Like the Mets, I napped through a good portion of Tuesday night's game with the Braves. Most of the baseball I saw came later in the evening after I (unlike the Mets) shook off my slumber. On a night when a division was clinched, a collapse continued and a couple of resurrections ensued, you know the most amazing thing I saw?

Manny Alexander is on the Padres.

Remember Manny Alexander on the Mets? He was here for two-thirds of a season nine years ago. When we got him in the spring of 1997 from Baltimore — trying to succeed Cal Ripken was wrecking him — I was certain he was going to be an important utilityman. Got into 54 games, hit .248, stole 11 bases in 11 attempts, spent some time on the DL and was shipped to Chicago in the Mel Rojas or Brian McRae or Turk Wendell deal, depending on how you like to define it. That was Steve Phillips' first trade as GM.

I'd say I lost track of Manny Alexander, though that would imply I'd attempted to stay on top of his whereabouts. After the Cubs, where he was buddies with Sammy Sosa, he floated to the Red Sox when they were between playoff appearances and then toured leagues minor and Mexican with several organizations until landing with Texas in 2004. He was with the Padres last year and has been hanging around San Diego since August 20. He seems to be batting .176.

A pennant race brings out the Mets in everybody. When Oakland celebrated in Seattle, two Athletics who seemed pretty happy to be A.L. West champs were Jay Payton and Marco Scutaro. The Astros are being kept alive with a little help from Dan Wheeler. The Phillies have Rick White warming in the pen just about every inning or about as often as David Weathers seems to pitch for the Reds. There's a Marlon Anderson here, a Jason Tyner there, a Vance Wilson of all things somewhere else. Preston Wilson and Jose Vizcaino haven't prevented the Cardinals from crashing — in fact, Braden Looper seems to be facilitating the process. Meanwhile, Mike Cameron and Mike Piazza are propping up the Padres.

Them and Manny Alexander, disappeared from the Metsopotamian consciousness since 1997. He's on a first-place club, for goodness sake, one we might see in the playoffs. Rojas, McRae and Wendell are all long retired.

He's also outlasted Steve Phillips in terms of Major League employment by three seasons.

