Ever since you went all elegiac on Mike Piazza, he hasn't hit a home run. And now he's got a fractured hand.

Try toughlove next time. Or ballet .

Mike Jacobs, when he plays, will be the 768th Met ever. That's exactly 100 Mets since the end of 2001, 100 brand new players — four rosters' worth — to take the field in less than four years. Does that seem stable to you?

I don't think either of us ever commented on Doug Mientkiewicz's current injury, probably because it's hard to recall where one bizarre stay on the DL ended and where the next one began. He hurt himself butting bodies with Rickie Weeks in a Pyrrhically successful breakup of a DP. Next shot we saw of him, he was all gimp in the dugout. Then it was Doug…out.

It's not a knock on the guy to say I sort of haven't noticed his extended absence what with all the drama that's swirled about of late. I'm at the point where I don't expect to see Doug Mientkiewicz play for the Mets. Every time he does, it's a little gift, I suppose.

I actually heard myself call Glavine “Glavo” when he finished the seventh. I need to cut that stuff out.

Poor Royals. I mean, really, 18 in a row? Would it screw us up terribly if they sent Super Joe our way? I doubt KC's troubles are all his fault and there's no way he deserves to live through all that. (Tony LaRussa kept a pair of his shoes, you may have heard.) What harm could he do here? I read the other day that he and Kaz would go out for sushi on every road trip last year. Maybe Matsui misses his buddy.

Tike Redman hates us. I'm sure of it. Seeing Gerald Williams soaking up what he believes to be Prentice's roster spot probably just inflames his ire even more.

Did you shudder every time Carlos Beltran was in motion Wednesday night? That he didn't is to the better. Gary Cohen pretty much nominated him for Comeback Player of the Year (intraseason version) based on his first two plate appearances. Such an assessment seemed a little gun-jumping. Sure hope it's true, but one game at a time for Carlos, one game at a time for us.

We're 2-1/2 back of a playoff spot with 43 to play. That's a matter of public record. And it indicates nothing about final positioning.

I got so excited in late July 1997 when the Mets nosed ahead of the Marlins for a moment. “If the season ended today,” I breathlessly told my apathetic sister, “the Mets would be in the playoffs.”

Suzan, whose relationship to baseball was tied to resentment over non-Mets games airing on her favorite talk station, replied earnestly, “I wish the season ended today.”

It's still the funniest thing she's ever said.

You know who this was a big game to? Kris Benson. Only one man in North America circles starts against the Pittsburgh Pirates and it is he. On the pregame, Howie warned that Benson would have to control his emotions in these circumstances. I doubt anybody's gotten terribly worked up over facing Pittsburgh since Orel Hershiser. So Benson'll probably remember Tuesday night, and good for him if beating his old team fires him up.

By the by, am I the ONLY person in all of Metsopotamia who remembers that Hershiser's very worthy foe on that tense afternoon of October 3, 1999 was a rookie named Kris Benson? Before he became ours, that's almost all I knew about the guy, that he pitched brilliantly against us at the worst possible time but that it was a beautiful thing, in a dispassionate sense — the eager pup taking on the grizzled vet with everything on the line. It was beautiful because it eventually worked to our favor, of course, but it was a happening no matter how it came out. When the Mets acquired Kris Benson, I assumed that his featured role one of the great days in one of the great stretches of Mets history, the 1999 run to redemption, would be at least a sidebar to somebody's story. But I didn't see it mentioned anywhere and I've yet to hear a thing out of Kris's mouth about it. I suppose nobody's asked him.

Can't get down on Gerald Williams for being less than adept in center. The Post Tuesday ran a picture of him saving Dwight Gooden's no-hitter with another team on a play sort of like the one he didn't make in L.A. Sunday (except that he, you know, made it for Gooden). I was going to fume at him for suddenly forgetting how to leap and grab except that was more than nine years ago. Pressed into unforeseen service, Williams has batted better than any of us could have anticipated. And yeah, there has to be a slightly warmer body on the depth chart to take it from here, but being mad at Gerald Williams after he's delivered four hits in nine at-bats over the last three games seems particularly Sheavian in its harshness.

