My kinda team, Charlie. It's my kinda team.

A deep sigh the size of Grimace. 

Well, the amazing run of the 2024 New York Mets came to a grinding halt Sunday night. When such unlikely, would-be storybook seasons run their course without your team winning the last game of the season, there is solace in numbers. A strength in communal sadness. It's almost as if... misery loves company.

Yep, here we go again, but the '24 version of MLC had the Sox dribbling to mediocre conclusions and the Mets making us cue up some Whitney. As rob said in his parting shot, the Beantown boys went 16-24 after MLC Redux kicked in. The Mets, meanwhile, went a startling 25-14 to run out the regular season. They still needed some 11th hour heroics to make the playoffs, and boy did they get them:

The MLB playoffs are longer this year than ever, so for clubs that scratch their way into the lower tiers of the postseason, you have to knock off four teams for a title now. First came the division-winning Brewers:

Then the powerhouse Phillies:

Ultimately, the super-stacked team with the best player in baseball and the best record in baseball (those pesky L.A. Dodgers) proved more worthy of a trip to the Fall Classic. So the Mets won 7 out of their 13 playoff games, good enough for some national acclaim, some killer fun nights for the fans, and a slew of outstanding memories -- but not good enough to move on.

My takeaway: Not just at the well-documented 0-5 mark to start the season; not just at the oft-mentioned June 2 mark when the club was flailing away at 24-25; but even when my buddy and I agreed on August 18 to run MLC back at GTB for fun, when the Mets were hanging around at 64-59... if you had told me the Mets would play 13 playoff games in 2024, I'd have thought you were insane and taken that deal 100 times out of 100. 

Folks have different reactions. My brother-in-law Pat lamented yesterday via text that "if you don't win the whole thing it doesn't really matter... you're just another loser if you don't win it all."

My young cousin chimed in at that and said, "You are allowed to enjoy things, Patrick."

Hear, hear. I cursed a whole lot over the last three weeks. Really nasty stuff directed at innocent human beings just trying to play a kid's game as a profession. I threw my hat down and across the room. I stomped and fumed, I gave up and got sucked in again. Not a ton of emotional intelligence on display.

But I reveled as well. Cheers and rooted and hoped and exulted and leapt and ran and high-fived and hugged. I communicated with Marls and rob a lot. I planned nights with friends around town or, as Sunday night's final moments, at my house. Grand slams and go-ahead homers and blown leads and comebacks and Grimace and OMG and LFGM and whatever the hell that arm gesture thing was. 

I definitely "enjoyed things." And I still will.  

Chatter amid Mets Township has immediately and predictably moved to thoughts of payroll, who stays and who goes, and what this team will look like in 2025. It will be different for sure. We have $190 million moving off the books just like that. Pete Alonso is the hot stove name du jour in Queens, but there are others. Sean Manaea, Jose Quintana, and Luis Severino, aka the majority of the starting rotation down the stretch and guys who threw the team on their backs at times during the late run. It will be interesting, and you can hope to build on the clubhouse culture that propelled this whole team to far, far exceed the sum of its parts, but turning over a lot of those guys will have its effect.

Maybe we'll do this again, rob and I. I loved it, for obvious reasons. It was less appealing for him, but he was a great sport. We move on now to Yankees vs. Dodgers in what should be an all-timer. Worth a look. 

Thanks, Metsies. That was fun.

——————————————————

Marls here with a little addendum.  At the risk of pissing off Rob (something something about post count) I’ll just add my brief thoughts to Whit’s much more eloquent musings. 

It may sound like an overstatement but this team let me love baseball again. I texted Rob and Whit at one point that since October 9th 1988 I have been conditioned to expect the Mets to ultimately lose in the most excruciating way possible. It is hard to be a fan and enjoy games while constantly expecting the other shoe to drop. To be honest, it kind of makes you an asshole to be around (more so than normal) and impacts others ability to enjoy the games. But the improbable ways that this team won games, texting with good friends, and the ability to see it though the eyes of my six year old, who actually just expects them to win, was freeing. If they lost, so be it, the ride itself was turning out to be the real joy.  

This Summer, Mrs. Marls and I saw Big Head Todd & The Monsters at Wolf Trap with Blues Traveler. Blues Traveler was not great mainly because John Popper is a shell of his former self both in terms of girth and ability to carry a show. However, BHT brought it and was much more enjoyable than I expected. A bit like this Met team, I went in with low expectations and left feeling lucky to have been witness to it. I also can’t help think of BHT’s biggest hit as it encapsulates the feeling that Whit expressed, Howie Rose noted, and that I felt on Sunday night after the last out.  It is bittersweet, but more sweet than bitter.  The Mets didn’t win it all, but it was a hell of a ride that I got to share with friends and family in person & via text. 

I know this is age speaking, but in the end, the text threads with Whit, Rob, Mark, TJ and lots of others (especially one conducted at 35k feet over Wyoming as Pete Alonso homered against the Brewers) are worth more than an actual championship.

Thanks Metsies for a fun ride.  LFGM. 

Today in '69

On this day 55 years ago, something amazing happened. The hapless New York Mets did this:

Check out that chaos. No matter who wins anything this year, it will certainly lack the anarchy and mayhem of that scene.

Against a decent measure of odds, your Misery Loves Company Mets of 2024 are in the National League Championship Series, and it's tied at one game apiece as they continue the battle against Los Angeles for the right to face the AL Champs in the World Series. (Looking at lot like that'll be the Yankees.) 

Game time tonight is 8:08. Nothing sounds quite like an 8-0-8 first pitch. 

Speaking of the Beastie Boys, the Mets, and a little NY/LA juxta, here's Martha Quinn to get you up to date:

LFGM.

Game 2: Electric Boogaloo

Yeah, that's right. It's time for Francisco Lindor, Pete Alonso, Ozone, Turbo, Kelly, Mr. Met, and Grimace to get it going for the stirring sequel to yesterday evening. 

La

Fo

Gata

Mets

er, uh

Let's

Fucking

Go 

Mets

LFGM

MLC x GTB: Promised Land

'Twas as insane a baseball game as I've witnessed in a while yesterday. For this half of the Misery Loves Company tandem bike, this was the (far more dramatic than needed) conclusion that we'd hope for when we resuscitated the baseball blogging. 

Deep exhale now. 

And now that exhale is over. Game 1 of the Wild Card series for the Mets begins today in Milwaukee at 5:30 ET.

But first, before that likely deflation of the Met balloon (Mr. Met's head?), let us please savor one day in NYM history that worked out like it was supposed to. Mind you, not by design. But the ultimate conclusion was more than a wee bit gratifying. 

It's best captured via a text thread between Marls, rob (sorta), and myself.

Takeaways: 

1. We emote a lot more vociferously at bad events than good. Where is our cheering?
2. We are convinced they will lose up until when they win. (Can you blame us??)
3. Rob needs to tune in sooner, even as a part-time new fan. 
4. Marls is a genius.
5. LFGM.

MLC x GTB: Vol. 1, Episode 7

We were in the habit of closing each season at Misery Loves Company with this lovely bit of baseball poetry from the late A. Bartlett Giamatti, former commissioner of Major League Baseball:

It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops.

For at least one of us, the only outcome that temporarily disguises the game's essence happened in 2004 (and again in 2007) and brightened one half of the MLC clubhouse. After the Sox swept the Rockies to win the 2007 World Series, I amended Giamatti's impeccable verse thusly:

It breaks your heart and it lifts your soul. It is designed to do both at intervals. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains stand ready to wash away another season, time stops for one glorious week. The Indian summer sun bathes you in its comforting glow before fading and leaving you to face the fall alone but for the long-lingering warmth of your memories. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it delivers again. And begins once more in the spring.