Wake up Metsies — I think I got something to say to you:
It's late September and you really should be back in ass-kicking groove.
Perhaps I'm just too nouveau at being nouveau riche, but I don't think so. Eighteen years, shmeighteen years. It was only a half-dozen ago that we were bound for glory. I remember the 2000 Mets having their act in gear as the regular wound down and the post loomed. Same in '88, same in '86, same in '69. In '99 and '73, there was no time to think about momentum. It took all we could muster to arrive where we needed to be.
But never mind the past, at least not the distant version. The last week, once the last bubble from the last bubbly bottle went pop!, our extended champagne wishes and caviar dreams have threatened to curdle into the realm of fantasy. I've stocked up on all sorts of division champs goodies (two shirts, two pins, a pennant, a button, a bumper strip, an official program enhanced by another sticker that proclaims us No. 1 in the East), but my commemorative jag is mocking me now. The thrill of being what we are is evaporating. The specter of being no more than that is frightening.
For the first time in 2006, fear is making a run at faith. Hello darkness, my old friend. I rue to talk with you again.
Yeah, yeah, yeah…A-minus lineups and everybody's resting or recuperating and there's nothing to play for and Willie's gotta see what this one and that one can do. But y'know what?
Poppycock. That's what.
I've been to four of the past six games, including last night's, all losses. The Log's '06 chapter has taken an unconscionable hit, dragged down from a hard-earned 9-9 on Clinch Night to 9-13 for posterity. Ugliest record I've rolled up since, get this, 1993 (6-10). More losses in any one season except 2001 (23-15). Indicative of anything but my own failure to choose my tickets wisely? Perhaps not. Maybe I'm simply projecting my own narrow trivia onto a larger canvas of angst.
Maybe, but this I'm sure of: The Mets of April to mid-September are in remission. There's no snap, no crackle, no pop in their play. They've gone soggy in milk. There's a grinch who stole crispness at work and I beseech that monster to give it back at once. Whoville ain't the same without it.
Quick: Where don't we have a question mark? Short for sure, third probably. Lo Duca can grind through pain and Beltran isn't limping. Pen is peaking, no question. But left and right fields are slumping, lumbering jumbles, Valentin shouldn't switch-hit, Delgado has lost his zip, the bench (save for Endy) is constructed from dead and dying wood and if you see a starter who answers to his real name who makes you feel comfortable, let me know, because after El Duque, I'm El Stumped.
As we speak, the Mets are sore, stiff and stale. They have lacked verve and panache since the first game of the last Dodger series. Since then, they are 6-11. They had a 6-11 ebb in late June, shook it off and returned to being bright and bouncy. Maybe they can do it again, but I'm not prepared to fall back on previous givens like we're way better than everybody in the National League and look at this lineup and they'll be ready when the bell rings. I've seen almost no sign of any of that.
I love being the 2006 National League East champs. I always will. But goodness gracious, this year is supposed to be about more than that. I decreed it be so 144 games ago. I don't want to trudge out of Shea Stadium nine nights from now facing a sudden end to what was, for so long, so awesome.
Obviously the Mets need to get well. Fortunately they're going to their personal health spa, Turner Field, where they have traditionally played themselves into shape, mentally and physically (tradtion est. 2006). Then it's a few more exhibitions with the Nationals. Then it's for real.
For realer.
It was presented with little pomp in the light of the circumstances, but last night's game was the last home contest of the regular season. It was my 12th consecutive appearance at Shea to commemorate the closing curtain, a custom intended to drench me in closure even if it occasionally soaks me in Offerman. Of course this year, as in '99 and '00, there is an encore in the offing, so they didn't bother with any serious tribute video and certainly nobody tossed a cap into the crowd. They're gonna need those things.
I showed up earlier than I have most nights, partly to grab one of the available 25,000 Fandinis (no, I have no idea what purpose they serve), partly to stroll the field level concourse with impunity (did you miss me, Daruma of Great Neck sushi stand?), mostly to take in Shea Stadium before it is overrun by the Octoberati. The other six o'clock arrivers did my heart good. I don't know how they're fixed for playoff tickets, but I hope they had luck. There was a WIGGINTON 9 and a VAUGHN 42 and a GILKEY 23 and, sitting together so they wouldn't get their signals crossed, a HUNDLEY 9 and an ISRINGHAUSEN 44, forever for me a battery on the cusp of leading the Mets to greatness on the final Sunday of 1995.
These are fans who aren't fashionable now and weren't fashionable then. This is a ballpark that very suddenly has only two seasons left. This was a night to soak in how Joseishly time motors from first to home, how Reyes used to be Rey O, how Valentin used to be Valentine, how one overindulged, over-the-hill J. Franco used to be another overindulged, over-the-hill J. Franco.
Instead, as the Nationals continued to make Metsmeat out of the Mets, I sat and fretted about next week. It's the best possible thing to fret over and, in a sense, I wouldn't have it any other way, except possibly to exude confidence and, let's face it, I wouldn't be doing a lot of that anyway. I haven't spent nearly four decades at this without embracing humility by the ton. Praise Omar and his disciples for providing us a next week, even if the last week has gone down like death on a cracker.
When the final home out of the 2006 regular season was recorded, the A/V squad didn't play one of its morbid faves to usher us out. Instead it went with BTO. Not the standard, triumphant “Takin' Care of Business,” but the promising, hopefully foreshadowing “You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet”. Nice sentiment, though I would point out that we saw plenty for 5-1/2 months…just not a lot lately.