This was one of those nights that has lulled me all season. I guess there have been just enough of them so it felt familiar: a relatively easy win over a not particularly daunting opponent (not that we take anybody for granted around here), ground picked up at every turn, a GB for the WC that doesn't look too bad. It's the kind of night that sends me to the magnetic schedule to start considering possibilities. And that's always the wrong thing to do because no good ever comes of “well, if we win these two and take two of three from them and then we go to…” Play 'em one game at a time. Hope for the best. Check the schedule only for start times and bobblehead dates.

While I try not to look ahead too optimistically (and thus inadvertently wish the Mets into the proverbial cornfield with my sensational if undiagnosed extra-sensory impact on their on-field fortunes) and attempt to avoid unhelpful projections, I do notice a trend of sorts.

A trend? Why didn't you say so? Do dish!

Here are the National League Central and West teams we've played on the road this year:

Cincinnati, Chicago, Milwaukee, Pittsburgh, Colorado, Houston, San Diego, Los Angeles.

Here are the National League Central and West teams we've played on the road this year and lost series to in their parks:

Cincinnati, Chicago, Pittsburgh, Colorado, Houston, San Diego, Los Angeles.

We took two out of three in Milwaukee.

From that subset, we've played our full complement of home games against Cincinnati, Chicago, Houston, San Diego and Los Angeles, winning each of those Shea season series.

We lost two out of three to Milwaukee.

Total reckoning from these games, including Benson's Bucfest: 25-22; a horrid 8-17 on the road, a luminescent 17-5 at home. For a team that's done no better than float just a bit over .500 now and again, I suppose this figures.

Does it mean anything? Well, we have six out-of-division home games left with teams we've finished our road work against: two versus Pittsburgh, four at the very end with Colorado. You want to be so bold as to make inferences from those, be my guest. But don't tell me about it. I don't wanna know.

It gets tricky looking at the out-of-division teams we've played at Shea but not yet elsewhere:

Arizona 2-1 (4 remaining)

San Francisco 2-1 (3 remaining)

St. Louis 1-2 (4 remaining)

That's eleven road games, all — can't pound at this enough — west of the Mississippi, which is where the flight gets brutally bumpy. When they returned from Los Angeles battered, bruised and down two outfielders, their W-of-the-M mark had festered to a futile 5-14. Consider the 14 losses included three straight to the maudlin Mariners and two to the risible Rockies. The Dodgers weren't such hot stuff either but we were in no position, post-collision, to look down our fractured noses at anybody.

Bottom line: 5-14 is ugly regardless of longitude.

The past isn't necessarily prologue. The Diamondbacks and Giants, both with losing records, don't have to loom eerily next week. Need I remind us that the Mariners and the Rockies looked like soft touches, too, and we went 1-5 on their respective turfs? I'd like to go the brain-dead sportstalk route and tell you “the Mets are at a soft spot in their schedule so pencil them in for X wins,” but such thinking is evidence of a soft spot in the head. Like I said, play 'em one game at a time and hope like hell that everybody who needs to lose loses and everybody who needs to lose who plays each other splits.

Now some glad tidings from New York. You may recall a few weeks ago, after we swept the San Diegans, I put together a pennant-pooper chart, a cautionary-tale table tracking the peak positions of some neocontender years of reasonably recent vintage. Instead of linking, I reprint:

Through 107 games in 1991, the Mets were 57-50, 5-1/2 out of first in the N.L. East.

Final record: 77-84.

Through 96 games in 1992, the Mets were 48-48, 4 out of first in the N.L. East.

Final record: 72-90.

Through 94 games in 1996, the Mets were 46-48, 4-1/2 out of the Wild Card.

Final record: 71-91.

Through 106 games in 2002, the Mets were 55-51, 4-1/2 out of the Wild Card.

Final record: 75-86.

Through 94 games in 2004, the Mets were 47-47, 3 out of first in the N.L. East.

Final record: 71-91.

