The weirdest part about the inevitable recollections a baseball game played between the New York Mets and Atlanta Braves at Shea Stadium on September 11 summons is the obligatory reference to how remarkable it was that when these teams squared off just shy of six years ago in our city's first large “normal” gathering of any kind, their fierce rivalry was put aside.

Think about it. The horrifying circumstances enveloping the city; the tension and uncertainty; the precautions and the prayers; the dimness in our hearts…and the fact that the Mets and Braves didn't hate each other for a night is considered as historically groundbreaking in context as any of it.

It's a different September now and it was a different Tuesday in New York yesterday, no matter the coincidence of the date and the day of the week. The Eastern Division equation has been shaken like a snow globe time and again over the past six years, never mind what's occurred in the world at large. The Mets have tumbled and they have risen. The Braves rode high until they succumbed to a middle path. The statistical reality is the two teams haven't actually finished adjacent to each other since 2000. Yet these are longstanding rivals still. Maybe someday through another round of realignment or another shake of the snow globe, they won't be quite in each other's heads and faces the way they have been for the last decade.

It would be too bad. Sport thrives on rivalry. These two have earned theirs. I used to think it was a little overstated because it was a lot lopsided. The Mets' ascension has altered that aspect of this rivalry for the better. The Braves' refusal to completely go to seed has been good for it as well. We like a good nose-looking-down where they're concerned — and we'd probably be pretty happy if they were about ten back of the Marlins — but in the abstract as well as in this particular September, the arrangement works. Neither combatant should be a hollowed-out version of itself. You have to hate somebody in sport, and your bile has to be worth your while.

Let's not be shy about how we feel about the Atlanta Braves. Hate is not too strong a world given the sordid interaction between these two teams since approximately the conversion of an Olympic stadium created Turner Field. Yet on September 21, 2001, I couldn't imagine hating a baseball team for the crime of trying to beat another baseball team, even my baseball team. Those were just people down there on the field. They were embracing. How could I hate anyone ever again who wasn't literally out to destroy me? Those feelings came back again with the stories that trickled out of the booth Tuesday night, particularly when it was pointed out there's still that cluster of Braves who were there then and are around now.

Everybody points to Piazza's home run and its healing power from the Friday night game. Yeah, I guess. I have to confess I've never quite bought into it, and I was there, standing and applauding like everyone with a pulse. I was happy the Mets had won a baseball game and I was encouraged that they extended their participation in the pennant race a little longer and I was thrilled if anyone who was in need of a serious lift received it from one swing of the bat…but I personally couldn't get past its marginal meaning in the larger scheme of things.

For that, I needed to hate the Braves. I couldn't hate them Friday night. No, it took Sunday afternoon — Brian Jordan and all he wrought (two-run homer in the ninth, game-winner in the eleventh) — to make baseball real again. To make it OK to hate a baseball team for trying to beat another baseball team. For succeeding at beating a baseball team. For ruining the playoff chances of a baseball team. For doing in my baseball team.

Logically, it didn't click any more than Mike launching his shot Friday night did. Not one more person lived instead of died because of a baseball game. But emotion usually has about a six-game lead on logic in our sport, and my prevailing emotion Sunday was hatred for the Atlanta Braves.

Hate. Baseball hate. It was back. It felt so right.

How far have we come as a people? We beat the Braves for the fourth consecutive time, in September, in a finishing kick that this franchise has lacked even in many of its good years, and when it came time to mock the visitors from Atlanta, it wasn't…

“WOH-OH-OH!”

It was more…

“Meh. Meh-eh.”

There was still some pretty good vitriol made available to the Braves lest they think we don't still consider themselves our partners in a special relationship. But in ninth innings past, with a victory nearing the reasonable assurance stage (and there were a few), there'd be the chant and there'd be the chop and there'd be the Chipper…sucks.

Not in 2007. Not at this point of the calendar. Not while the standings are arranged as neatly as they are. Barely a hint of a chant or a chop at Shea Monday night and no sign of Chipper on the field. No Andruw either. When the Joneses aren't dragged from their sick beds to keep up with the Mets, there must be a towel involved.

You know, the kind the Braves have obviously thrown in.

WOH-OH-OH!

Hey, this feels good, huh? Remember when the only reason the Braves wouldn't have wheeled out their big if dinged guns in September was to rest them up for the playoffs? Unless watching the playoffs requires fresh legs (and those trips to the fridge can take it outta ya), it would appear there is no urgency to Bobby Cox's lineup construction these nights.