The Sox gave us the usual ending this year. Their 3-1 win over similarly mediocre Tampa Bay gave them an 81-81 record, good for third in the AL East, five games from a postseason slot. I note with some chagrin that the Sox went 16-24 over the season's final quarter, starting with the first episode of this pop-up blog special. 

And yet, there's hope. It does begin once more in the spring, and there's a good bit of young, exciting talent on the Boston roster. The Sox - the Boston Red Sox(!) - were third in the American League in stolen bases. Runs, too. They were also second in the majors in errors, and the pitching faded badly down the stretch. There's work to do.

Now, though, we turn our attention to Queens and we root for the Blue and Orange. May their fans get the second version of the baseball poem.

* * * * *

As The Cult's Ian Astbury crooned to open the last great album they ever made...

This is where it all ends...

Yep, this is it. When we spawned this Misery Loves Company redux reboot whatever, the Sox and Mets were just on the outside looking in, and with a quarter of the season left, there was plenty of optimistic reason to believe that each of our squads could make a run. Based on the 2003-2009 lifespan of MLC, rob had much more reason to believe. But we both had Paul Giamatti's dad's wide-eyed springtime-in-August belief.

The New York Mets, bolstered by Grimace, OMG, and 1/2 of MLC, went 23-10 after we launched this resurrection. Everything was clicking. Players like Lindor and Alonso -- fan faves who languished early in the season -- were just mashing. The Mets were winning every which way but lose -- sometimes ugly as hell, sometimes lucky ducks, sometimes just good. It was blissful.

With a handful of games remaining, the Mets were a click or two away. And then... pffft. Bats went silent, pitchers started surrendering grand slams... as Donna would acronymize, OMDL. They dropped 3 in a row in very poor form before salvaging it with a win Sunday. 

Please, no. Come on.

Due to Hurricane Helene, who, as you may have read, decimated Asheville to its core (among other spots), it comes to this: the day after the date formerly known as the last day of the regular season, the New York Mets will visit the Atlanta Braves for a daytime doubleheader. That's today.

I'd say it's for all the marbles, because both teams are vying for a wild card spot, but there's a wrinkle. The Arizona Diamondbacks are in the mix as well. Their regular season is done. It looks like this:

Atlanta..............88-72

New York..........88-72

Arizona.............89-73

The Dbags lose out in case of a 3-way tie. So the Mets, as well as their longtime rival the Braves, need just one win tomorrow to get in.

Just. One. Win.

Game 1 - 1:10 PM

Game 2 - 4:40 PM

Anxiety is high, very high, as we look at the long slog of the 2024 season coming down to a pair of games against a very good team. It comes to one of two conclusions:

1. I encouraged rob to resuscitate our old blogging content in order to capture a dramatic, rather unlikely trip to the playoffs for my favorite ballclub.

2. I encouraged rob to resuscitate our old blogging content in order to kick myself in the groin with an 11th hour collapse.

Here's my ask. Misery Loves Company was a super-rewarding, wonderful escapade with my best buddy. But it was also a one-sided affair featuring one season of pure heartbreak for rob (2003) followed by unbridled bliss. For me, I laughed, cringed, and cursed the ineptitude of my team for a few years, then saw them (in person) be denied the World Series in gut-wrenching fashion. Then a historic late-season collapse. And then more suck. It was rough.

None of us deserve a damn thing, but please... give me this. One win. 

I love this team like Coach Dale loved the Hickory Huskers. Let's do this.

LFGM. 

MLC x GTB: Vol. 1, Episode 6

Shitty-Ass Red Sox Update

Record: 75-75

4.5 GB AL Wild Card, 6th place in Wild Card race

When we commenced this exercise in fandom, futility, and friendship, the Red Sox stood at 65-57, a mere 2.5 games out of the postseason picture. Since then, the math ain't been kind. 10-18 during the season's stand up and be counted phase is suboptimal. Redolent of the 2011 Fried Chicken and Beer Kerfuffle when the Sox went belly up, finishing the campaign on a 5-16 run to miss the playoffs after leading the AL East for 72 days during the season. As in, they both stink.

So were left effectively playing out the string and having fun with great baseball terminology. We talked about TOOTBLAN in a previous episode. Today we bring you ducksnorts, seeing-eye singles, bloops, and gorks. Cedanne Rafaella gave us the former to plate a couple of runs in a win over Baltimore early last week before the Sox shit the bed in the Bronx. The letter three came during a lively text conversation between me, Whit, and Marls as the Sox and Mets were part of an epically poor series of results last Tuesday.

On that evening, we were following six games with outcomes that impacted the race for the postseason. the teams we were rooting for all...ALL...lost, by a combined score of 49-10. I'm told by reliable sources that such a combination is scientifically impossible, and as such have filed a protest with CERN.

Those gorks led us to one of the great baseball movie quotes of all time, from likely the greatest baseball movie ever made:

“You know what the difference between hitting .250 and .300 is? It’s 25 hits. Twenty-five hits in 500 at-bats is 50 points, OK? There’s six months in a season. That’s about 25 weeks. That means if you get just one extra flare a week, just one, a gork, a ground ball — a ground ball with eyes! — you get a dying quail, just one more dying quail a week and you’re in Yankee Stadium. You still don’t know what I’m talking about, do you?”

And so, if I get nothing else out of this godforsaken exercise, I get to talk ball with my pals. And that's worth something.

This Week in Mets (T.W.I.M. Notes)

81-68
9 GB NL East, Tied for Last NL Wild Card

Well, the Mets Machine has sputtered a bit in the past week.  Here are quick hits, something the Mets haven't had enough of lately.

3-3 since last update:

1. Losable win vs Jays, a real gift thanks to 8th inning progression of walk / infield single & error / walk / wild pitch / passed ball
2. Ugly loss vs Jays, former Met Chris Bassitt confounding our guys
3. Losable win vs. Jays, Mets were no-hit through 8 innings, then Lindor homered to open the 9th* and the Mets poured it on for 5 more
4. Lovely win vs. Phils, an 11-3 romp with Earl Weaver's principles ("pitching, defense, and the three-run homer") on full display... Alvarez, Nimmo, and Bader each hit 3-run bombs
5. Winnable loss vs. Phils, blew a 4-run lead, bullpen was leaky, Mets' bats were 2-14 to close the game out
6. Winnable loss vs. Phils, blew a 1-run lead in the last pair of frames and the Phillies walked off with a Diaz loss

*I was watching the game and text-chatting with rob and Marls. Ending the no-hit bid looked like this:

Fun stuff. 

The Metropolitans were pretty close to a disastrous 1-5 road trip that would mean a steeper uphill battle down the stretch. We'll take 3-3 as they come home for 7 games.

The truth is that as middling as the past week was in outcomes, when it comes to scratching out wins in late innings against the odds, the Metmen are faring pretty nicely. Sometimes lucky, some times skilled. Let's be both.

Tonight is the first of 3 must-win games against the Washington Nationals. The Nats have the inverse record of the Mets, with 81 losses and 81 more runs allowed than scored. They're not great. But they've won six of the past nine and three in a row. 

They are historically flies in the Mets' ointment. Gnats, if you will. 

With 4 daunting games against the The Phightins coming up next weekend, the Mets cannot afford to lose even one of these three games. 

LFGM. Here's some closing theme music and some images of bygone years, players, and plays to inspire all of us, especially the boys in royal blue and blaze orange.

MLC x GTB: Vol. 1, Episode 5

Let's write about baseball again, he said. It'll be fun, he said. Pennant race, he said. He's a jerk.

This Time in Red Sox

72-71
10 GB AL East (we should probably stop worrying about the AL East), 4 GB the last AL Wild Card

Chris Flexen is the very definition of a journeyman. The 30 year-old righthander has started 109 games over seven seasons (including three as a Met). He won 14 games for the Mariners in 2021, nearly half of his career total of 29. He sports a career ERA of 5.04. And this season, he's broken records as a member of the Chicago White Sox rotation. 