Here's the good news for us, albeit at the expense of us in campaigns gone by: We've outlasted all of those losers. We are through Game 118 now and the Mets are 60-58, 3-1/2 out of the Wild Card. At a stage where five of our pretender-predecessors shrunk from the task at hand, we continue to live and kick. The grim reaper, the one who buries seasons before school starts, has yet to be invited to throw out the ceremonial first pitch. We're not kicking ass and taking names the way we were after 118 decisions in 1986 (77-41) or 1999 (71-47), but we're still in this thing.

What's more, barring another even uglier episode of smashmouth baseball — this one with Wright crashing into Reyes and the two of them landing with a thunderous thud onto both of Floyd's legs (in a driving hail storm for good measure) — we're about to separate ourselves from 2004 by more than chronology. All season, it's been an easy out for lazy beat writers and lazier columnists who want to criticize the Mets to write something like, “For all the money/commotion/hype, the Mets have basically the same record as they did a year ago.” Indeed, at this stage in '04, the Mets were 57-61, closer to our record now than the 2005 Mets are at the moment to the Wild Card-leading Astros. Fair enough. But those Mets would keep it up exactly three games longer, maintaining marginal respectability through 121 contests. From 59-62, however, they'd plummet off the face of .500 like nobody's business.

I don't expect a 1-16 bender lurks around the corner. We may not shake off the win-one-or-two then lose-two-or-one syndrome that's plagued us and we may be beyond assistance if somebody else in this competition gets irreversibly hot, but we're having fun and having hope approximately three-quarters in. We can worry about the schedule and, in my case, worry that I'm worrying about the schedule too much. Feels pretty good to have that much to brood over.

We're 3-1/2 back of a playoff spot with 44 to play. Trachsel's returning. Beltran's returning. Neither is to be viewed as a lock contributor (I don't necessarily know Carlos strapping it on so soon is particularly wise), but Norfolk and Bingo reinforcements are two weeks away. If we can be just a little better than we've been for just a little while, there may actually be something to reinforce. There may be a September that isn't strictly academic.

Honestly, who could ask for anything more?

Miserable human being, absolutely remarkable pitcher…that can only mean there's some historical perspective on why Roger Clemens is a big, fat liar at Gotham Baseball.

Tonight's game was one of those games that fades quickly without leaving much of a trace — it's been over about three hours, and I can remember exactly three things from it:

1. Gerald Williams is apparently determined to prove in every single game that he cannot play center field. You know he had to be thinking, “Oh Lord” when a carbon copy of the Antonio Perez ball came hurtling out of the darkness toward him, just in case any Met fans were over thinking about him getting a crappy jump and missing the ball at the wall. Reminded me a bit of Luis Fucking Sojo's 94-hopper in the World Series that Kurt Abbott couldn't quite field, slamming our coffin shut and forcing us to seek cold comfort in muttering that Ordonez would've gotten it. So next year, in one of those tragedy-becomes-farce baseball moments, Sojo hits one in the Little Subway Series off Leiter, and it takes like 94 hops and just eludes Ordonez. You could hear an entire ballpark — well, OK, 60% of one — muttering to its neighbor.

But regarding Gerald Williams. I mean, what does it take? Remember the scene in “The Man With Two Brains” in which Steve Martin asks his wdow's spirit for guidance about whether he should marry Kathleen Turner? The house practically collapses in a hurricane of shattering objects and spectral screams, during which Steve stands there oblivious, saying, “A sign…anything…” C'mon, Omar — does the scoreboard have to start gushing blood like some crazed recreation of “The Shining” before you take this man off the roster?

2. David Wright doing a beautiful job turning an 0-2 hole into a walk — he reminds me of Alfonzo the way he can work out of bad counts — followed by Clifford hitting a no-doubter.

3. Todd Zeile showing up in the middle innings dressed like a “Partridge Family” character. If he was in costume or something, sorry, I missed it. Funny thing about baseball: In uniform Zeile looked old and small towards the end, but put him in civilian clothes (even ones from the Nixon administration) and he looks young and huge.

So bottle those three moments for posterity, because the rest is all slipping out of mind already. And after a trip that featured a horrifying collision, a Zambrano/Heilman choke job and a blown no-hitter, a fairly anonymous game was just fine with me.

Curtain opens on the interior of a rustic cabin. There are deer heads and trophy fish on the walls, large hoagies on TV trays, and a gaggle of men of all ages and races arranged around a big-screen TV, eating and drinking beer and laughing loudly.