WOH-OH-OH!

So no chop, no chant — nothing sustained, at least. Laurie and I did have one guy two rows behind us who let the Braves know they can just go ahead and “SWEEP US! WE'VE GOT THE DIVISION! TWO YEARS IN A ROW!” but he lost his momentum when he attempted to shout agate type involving Pythagorean Winning Percentage and such before the intense curmudgeon to Laurie's left turned around and told him to knock it off and he did (why haven't I ever tried that?). The Atlanta Braves haven't suddenly become the Generic Opponent Questionable Nicknames, but let's say smacking them down in another close one has lost the slightest touch of its edge.

I'm pretty sure Jason or I (or both of us) predicted five years ago, when Angels fans were ThunderStixing their way to a world championship, that the annoying inflatable noisemakers would be all the rage at Shea come 2004, just after the novelty of them had completely deflated. We were only off by three years (though we continue to wait on the Rally Monkey.) In the spirit of corporate synergy, Monday night was Citi Night. Free money? No-fee checking? No, just blue ThunderStix with the Citi logo. How's that for team spirit?

There's nothing written on them that had any connection to the Mets, Laurie said.

It will by 2009, I replied.

“WE'RE NOT CLIENTELE!” the yelling guy later added, possibly in response to the assault of Large Financial Institution Is Wonderful announcements that ran on DiamondVision between Kiss and Smile cams. Or maybe he was telling the pretzel man to move along.

Knock it off. You too, Citi.

Monday was my 27th home game of the year, most of them reached by mass transit, leading me to a rather disturbing revelation: Should I ever stumble from the platform onto the tracks and meet my untimely demise at Woodside, I think I know the way Newsday will identify me in the headline of this latest story of how the LIRR gap epidemic is swallowing riders whole. After their reporter talks to a few eyewitnesses, I will be:

Mets Fan Who Directed Others to Trains

Hence the irony.

What is it about my persona that compels total strangers to ask me every conceivable question as regards public transportation between Long Island and Shea Stadium? Aren't there professionals paid to provide answers? Doesn't anybody else appear they know where they're going?

Excuse me, what's the next stop?

Will we have time to make our connection?

Does the Huntington train stop on this platform?

Is this Track A?

Do the doors open here?

Should I get off at Jamaica or stay on?

Would I look good with a mustache?

I don't mind, per se. I like to be helpful, especially to my fellow Metsopotamians. If I didn't know where I was going, I'd want somebody to set me on the right path. But why do they ask me out of everybody around? This isn't 1997 — there are thousands of people who take subways and commuter trains to and from Shea. The MTA has been flogging a campaign encouraging it for two years. I have thus concluded:

a) most Long Islanders are clueless as to how the system works;

b) I emit an aura convincing them to see me as their map, their timetable and their compass rolled into one.

They view me as the Swiss Army Knife of the Long Island Rail Road.

This has been going on as long as I can remember. And it's not a strictly local phenomenon. It happens, probably once per trip, on our out-of-town ballpark sojourns. I don't know how somebody from Milwaukee or St. Louis or Philadelphia is supposed to look, but do I look like I'm from Milwaukee or St. Louis or Philadelphia?

Is there something clueful about the way I stand and stare? Do I seem a better bet than all the signage designed and posted specifically to issue commutation information? Has anybody else ever picked up a branch schedule and kept it just in case they needed to turn around and go home after the game? Or go to another game?

This is probably an NBC series waiting to happen…pitched as Heroes meets Early Edition — something like that. I can hear the promos now: He was just a baseball fan waiting for a train. Until he was…CHOSEN!

Ask the guy over there for directions. Save the world.

Yunel Escobar was the first batter last night. and Oliver Perez looked horrible against him, throwing two balls very wide before getting a gift of a called strike. Fortunately, Yunel Escobar is young. After the strike call, he seemed to get antsy. Oliver struck him out, and that seemed to restore his focus on his mission — namely, to drag the Braves' casket out of their dark lair and into the morning sun. The Braves aren't moving, but you can never be too careful with them, as Armando Benitez and John Franco taught us once upon a time. I now recommend the stake in the heart, the communion wafers in the mouth, and about a gallon of holy water.

