"I couldn't imagine being a paramedic going to the scene of a wreck. That's what that was, pretty much, a wreck," Marlon Anderson said.
Man, it was ugly.
"I couldn't go over there, man," the last remaining outfielder Cliff Floyd said. "Once I saw the blood, I'm not good with blood. It choked me up for a minute. We were laughing and giggling one minute, the next minute, a man's down on the ground, both of them."
With the score tied in the seventh inning Padre pinch hitter David Ross popped a pitch to shallow right center field which both Mike Cameron and Carlos Beltran took off after. With both concentrating on the ball, Cameron sprinting to his right and Beltran to his left, both left their feet in dramatic dives to try and catch the ball only to collide full speed, mid-air, head-to-head in a collision that would have made even ardent football fans cringe with the force of it.
If you haven't seen it yet (and my guess is this is being played over and over on national television in America like Theisman's leg getting snapped like a twig on MNF) and possess a morbid curiousity here it is.
Apparently, Cameron was bleeding from the mouth and nose. The NYT reported that left fielder Cliff Floyd tried to approach Cameron, his closest friend on the team, but he said he saw blood on the turf and became too choked up. He walked away and crossed himself.
It appeared that dazed, Beltran tried to get up and had to be held to the ground.
And all the while, in an odd scene, while everyone was taking it in, Ross was running around the basepaths and probably would have made it for an inside-the-park-homerun were it not for Chris Woodward sprinting out and picking up the ball and holding him to a triple. Joe Randa later drove him in to make the score 2-1 as it stood for the rest of the game.
But no matter, by then. The shock has set in on the Mets and this likely symbolises the end of the Mets hopes this season.
Cameron was placed on the disabled list after he broke his nose, sustained multiple fractures of his cheekbones and was found to have a concussion and Beltran, fortunately, had "only" a sore left shoulder and a cut on his left cheek.
Victor Diaz was called up from Norfolk and will replace Cameron, but whether or not Beltran will be available is still up in the air.
""It stinks that we lost and it stinks that one of our buddies got hurt," said starting pitcher Tom Glavine, who gave up two runs and had three hits and probably felt that it also stunk he didn't get to .500 yet again this season.
The Braves lost as well though which means the Mets are still 7 1/2 behind them. But the Astros keep winning and are now 4 ahead of the Mets for the wildcard.
Now they must somehow forget about this, suck it up and move on to Los Angeles where they will throw Victor Zambrano, Jae Seo and Pedro, who threw only five innings in his last outing, against Jeff Weaver (10-8, 4.34), D.J. Houlton, RHP (4-5, 5.49) and Brad Penny, RHP (5-7, 3.50).
The Dodgers are 51-63 for the season, have won only 4 of their last 10 and even have a losing record at home but there is no doubt this collision, not to mention the loss of their two best fielders as well as their bats, will have shaken the Mets to their core on top of having lost two of three to the Padres.
This is the moment of the season. This ranks up there with the 0-5 start to the season, the need for victory stronger now than at any other point if they are to save themselves and not now begin their descent, fall back from the pack, peel away and start thinking about 2006.
If it does prove to be the end, at least it ended spectacularly.
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