Tonight didn't matter. This string of flat, lifeless baseball games doesn't matter. Unless it does, of course.
It shouldn't. This is a well-rounded club with the right mix of wily, experienced vets, happy-go-lucky kids and hungry guys in between, led by an experienced coaching staff and an even-keeled manager whom guys respect and play hard for. One might expect the Mets to be resting up and not getting hurt, and a charitable person might say that's all they're doing right now. One would also expect that when the bunting's unfurled and the band's assembled and the blimp's aloft, they'll flip the switch and administer a licking to whatever team is unlucky enough to arrive at Shea for October baseball. An optimistic person would say it's a guarantee.
And yet. The long season can turn short awfully fast, and in a five-game series there is definitely such a thing as waking up too late. This team needs to play well to avoid its first sub-.500 month, which would be another one of those things that doesn't mean anything unless it means everything. And then it needs to play well lest this charmed season be revealed as a cruel illusion.
One of my baseball cliches is that I've grown old enough to realize my team can't go to the playoffs every year. All you can ask is to get to play games that mean something during the last week of the season. (OK, it's different if you're a Yankee fan. But then you have to deal with having a howling vacuum where the rest of us have a soul.)
2006 is the loophole in the rule: These games don't mean anything. Or rather, they better not mean anything.
Emily came home shortly before 10, as the lackluster baseball was nearing its dreary conclusion. At 10, TiVo inserted itself into the conversation, saying that it had something to record and asking to change the channel. Emily volunteered to cancel whatever it was, but I waved her off. I don't need to see the rest of this, I said. By the time we were settled downstairs it was over, and we wound up watching the Saints' triumphant return to New Orleans, the city where we met. (Officially met, anyway.) Come eat and spend some money, Harry Connick Jr. entreated us and everybody else watching. Hmmm. Next year the New Orleans Zephyrs will be a Met affiliate, and we discussed that we should go, see the parts of the city that seem much as they were and also see the parts that will never be as they were again.
Everybody knows the Mets wanted no part of New Orleans — at a time when the fashion is to group the minor-league affiliates more closely together, ours somehow got farther away. And despite the Crescent City's putting on its best face for ESPN (which did a good job balancing sports and the rest of life, I thought), in recent days the Zephyrs-turned-Nats have expressed relief at not being there any longer. I doubt the Mets will stay long, but here's hoping we aren't indifferent tenants. Here's hoping some of that post-9/11, Shea parking-lot spirit can be summoned for a city that desperately needs it. Here's hoping Ron Swoboda has some happy tales to tell.
But that's for next year. For now, another lousy game, import of which TBD.
Sigh. This weird logic, this conditional defeatism, has had me chasing my tail for days, not sure what to think but tired of thinking it. The Mets left Shea for the last time in the regular season playing lousy ball. When they return, it'll be to standing ovations. Normally I savor the merest inning of the most-meaningless game, but I'm having a hard time with that right now. Would anyone mind if we just fast-forwarded a bit? Let the good times roll already.

Tonight didn't matter. This string of flat, lifeless baseball games doesn't matter. Unless it does, of course.

It shouldn't. This is a well-rounded club with the right mix of wily, experienced vets, happy-go-lucky kids and hungry guys in between, led by an experienced coaching staff and an even-keeled manager whom guys respect and play hard for. One might expect the Mets to be resting up and not getting hurt, and a charitable person might say that's all they're doing right now. One would also expect that when the bunting's unfurled and the band's assembled and the blimp's aloft, they'll flip the switch and administer a licking to whatever team is unlucky enough to arrive at Shea for October baseball. An optimistic person would say it's a guarantee.

And yet. The long season can turn short awfully fast, and in a five-game series there is definitely such a thing as waking up too late. This team needs to play well to avoid its first sub-.500 month, which would be another one of those things that doesn't mean anything unless it means everything. And then it needs to play well lest this charmed season be revealed as a cruel illusion.

One of my baseball cliches is that I've grown old enough to realize my team can't go to the playoffs every year. All you can ask is to get to play games that mean something during the last week of the season. (OK, it's different if you're a Yankee fan. But then you have to deal with having a howling vacuum where the rest of us have a soul.)

2006 is the loophole in the rule: These games don't mean anything. Or rather, they better not mean anything.

Emily came home shortly before 10, as the lackluster baseball was nearing its dreary conclusion. At 10, TiVo inserted itself into the conversation, saying that it had something to record and asking to change the channel. Emily volunteered to cancel whatever it was, but I waved her off. I don't need to see the rest of this, I said. By the time we were settled downstairs it was over, and we wound up watching the Saints' triumphant return to New Orleans, the city where we met. (Officially met, anyway.) Come eat and spend some money, Harry Connick Jr. entreated us and everybody else watching. Hmmm. Next year the New Orleans Zephyrs will be a Met affiliate, and we discussed that we should go, see the parts of the city that seem much as they were and also see the parts that will never be as they were again.