Along those lines, last night's game briefly threatened to turn into a horror movie, but in the sixth Oliver showed the grit needed to escape the most frightening action sequence (lineout to third, pickoff at second, strikeout) and Billy Wagner made his way across unholy ground (McCann and Teixeira and Francoeur, oh my!) not only intact but also unmolested. In the end, with Wright (“MVP! MVP!”) and McCann trading two-run shots, the difference was that first-inning run scratched out on a Beltran groundout.

No Oliver Perez start is without a head-scratcher or two, of course. In the Times' game story, Perez said he's been “trying different things” and changing his mechanics. Wha? I hope that was out of context or the language barrier was at work, because otherwise that's puzzling: Why would anyone who'd been sent down by the Pittsburgh Pirates and survived to resurrect his career start playing around with his mechanics? Perhaps the answer is ( as is often the case with foolish tinkering) that Oliver Perez is young, too. At any rate, he did follow that admission with a certain wisdom, noting that he'd succeeded by keeping his arm slot consistent. And he got this bit of public advice from Carlos Beltran: “You need to look at the tape and continue to pitch like this.” From the center fielder's lips to the pitcher's ears, please.

Chipper Jones and Andruw Jones are not young, not anymore. But they were both absent — Chipper with an oblique strain and Andruw with the flu. Huh. Wow. I can only assume Chipper is very hurt and Andruw is very sick, what with their season circling the drain and all. If Jimmy Rollins and Chase Utley want to sit out with a hangnail and a sore throat, I will applaud their caution. But somehow I think they'll show up regardless of what the trainer has to say.

Chipper's oblique was the subject of fascination for the SNY crew, which had the injury (a innocuous batting-practice swing) on tape. Their Zapruder-like analysis of the infamous swing led to yet another 2007 Keith Hernandez moment — a passionate denunciation of sit-ups. “Too much swiveling!” Keith exclaimed with indignation, as Emily and I giggled on the couch and Gary Cohen (who's gotten very good at sneakily turning up the heat once Keith gets rolling) goaded him by asking whether today's players didn't have enough body fat.

Keith is an icon, and so his age is immaterial, but he certainly is getting amusingly cranky — we knew he was off to the races when he groused that “I never did a sit-up.” Keith's get-off-my-lawn moments make me wish he could do postgame spots after a few hours at Elaine's. Sit-ups? We never did sit-ups — did we, Ronnie? Our regimen was shotgunning beers and screwing girls and deep-frying steaks and destroying planes and we won a freaking World Championship doing that — right, Ronnie? All you kids out there, you watch what happened to Chipper. Don't do that! What's that, Gar? Well, I think it's that the game's changed with the steroids and the sit-ups. And the swiveling! Too much swiveling!

Postscript: The Brooklyn Cyclones battled fog and the Staten Island Yankees and defeated both, ending the Junior Yanks' season and advancing to the New York-Penn League Championship Series, a best-of-three affair that begins Thursday. The game ended after midnight, taking it into Sept. 11 and thereby bringing up an old memory: 2001 was the Cyclones' inaugural year, and they won the first game of the Championship Series and could have won the title on 9/11. Instead, the game never happened. Brooklyn and Williamsport were declared co-champs. Given everything that happened on that terrible day, this is at most a footnote to a footnote. But that's not quite the same as nothing. Now, six years later, a win on 9/11 will give the Cyclones a chance at a new title. It's the least of things, but I found some small measure of satisfaction in it.

And so another chapter is written in the epic that is Pedro J. Martinez: My True Story in Baseball.

When did he have you in the palm of his hand this time? When he walked to the mound, his playful demeanor in Cincinnati replaced by that gunfighter's stare? When he was forced into the possibility of striking out four guys in the same inning and you wound up surprised he didn't? (Mike Lamb flew out to center, the spoilsport.) When he rocketed a double off the very hittable Roy Oswalt? Or was it when his second win and the game were in balance, his rising-beyond-agreed-limits pitch count practically etched on the faces of Willie and the Jacket, and they left him in to face Lamb with the tying run on second? (Of course they did — would you want to be the mouse assigned to bell this particular cat?) Was it when Pedro got Lamb to lie down, letting him walk off the field to be lionized? Or did it take until the Man took a detour on the way to the clubhouse for a final acknowledgment of a stadium full of giddy supporters and admirers?

I'll leave the scene at Shea for Greg to describe — I was going to go, but was facing a complicated evening and had no one to go with (cue those violins), so I wussed out. But what's struck me during this series with the moribund Astros is how September can feel like springtime redux for an apparently playoff-bound team.