There's a knock at the door. An older man in a faded Cubs hat gets up and opens it, revealing a young, puzzled-looking man standing on the front porch.

YOUNG MAN

Am I in the right place?

OLDER MAN

Hey, everybody, look! It's Antonio Perez! You got the invite! C'mon in, kid!

ANTONIO PEREZ

Yeah. Man, that was some creepy Edgar Allen Poe shit. I mean, the vellum and it was sealed with blue and orange…I dunno, I almost didn't come. And what's with the '30' stamped into the wax?

OLDER MAN

Tony, have a beer. We'll explain. I'm Jimmy. Been coming here since they opened the place in the winter of '71. Me and Ernie and Vic over there, we been here just about forever.

ERNIE

Nice job, kid. Lemme tell ya, we thought Pedro was about to shut this place down. Gettin' kind of nervous in here, you wanna know the truth. But then Quallsie here stood up on the couch, must've been about the seventh, and started shouting, “What's wrong with you guys? Don't you know how this works? It's always the guy you never heard of! This Perez kid, he's a guarantee! A goshdarn guarantee! Just like me!” And ol' J.Q., he was right.

ANTONIO PEREZ (stunned)

Aren't you…aren't you Ernie Banks?

ERNIE BANKS

Nice to meet you. Beat Gary Gentry in the 8th at Wrigley, May 1970.

ANTONIO PEREZ

I never heard of Gary Gentry.

JIMMY QUALLS

That's because of Ernie. Me, I faced Seaver. I was gonna be the 26th out, July 1969. Clean single in the 9th. Oh, was he disappointed. Hell, I made his wife cry.

ANTONIO PEREZ

That's when Seaver pitched for the Mets, right?

JIMMY QUALLS

That's right. He was gonna throw a perfect game, but I took care of that. Just like you took care of Pedro today. Just like everybody in this room took care of a Met no-hitter in the late innings. Ah, Tom Terrific. Vic Davalillo over there, got him in the seventh back in '71. Leron Lee's in the can, but he got Seaver in the ninth, Independence Day '72.

FELIX JOSE

David Cone was mine. 8th inning double.

ANTONIO PEREZ

Hey, isn't that Wade Boggs?

WADE BOGGS

Hey kid. Two-out double against Rick Reed in the seventh, June 1998.

ANTONIO PEREZ

What were you then, a Devil Ray? Man, I had to be a Devil Ray last year. That shouldn't even count.

WADE BOGGS

It counts, kid. You could look it up.

EDGAR RENTERIA

You know the hilarious thing? I got Reed 11 days later. One out in the seventh. Oh man, did he ever look pissed!

ERNIE BANKS (cackling)

Let's play two!

ANTONIO PEREZ

Wait a minute — I know that dude. I've played against him.

THAT DUDE

Kit Pellow, how the hell are you? Kept Met fans from ever taking a liking to Tom Glavine.

ANTONIO PEREZ

Hey. Sorry, man, I didn't know your name.

KIT PELLOW

That's all right, dude — they know my name in New York!

Much laughter all around.

JIMMY QUALLS

You may not do anything else in your career, kid, but they'll always know your name in New York. Just like they know mine, and Leron's, and Kit's, and those of all these other guys back here you ain't met yet. Now go out to the cooler in back and get us some more beers, huh?

Perez looks reluctant.

KIT PELLOW

It's the rules. You're the new guy.

CHRIS BURKE

Don't sweat, man. I only had to do it for like two months.

ANTONIO PEREZ

Oh yeah? Whose no-hitter did you spoil?

CHRIS BURKE

Pedro's! High-five, man!

Raucous laughter.

ERNIE BANKS (cackling again)

Let's play two! Beautiful day for a ballgame!

ANTONIO PEREZ

So all you guys get to hang out here because you broke up a no-hit bid for a Met pitcher? That's incredible. But how come nobody's chased you out of here yet? I mean, the Mets had Seaver, Cone, Gooden, Saberhagen, all these great pitchers over the years. Who cares about what we did, with all the no-hitters they must have thrown?