Everybody knows the Mets wanted no part of New Orleans — at a time when the fashion is to group the minor-league affiliates more closely together, ours somehow got farther away. And despite the Crescent City's putting on its best face for ESPN (which did a good job balancing sports and the rest of life, I thought), in recent days the Zephyrs-turned-Nats have expressed relief at not being there any longer. I doubt the Mets will stay long, but here's hoping we aren't indifferent tenants. Here's hoping some of that post-9/11, Shea parking-lot spirit can be summoned for a city that desperately needs it. Here's hoping Ron Swoboda has some happy tales to tell.

But that's for next year. For now, another lousy game, import of which TBD.

Sigh. This weird logic, this conditional defeatism, has had me chasing my tail for days, not sure what to think but tired of thinking it. The Mets left Shea for the last time in the regular season playing lousy ball. When they return, it'll be to standing ovations. Normally I savor the merest inning of the most-meaningless game, but I'm having a hard time with that right now. Would anyone mind if we just fast-forwarded a bit? Let the good times roll already.

Steve Trachsel is a hard Met to love. He showed up here as an afterthought, introduced himself with incompetence and has done his best work under suspect circumstances. Even when he has succeeded, he has engendered little to no loyalty. There are no T Tallies to record each of his pop outs. There is no section of Steven's Stevedores, loading and unloading baseballs in his honor. Fans don't clap when he gets two strikes on a hitter. They look at their watches and wonder when he'll attempt to throw strike three. The lack of feeling is mutual. The next commercial in which the pitcher invites fans to “come out and get on the winning Trach with me!” will be the first.
There was never a Steve Trachsel bobblehead day per se. Instead, the Mets gave out his nodding likeness to a random row of patrons during his home starts. I think it was in his contract.
The Steve Trachsel oeuvre has been pretty well summed up in his past three Shea starts, all of which I've witnessed first-hand. On September 10, he didn't make it out of the third inning and was mostly booed. On September 18, he shut out the Marlins into the seventh en route to the Mets' clinching their division and was given a standing ovation. Yesterday, he plodded his way into the sixth before he was removed, trailing 3-1. He was mostly grumbled at.
In all three cases — pitching terribly, pitching brilliantly, pitching OK — Trachsel left the mound quietly and without acknowledging what was going on around him. Even when positioning himself as the first star of the game on the night the Mets became N.L. East champions, he kept his head down and kept walking.
That's Steve. Whether it's because he's ridden the rollercoaster of “who have you struck out for me lately?” far too many times or because he hadn't forgotten being unloved eight days before being showered in adulation or because he's steady as he goes, you're not going to get a lot that is warm or fuzzy out of Trachsel.
Check out this picture, the one appropriately entitled Joy. Carlos Beltran has just launched a two-run homer in the bottom of the ninth to defeat the St. Louis Cardinals 8-7. At one point, the Mets were down 7-1. In what was then considered a National League Championship Series preview, the Mets had gotten the best of their most serious opponent. There was no stoppin' us now.
Beltran, not the most animated centerfielder on the block, is enraptured. His teammates are rushing home plate to embrace him. Dave Williams, a Met all of five minutes at that point, is joining in. And on the outskirts, lightly applauding as one might at the opera? It's Steve Trachsel, the longest tenured Met. Steve was pitching the next night. Maybe he didn't want to risk injury in a dogpile. Or maybe that's just Steve, a man who hasn't lasted as long he has in one place by getting too high or getting too low.
If you catch a replay of Mets Weekly this week, there's a ton of neat footage of the clinching celebration, lots of tape of the players frolicking on the field after they sprayed themselves silly in the clubhouse, lots of champagne bottles being swigged from. And there's Steve Trachsel standing off to the side, small smile creasing his face, holding a champagne flute. Ever the dedicated oenophile, Steve — the first Mets pitcher to win a division-clincher since Ron Darling — wasn't going to drink his sparkling wine in any way but the correct one.
Again, he was just being Steve Trachsel. The way he carries himself, the way he acts and doesn't react, the way he takes his time with runners on base, the way he gets little support when pitching exceptionally well, the way he gets loads of support when pitching a little too typically poorly…that's Steve Trachsel. There may not seem to be a lot of there there, but there he is: here.
When the Mets won in 1969, Ed Kranepool had seen it all, going back to the Polo Grounds. When the Mets won in 1986, Jesse Orosco could tell you what it was like in the last, dark days of the de Roulet administration and Mookie Wilson could add a few sentences on how far the team had come since the crowds barely equaled quorums. When the Mets made it back to the playoffs in 1999, all eyes turned to John Franco and the longevity he symbolized through a slew of bad and embarrassing seasons. In 2006, the Met who's been around longest is Steve Trachsel with six seasons of service. Yet there's nothing about him that suggests legendary perseverance or smacks of “this one's for Steve!” He signed a series of contracts starting in December 2000 and the latest one is still in effect. Result? Longest Met tenure. Save your tears for someone else.
He's pitched well over the years. Rarely great. Occasionally awful. He began about as badly as one could. In his first 7 starts, his ERA topped 8. He accepted a demotion to Norfolk and, in layman's terms, got his shit together and pitched like a professional for the rest of 2001. He was better in 2002 and 2003, but the Mets got worse. When his team turned a corner in 2005, they did so without him. By the time he was recovered from surgery, he was an afterthought. He was back for 2006 because his option was a relative bargain. He has taken every start this year because he's been healthy, the only starter from the original rotation of Martinez, Glavine, Zambrano, Bannister and Trachsel who's been able to say that.
Trachsel has the second-highest amount of wins, 15, among National League pitchers right now, one behind Brandon Webb, Carlos Zambrano and Brad Penny. His ERA, 4.97, is 34th among 39 qualifiers for the N.L. title. He has struck out 79. He has walked 78. This season, he has passed Bobby Ojeda, Craig Swan and Rick Reed on the Mets all-time victory chart. Steve Trachsel is now No. 10 among all Mets pitchers ever in wins. Bobby Ojeda was a World Series hero, Craig Swan won an ERA title, Rick Reed a two-time All-Star.
Steve Trachsel is Steve Trachsel, y'know? It's not even a matter of Good Trachsel and Bad Trachsel. There's just Trachsel. Sometimes what he's throwing works, sometimes it doesn't. He'll have one more start in the regular season and will probably be handed the ball at some critical juncture in the postseason. He will pitch and we will hope he succeeds not because he is Steve Trachsel but because he is on the Mets. However he accounts for himself next month, whether he produces a stifling conquest of the other team's batting order or an utter implosion that gets the bullpen cranking immediately, it will probably be the last we see of him. His contract is up, his manager doesn't seem terribly attached to him, his potential successors in the organization and on the open market are already looming.
And that will be that.

