Head on Collision

(Note: This piece contains a vaguely NSFW picture that you're probably looking at right now.)

The Mets have lost 5 games in a row, and 9 of their last 10. As was discussed yesterday, they look worse than Tom Hanks in the last half hour of Philadelphia.

The Yankees have won 9 games in a row. After months of shittiness, all of a sudden the Yankees can't lose. They look better than Ali Larter in the whip cream bikini.

Sickly Tom Hanks vs. Hot Ali Larter isn't exactly how any of us would have drawn it up, but hey, we don't deal the cards, we just play the ones we've got.

So it's a shitty feeling right now. The vulnerability is palpable. A sweep at the hands of the Yankees would be too much to endure. We could fall out of first for the first time in a long time, but worse than that is the entire climate of the city would change, baseball-wise. Big brother restored; little brother, know your role.

So in many ways this is a scary series, but it's also a tremendous opportunity. Who better to turn it around against than the Yankees? Who better to snap the Yankees' 9-game winning streak than the Mets? Think of the glory... my god, the glory!

The more I think about it, the more it reminds me of 1999. It was Mets-Yankees in the Bronx and if memory serves the Bombers took the first two of the series, sending the Mets' losing streak to 8 games. I think that brought our record to something like 28-27. A strong team was underachieving. It was decided a change had to be made.

General Manager Steve Phillips fired three coaches; the hitting coach was one of them, the other two I'm not sure (Bob Apodaca ('Dac!) maybe?). The Mets went on to win the final game of the series, and later finished the season with 97 wins, the final one coming in a one-game playoff against the Reds to loft the Metsies into the playoffs.

In that case, the Mets made a dramatic move after a deep slide. This time around, I don't know that that would happen. Of the coaching staff, I gotta think Willie, Jerry Manuel, Rick Peterson and HoJo are untouchable. The only one who's vulnerable is Rick Down, particularly with Carlos Delgado mired in a season-long slump and the lineup, as a whole, underachieving.

Down may not deserve the blame for their inability to drive in runners from third with less than 2 out or drive in any runners in scoring position, but as they say, you can't fire the players so you fire the coaches.

I'm really just speculating here, mostly because I'm tired of talking about the Mets losing. Me and Sip are on record saying we're not altogether too concerned about this slide. Our attitude: It's frustrating, it sucks, but the Mets are better than this, there are only so many wins and losses in a hot or cold streak, as all things do, this too shall pass. Blah blah blah.

And who knows, maybe they win tonight? And maybe then they win tomorrow, and the next day? Maybe three months from now as the Mets charge closer and closer to 95 wins we say with a chuckle, Remember that horrible stretch in mid June?

For now let's just entertain that possibility, shall we? Enjoy your weekends everybody.

- A.F.O.M.G.

(Images courtesy of ngdev.net and baseball-almanac.com)