Mets Victory Somehow in the Cards

"For fun, I let my dog make all the management decisions tonight!"

I would love to recap this game, this 20 inning classic. But thanks to the MLB and Fux, I could only follow along on Gameday and watch the ESPN highlights.  The 18th inning, wherein our heroes could not muster offense against position player Felipe Lopez on the mound, was one of the most pathetic things we may ever see from the Mets franchise. I think it's time for me to dust off the term I coined for this: the Mets "awfulfence" is back; it's offensive yes, but it ain't offense.  Perhaps the Mets owe Tony LaRasshat for their victory, since Tony seemingly bent on willingly disabling his club. LaRasshat will have an easier time explaining how he ends up asleep at Florida stoplights than explaining some of the moves he made in this game.

Thanks to MLB and Fux, for blacking out baseball's most loyal out of town fans!! MLB.com is another joke: just try to explain to me why it is nearly impossible to find a given highlight video by linking to their game recaps--first you have to page through pages of distinct highlight plays and only if you're very lucky will you come across the actual game highlight reel, you know, the one a fan actually wants to see so they can catch up on the game.  Do they really think the aggravation that comes with their piecemeal highlight bullshit is going to drive customers to their on-line product? It's so counter intuitive and stupid, it must be the MLB.

What to do today while I staved off the frustration of anther year of Fux's Saturday Baseball screwjob where I buy the $180 out of town "Extra Innings" baseball package from MLB only to find that they already sold half of the weekend games to Fux, whether or not they decide to broadcast it? To be clear, during the weekend, when the fan can actually sit back and enjoy baseball, the MLB and Fux blackout just about all the games.  Out here in California, I can watch the Dodgers-Giants (which I could have done anyway and listened to Vin Scully instead of some idiot like Joe Buck), or I can go screw.  Even in this day and age of long tail, niche entertainment, what the customer wants (and pays for) doesn't matter, and there's nothing we can do about it, despite our blogs, call-in shows, purchasing power and supposed influence.  Other than stew in my ill-will and wait for the chance at cosmic payback, today I watched hockey; at least they want my attention. And I did a bit of reflection.

It's so hard to draw distinctions between this year's effort and the past couple of suckfest seasons. To the untrained eye, the product looks about the same as usual, at least in the games I've seen this year.  So far, I would say where as last year's squad's modus opperandi was to snatch horrible, emotionally and physically scaring, multi-level defeat from the jaws of occasional victory, this year's squad seems content to grab routine defeat from the slobbering mouth of certain defeat.  These Mets are pretty boring and we fans are anesthetized to the pain, but at least a Collapsathon TM seems to be out of the question this season.

So where are we and how did we get here? After the 2006 campaign, Mets fans were giddy.  Seen metaphorically, Omar's team was a great hitter who just needed to take the bat off his shoulder to have a really good chance at defeating the next soul-patched enemy in 2007.  The club was well-financed, had a small stable of quality players, under rather fresh new management, and seemed post-season bound or at least competitive.

                                                    This product hits way too close to home for the Wilpons.

Fast forward to 2010.  The team already looks like toast.  Organizationally, the Mets are a complete joke, like the Chicago Cubs, only not funny or lovable.  It started again this winter when Omar couldn't manage to upgrade the pitching rotation, to at least give us some fresh hurlers to loose faith in and eventually dread seeing.  They play (or will soon play) in a half empty, price-gouging, tax-payer supported stadium that's poor sight lines are the only way it doesn't pay tribute to the Dodgers.




Bobby V. brings a lot of baggage wherever he goes: "let's not get crazy here" 


What it means to blog about the Mets at this point is to provide chronicles of the futile and catalogs of missteps so unbelievable, you have to rub your eyes. This year, being a Mets blogger means guessing when the Wilpon's will cut bait on their GM or manager (or when they'll get contract extensions!), and weighing in on whether the front office clowns will try to right the ship by signing up for another go-round with unpredictable, non-company man Bobby Valentine. The fact that I knew in my heart that the Metsies were ultimately lose this marathon game (even though they won a Pyrrhic victory) just shows the expectations that Omar and his chuckleheaded bunch of clowns have fostered in their fans. I expect the worst.