Steve Trachsel is a hard Met to love. He showed up here as an afterthought, introduced himself with incompetence and has done his best work under suspect circumstances. Even when he has succeeded, he has engendered little to no loyalty. There are no T Tallies to record each of his pop outs. There is no section of Steven's Stevedores, loading and unloading baseballs in his honor. Fans don't clap when he gets two strikes on a hitter. They look at their watches and wonder when he'll attempt to throw strike three. The lack of feeling is mutual. The next commercial in which the pitcher invites fans to “come out and get on the winning Trach with me!” will be the first.

There was never a Steve Trachsel bobblehead day per se. Instead, the Mets gave out his nodding likeness to a random row of patrons during his home starts. I think it was in his contract.

The Steve Trachsel oeuvre has been pretty well summed up in his past three Shea starts, all of which I've witnessed first-hand. On September 10, he didn't make it out of the third inning and was mostly booed. On September 18, he shut out the Marlins into the seventh en route to the Mets' clinching their division and was given a standing ovation. Yesterday, he plodded his way into the sixth before he was removed, trailing 3-1. He was mostly grumbled at.

In all three cases — pitching terribly, pitching brilliantly, pitching OK — Trachsel left the mound quietly and without acknowledging what was going on around him. Even when positioning himself as the first star of the game on the night the Mets became N.L. East champions, he kept his head down and kept walking.

That's Steve. Whether it's because he's ridden the rollercoaster of “who have you struck out for me lately?” far too many times or because he hadn't forgotten being unloved eight days before being showered in adulation or because he's steady as he goes, you're not going to get a lot that is warm or fuzzy out of Trachsel.

Check out this picture, the one appropriately entitled Joy. Carlos Beltran has just launched a two-run homer in the bottom of the ninth to defeat the St. Louis Cardinals 8-7. At one point, the Mets were down 7-1. In what was then considered a National League Championship Series preview, the Mets had gotten the best of their most serious opponent. There was no stoppin' us now.

