Dog Days All Around

The Mets have taken it on the chin so often lately that it was almost shocking that they actually managed to win a game last night. Not that they made it easy on themselves. Fernando Tatis had the game-winner once again, but it almost wasn't. A 9th inning rally by the Padres fell one run short and the Mets finally won a game. And they did it without their closer, Billy Wagner.

Up and down relief pitcher Aaron Heilman was on a down cycle last night and tried his best to give the lead back to the Padres in the ninth but Jerry Manuel wouldn't let it happen. After giving up a run, a hit and a 3-run homer, Manuel had seen enough. He brought in Joe Smith and Scott Schoenweis to get one out apiece and the Mets hung on.

The Yankees didn't do nearly as well against a Texas team that seems like a Murderer's Row. Young phenom Josh Hamilton greeted Yanks starter Andy Pettite with a 2-run homer and it was all down hill from there. A rookie named Matt Harrison went 7 innings for the Rangers, while Ranger sluggers Chris Davis and David Murphy ensured the win despite some late-game heroics from another Yanks new guy, Richie Sexson, who banged a grand slam to deep centerfield in the 8th.

They don't call these the "dog days of August" for nothing. Major league players have all withstood the rigors of playing about 115 games and they're not that close to the end. Players start getting really tired. The weather is really hot, especially if you're playing in sun-baked Texas. And players start going down.

The Yankees have to hope Joba's shoulder is ok, because if it's not, they're in pretty bad shape overall, what with a 6 1/2 game deficit to the Rays and quite a few games on the road staring them right in the face. While all their trading deadline pickups are working out for them, Nady and now Sexson and Pudge Rodriguez, they never did get the pitcher they coveted, and now they may have lost another starter, maybe their best one.

And, of course, the Mets are going to have to tough it out without their closer. Billy Wagner has some forearm problems for which there was no forewarning. (Sorry). They surely missed him last night. No lead seems secure enough these days for the Mets as all their relievers seem worn out.

Manuel has had to abandon his plans for defining bullpen roles as one after another of them has failed him in big spots, Duaner Sanchez, Aaron Heilman, well, you get the idea. The Mets starting pitching will have to go deep into games for the next week anyway, or until Wagner returns. Hopefully, he'll be able to return.

The Mets seem to enjoy their position just short of the division lead. Much as Big Brown, that magnificent thoroughbred of Derby and Preakness fame, who won the Haskell Stakes Sunday, likes to just hover on the outside shoulder of whatever nag happens to take the lead, so the Mets seem to be just hanging around.

But will the Mets have anywhere near the finishing kick needed to outlast the Phillies or Marlins? I guess we’ll see, but they surely haven’t gone out of their way to improve their situation.

While the Yankees and other teams such as the Dodgers and Brewers made some moves, the Mets have stayed pat. One wonders whether Minaya is on a strong hold from the ownership, once again, much as Big Brown’s jockey practically strangled his mount in the Belmont.

It’ll be nice to get a reprieve from baseball for a while, as the Olympics will take center stage for a couple of weeks. The Games should also give us all a break from the baloney Bret Favre has been dishing out. Can there be a “dog days” of football’s exhibition season? If I read one more thing about the phony “quarterback battle” between Pennington, the clear starter and leader of the Jets, and second-year guy Clemens, I think I’ll be sick.

There is no joy from this corner of the world as this football season kicks off. I cringe at the piracy being foisted on Giants and Jets fans as the Maras and Woody’s of the world cry the blues as to the cost of building a new stadium, THEIR new stadium.

Oh well, at least the taxpayers of New Jersey will be getting a break. The stadium costs will be borne directly by the users. Although there is justice in that, I do hate to see football becoming only a rich man’s game. And, how near is the day when professional football becomes pay-per-view only?

It’s ironic that all this spending on stadiums is happening precisely at the juncture of what may become a very serious recession. And maybe a long-lived one. While I can see the Super Bowl Champion Giants surviving while the rest of the world goes to hell, it’s a little more difficult to say the same about that team with the ugly green uniforms.

Will the Jets be playing before a crowd of 25,000 a year from now? It’s possible. While I can see that a Giants season ticket could be considered an asset, the cost of which could later be transferred to a new owner, will Jets fans feel the same way about their ducats? How much risk will they be willing to assume? Isn’t it easier to just watch from home?

But enough doom and gloom. I guess these really are dog days. I should be looking forward to finally being able to watch Olympic weightlifting on TV, or, at the very least, on my PC. I love all the track and field events. Gymnastics can be interesting, and then there will be soccer and basketball. And, of course, the whole extravaganza of the opening ceremonies coming to us from Beijing.