It's a baseball cliche that hope springs eternal in March –veterans say the right things, pitchers returning from injuries report they've never felt better, rookies hit well and know their place, and as fans we tend to accentuate the positive, even when we know better. That veteran hitting .140 will answer the bell when it rings, because he knows how to pace himself. That rookie striking out everybody and his brother will carry his newfound success into the season. Not all of this turns out to be true, of course — hell, in a lousy year none of it proves on the money. But we still believe it, because we're fans and this is spring training and it's what we do.

Now, September. If your magic number is ticking down (to 15, for instance) and you've got a decent lead (six, for instance), this month can feel the same way. Of course you fret about some apocalyptic collapse until the chances of that shrink from slim to none. But when you're not fretting, you can find yourself loving the view through those suddenly rose-tinged lenses. Those players having MVP-type years, or MVP-type years on the road? Any fool knows they'll keep hitting that way in October! The player who's been popping everything up for weeks, or the guy who keeps letting bad changeups get hit over walls? Why, those two have plenty of time to find themselves! Those guys who just returned from DL stints? Think how well-rested they are!

This September optimism is as reliable a predictor of October as March giddiness is of April. Come October, guys will get hot and go cold and rise to the occasion and shrink from the challenge and prevail and falter and win and lose. And as we found out last year, one bit of bad news can change everything in a hurry. We know that and (barring apocalypse), we'll deal with it when it comes. But we'll deal with it later. For now, it's nice to have September days where you gaze contentedly at your glass and know it's half-full.

I don't want to alarm comely Christine Glavine, but maybe I should have stayed in bed with her husband.

Though at long last I consider myself firmly entrenched as one of Tom's acolytes, perhaps I need to extend the above thought for clarity's sake:

Maybe I should have stayed in bed with her husband pitching a perfect game.

See, I flipped on the radio inches from my pillow in my usual Saturday afternoon groggy state around the third inning to hear Tom McCarthy oversell the fact that Tom Glavine had retired nine in a row to start the game.

Oh? Really? Too soon, but, uh, you know…nine in a row equals three innings and that's only six innings shy of…

I'm not going anywhere.

Glavine made it through four, then five without a single Astro reaching base. The gods and the Qualls were clearly choosing up sides. You can't screw with the possible Big One in progress. But I needed to get up already yet. What to do?

All the signs that this might be The One (believe me, I always find signs) demanded I hide under the covers with both ears peeled:

• The glorious symmetry of Buchholz, the Red Sox rookie, last week giving way to Glavine the 300-game winner this week

• His buddy Smoltz coming fairly close Friday night

• Seaver having been in the ballpark the night before to pay tribute to Gil Hodges

• My dim recollection of Eric Milton taking advantage of a similar sleepy, visiting, young, string-playing-out bunch (the Angels) on the second Saturday afternoon of September eight years ago

• The mystical presence of Pedro Martinez and Chris Burke in opposing dugouts two years and three months after their passion play

• My fleeting vision that Sunday might be the day Pedro does it because I'll be there and it would be awesome

• The strange coincidence that I wrote something about the Mets and no-hitters hours earlier (in the context of an MVP being something besides a no-hitter that we've never had) but shelved it lest I seem prescient

• Wright, whose sudden award boomlet was the impetus for that Most Valuable thought, bobbling but recovering Ty Wigginton's grounder for the 15th out in the fifth

• Wiggy, David's predecessor, having been the third baseman when Glavine carried a no-hitter seriously deep against the Rockies three years ago

• And my favorite sign: Five perfect innings.

On the other hand, I just had a sense that this wasn't The Big One. Glavine usually doesn't have the kind of stuff to keep a lineup, even one composed of apathetic Astros, off balance for three spotless go-rounds. Besides, my lifestyle isn't nearly sophisticated enough to permit me to wallow away an entire Saturday afternoon in bed, even with a 300-game winner.

I got up. I went downstairs. I turned on the TV. And just as I was deciding that Ralph Kiner's unbilled appearance in the booth was yet another positive indicator, our longtime nemesis Hoozhee McRandom singled. And there it went.

Maybe I should've stayed in bed. But probably not. Unlike my bitter disappointment when John Maine's somewhat more tantalizing attempt at shifting the Earth's plates crumbled in April, I viewed Glavine's no-hit bid as an ornament to the Mets' sudden run of steely resolve. The real prize, or at least the gateway to it, is suddenly in sight. The magic number isn't zero hits. It's 16 properly distributed wins and losses. It took no rationalization to decide seven beauteous innings from Glavine along with two more from the previously discredited firm of Heilman & Wagner was an Amazin' enough pitching feat for this particular Saturday.