Going into today's game in Boston, the White Sox had lost 20 consecutive games when Flexen started. He's 2-14 with a 5.26 ERA and a 1.52 WHIP. There's an argument that he's been the worst pitcher in baseball this season. I think you know where this is going.

After winning the first two games of the series against Chicago, the Red Sox took a 1-0 lead into the sixth inning, where they promptly gave up two unearned runs. Wilyer Abreu tied the game in the bottom of the frame on a homer, and it stayed 2-2 until the top of the 9th. When the White Sox scored five times, two of those runs scoring on an - altogether now - error. 7-2 bad guys, while the good guys have fallen into sixth place in the American League, even as the gap to the final playoff spot has remained stubbornly constant.

Nineteen games to play, against the Orioles (3), Yankees (4), Rays (6), Twins (3), and Jays (3). Nine at home, ten on the road. Not that much ball left, and the target's annoyingly out of reach. Whitney rooted for the Sox in 2004 when it became apparent things weren't going the Mets' way. I'm not that far from breaking out my blue and orange stuff.

Right Now in Mets

78-65
7 GB NL East, Tied for Last NL Wild Card

Not so fast, my friend. 

What the last 24 hours in Mets Township have taught us is that anything can happen in baseball in a single game or a short series. 19 games is a season's equivalent of a short series. The Sox have 9 games against sub-.500 teams and 3 against a Wild Card foe. As Kate Bush sang to Peter Gabriel in 1986, Don't Give Up.

Meanwhile, the Mets' own n-n-n-nineteen games come against the Jays (3), Phils (7)(!), Nats (3), Braves (3), and Brewers (3). 7 home, 12 away. 10 games against division-leading teams assured of playoff spots, maybe runs. It's a stretch that leads off with a telling week in Toronto and Philadelphia. Yipes.

But let's take a quick second to pat the Metsies on the back. Putting together 9 victories in a row during a key turn in the season has proven absolutely vital. The Braves, our nemesis this year as in history, have won series after series, annoyingly so. But they dropped 3 of 4 to the surging Phillies, and that gave the Mets a chance to pull even in this sprint.

Francisco Lindor, please keep up this torrid pace. Need ya down the stretch. Pete, keep on clubbing it. Mark Vientos, stay the course. And to the pitching staff... please continue firing away. Build on the very good we saw lately.

Yesterday's smothering by the scrubby Reds and their so-so arms was frustrating, but I guess those games are just going to happen. Winnable losses are still something we are looking to dodge.

But let's face it -- the road to the postseason is fraught with potholes and landmines, darting squirrels and deer, slowing gravel and halting road signs. The Phillies themselves represent a scowling statey with flares checking for inebriated drivers. So let's not get too drunk on a great nine games. 

So much work left to do. But we are where we wanted to be when we began this sprint. LFGM.

MLC @ GTB Vol. 1, Episode 4

Yes, GTBers, it's more Mets and Red Sox drivel. Hoping you are enjoying this throwback venture, and if not, well, I guess I'd suggest that you get off your collective keister and add some content of your own. Other than a solitary Teej joint in June, only OBX Dave has buffeted the (mostly) rob and (way less) Whitney show this summer. 

Game 2 of the GTB Derby
Red Sox at Mets
7:10pm, Tuesday, September 3

With our Sox correspondent RR taking in some of New Zealand's finest smooth music (ever) tonight, that leaves me to watch the Met-iocrity and paint something of a picture for him upon his return from the Trap. We'll drop a few Crowded House references in here for fans.

Met lefty David "Sgt." Peterson on the hill tonight. Last season he spent six months in a leaky boat (Not even Crowded House! Their brother act Split Enz! Wow!), but this year he's plugged the holes and is sporting a 2.83 ERA.

Oh, and it's his birthday tonight. O/U on mentions of that unimportant fact in the broadcast: 16.5.

Peterson is on tonight: 3 K's in the first. (Ed Note: 8 K's through 4, and he ended up with 11 through six frames.)  But Sox hurler Kutter Crawford matched him -- if not in strikeouts, sheer dominance. He surrendered just one hit and 2 walks over six strong innings while fanning 8.

Thing is... that one hit was a 2-run job by Francisco Lindor. Crushing it, my man.

So, I think I failed to get through to the GTBitterati how good a reference this was in the last post:

His name sounds like Roger Clemens and Mariano Rivera had a baby.

See, for the uninformed, Roger "Shamuel Longhorn" Clemens named his sons Koby, Kory, Kacy, and Kody to reference his lofty K total. It's cool, no, really. And Mariano Rivera was the maestro with his cut fastball, referred to as the "cutter." You know what they say about jokes you have to explain. Sigh.

Anywho, Kutter Crawford kept the Mets hitters utterly locked out beyond that one mistake. Kid has some sick off-speed weapons in his arsenal. 

Peterson leaves after 6, up 2-1.  His only allowed run came on a flare, a gork, a dying quail, to quote Crash Davis. Not bad.

José Buttó comes on in relief. I'm not thrilled. This guy's work makes me mangle his name in a horrible way utilizing a certain Long Island Lolita Lothario and the f-word. Be cool, Whit. Deep breaths. And then he mows the Sox down 1-2-3.

Keith Hernandez sees a toddler smiling adorably for a sideline camera and takes the time to point out that there's chocolate on her face and that her mother should clean her face. Yeah. You tell her, Keith.

Crawford leaves after 6, down 2-1. Mark Vientos promptly hits something so strong into the left field seats in the bottom of the 7th. That's our 3B, baby.

Then the same Mets pitcher walks the first two batsmen in the Red Sox 8th. Buttofucko! He's quickly yanked for Reed Garrett, but after an infield single, there are bases loaded with nobody out. A sac fly later, Rob's speedster Masataka Yoshida comes up with a chance to break our backs. Don't dream it's over, boys. (You knew it was coming at some point.)

4-6-3. Phewwwwwwww. Feels like we've seen that go the other way too many times, but as we know, history never repeats. 

Need some insurance here, Metsies, I say aloud to a television. Up 3-2, bottom 8. As if to say "I got you," the Mets bats come alive. 38-year-old Sox reliever Chris Martin is in trouble immediately, firing nothing at the speed of sound (gauche to mix bands, but that's his name). McNeil singles!

"You know, if I thought Alvarez could bunt, I'd say it'd be a perfect spot to let him do something successful offensively."

      -- Gary Cohen backhanding our catcher, who's free-falling in a slump

And then Alvarez, in defiance of that slap, hits one the opposite way. 2 runners aboard. Then Flushing's conquering hero Lindor doubles off the wall. Keep it up, lad.

Darude's "Sandstorm" is playing at Citi Field. Um, that's a Gamecocks song! Ask Mark or Greg! Oh well. It's out. And it's fun.

A sac fly and a strikeout later, Polar Pete crushes one to left to make it 7-2. Hoo boy.

The Sox go down in order in the 9th as the Met with the worst haircut (Ryne Stanek) closes it out. Mets win. Happy Birthday, David Peterson.

I'm hoping rob isn't giving up the ship yet. But I need one more W tomorrow night.

MLC @ GTB, Vol. 1, Episode 3

A little bit of a delayed release schedule from the MLC editorial team, what with the holiday weekend, and everything. We'll try to do better next week.

This Week(ish) in Red Sox

70-67

9 GB AL East, 4.5 GB Last AL Wild Card

When we last gathered here to talk baseball, I posited that the Sox' upcoming homestand offered a chance to breathe after a pair of tough road series. Then the Sox proceeded to lose seven of 10 to dent their postseason chances none too slightly. 

