The Mets last night were the darling of those who love baseball oddities. We can’t imagine there has ever been another game in baseball history that featured an inside-the-park home run, a triple play, and a knuckleballer. If last night’s game were a video game, the Mets would have unlocked a ton of badges. All but the “win” one, anyway.
Angel Pagan, a player who’s a little better than he seems but not nearly good enough to play as often as he does, was the quirky superstar for the Mets, personally responsible for the triple play and the inside-the-parker. (Who knows, maybe he threw a knuckleball in the dugout, too.) The Mets still lost 5–3 to the Nationals and Livan Hernandez, who might be the only pitcher in the majors whose fastball is slower than a knuckleball. The Mets have now won only two of their last eleven games.
David Wright didn’t play yesterday, a day off that happened to coincide with one of the uglier games (and slumps, really) of his career. He’ll be back in the lineup for the second game of the short set with the Nationals. Did you realize the Mets are 5–14 on the road? They’re also 5–13 this month. And the Yankees are coming by Citi Field this weekend for three games. The Mets need to win four.