Hours away is Pedro versus Oswalt — it's serendipitous that this game has been on my “go” list for months. I'm actually giddy over such a matchup, which seems like a recipe for Astros 9 Mets 7 disaster, but let's let the maestros tune their instruments and take it from there.

As long as I'm between morning naps, a couple of quick questions:

When did David Wright become the leading MVP candidate?

Somewhere down the list from another world championship and, yes, an eventual no-hitter, I'd like to see a Met named National League Most Valuable Player by a panel more official than the voice inside my head (from whence Carlos Beltran 2006, Mike Piazza 2000, Robin Ventura 1999, Darryl Strawberry 1990-1988-1987, Gary Carter 1986, Dwight Gooden 1985 — shared with Carter — and Keith Hernandez 1984 have all accepted trophies). Suddenly I can't go three clicks without reading a story about David Wright surging into contention or the actual lead in the MVP stakes.

Really? A Met? Fantastic!

Maybe he has a real chance at the award given that unlike his theoretical predecessors, it had barely occurred to me that he's a candidate (and what do I know?). The Mets' roster has seemed breakthrough-free this season unless you want to count Ruben Gotay as having a career year. Until recently I'd have said Wright 2007 wasn't anywhere near Wright 2006. But after a lackluster April, he has been the steadiest of first-place Mets. His August was downright D-Wrightful: 1.172 OPS, 21 RBI, his third month driving in 20 or more. He's got that potential 30-30 thing going. He homered in support of Glavine Saturday. I guess he's legit.

David's numbers pale against Prince Fielder's, though Fielder's team has taken steps to render unvaluable all individual Brewer efforts by blowing that lead they had, but they ain't dead. And Rollins has had the kind of season voters are often taken in by: he's been very, very good and the Phillies have been…wait for it..better than expected. Well, maybe Rollins expected them to be awesome, but with their lousy Wrightlike April, the Phils seem as if they've come out of nowhere. A Herculean/Yastrzemskian September in which Philadelphia comes very, very close — which is the traditional Phillie equivalent of winning something — would probably capture Rollins votes. I also hear there are worthy candidates on other clubs, but without monster years in the Bonds/Pujols vein, this may be a year in which a high-performer like Wright actually gets credit for helping the only consistently leading team in the league to its standing at the head of its class.

Imagine what that might do to vitaminwater sales.

Do we care about Craig Biggio?

It wasn't until Bill James produced a new Historical Baseball Abstract a few years ago that I realized how great a career the Astro second baseman had been having. James wrote in the 2001 edition that Biggio was the best player active in the game, the 35th greatest ever by his win shares formula. The traditional measurement for immortality among everyday players is 3,000 hits and Biggio surpassed that milestone earlier this year. Don't forget he came up as a catcher and put in team time in the outfield amid his star turns at second.

He's not the main attraction, but those of us attending today's game might bear witness to the final New York plate appearance of a Long Island boy who made very good. There's no reason to keep Craig Biggio out of the Hall of Fame. None at all. Should he start or just bat once, we will see somebody who is plaquebound.

But do we care?

Usually you get a player of that caliber on his last trip through town and you want to get up and give him a hand. Why not? It doesn't cost you anything. I reserve the right to withhold such treatment from anybody who's been a particular pain in the ass to the Mets (it's a long list in the N.L.), but Biggio's been a solid citizen and an honorable opponent. Yet he's been so unspectacular — so 2007 Metslike, if you will — in building his credentials that it's kind of hard to get excited about seeing this future denizen of Cooperstown in the flesh. If you knew you were seeing Aaron or Ripken or Gwynn step up at Shea for the final time, wouldn't you applaud by instinct? I'll have to remind myself to do it for Biggio if in fact he plays tomorrow.

FYI: Biggio has never won a Most Valuable Player award. He finished in the top five twice but hasn't received a vote in this century. In case young David doesn't get one this year or ever, it just goes to show even the greats miss out on some of these baubles.