The men double over with laughter, hoagie parts and spittle flying. Some of them are laughing so hard they're having trouble breathing.

JIMMY QUALLS

Oh, kid, you're priceless. You really are. That's the thing — they never have! Never! That's the whole point! They get close, and then some no name — some Jimmy Qualls or Chris Burke or Kit Pellow or Vic Davalillo or Antonio Perez or Wade Boggs —

WADE BOGGS

Hey! Knock that shit off, Qualls. Some of us are in Cooperstown, y'know?

JIMMY QUALLS

Get off your friggin' high police horse, Chicken Man, I was just kidding. Anyway, kid, anytime some Met pitcher gets within spitting distance, some nobody comes along and restores order. There's never been a Met no-hitter. Never. Not in…how many games is it now, guys?

The men look at the floor and the ceiling, clearly uncomfortable. Much muttering and shrugging.

JIMMY QUALLS

Well, we're not quite sure, but let's just say it's a lot, kid. There's never been a Met no-hitter. And there never will be. Not until our spiritual leader gets over being pissed at the New York Mets and lifts his curse.

There's a knock at the door.

JIMMY QUALLS

Here he is now.

The door opens and a rangy older man walks in.

RANGY OLDER MAN

Hey, how y'all doin'?

ANTONIO PEREZ

Wow, isn't that…

RANGY OLDER MAN

Nolan Ryan, pleased to meet you. You get any grub yet? Plenty of cold beer out back. Just dropped by to welcome you aboard.

ANTONIO PEREZ

So this is all your doing?

NOLAN RYAN

Son, you get traded for Jim Fregosi and see if you ain't madder than an armadillo that done walked across a mile of asphalt into a purse factory. First them sumbitches made me soak my fingers in pickle brine, then they trade me for a washed-up shortstop with a bad foot. And they throw in three other guys to make the deal even or something. Would you forgive that?

ANTONIO PEREZ

I guess not.

NOLAN RYAN

You guess not. Anyhow, thanks for your work. I'd like to stay and set a bit, fellas, but I've got to go scout the Nats. This Seo fella's gone down to Tidewater and found all these pitches all of a sudden, and he's making me nervous. So I'd best find us a nobody. Whaddya think? Brian Schneider? Jamey Carroll?

KIT PELLOW

I dunno, Express, I've heard of those guys.

ANTONIO PEREZ

Can I see that roster? Hmm…who the hell is Brandon Watson?

NOLAN RYAN

Gentlemen, we have a winner!

Much laughter as curtain closes.

I've known two people who told me they had an older relative tell them, “Hate is for Hitler.” In other words, don't throw that particular four-letter word around so much. Show some perspective. Keep your feelings from getting ugly. That's very sound, very wise advice.

Unless of course you're a Mets fan.

One of our coolest blolleagues is Metsradamus, a seer of all things who saw this would be a good week to take off. But Metsradamus did not leave us hanging. In fact, he left us hating. Go check out his ballot for the 2005 Hall of Hate. Mind you, this is only the latest bunch of bastards on his/our dance card. The comments section explains who's already in.

I hope it's not too late to write in Antonio Perez.

Well, that was a bracing slap in the face, wasn't it?

Antonio Perez. Swear to god I pegged him early in the afternoon as the eventual culprit. How? Just pick the guy I've never heard of and assume he'll ruin things for the future Hall of Famer.

Now that he's a fully accredited graduate of Jimmy Qualls Senior High, there's the matter of the game. Who hit the home run that followed the triple? I actually don't remember anymore and it was only a few minutes ago. Jayson Werth, Gary just said. OK, Jayson Werth. Familiar name. Doesn't make it any better.

Then there's the matter of not scoring behind Pedro Martinez. Brad Penny? The “Bad Penny” from “suck on this for Shinjo” night? The guy who never beats us, allegedly? He chooses today? I hate the Dodgers, I swear I do.

We really could've used this game. Houston goes to the trouble of losing to Pittsburgh again. It would've been so sweet, even if it was just a win, never mind a (go ahead, say it) no-hitter. What a nice, nice way of ending the trip and helping to forget if not heal the wounds inflicted on Mike Cameron and Carlos Beltran.