Beltran, not the most animated centerfielder on the block, is enraptured. His teammates are rushing home plate to embrace him. Dave Williams, a Met all of five minutes at that point, is joining in. And on the outskirts, lightly applauding as one might at the opera? It's Steve Trachsel, the longest tenured Met. Steve was pitching the next night. Maybe he didn't want to risk injury in a dogpile. Or maybe that's just Steve, a man who hasn't lasted as long he has in one place by getting too high or getting too low.

If you catch a replay of Mets Weekly this week, there's a ton of neat footage of the clinching celebration, lots of tape of the players frolicking on the field after they sprayed themselves silly in the clubhouse, lots of champagne bottles being swigged from. And there's Steve Trachsel standing off to the side, small smile creasing his face, holding a champagne flute. Ever the dedicated oenophile, Steve — the first Mets pitcher to win a division-clincher since Ron Darling — wasn't going to drink his sparkling wine in any way but the correct one.

Again, he was just being Steve Trachsel. The way he carries himself, the way he acts and doesn't react, the way he takes his time with runners on base, the way he gets little support when pitching exceptionally well, the way he gets loads of support when pitching a little too typically poorly…that's Steve Trachsel. There may not seem to be a lot of there there, but there he is: here.

When the Mets won in 1969, Ed Kranepool had seen it all, going back to the Polo Grounds. When the Mets won in 1986, Jesse Orosco could tell you what it was like in the last, dark days of the de Roulet administration and Mookie Wilson could add a few sentences on how far the team had come since the crowds barely equaled quorums. When the Mets made it back to the playoffs in 1999, all eyes turned to John Franco and the longevity he symbolized through a slew of bad and embarrassing seasons. In 2006, the Met who's been around longest is Steve Trachsel with six seasons of service. Yet there's nothing about him that suggests legendary perseverance or smacks of “this one's for Steve!” He signed a series of contracts starting in December 2000 and the latest one is still in effect. Result? Longest Met tenure. Save your tears for someone else.

He's pitched well over the years. Rarely great. Occasionally awful. He began about as badly as one could. In his first 7 starts, his ERA topped 8. He accepted a demotion to Norfolk and, in layman's terms, got his shit together and pitched like a professional for the rest of 2001. He was better in 2002 and 2003, but the Mets got worse. When his team turned a corner in 2005, they did so without him. By the time he was recovered from surgery, he was an afterthought. He was back for 2006 because his option was a relative bargain. He has taken every start this year because he's been healthy, the only starter from the original rotation of Martinez, Glavine, Zambrano, Bannister and Trachsel who's been able to say that.

Trachsel has the second-highest amount of wins, 15, among National League pitchers right now, one behind Brandon Webb, Carlos Zambrano and Brad Penny. His ERA, 4.97, is 34th among 39 qualifiers for the N.L. title. He has struck out 79. He has walked 78. This season, he has passed Bobby Ojeda, Craig Swan and Rick Reed on the Mets all-time victory chart. Steve Trachsel is now No. 10 among all Mets pitchers ever in wins. Bobby Ojeda was a World Series hero, Craig Swan won an ERA title, Rick Reed a two-time All-Star.

Steve Trachsel is Steve Trachsel, y'know? It's not even a matter of Good Trachsel and Bad Trachsel. There's just Trachsel. Sometimes what he's throwing works, sometimes it doesn't. He'll have one more start in the regular season and will probably be handed the ball at some critical juncture in the postseason. He will pitch and we will hope he succeeds not because he is Steve Trachsel but because he is on the Mets. However he accounts for himself next month, whether he produces a stifling conquest of the other team's batting order or an utter implosion that gets the bullpen cranking immediately, it will probably be the last we see of him. His contract is up, his manager doesn't seem terribly attached to him, his potential successors in the organization and on the open market are already looming.

And that will be that.