And for our college football fan(s) out there, this final from late Saturday night: my USF Bulls topped the No. 17-ranked Auburn Tigers, at Auburn no less, 26-23 in overtime on ESPN2, a result described by the pinhead announcers as a potential “program-maker” for the most anonymous gargantuan school in the land. It wasn't an easy victory to come by as our kicker missed four field goals, our special teams unit failed to field eleven men at one point and our personality-deprived coach called play upon play as if he had taken Auburn and was laying the points. The Metsiness of my alma mater's flirtation with the big time shone through for me when I blurted out to no one but the cats at a quarter to one, “Why do I always have to root for teams that have no idea how to score?”

When I first subscribed to MLB Extra Innings in 2003, there were four teams whose telecasts were never made available: the Expos, the Blue Jays, the Padres and the Phillies. I assumed the first two had something to do with them being from Canada while the other two were a mystery. The Expos moved to Washington and that took care of their video. The other three teams until this season had to be watched via opponent feed or not at all. Then early in '07, the occasional Jaycast popped up (with Canadian commercials and everything). A couple of months ago I saw what a Padre game looked like through the eyes of a San Diegan (about what it always looks like to me: bleary). That left only the Phillies at large.

Until Friday night, when their game with the Marlins was beamed into my living room via not a Floridian cable, but one emanating from Pennsylvania. It was my first look at Phillies TV since I peeked up at a Citizens Bank monitor in June. I could tell it wasn't the Marlins' crew calling the game by the way Miguel Olivo's fourth-inning home run was greeted with television silence.

Between innings there was a commercial urging all good Delaware Valleyans to leave a deposit on 2008 season tickets if you want a guaranteed shot at buying tickets for Phillies home playoff games in 2007.

OK, every team remotely alive in September pulls this scam every year, including us, and they're still in the Wild Card scrum, so I'm not going to snicker at the offer per se (at least not for the record), but what got me about this spot was that to cap off the montage of inspiring Phillie highlights that will have me going straight for my credit card they showed the play at the plate that ended the 11-10 game of August 30. You know, the one we lost and they won.

I had never seen any footage of it because I was en route to Milwaukee that day and, as I explained when I got home, I decided to take a vacation from my team, or at least my mania for them. Two things struck me:

1) I'm glad I didn't see it live. It was bad enough following it through the refresh button on my Sprint phone. I'm glad I didn't watch SportsCenter that night. I'm glad I didn't read more about it the next day beyond the perfunctory accounts that appeared in USA Today and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Except for Jason's post and what those who commented wrote in the course of that likely nonfateful day, I'm glad I did not go back and delve into my usual regimen of blogs except for the headlines that implied tragedy had transpired. I'm glad I didn't have to be immersed in my e-mail group's take of doom and gloom while the wounds were fresh. I'm glad I was nowhere near WFAN.

I wasn't kidding about taking a vacation from your team. As bizarre as it will sound come November when I'll wish I could watch Pat Burrell launch home runs for the sheer baseball entertainment of it, a day without the Mets isn't the worst thing in the world. Not a day like that anyway.

2) That 11-10 win's place in Phillies history appears destined to be obscured by their failure to follow up on it if in fact they don't straighten out over the next three weeks starting immediately. Natch, it is not in our interest for them to straighten out. But I can imagine the future Phillies blogger who has already enshrined this game as one of the greatest ever played. If the Phillies do not go to the 2007 playoffs (and depending on what they do in 2008 and beyond), that hypothetical fan will cherish what he will call “the 11-10 game” and tell every Phillies fan he meets later in life about what he was doing that great day at the end of August “when we beat the Mets.”

For a while his fellow fans will remember instantly. Then later they'll need more of a reminder. 2007? Didn't we suck in 2007? The future Phillies blogger will maintain that, no, we didn't suck. We just didn't win. We came real close. We had a great season. Don't you remember? Don't you? Then he will write heartfelt paeans to it and wonder why every other Phillies fan developed amnesia five minutes after the events of August 30, 2007 were history.

On some distant level, I feel for that future Phillies blogger. And with continued luck, I look forward to not being the Mets version of him for this particular season that ends in a 7.

PS: The Braves' pitch to have their fans buy tickets for their in-progress postseason run is, by dint of its existence, outright hilarious. The details — essentially management congratulating itself for not throwing in the towel at the trade deadline — make it even more so. Sometimes Extra Innings is a bargain.

PPS: If you're going to take at least part of a vacation with your team, you could do worse than taking it with the incomparable Metstradamus, especially if it's anything like the Cincinnati-Chicago jaunt he just tackled. (Note the unphotographed shirt sighting he mentions in the state of Ohio.)