112 men on base?

Well, let's see. Ah, leadoff man got on in the 9th. To be expected, seeing how they'd done that all night. Flyout, strikeout, flyout, ballgame. OK then. Faintly amazing they didn't somehow hit into another double play, but not a huge surprise otherwise.

Awful night for Daniel Murphy. A typically agitated night for Mike Pelfrey — if he worked in your office he'd be the guy everybody worries might shoot up the place one day. (Potentially related observation: His outing would have looked a lot better with infield defense not borrowed from Day 1 of a Mets fantasy camp.) David Wright striking out. 13 losses in 18 tries against the Braves in 2009. Pondering that 2010 could be the last go-round for loathed and grudgingly respected foes Chipper and Cox. (Don't worry, we'll have years to see our souls crushed by Brian McCann and Terry Pendleton.) The question of whether the 2009 Mets can win 66 games still to be resolved.

At least they can't lose tonight. And at least I'm rested.

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