As we type this, the Sox are locked into a Monday night battle with the Metropolitans. In the past 10 minutes, we've seen New York centerfielder Brandon Nimmo let a hard-hit ball by Ceddanne Rafaela get under him for a triple, which turned into a run-scoring single by Jarren Duran, which in turn became a top-notch TOOTBLAN. After the end of the half-inning, Duran misplayed a Nimmo flyball into a double that gave the Mets a 2-1 lead. Right as Mets' color man Keith Hernandez was talking about the putrid nature of the Sox' defense. Sigh.

Let's talk TOOTBLAN a bit, because it's more fun than the Sox right now. It's an acronym for Thrown Out On The Bases Like A Nincompoop, originally coined by Cubs blogger Tony Jewell in 2008. Jewell actually turned it into a statistical measure, defined as "... any non-force out a player makes on the bases, including outs made while attempting to take an extra base, outs on would-be sacrifice flies, pickoffs, double-offs, fielder’s choice outs with an open base, batter and runner interference and getting hit by a batted ball." Whit and I concur that it's one of the better framings out there, fun to say and as silly as the play that causes one to invoke it.

Connor Wong just dropped a foul pop to keep a Jeff McNeil at-bat alive. I assume it'll become a homer. That's the team's 100th error of the season. Maybe I'll workshop a TOOTBLAN-like acronym to capture the absurdity of this team's defense. 

Actual photo of Tyler O'Neill with his glove

It'll be useful for describing what Tyler O'Neill just did, chasing a ball into the corner and then batting it about like a golden retriever puppy learning how to fetch and allowing the keg-shaped D.J. Stewart to score from first. How does Mangled And Muffed Like A Dude With Pan Hands? MAMLADWPH? I'll keep working on it.

The game's settled into a comfortable rhythm, a couple of doubles here and there, bunch of strikeouts, no real threats for either team on a windy evening in Queens. Baseball that matters, at least a little, at this time of year is nice.

Citi Field folks just put up an Amazin' Mets, Amazin' Dunkin advertisement behind the plate. Against the Red Sox? Them's fighting words. 

Sox got runners at 2nd and 3rd with two out in the top of the eighth and Danny Young struggling to find his command. Rafael Devers came to the plate and...dribbled one to second to end the inning. Went down meekly in the ninth to lose, 4-1.

With 25 games to play, the Sox are both going to need to get moving and have one or both of the Twins and Royals to scuffle. The latter have been trying to oblige, losing six of seven while the Sox have slumped. Meanwhile, the Tigers have won eight of 10 to climb within one of Boston, and Seattle are only a half-game further back. It's getting late early for the good guys.

This Mini-Week in Mets

74-64

7.5 GB NL East, 0.5 GB Last NL Wild Card

TOOTBLAN.  MAMLADWPH. WTFMFWTFAYT? These and other disparaging acronyms are, at varying times, more than apropos for the New York Mets. The thing is, right now... dare I say it... we're seeing a fair bit less of the dunder-headed gaffes that have plagued the Mets through their failed seasons.

What we're seeing instead is timely hitting, solid pitching, just enough defense not to be mocked like the Sox (Brandon Nimmo's whoops-a-daisy and DJ Stewart's wik-wik-wonk last night excepted), and the ability to capitalize on the mistakes of opponents. As was live-blogged above.

Us History: After the games of June 2, the Mets were dangling at 24-35 and once again sporting a look that warranted an Office Space caption of "What would ya say... you do here?" It weren't pretty. After the games of last night, precisely three months later, the Mets sit at 74-64. That's a 50-29 clip. To which I tip my cap. 

(Them History: The Sox were at 30-30 on June 2 and they're now 70-68... nothing disastrous, just midgrade.)

That said, all that matters, mathwise, is that the Metros are still on the outside looking in for that last Wild Card slot. By the skinniest of margins but still -- not in. 24 games left. Three solid teams ahead of them, each following every mini-slide with a bigger mini-streak. Gaining ground has been challenging. 

The Mets' David Peterson on the hill at Citi tonight. Solid lately. The Sox send Kutter Crawford out there. His name sounds like Roger Clemens and Mariano Rivera had a baby. Let's hope he doesn't channel either of them tonight. LFGM.

MLC x GTB: Vol. 1 Episode 2b

The Week in Mets

Record: 69-63
9 GB NL East, 3 GB Last Wild Card

After we checked in on the Metropolitans last week, they went 4-4. Not awful. Not great. Two winnable losses from a leaky ‘pen. Two losable wins thanks to walk-off dramatics. And four games that were never much in question. 

A little bit of drama in my life
A little bit of ho-hum by my side
A little bit of vict’ry is what I saw
A little bit of lead blow’n stuck’n my craw
It’s Metbo Number 5!

Yep. Lotsa rust on the old MLC engine. Give us some time. 

To celebrate: Jesse “Be Odd” Winker! (You gotta say it out loud. Likely more than once. And even then...)

Jesse Winker used to ruffle feathers among the Township turkeys with his on-field antics and fan-gibing. Some bad blood, though you’d see a few barbs hurled his way that were tempered with the “although, if he were a Met…”

One deadline trade later, and one walk-off tater later, he’s the flavor of the week in Queens. Keep it up, Jesse. We need ya. 

I just spent four days in Maine (Portland and Boothbay Harbor) eating lobster (6 meals of 8) and drinking (every meal) and memorializing my stepdad. I’d say we did our guy some justice. It also meant that I watched Red Sox games on NESN and talked a ton about the Mets with my family. 

Consensus: nobody’s giving up yet. Even to squeak into the postseason would be a little bit of a coup for a team clearly rebuilding. (Rich owner rebuilding has upside some clubs aren’t blessed with, obviously.) We can do this, even with a flawed roster. 

Also agreed upon: lots to like, starting with Francisco Lindor’s season. There have been times over the past few seasons with a wee bit of meh, but he’s now fully Met. After a slow start to 2024, he’s got an OPS+ of 134 with 27 bombs while flashing some serious leather at short. We don’t take this output for granted from any player. 

Polar Pete still has my family… well. polarized. A thought was dangled that we could move Mark Vientos to 1B if/when Pete signs elsewhere. But I say 3B has been a black hole since His Holiness of the Hot Corner David Wright hung ‘em up. Maybe I’m just hoping against hope that Pete Alonso doesn’t wind up in Atlanta or Philly or anywhere else. 

After splitting with the Padres (who hold one of the 3 wild card spots), the Mets are in the desert for 3 against the D-backs. .500 ball won’t get it done. Caulk the bullpen and finish the job, night in night out. 

* * * * *

I got back home in time to watch all of the opening game of the series. Mets 8, Diamondbacks 3. Alrighty then. Sean Manaea was lights out for 6 frames. His surrendering a pair of gopher balls in the 7th gave me the "here we go again" indigestion, but the bullpen locked it down. The Polar Bear homered and everyone contributed. Especially the Arizona D. Just awful. They misplayed, booted, and threw away enough balls to extend every rally. We will take it. A trio of AZ's best everyday players are on the IL right now... this is a must-win series, maybe must-sweep. LFGM. 

MLC x GTB: Vol. 1 Episode 2

The MLC Derby takes center stage this week, but not on a diamond. Whit's Leicester City travel to London to take on Fulham in the second match of the Premier League season. The newly-promoted Foxes dug out an impressive draw against Tottenham on Monday, while Fulham gave up an 87th-minute goal to fall at Old Trafford to a decidedly mediocre Manchester United. The Whites kinda need a result this morning.

Closer to home, the Sox and Mets tangle in Queens a week from Monday. All derbies, all the time in this corner of the interwebz.

The Week in Red Sox

Record: 67-59

7 GB AL East, 3.5 GB Last Wild Card 

Though the Sox dropped a game in the Wild Card chase, it wasn't a bad week. Boston closed out a difficult road trip by winning a series in Houston after a four-game split in Baltimore. Meanwhile, Minnesota came back to the pack a bit, so the Sox are chasing both the Twins and the Royals for a spot in the postseason.