Before anyone goes blaming the prevailing doofusdom I encountered in my section of the mezzanine this afternoon on beer and front runners, understand that I witnessed no overpriced suds consumed and no clueless interlopers. I was surrounded by what appeared to be sober, loyal Mets fans. Doesn't mean they couldn't be moronic.
Behind me was a family or two — whatever their relationship, they were enmeshed — whose matriarch was a raspy yeller in a Wright shirt. Reminded me of a neighbor we had when I was growing up, one who'd threaten to call the cops if somebody parked in front of her house. She just figured out that Trachsel works slowly and informed her children of this…over and over and over again. She took great delight in the Devil Rays' pounding of the Yankees and chanted “Let's Go Rays!”…over and over and over again. When Trachsel or the parade of relievers that followed him managed two strikes on a National, she led her brood in “Strike Him OUT!”…over and over and over again. Oh, and when a brief shower sent those sitting to our south scurrying for shelter, she started a “Who's got the cover? We do!” call and response that fortunately fizzled as fast as the rain.
Her or whoever's kids they were specialized in kicking seats. A kicked seat doesn't have to be yours for the kicking to be irritating as psoriasis. For those of you don't have it, psoriasis is extremely irritating.
A couple of rows in front of me was a Jets fan. I suppose there were lots of Jets fans at Shea. That's fine. I'm a Jets fan in my spare time. But this Jets fan — COLES 87 jersey, Mets cap — wanted to be Fireman Ed east. He listened intently to their game with the Bills on a transistor radio and whenever the Jets scored, he turned around and raised his arms to signal a touchdown. The raspy lady, after protesting that the Bills are the only “real New York team” (I'd never heard that!), got caught up in this, too, and intermittent J-E-T-S spelling was added to her repertoire.
While all I did with the kicking kids was turn around and tell them to STOP IT!, I found myself strangely emboldened to heckle the Jets guy. It wasn't so much the updates from another sport infiltrating our national pastime that got me (though a harumph of “baseball gentlemen, baseball” never seemed more in order). It was the solemnity with which he carried out his dispatches that struck me as inappropriate. The hands over the head for a few beats too long elicited a “WHAT ARE YOU, TOUCHDOWN JESUS?” from me. And when the Shea scoreboard offered the final from Orchard Park before he could — about an eighth of the crowd was already applauding — he started to tell us that hey, the Jets won. “WE KNOW,” I said, “BUT THANK YOU FOR DOING SUCH A DUTIFUL JOB OF KEEPING US INFORMED ALL DAY!”
Forgive me for telling the story with me as the de facto hero, but I got a very positive response from at least a couple of Mets fans who came to the Mets game to watch the Mets game.
So I was not crazy about those behind me or in front of me. Next to me? Joe. As in my pal Joe with whom I've gone to five games this year and with whom I am now Joe and five. Not much to say here about Joe and me at Shea today except we sure do wish we could have seen the Mets win a game together in 2006.
Except for this:
While I was settling in to my seat, with the raspy lady and the Jet correspondent making themselves evident early, Joe was completing the triangulation of my day by harassing Ryan Zimmerman. With Reyes up in the first, Joe shouted, “HEY ZIMMERMAN! YOU'RE NOT PLAYING IN ON THE GRASS…YOU FOOL!” over and over and over again. Reyes singled, which meant Joe was going to scream at the Nats' third baseman during every single Met at-bat for the rest of the day, several times per at-bat — or until it was proven that it wasn't working. Took a couple of futile innings, but he got off it, though not until the raspy lady wanted in. “What about the grass? Why are you saying that?” Joe didn't acknowledge her. Good man.
All that was missing from this discomfiting 5-1 loss was some idiot in a Yankees cap. As if on cue, one appeared, a guy in his teens in the company of his similarly aged Mets fan friends. The sight of the vertical swastika raised everybody's ire into a good, old-fashioned “YANKEES SUCK!” Natch, the kid did the thing where he points at the vertical swastika with pride. “TAKE HIS HAT! TAKE HIS HAT!” swelled in response.
The Nikon Camera Player of the Day was clearly the kid's buddy, a dude who actually did take that crappy Yankees cap and actually did fling it logeward. A huge cheer ensued.
So really, a good time was had by all.

Before anyone goes blaming the prevailing doofusdom I encountered in my section of the mezzanine this afternoon on beer and front runners, understand that I witnessed no overpriced suds consumed and no clueless interlopers. I was surrounded by what appeared to be sober, loyal Mets fans. Doesn't mean they couldn't be moronic.

