The Long Road Back To .500

A season of hoping to be in the playoffs is reduced to a season clawing back to .500 and hoping to climb out of the NL East basement but what the hell, it's something, after all and some of the Mets are beginning to show some life.


Might Makes Wright

Last night David Wright hit his second career grand slam to give the Mets all the runs they would need in the top of the first inning and Tom Glavine went eight innings, allowing four hits and striking out six to earn the easy victory but more importantly, Willie Randolph was finally ejected from a game!

On the other side of the coin, Nats manager Frank Robinson, captain of the swiftly sinking vessel called mediocrity in the nation's capital, opted to play, for the most part, rookies and backups, deciding to shut down most of the veterans for the final week of the season, quitting on the team owned by the owners.

"Im not going to challenge any of Earl Weaver's or Billy Martin's records [for ejections]," Randolph disavowed after both he AND Jose Reyes were tossed from the game. "But this one's been building up for a while."

I'll say, Willie. Must have been building like all fucking season whilst you sat on your hands and looked coy from the dugout, never littering the field with baseball, bats and shin guards in an obscenity-laded, spittle-on-the-lips sort of explosive tirade so many other great managers (like, let's say Lou Piniella, for example) are known for.

Finally, we can say with emphasis: our manager is no Joe Torre mannequin wanna-be any longer!

Talk about pulling your career out of your back pocket and going: look what I've found!, over his last 11 starts, Glavine has pitched at least seven innings 10 times and has allowed three or more runs in only two of those games and last night he was simply baffling to these rookies and reserves of the Nats, retiring 14 straight batters at one point and earning the 274th victory of his career, remarkably, grabbing sole possession of 29th on the All-Time Victory list.

"If there was a time when I wished we were going to the playoffs, it's now," Glavine effused. "When I'm going so well." -- interesting quote. Did he intentionally drop the rest of his team when referring to things going well or is he trying to say he only cares about himself and his 300 victories now?

Last night, a mere 11 minutes and 18 pitches into Nat All-Star pitcher Livian Hernandez's outing, it was 5-0 and the right-hander had yet to record an out. When he did, striking out Marlon Anderson, a bit of a sarcastic cheer rose from the crowd of 32,467.

Wright's grand slam gave him 93 RBIs on the season - he'll need 7 in his last 8 games to reach the magical century mark in what offensively anyway, has been a terrific season, one which will certainly garner future All-Star sympathy for him, perhaps as early as next season.

Not much else to say about this other than if the Mets win the rest of their games this season and the Astros lose the rest of theirs well...