With their next 7 at home against Arizona and Toronto in advance of a three-game set in Detroit, the Sox would certainly hope to make some hay. Since I wrote that out loud, and we're talking about baseball, no actual hay may be manufactured.

I enjoyed the baseball stylings of second-year Japanese outfielder Masataka Yoshida this week. According to my notes, "Yoshida battles the orange robots!" was a thing I said after his two-run homer gave the Sox a 4-2 lead in the first game in Houston. Sadly, their old bugaboo came back to haunt them for the second consecutive day, as a fielding mishap by catcher Danny Jansen led to two runs. In a one-run loss, that'll leave a mark.

Sox color man Kevin Millar, who will never, ever buy his own beer in Boston, is enamored of Yoshida's running style, waxing rhapsodic about his perfect form. Yoshida, it should be pointed out, is not particularly fast. He has, in fact, one stolen base this season. Which he got on Wednesday, just as Millar was talking about that running form, which led to a predictably and hysterically gleeful reaction from the booth. Millar's reliably entertaining, and I still miss Jerry Remy. I can hold two different thoughts in my brain at the same time.

Young multi-position player Ceddanne Rafaela also caught my attention this week. He's slender and quick, and while he's not particularly good at the plate (.707 OPS, though his 61 RBI rank him third on the team out of the 9th spot in the order), he's equally adept with the glove at shortstop and in center field, with excellent range in both positions. He's a fun watch. 

Let's hope this week matches him.

The Week in Mets

Our man from Citi Field is traveling, so the Metropolitan portion of your programming will follow shortly.

MLC x GTB: Episode the First

As promised, the first of many (several? some?) semi-recurring posts chronicling the final quarter of the 2024 Major League Baseball season from the perspective of a pair of fans. 

MLB is wiiiiide open at the moment. As of this writing, eight teams are separated by 3.5 games for the best record in baseball. The Cleveland Guardians hold that top spot, for those of you scoring at home. And for those that are alone. Unfortunately, neither the Red Sox nor the Mets are in that mix. Fear not, though, as both have a fighting chance at making the postseason. ESPN's math wizards give Boston a 32.5% chance of making the playoffs, while the New York nine clock in at 18.7%. The season, she has some twists and turns left in her.

Without further ado, then.

The State of Play - Red Sox

Red Sox 5, Orioles 1
Record: 65-57
7 GB AL East, 2.5 GB Last AL Wild Card

Who are these guys? That question is more of an indictment of the slow, but fairly steady decline of my day to day interest in major league baseball than it is of the players on the Sox' roster. Life gets in the way, and all that. 

There was a time in early adulthood when I could rattle off the batting order, and pitching rotation, and give you a few nuggets about the kids waiting in Pawtucket. Now the Sox' AAA franchise is in Worcester (go WooSox!), and I couldn't make it halfway through the lineup. I still follow the team's fortunes - look at the box score most days and at least scan the scores and standings regularly. All of this is to say I'm looking forward to reconnecting over the next couple months.

I watched most of last night's game, where Brayan Bello took a no-hitter into the sixth inning, Jarren Duran broke a 1-1 tie in the seventh with a two-run single, and Rafael Devers smoked a chin-high fastball deep into the Baltimore night for the final margin. Duran and Devers have been the club's offensive engine for most of the season, the latter expected, the former more of a pleasant surprise as Duran has emerged in his first full campaign as a dynamic offensive weapon at the top of the order.

Less pleasant, Duran's recent homophobic outburst and somewhat petulant response. The All-Star game MVP has spoken openly about his struggles with mental health, which is admirable, but not an excuse for calling a fan such a slur. Everyone's said the right things about Duran's need to learn from his mistake, but the proof in these things is in the pudding. Color me a little bit skeptical.

Back on the field, the Sox have been a bit imbalanced. They're third in the AL in OPS and runs scored (and second in stolen bases - who are these guys, indeed!). They can rake. On the mound, a bit more of a mixed bag, ranking in the bottom half of the league in ERA, runs allowed, and WHIP. Tanner Houck's been really good, his 3.01 ERA tops on the staff, but he's seen his ERA rise from 1.91 in early June to his current mark. The rest of the rotation all carries ERAs over 4.21. Kinda mid, as the kids say.

We won't talk about fielding, except to say that it looks like the Sox don't talk about it (or practice it) much. Dead last in the league in fielding percentage, top of the list in errors made. Not great, Bob.

And with all that, we're in with a shout for a playoff berth. Lotta ball left. Stay on target.

The State of Play - Mets

Mets 4, Marlins 0
Record: 64-59
9 GB AL East, 1 GB Last NL Wild Card

Meanwhile, somewhere in Queens... since we last tuned in...

So this has been how the brain trust that has operated the Mets for the better part of the last 20 years has been doing things.

New eras, new squads, new mentalities, new management, and new campaigns have dawned and faltered. The lone exception was the 2015 season, one during which I frequently wished we'd kept the Misery Loves Company jalopy gassed up. World Series! I know, I know, the once beleaguered Red Sox Nation now considers such things de rigueur, but over here in Mets Township, such milestones are rare mountaintops 'twixt long stretches of barren valley. I went to a couple of NLCS games that year, one thanks to Marls, but I never made it to the Series. Which they lost rather handily to the (!) Kansas City Royals.

And two seasons after that, it was back to the doldrums. Feels like home.

Like my Sox-loving buddy, I've let my once avid fandom and following of my favorite team wane through the years. There have been moments that sucked me back in like a tractor beam:

I was jazzed at the "potential" and "opportunity" we thought we had the past two seasons. Stupid words that always seem to curse this club. Owner Steve Cohen's Damn the Tax Torpedoes approach was tons of fun when we inked Verlander to join Scherzer and Lindor to tee up Polar Pete. Then... as if on cue... the Mets do me like that and leave me living like a refugee. And I shrug it all off and arm's-length it for a while. 

Cue the 3rd Bass:
But now in '04, we got new life, a new wife, looking like the same old strife
Same old teams with big dreams so we got to make sure
That MLC has got to endure

Something like that. So what of this club? Good question.

The 2004 Mets are as middle of the pack as they could be. They wallowed a bit below .500 in the early months, they surged and plateaued a bit above .500 for the past month or two. They hit for some pop but lead no offensive categories, including nose hair. They pitch decently well, walking more than any other NL team, but they maintain well enough. In the field, well, they're not the Punt, Pass, & Kick show that the Sox are, but they're... they're not good. And with elder OF Starling "Dead Man's" Marte coming back from the IL, that won't get better. But all in all, they're fine.

That's the summary of the Mets: fine. They're not so fine, like art. They're just fine. 

But they're in the race. They've had injury setbacks, mainly on their pitching staff, that could have felled them. But they're right there, one game back of the vaunted Braves. Severino / Manaea / Quintana / Peterson / Blackburn scares nobody. But let's keep on chugging. 

Pete Alonso is still on the team. I rooted for that. I root for him to be a Met for life, just because I like rooting for him. But he's been mediocre all season, and he's trending downward dog, as a nod to Rob. He's fallen out of the cleanup spot, and took it well enough, but come on. Lindor / Vientos / Nimmo / Martinez / Alonso scares nobody. And yet... here we go.

Longtime Mets fans and MLC readers will remember the Fred Wilpon quip of 20 years ago that this team needs to play "meaningful games in September." (After which there would be pointless games in June.) Well, here we are on August 18, and these are high-stakes games for the New York Mets (and Boston Red Sox.) 

Good enough for now. 

LFGM.

