The 700 Club

Big day in New York sports on Sunday. Pedro returned to the Shea Stadium mound. Roger Federer continued his run of Grand Slam titles and awkwardly self-congratulatory victory speeches. Brother Eli actually had some flashes of inspired play. Britney looked coked out of her mind.

And Y2K, the little website that could, notched its 700 career post in just under two years. If you'd have asked me in October 2005 whether this site would get to 700 posts I'd have said no chance in hell, but here we are. Go us!

None of it, of course, is enough to convince Matt Cerrone to include us among the "Other Mets Blogs" on his site, but whatever. He also still lists us as being at yankees2000.blogspot.com, which we left in December of last year. But whatever.

In any event, yes it was a big sports day yesterday, but obviously the only storyline I really followed with legitimate interest was the return of Pedro.

And what a thing it was. What a showman that guy is; honestly, can you think of another figure who so delights the home crowd? Yankee fans admire and love Jeter, but does he fill them with glee?

Ewing, Messier, Piazza, the great New York sports figures of our youth, did they thrill you the way Pedro does? It's basically impossible to watch Pedro perform without immediately becoming really happy.

It's not a knock on any of those guys -- hell, I loved the Monster as much as any Mets fan around. Ewing? New York hasn't been the same since he left. But neither of them had that same quality that Pedro does, that rare gift to impart joy in the audience. It's just such a pleasure to watch.

Needless to say, none of that charisma is worth a damn if Pedro is getting rocked, but through 10 innings at least that hasn't been happening. He's got another three starts or so before the playoffs, plenty of time to build arm strength, shake off any lingering rust and show us the pitcher he will be, post-surgery. Let's hope he gets to a place where we all feel good about him taking the ball in Game 1 at Shea.

In other Mets happenings, Carlos Beltran has somehow managed to get his numbers into totally good season territory and David Wright has some SERIOUSLY bad acne thing going on right now. Yikes.

And tomorrow's 9/11. Every year I intend to write something really heartfelt about it but I never do. Let's just say I nearly weep every time I see footage of Piazza hitting that homerun in the first game back in New York after it happened.

Anyway, that's all for now. The Giants are down 10 with 7:20 to play as I finish this. Remember when we used to call Eli "Captain Comeback"? Well how 'bout it, Eli?

- A.F.O.M.G.