Shea Goodbye

I did not want to talk about this, but it was been with me since I saw the ball settle into Cameron Maybin’s glove around 5 o’clock on Sunday. For the 3^rd year in a row I saw my Mets lose an elimination game, only this year came with a little different emotion. In 2006 after the Mets lost a game 7 at home in the NLCS and last year after the epic collapse I felt angry. I was tired of rooting for teams that found a way to break my heart every season, and I did not recover until the beginning of this Baseball season.

In 2008, however, it was a very different feeling. Unlike most Met fans, I understood that the 07 collapse was a fluke thing and this version of the team, armed with Johan Santana, would surely make me forget about 2007. Looking back on April I don’t think I have ever been more excited or optimistic about the start of any of my teams seasons…boy am I a gullible idiot.

The season started off in disappointment with Pedro getting hurt in his first start and the team playing under .500 ball. David Wright and Ryan Church were the only ones hitting and Carlos Delgado was on the cusp of being released. The Mike Pelfry experiment looked as though it was a big mistake and he was about to be sent back down to the minors. Still the Mets did enough to float around the .500 mark and I was confident they just needed one little spark to get everything rolling.

Almost 3 months into the season, the Mets received that spark with the firing of their worthless manger Willie Randolph. Omar decided to go with the experience of bench coach Jerry Manuel and I was unsure about the choice, but willing to take anything that wasn’t Randolph. Sure enough things began to run on all cylinders as the Mets went into the All Star break riding a 10 game winning streak and a season high 7 games over .500.

Things were clicking under Manuel and the Mets looked poised to take the NL East crown. They stormed through August going 18-10 and saw themselves sitting atop the Division with a 2 game lead. The dreaded month on September had arrived and the only thing on everyone’s mind was shaking the ghosts of 2007. At the mark of 17 games left to play, where everything went wrong last year, the Mets were 82-64 with a 4 game lead in the loss column over the Phils.

Fast forward two weeks later to Friday September 26 and the Mets had let the division all but slip away. Entering the last weekend at Shea they sat 1 back with 3 to play and even in the Wild Card chase with the Brewers. To avoid making this a summary on the season, I will assume everyone knows how the weekend ended as all us Met fans got to Shea goodbye.

As the game ended, I sat speechless staring at the screen. I was not mad, I was not upset, I was stunned and disappointed. I know I should have expected this but 2008 was supposed to be different. Many want to sit and point fingers and say that Wright or Reyes did not hit in the clutch, or the bullpen blew it again, or the rotation other than Santana could not go deep into games, but the bottom line is something is just missing from this team.

I can say that if they had Jerry Manuel all year things would have been different, but that is not just another excuse. The bottom line is the team had a 4 game lead with 17 to play and a 2 game lead with 7 to play and ended up blowing both. I cannot tell you what caused this and what to do to fix it. I can list players they need to acquire and players they need to rid themselves of, but if bringing in Johan Santana did not do the job I cannot imagine what player will.

The whole last day of the season I was debating weather I would watch the closing ceremonies of Shea after the game if the Mets lost. Once the game ended I did not want anything to do with the Mets or sports in general. Somehow though in a room with a Yankee, Cub and Red Sox fan the post-game show was left on and I began to watch the ceremony.

After watching Mike Piazza and Tom Seaver walk out to Centerfield and shut the gates of Shea Stadium for the last time I was full of emotion. I was still disappointed and in shock from the loss, and all I could think about was how great it would have been for the 2008 team to be apart of that ceremony. On the other hand I had a tear in my eye because that same team that has disappointed me so many times would never play another game in the only place I knew them to play.

As the festivities ended I put all that disappointment behind me and said goodbye to Shea. After another tragic weekend and season I realized that there is nothing the Mets can do to make me stop caring. With tears in my eyes I sat there and got closure on the 2008 season and the last thing I can remember thinking was “I cannot wait until 2009.”