Run It Back: Misery Loves Company

From April 1, 2003 to December 31, 2010, Whitney and I (and late in the game a few other blogsmen with good intentions and shark-jump impact) wrote about baseball on a nearly daily basis during the season. Our blog was entitled Misery Loves Company, and for a good 18+ months that moniker was as accurate as it was stolen. October 2004 changed the dynamic a bit, though it didn't really dampen our enthusiasm, at least not right away.

All told, we wrote 1,638 posts about baseball. We mocked David Wheeler (a lot), lauded Pedro Martinez, excoriated Grady Little, pondered Terry Collins, felt for Tim Wakefield (RIP), and worshipped David Wright. Among many, many others. We actually had readers, real, live readers from points all over the globe - one of our regulars was a Mets fan from Japan. The first comment on our valedictory post read, "sayonara!"

It was a blast, even as it got to wear on a fella after damn near seven years of trying to keep up. I loved doing it because it made me feel like a better fan, but also because it made me feel like a better friend - getting to share that experience with Whit was every bit as rewarding as watching the Sox win a World Series. Two, actually. Sorry, man.

So imagine the unexpected glee I felt earlier this afternoon when I got this text from my man. "Red Sox and Mets find themselves 2 games out of the last wild card spot as of right now. We could do sprint to the finish MLC coverage."

Lo there was rejoicing. 

Starting this weekend, G:TB will also be an MLC pop-up, at least once a week. Your proprietors are notoriously inconsistent and shirk most work, so a daily dose is probably out of the question. We can promise snark, overreaction, and the occasionally excellent turn of phrase. Very occasionally. 

Setting the table, the Red Sox are currently 63-56, with 43 games remaining. They trail the division-leading Yankees by 7.5 games, having scuffled to a 10-14 record since the All-Star break. The Royals are a more catchable 2 games ahead of the Sox in the Wild Card race. 

The Mets trail the Phillies by 8 games in the NL East, clocking in at 62-59. New York's other team have also been mediocre of late, their 13-13 post-break record courtesy of a five-game winning streak in late July. As of this writing, they're in the process of blowing a 5-0 lead to the A's that would leave them 2 games behind the hated Braves in the race for the final NL Wild Card. "Winnable Loss", texted Whit, a callback to one of our too-oft-used catchphrases.

Strap in, friends. You'll either get to experience the thrill of the chase vicariously, or you'll have the chance to experience the increasingly bitter mutterings of a pair of aging baseball fans. Fun for all ages, regardless.

As a sage scribe once said, lotta ball left. Stay on target.

The Red Winning

All over the greater DMV today, giddy, nervous, white-knuckled Washington Capitals fans are dealing with personal maelstroms of conflicting emotions. The long-choking Caps are a mere single victory from clinching the club's first Stanley Cup title, and the city's first major sports championship since 1992. (DC United says hello, several times, but nobody listens to them.)

As someone with a great deal of relevant experience in such matters, I come here to offer advice to Caps fans, many of whom I hold in great esteem. I'm not one of them myself, but in the same way Mets fan Whitney jumped on the Red Sox bandwagon to support me in 2004, I'll be pulling for the team in red this evening.

After Game 3 of the 2004 World Series, with the Red Sox one game away from snapping their legendary losing streak, and from changing forever my relationship with sports, I wrote this*:

"The Red Sox are 1 win from capturing a World Series championship so elusive that 3 generations of Sox fans have never seen one. They find themselves on this precipice because they believe in themselves and each other to the exclusion of all distractions, and I and people like me find ourselves silently mouthing, "Believe" as games draw to a close. Though the karmic cruelty supposed by a Cardinal comeback in this series would be legendary in its devastating impact, we still hold on. "Believe," I tell my family. "Believe," I implore as Pedro Martinez faces a 0-out, 2nd and 3rd situation in the 3rd inning of a 1-run game. "Believe," as Pedro retired the next 14 Cardinals, and then watched Mike Timlin and Keith Foulke shut the door. 

It's a new thing for us, this believing. We're all still dipping our toes in it, hoping that it's real. We know the facts, and the stats, and we understand that the Cardinals team, while terrific, really isn't set up well for postseason baseball, especially with so many control pitchers who don't make many batters swing and miss. Pitchers that throw a lot of strikes against these Red Sox tend to get battered - no change in this series thus far. We also understand that the Sox have gotten all the breaks thus far - that the Cardinals, the league's best fundamental team, essentially gift-wrapped Game 3 with 2 colossal base-running errors in the game's first 3 innings. We see the Sox rap 2-out hit after 2-out hit, and belief comes a little easier. We know that the bullpen is rested, that Derek Lowe is confident, that the offense is on fire, and that the Sox players are looser than the intestines of a dysentery patient. (Did he just introduce dysentery into this paragraph? Forget it, he's rolling.) 

We know all these things, and we're so ready to really, truly believe. And yet, we're Red Sox fans, so the exhale won't truly come until Keith Foulke induces the last Cardinal batter to fly softly to center, until the last out of the last inning of the last game of the World Series is recorded, and the Red Sox have more runs than the Cardinals. And if that happens, well...my God...I can't even imagine."

Honestly, it was even better than I could...even imagine. The Sox' Game 4 victory ranks in the top five most joyous moments of my life. I cried like a baby.

I really hope the many fervent Caps fans get to experience that.

And so my advice to them, like Curtis Armstrong's Miles to Tom Cruise's Joel, is: say fuck it. If you can't say it, you can't do it. Or, more directly, if you grip too hard on your hopes, you won't enjoy the moment. And goddamn is it a moment to savor.

Fuck it, Caps. And Godspeed.

* If you think I used the occasion of the Capitals potentially winning the Stanley Cup to talk about the Red Sox and highlight my own writing, well, you nailed it. Congrats for your grasp of the obvious.

Joy is a Teenager

Thirteen years ago today, in the instantly inaptly-named Misery Loves Company, I wrote what will likely be the best paragraph I will ever pen:

Somewhere, Charlie Brown is smoking a cigarette, the Little Red-Haired Girl's head nestled against his shoulder as they lay in the afterglow of beautiful cartoon lovemaking. Lucy's sitting outside wondering how the hell he kicked that ball so far.

Me quoting myself using this very piece of prose is becoming something of a tradition this time of year. This is at least the fourth time I've done it. Perhaps it's because that memory is still seared so vividly in my mind.

So forgive my indulgence while we wait for a new fanbase to experience the pleasure of amorous animation. It was just so bolt from the blue blissful.

Memory Lane

"Next year is right now. It's 12:30 am, I'm drunk, tears are dried on my cheeks, and I have a perma-grin on my face that's not likely to recede any time soon. To steal from the great Jack Buck, I cannot believe what I just saw." - Misery Loves Company, October 28, 2004

As I settle in to watch one of the most feel-good World Series of my lifetime, I find my mind drifting back twelve years. Thanks to the Chicago Cubs, the 2016 Fall Classic is an opportunity for me to vicariously re-experience one of the great fortnights of my life.

If you'll indulge me, we're off on a blatantly selfish tour of my memory banks.

Popular culture's long past it now, in a millenium when the Red Sox have won three World Series championships, but in 2004, the Boston nine were still losers. Lovable, if you were connected to the Hub, and enjoyably cursed if you weren't. And when they went down 3-0 to the Yankees in the ALCS, one short year removed from a gutting series loss to their greatest rivals, next year seemed impossibly far away.

The morning after the third loss of that ALCS, a mere 10 days before I wrote the quote that leads this post, I said this, "I simply am not smart enough, or talented enough to put adequate words to my utter disappointment with these Red Sox." The Yankees had just pasted the Sox, 19-8, in Fenway, leading to shot after shot of dejected Bostonians sitting in stunned silence in the stands.

Whitney and I started writing Misery Loves Company at the outset of the 2003 baseball season. It made me a better writer, and it made me a better baseball fan. It made me think about the game, and find new ways to talk about it. To be honest, we wrote some stuff over the six years that we did it that I'm quite proud of. (And a decent volume of crap, to be fair.) I really loved doing that blog, and it was made all the better because I got to do it with my best friend. And now, I'm extremely grateful that I wrote all that stuff down more than a decade ago.