Behind me was a family or two — whatever their relationship, they were enmeshed — whose matriarch was a raspy yeller in a Wright shirt. Reminded me of a neighbor we had when I was growing up, one who'd threaten to call the cops if somebody parked in front of her house. She just figured out that Trachsel works slowly and informed her children of this…over and over and over again. She took great delight in the Devil Rays' pounding of the Yankees and chanted “Let's Go Rays!”…over and over and over again. When Trachsel or the parade of relievers that followed him managed two strikes on a National, she led her brood in “Strike Him OUT!”…over and over and over again. Oh, and when a brief shower sent those sitting to our south scurrying for shelter, she started a “Who's got the cover? We do!” call and response that fortunately fizzled as fast as the rain.

Her or whoever's kids they were specialized in kicking seats. A kicked seat doesn't have to be yours for the kicking to be irritating as psoriasis. For those of you don't have it, psoriasis is extremely irritating.

A couple of rows in front of me was a Jets fan. I suppose there were lots of Jets fans at Shea. That's fine. I'm a Jets fan in my spare time. But this Jets fan — COLES 87 jersey, Mets cap — wanted to be Fireman Ed east. He listened intently to their game with the Bills on a transistor radio and whenever the Jets scored, he turned around and raised his arms to signal a touchdown. The raspy lady, after protesting that the Bills are the only “real New York team” (I'd never heard that!), got caught up in this, too, and intermittent J-E-T-S spelling was added to her repertoire.

While all I did with the kicking kids was turn around and tell them to STOP IT!, I found myself strangely emboldened to heckle the Jets guy. It wasn't so much the updates from another sport infiltrating our national pastime that got me (though a harumph of “baseball gentlemen, baseball” never seemed more in order). It was the solemnity with which he carried out his dispatches that struck me as inappropriate. The hands over the head for a few beats too long elicited a “WHAT ARE YOU, TOUCHDOWN JESUS?” from me. And when the Shea scoreboard offered the final from Orchard Park before he could — about an eighth of the crowd was already applauding — he started to tell us that hey, the Jets won. “WE KNOW,” I said, “BUT THANK YOU FOR DOING SUCH A DUTIFUL JOB OF KEEPING US INFORMED ALL DAY!”

Forgive me for telling the story with me as the de facto hero, but I got a very positive response from at least a couple of Mets fans who came to the Mets game to watch the Mets game.

So I was not crazy about those behind me or in front of me. Next to me? Joe. As in my pal Joe with whom I've gone to five games this year and with whom I am now Joe and five. Not much to say here about Joe and me at Shea today except we sure do wish we could have seen the Mets win a game together in 2006.

Except for this:

While I was settling in to my seat, with the raspy lady and the Jet correspondent making themselves evident early, Joe was completing the triangulation of my day by harassing Ryan Zimmerman. With Reyes up in the first, Joe shouted, “HEY ZIMMERMAN! YOU'RE NOT PLAYING IN ON THE GRASS…YOU FOOL!” over and over and over again. Reyes singled, which meant Joe was going to scream at the Nats' third baseman during every single Met at-bat for the rest of the day, several times per at-bat — or until it was proven that it wasn't working. Took a couple of futile innings, but he got off it, though not until the raspy lady wanted in. “What about the grass? Why are you saying that?” Joe didn't acknowledge her. Good man.

All that was missing from this discomfiting 5-1 loss was some idiot in a Yankees cap. As if on cue, one appeared, a guy in his teens in the company of his similarly aged Mets fan friends. The sight of the vertical swastika raised everybody's ire into a good, old-fashioned “YANKEES SUCK!” Natch, the kid did the thing where he points at the vertical swastika with pride. “TAKE HIS HAT! TAKE HIS HAT!” swelled in response.

The Nikon Camera Player of the Day was clearly the kid's buddy, a dude who actually did take that crappy Yankees cap and actually did fling it logeward. A huge cheer ensued.

So really, a good time was had by all.

The Mets finally hit a lot while they pitched enough. That part Saturday was swell; the end of the world — nigh after a three-game losing streak by our division champs — has once again been postponed.
Mostly, I hope Nick Johnson of the Nationals is up on his feet soon and attempting to torment 14 other National League teams in 2007. As horrified veterans of collisions from Hahn & Theodore to Cameron & Beltran, all we can do is hope the human being in the other uniform with the broken right leg recovers soon.
What a bad break toward the end of a season for a guy who was hustling all the way for a last-place team. Him and Kearns, the guy he got tangled up in. In a perverse way, it makes me laugh at those who think highly compensated ballplayers don't really care about the game.