I did what I could. I sat in my home office where I started the game. I busied myself with whatever I could find to do. I kept the radio on and only peeked at the TV after each out. I had no problem with Gary and Eddie reporting history but I felt a tectonic plate of fate shift when Gary mentioned Howie was off for the weekend and “think he's not sitting on the edge of his seat?” Oh Gary, how could you? Howie's the one who uncovered the King Korn Kurse years ago on Mets Extra, something about the 50,000 trading stamps the supermarket sponsor promised in 1962 to any Mets pitcher who threw a no-no and how that served to keep all Mets pitchers from joining the ranks of the hitless, apparently for all of eternity. Obviously Howie is a karrier of the kurse.

One run. We had nine hits but one run when Antonio Perez, whoever he is (oh yeah, he's the guy who broke up what was going to be the first no-hitter in Mets history), stepped up in the eighth. We've really got to give Pedro some cushion for these outings.

I was going to take a shower earlier. But I remembered that 30 years ago Randy Tate lost a no-hitter to Jim Lyttle and the Expos as I was getting into the tub. So I decided to sweat it out. I guess I can go hit the showers now.

I guess we all can.

Double damn.

Damn.

I'll admit it: Didn't see a single pitch of Jae Seo's latest glorious outing. (Gerald Williams?! Really?!) We were claimed by the social ramble, which Satchel long ago warned ain't restful. And as I retype this multiple times with only one eye able to open (please excuse any and all typos), I assure you it ain't.

Besides the fact that it's always exceedingly strange to come up cold and see the simple recitation of a ballgame, stripped of all the anxiety and parallel universes and what-ifs, this reminds me of one of the oldest fan hypotheticals: If your team could win the World Series, but you weren't allowed to watch a single game of the season, would you take it?

If you say no, isn't that awfully self-centered? Presumably the team will live on after you've sloughed off this mortal coil, so are you saying you don't care if they go 0-for-the-rest-of-eternity? Are you really so important? Don't you wish them well whether your butt's on the couch or not?

But if you say yes, isn't that horribly bloodless? Aren't you just in love with numbers? What, exactly, celebrates you from the average Yankee fan?

One game doesn't make this argument — one game is like missing one of those small chapters in a 19th-century novel. Eliza visited the vicar, decided his advice was worthless, and returned home to find her youngest sister had become smitten with an officer. You'll probably find out all that again in the next chapter anyway, just as the prelude to Pedro's telecast will include Jae Seo persevering, Castro and Williams coming through and the Mets understandably shying from collisions.

But that said, the larger thought experiment stands, as you and I have argued before. As I recall (I trust your memory will be better), when confronted with this hypothetical you looked in rapid succession amused and wary and concerned, and then asked: “Could I watch the season-highlights video?” To which I replied no — you could never glean any more context than offered on random SportsCenter clips and from the written word. No highlight videos, no ESPN Classic, no cast of characters, no ebb and flow of the season.

My vote is no — it's not worth it. I've got to watch — not every game, witness tonight, but enough of them so the season can become a story, full of heroes and villains and plot twists and a conclusion in the first days of October or (God willing) weeks later. We fans may not be good enough to play or close enough to the clubhouse to understand the psychological work of keeping a team on the beam, but we're part of this family nonetheless, and without us it's a hollow affair. We're the ones cheering when things go right and booing when things go wrong and even (in the case of Shea) booing when we've decided someone's in for a licking, justified or un-. Fans can lift you up and bring you down, be smart and infuriatingly obtuse, but without us it's 50 rich guys playing in an empty park, and no title means anything.

That said, I'll do my best to be on-station tomorrow. A 3-3 road trip — and this whole crazy season, observed or not — remains within our grasp. What that means, I don't know. But it's part of this story, however it ends up being writ. So I'll be there. It's all I can do, but it's not nothing.

Gerald Williams? Homering? Doubling? Stealing third? Scoring an insurance run? Leading the way to victory?

C'est la vie, say the old folks. It goes to show you never can tell.

Now if Pedro Martinez can pitch like Jae Seo and Mike Piazza can hit like Ramon Castro, we could be getting somewhere.