I wasn't so grateful after Game 3.

Everyone knows the history (and some of you are Yankees fans), so I'll spare you the blow by blow. That ALCS was so cathartic that I literally fell to the ground after the final out of Game 7 in tears, pounding my living room floor, crying and yelling "they did it!" over and over again.

In all honesty, after the emotion of the ALCS, the World Series against the Cardinals was almost anti-climactic. It's easy to say this in retrospect, but there was no way that particular Red Sox team, that band of idiots, was going to lose. When they finally won, I wrote something that I saw echoed online just this last week:

"Somewhere, Charlie Brown is smoking a cigarette, the Little Red-Haired Girl's head nestled against his shoulder as they lay in the afterglow of beautiful cartoon lovemaking. Lucy's sitting outside wondering how the hell he kicked that ball so far."

That's one of the best paragraphs I'll ever write.

In the days and weeks after the Red Sox series-clinching win, I saw and heard a lot of people writing about how things would change for their fans. That the curse-busting championship would forever change the essential character of Sox fandom. Maybe they were right. I certainly don't follow the Red Sox with the same intensity, though that's a function of the way my life has changed more than any diminishing interest. My Dad's Sox fandom took on a different character as he got older, even though they never won one until he was 57.

But I wouldn't trade those 10 days in October 2004 for anything, even if it means I don't get to feel the same gut-twisting, will-it-ever-happen anxiety again. That time brought me a joy that I still find hard to express. Everyone should be so lucky.

And right now, Cubs fans are four games away from being just that. My own memories of 2004 are fresh enough that I know exactly how they feel. This was famed Cubbie backer Bill Murray after the Cubs toppled the Dodgers to win the National League pennant.



I know how you feel. Boy, do I.

FOX Sports opened its coverage of this World Series with a montage of elderly Cubs and Indians fans talking about their excitement to have a chance to see their teams win it all just one time. It reminded me of hearing about so many New Englanders in their 70s, 80s, and 90s experiencing the bliss of the Sox finally winning it all.

Sometime in the next week or so, another long-suffering group of fans will feel a joy they worried they'd never experience. And I'll be thrilled for them. Joy, after all, is worth celebrating.

Good Grief

Somewhere, Charlie Brown is smoking a cigarette, the Little Red-Haired Girl's head nestled against his shoulder as they lay in the afterglow of beautiful cartoon lovemaking. Lucy's sitting outside wondering how the hell he kicked that ball so far. -- Misery Loves Company, October 28, 2004

I wrote that the day after the Red Sox won the 2004 World Series. It remains one of my favorite pieces of prose, self-written category.

Somewhere today, Charlie Brown's world is just a little sadder, as news came from Minnesota that the little red-haired girl died last week.

Donna Wold was the one that got away for Charles Schulz, a girl he met while in art school who chose another man. Judging by her obituary, she lived a long and happy life, raising four kids with the guy that beat Charlie Brown out.

Charlie did okay for himself, too, as it happened.

Indulgence

My youngest daughter is nine years old. She's seen the Red Sox win three World Series championships. My grandfather is 94. He's seen the Red Sox win three World Series championships.

The day after the Sox clinched the 2004 World Series, I wrote this on the late, not-really-lamented Misery Loves Company, "Somewhere, Charlie Brown is smoking a cigarette, the Little Red-Haired Girl's head nestled against his shoulder as they lay in the afterglow of beautiful cartoon lovemaking. Lucy's sitting outside wondering how the hell he kicked that ball so far."

Forgive that purple prose - I was pretty damn over the moon. 2013 is necessarily different than 2004's once in a lifetime fortnight, but my jump off the couch after Koji Uehara struck out Matt Carpenter wasn't a whole lot different.

I said last night that 2004 team will always occupy a place of honor in my personal sporting pantheon. But the 2013 squad is close second. Hirsute goofballery both served to tighten the bonds of teamwork and mask (pun only minimally intended) a very resolute, disciplined, and professional group of ballplayers.

Ten years ago, I couldn't imagine saying this, but Sox fans are a pretty goddamn blessed bunch.

Burying the Hatchet Job

Tim Kurkjian can come back in off the ledge. We finally have some news about Roberto Alomar that doesn't involve him spending time at Hivvy's. He's been voted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in his second year of eligibility. Congrats are in order. I guess.

As the wee Mr. Kurkjian proclaimed in his squeaky soprano after last year's snubbery, the numbers on Alomar as compared with his fellow second basemen through the years are unbelievably strong. Only he and Joe Morgan manned baseball's "diamond tip" with such four-tool prowess in the last 60 years of the game.

.300, 210 HRs, 1134 RBI, 474 SB, 10 Gold Gloves, 12 All-Star appearances, 2 World Series, 1 spitting incident. One of the best 2B's of all time for sure.

Blah.

Blah.

Blah.

While there is not, to my knowledge, a website called www.firerobbyalomar.com, there did used to be a little blog in a quiet corner of the 'sphere (inappropriately) called Misery Loves Company: Two Guys Watch Baseball. Over there, someone took great delight in briefly chronicling, then lamenting ad nauseum the eerie transformation that Alomar underwent when he arrived in Queens in 2002. Someone with some serious deep-rooted issues. Someone like me.

Everything good you will hear about Roberto Alomar happened in San Diego, Toronto, Baltimore, and Cleveland. Everything bad that can happen to a baseball player's skill set happened in New York. And it drove us fucking nuts. But before I fall into another rant, I'll stop. Because (a) I've done this too many times already, and (b) let's face it, he's kind of gotten a whole lot of bad press elsewhere lately.

Go type "roberto alomar" into the Google bar, but like The Rear Admiral, don't enter it. See what comes up in the suggested searches:

• roberto alomar
• roberto alomar hiv
• roberto alomar aids
• roberto alomar gay
• roberto alomar stats

Oof. By comparison, a similar test with "rogers hornsby" gets you:

• rogers hornsby
• rogers hornsby stats
• rogers hornsby quotes
• rogers hornsby baseball card
• rogers hornsby biography

Yes, it seems as I was tearing Roberto Alomar a new one over at MLC, someone was tearing up his old one just as frequently in the back room at Tavern on the Brown. Not that anyone's surprised. Word always was that the spitting fiasco stemmed from Hirschbeck hurling a gay slur at Alomar. And to see Robby Alomar... well, he's the negative image of Gorman Thomas not merely because of his complexion and fluid turn at 2B.
And so I come here today not to bury Roberto Alomar any deeper than I have, but to acknowledge that the ulcer-inducing level of angst he singularly injected into the guts of Mets Township in a season and a half of stank may be evened out with the public rear-ending he's getting in the media. He may have already paid his debt to (our little socially inept slice of) society, and as such, I invite him to enjoy the accolades freely without further barrage from us Mets fans.
As an added bonus, when your name is looked up, Robby, may "infected" and "HIV" be supplanted by "inducted" and "HOF" in search engines everywhere from Fire Island to Key West to the Mission.
Not so fast, my friend. Before we go, let's run the highlight reel on Robby Alomar's time in the spotlight of MLC. I have culled out dozens of remarks in the interest of saving space, so this is just a smattering. Reprinted with permission.

“...lest they fester like Robby Alomar all season.”

“All-Star Voting: The only Mets on their respective positional leader charts are Piazza (hurt since May, still out) and Alomar (crappy since last May, still crappy).”

