Sip's World Tour and the New Mets Secret Weapon

Sip's world tour made a stop in heaven this past weekend, aka, Norman, Oklahoma.

Nice people, the most beautiful girls I've ever seen, and an entire town of people that bleeds Sooner red. As a die hard sports fan I can comfortably say that there is no better environment in sports than a big time college football game in the South. 90,000 people in school colors, with the well being of an entire state on the shoulders of 100 18-22 year olds. When the Mets lost last year a few million New Yorkers were devastated while many more couldn't care less. When Oklahoma blew out Miami on Saturday afternoon, the entire state was buzzing. Short, tall, skinny, fat, man, woman. Everyone cared. It was really pretty awesome.



It was also pretty sweet in that it was the first time that me and my 3 best friends from summer camp had been in the same room together in ten years, one of the big four is Jeff Capel's guy for the basketball program, which was also pretty sweet. One name to watch out for: Blake Griffin.

But enough of that. The description above is meant solely to help our millions of readers understand my current mood- a good one.

With this happiness we've seen the Mets play their best baseball of the season and Eli Manning play his best game as a Giant. Sip's a pretty happy guy.

Before we go happy with the Mets let me get in a few quick lines on the Giants. Can't say enough about the offense. With a healthy Amani Toomer and what looks like a decent #3 WR in Steve Smith, the offense looked as good as it ever has. Funny that Tiki Barber, who really needs to just shut his mouth, was watching from the sidelines. It's pretty sad that his legacy has gone from Giant great, to the football player that wants to be on The View.




Unfortunately for the Giants, the D has about 3 NFL worthy starters (Strahan, Osi and Pierce) and 8 below average defenders. With the injuries to Eli and Jacobs we could be looking at a very very bad season. Oh well.

The Mets will be playing for at least half of it and a lot of that is the result of one somewhat unheralded player: Moises Alou

The Mets are 39-25 in games where Alou starts this season and 43-36 in games that he doesn't. They are 25-16 since his return to the lineup in late July.

Alou is the balancing act. He evens out the lineup. He was the right handed bat that the Mets craved last season, the team's one real vulnerability. Since his return on July 27th David Wright's batting average has jumped 24 points. Of course a lot of this can be attributed to putting him in the 3 spot and a lot can be attributed to the randomness in baseball. But maybe just maybe this has something to do with having an extra right handed thumper in the lineup that prevented pitchers from pitching around the Mets one right-handed threat.



The Mets are actually a really good team right now.

With the return of Pedro they are throwing out a very good pitcher every single night. With Wright and Beltran crushing the ball the lineup is again truly imposing and the bullpen of late has looked pretty decent, too.

The Mets look like they will be in October. Thats the good part.

From there, it will take a lot of luck. A good couple of weeks out of some key pitchers and the Mets can make a run. But as we saw last year, a few late inning blunders and a few decent starts from an opposing pitcher and the season is over, even when we are the better team.

For now, all I can say is...

BOOMER SOONER!

Oh.

And Lets go Mets!

Vaya,
Sip

Before I close, I just wanted to take a minute to pay my respects to everyone who lost someone in the attacks of September 11th, 2001. That remains the most vivid day of my life.

(Pics courtesy of Stadiumpanaramics.com, comcast.net, nypost.com)