But will anybody be able to breathe?

The Chemistry Set

How'd you like to come back to the dugout after a big hit and get high-fived by Carlos Beltran and David Wright? And finish the night in first place. Well, that's what Fernando Tatis got to experience last night. He was one of 8 different Mets producers in a game marked by some shaky pitching, some nice hitting from both sides, and comebacks, lots of comebacks.

Ten is good. Ten beats 9 and 11 would be heaven. (No, I didn't really say that). I thought the streak would end at 9. It certainly could have. They were up 2, then down 3 in a flash, then down just 1, then up by 1, then down by 2 before finally ending it up by 2. Wright, Beltran, Easley and Delgado were strong at the core of the lineup while Delgado and Tatis did their best to extend that middle. They even got something out of Nick Evans and Marlon Anderson.

So last night it was hitting. Carlos Delgado was especially impressive, I thought, not so much for his power but for his nice little dump-job single over the shortstop into short left field. If Carlos the Elder doesn't watch out, he may find himself in the National League RBI race. In the last month, he's driven in 23 runs, second only to Jermaine Dye. While he still has a long way to go, with just 55 ribbies on the season, it's conceivable that he could catch a lot of folks.

So there was a lot to be happy about....again. But there were some rough spots on the pitching side of things. Johan Santana wasn't Johan Santana last night. But Aaron Heilman reverted into, well, Aaron Heilman. Johan gave up a 5-spot in the fourth inning, including a couple of dingers, but what the heck, Jake Peavy gave up 4 home runs in his game so it was a strange night all around.

Heilman just allows too many baserunners, base hits and walks too. Last night he managed just 2/3 of an inning, and his three baserunners were inherited by Scott Schoenweis, who tried like the dickens but still wound up allowing them all to score before recording the final out.

It was interesting that Manuel replaced Heilman as soon as he did. And, even though Schoenweis wasn't able to avert the damage, it was the right move. Jerry managed his head off last night, replacing pitchers all night long. And they were the right moves. That they all didn't pan out is secondary.

Those pitching moves do a couple of things. First, they check the momentum. Second, they give the opposing batters something different to look at. But they also keep your team in the game mentally, and that showed last night too.

Who woulda thunk it? The Mets from April and May wouldn’t have come back even once. These Mets came back again and again, continuing a predilection not only for increasing leads but for coming back too. It’s something on which Manuel focused, and it’s working out for them.

Yes, the Mets are finally in first place, tied with the Phils at long last. But the Phils picked up a pretty fancy pitcher yesterday, and the Marlins aren't far back. The Mets need to keep it going, and it'll be up to John Maine tonight, who hasn't been quite as overwhelming as have battery-mates Mike Pelfrey and Oliver Perez, at least not lately.

Tonight will be a good test for him and the Mets as they face the Reds Bronson Arroyo, who can be very good or very bad. We’ll see whether our local boys can get another win to extend that streak, against a team that had had a fairly nice run themselves as of late, before they ran into the juggernaut. The Reds are a very respectable 10-6 since June 28^th.

Those Reds sure can hit a little bit. They were calling Adam Dunn Dave Kingman last night but he looked like more to me, as a batter anyway. He does have a little trouble keeping his feet while rounding the bases. And Ken Griffey Jr. is pretty much as advertised. Then there’s Brandon Phillips and Joey Votto, not a lineup that can be taken lightly for sure.

And baseball is a strange game. A pitcher can, all of a sudden, pitch lights out. Batters can get cold. For no reason whatsoever. And then there’s the law of averages. How many teams win more than ten in a row?

But the Mets played last night as if they really, really wanted that tenth win. They certainly didn’t play like a team resting on its laurels. From the manager to the pinch-hitter, they were definitely paying attention, as if they knew the slender thread that separates winning from losing is a very thin one, and as if they were determined to fend off that first loss, for, once losing, who knows what will be on the other side?

The Mets had every reason to lose last night. Not only was there the streak, but there was the break too. Surely they couldn’t be expected to put one more win up on the board. But they did it, in a pretty spectacular fashion too, a fact that I’m sure was not lost on the Phillies, or the Marlins, for that matter.

The Phils have already picked up Joe Blanton from the seemingly inexhaustible inventory of pitching in the Oakland A’s organization. All in all, a smart pickup for them, given that the guy eats up a lot of innings, has pitched really well in the not too far recent past, and will probably pitch better in a pennant race.

Omar Minaya may be burning up the phone lines, but somehow I don’t think so. We haven’t heard one good rumor. I suspect he’ll make a move when he feels that he has to do so. Chemistry after all is a delicate thing.

And the Mets have some right now.