“In his last three years with Cleveland, Alomar put up an average season that looks like this: .323, 21 HR, 103 RBI, .405 OBP, .516 SLG. Awesome, Hall of Fame-type numbers, from a guy who was also one of the league's slickest fielders. In the two years he's "played" with the Mets, his numbers look like this (with '03 projected based on current stats): .264, 8 HR, 49 RBI, .333 OBP, .367 SLG. That's not bad, it's falling-off-a-cliff awful. Man, Mets fans must be happy to get this stiff gone.”

“It's still a kick in the groin, but at least it's not with a stiletto heel (raided from Robby Alomar's locker).”

“Forgetting the season-and-a-half-long enema that was Robbie Alomar…”

“December 11, 2001: Received Roberto Alomar, Danny Peoples, and Mike Bacsik from the Indians Matt Lawton, Alex Escobar, Jerrod Riggan, Earl Snyder and Billy Traber. Stink. Stank. Stunk.”

“Win it for Robby ‘Bait and Switch’ Alomar, who just retired Saturday after taking his career from ‘sure-fire Hall of Famer’ to ‘not so much,’ mostly while in New York. He would especially enjoy this -- not the winning of the World Series, but this teary, pouty discussion of it.”

“Of course, every time in the past two seasons that I've proclaimed that it was ‘Go Time’ for the Metropolitans, they've answered the call with all of the verve and vigor of a tea party with doll-babies in Robby Alomar's basement. Tea for two - and two for tea - I hit .332 - then .233 . . .”

“After the beauty of Games 1 and 2 of this series, watching last night's contest was like tweezing my eyebrows out hair by hair. (Robby Alomar used to do exactly that in the Mets' clubhouse, coincidentally.)”

“You've known since your first month in New York that the only 'run support' in that clubhouse involved Robby Alomar's pantyhose and not hitters driving in runners for you.”

“Aflac Trivia Question: Who was the last Pirate to lead the league in hits? I’m saying a pre-bloat Bonds. Of course, Robby Alomar used to be up there in hits, and he was a pirate of sorts.”

“Liken ourselves as we do to large-scale journalists (Rob, there's a bump-set there waiting for you), we get to enjoy some freedoms not known to mass media writers. We can bash people sans recourse: Roberto Alomar (‘horrid,’ ‘falling-off-a-cliff awful,’ ‘Bait and Switch,’ ‘the season-and-a-half-long enema,’ ‘fair Spanish lady,’ ‘the little boy down the street who plays with dolls’)”

“the Beelzebub of Flushing, Robby Alomar…”

“…we can only hope for an Alomarian plummet down the stairs, though the manhole, and into the sewer.”

“…Roberto Alomar’s singular disemboweling of not only the 2003-04 New York Mets (a.k.a. dues-paying time at MLC) but also the future general management of the Metropolitans organization as a whole”
“Being able -- obligated, even -- to come up with new and creative ways to explain Robby Alomar's putrid plummet into doldrumville kept me going.”

Just When I Thought You Couldn't Get Any Dumber, You Go and Do Something Like This . . .

I am a Mets fan.

Note the present tense; yes, I'm still a fan despite the disemboweling Mets Township took this year at the hands of this once-proud franchise. Well, at least once-feisty. Now there are just thousand-yard-stares abound in both the organization and its fan base. By late August we all became a bunch of R. P. McMurphys, lumbering along, hoping and praying someone would appear to Big Chief the Mets, the 2009 season, and our rapidly diminishing attention to baseball.

Terrible. But, as I've been forced to point out for waaaaay too long, these times are the proving grounds for people to earn their stripes as fans. Dues-paying time, and a fine opportunity to shed worthless bandwagoners who've by now ordered, received, and donned their 2009 World Champions Yankees caps and their "27" T-shirts. We won't be leaving the back porch light on for you folks, so let's go ahead and have your mail forwarded to the Bronx. Good riddance.

I'm still a fan. The baseball blog we began in earnest in 2003 -- and will be giving a Viking funeral in a couple of weeks -- didn't illustrate that fact very well this season, but I think my contribution to the 1,637 posts over the years at Misery Loves Company speak to it. I've poured and will continue to pour a good deal of time, money, effort, interest, and emotion into the New York Mets. For better or for worse.

But you know what? I'm not such an avid Mets fan that this amusing little nugget didn't slip through my radar. (Amusing like a 2x4 to the eye socket.)

Looking ahead a year or so, here's what the the Mets' 2011 payroll currently looks like:

New York Mets 2011 Payroll
Luis Castillo: $6,250,000
David Wright: $14,250,000
Jose B. Reyes: club option @ $11,000,000 or $500,000 buyout
Carlos Beltran: $18,500,000
Johan Santana: $22,500,000
Oliver Perez: $12,000,000
Francisco Rodriguez: $11,167,000
Bobby Parnell: $400,000
Omir Santos: $400,000
Alex Cora: a vesting option
Daniel Murphy: $400,000
Bobby Bonilla: $1,193,248.20

Yeah.

That's right.

The Mets will pay Bobby Bo $1.19M in 2011. And 2012. And 2013. And 2014. And 2015. And it goes on until 2035.

What I'd either forgotten or never knew was that rather than pay this worthless, two-time loser $5.9 million to go away in 2000, the Mets agreed to pay him $1.19M every year from 2011 to 2035. That's a total of $29,831,205. Seems stupid, right?

Here's where it gets doubly delicious. Yes, the Mets seem to be rewarding Bonilla for being an enormous prick. (Not having one, however, as the NY rumor mill will tell you.) Giving him close to 30 mill instead of 6. And by dispensing it like allowance, it keeps him from being the moron that he is and blowing it all in one fell trip to A.C. -- all highly annoying.

But . . . taking into account the interest over 10-35 years, and dollars in 2000 versus dollars in 2035, it's actually a much better deal for the Mets. Here's how fellow Mets blogger (I still have my membership card, dammit) Eli from Brooklyn explained it when people thought it was a misprint:

It is actually correct, and a horrible deal... for Bonilla. Ahh, the power of compounded interest. The way it works, the Mets set aside $6 million in 2000 @ a rate of 12% per year. They are not allowed to withdraw any funds until year 11, in which they can withdraw $1,200,000 per year for 25 years. After the 25 years, and after paying off Bonilla, the Mets will have... drum roll please... $138 million. So they took the $6 million he was supposed to receive and invested it themselves and made $132 million for themselves on it. They also have a similar deal with Bret Saberhagen.

Wow. I'm stunned -- the Mets were actually shrewd with their money and didn't find themselves on the ass end of a big-money deal. Bonilla gets his money, and more of it, but the Mets make a lot of cash off sending him to the scrap heap. (As it turned out, the "scrap heap" was Atlanta, which makes sense to me.)

But . . . wait . . . there's more.

Now here comes the problem with this deal and others. Bernie Madoff is the one that was guaranteeing them the 12%. So the Mets are now going to be paying the players out of their pockets, with new 2011 dollars, not 2000 compounded dollars, and on top of that, never receiving the $138 million lump sum. Much of the speculated $700 million the Mets lost was not what they lost out of pocket, but what was supposed to be there after this great compounded rate.

Honestly. This organization can't win for losing, and it feels like we take just as many lumps. They get hoodwinked by this scheming pettifogger for hundreds of millions of dollars, and the end result is that the team we watch will be worse for it and . . . AND . . . Bobby Bonilla's grimace-inducing name will not come off the books of The New York Metropolitans Baseball Team until I am 65 years old. It's just . . . [labored groan].

Apparently this story made its way around the Township in August / September this year, but of course I wasn't privy to it, what with my inadvertent, self-imposed Mets blackout. So most fans got this punt in the groin amid the flurry of bad news that kept coming during the season. I, of course, get it now . . . when I had just put the ugliness of '09 to bed and commenced the delusional high hopes for the future.

I'm still a fan. Serenity now, I'm still a fan. Serenity now, I'm still a fan . . .

Oh, and Steve Phillips, you douchebuckle, I hope you get what's coming to you.