Giants 4, Mets 3 - More Disappointing than any Mid-April Loss Has any Right to Be

This guy, this friggin' guy.

Sometime last season I wrote that it seemed like the Mets were in a perfect balance where for every positive thing that happened, an equally awful thing had to occur to set the universe back on its axis.  Well, that couldn't be more true than tonight when the Mets were just stumbling along like a bunch of fools, decided to play baseball for a couple of innings, but only just enough to get fans' hopes up before dashing them with some truly terrible extra innings play.  

Look, I'm not going to hide from the fact that one of my favorite targets on the team is Jason Bay, but he has looked, dare I say, dangerous in the box lately, hitting some big home runs against Philadelphia and Atlanta, and then another one this evening when the Mets had fallen behind, 3-0.  

He was also able to leg out the infield single in the bottom of the ninth that started the Mets rally, and came around to tie the game after Josh Thole capped a wonderful at-bat by singling just past a diving second baseman into right field.  However, all that being said....

How the HELL do you have the tying run and third and the winner at second and take the absolute MEATBALL you take for strike two, and then swing at the CLEARLY OUTSIDE pitch to become the second out in the 10th inning?  I need to give more credit to pitchers but I absolutely abhor when there is a runner at third with fewer than two outs and a team is unable to drive him in, it is against the very nature of a game that some of these men have been playing for UPWARDS OF 25 YEARS.  

And Kirk Nieuwenhuis.  Ah, how you know me too well.  Nothing puts a hop in my step like a homegrown talent made good coming up and just fitting right in, doing what he's called to do, and even surprising at times, (as was the case with his dramatic game-tying home run against the Nationals in the season's first week, and tonight's opposite field shot that made it 3-2.)  

Then you work a walk after Bay's infield single and demonstrate some smarts on the base paths by making it to third from first on Thole's single, putting yourself into position to score the winning run.  

And then you run into a tag play at home and become the second out. 

Look, I cannot give Brandon Belt enough credit for the absolutely amazing play he made to keep the Mets from winning the game, but Kirk, you need to protect yourself there.  

At any rate, this feels like one of those games that, either way, has the power to tip a season. If you win it early, it goes down as a chemistry win, pulling victory from defeat and everyone doing their part to get a W.  If you win, you are 8-5 and your mini-skid is over, the bad taste from a pretty bad series in Atlanta washed clean.  

However, if you lose, you are 7-6, deflated, your bullpen is spent, and you are just kicking yourself over what could have been.  This was pretty lame, guys.