Mets 6, Brewers 5 (51-55, 8 GB)

First of all, a big apology. This is no way to start a new feature on this site, by promising your e-mails on Wednesday and not delivering. On the other hand, it still is Wednesday as I write this, so it's not really like I lied. Next week, though, I will have the mailblog ready by Wednesday morning, to keep consistent with your regular reading schedules.

I hope everyone remembered to watch my brother's show Wednesday night. If you watched it, you missed the Mets tying the game at 3, but you could have switched over immediately afterwards and seen the Mets take the lead. I hope you watched it, that show is more funny every time I watch it.

Damn the Mets. Everytime I want to write them off, they come back and look fairly impressive. Now they're scoring runs...if they keep this up, with the great pitching we expect from the staff, they might have one more run in them. Damn the Mets. Damn me for thinking so damn positively.

Let's check out the mail, because the first e-mail illustrates my above point about the Mets' "one more run" this season:

Kathryn in Watertown writes, "I've been looking at the Braves' record and the Mets' record. Let's say that the Braves win half of their games for the rest of the year. They'll finish out at 87-75. That means the Mets will have to win nearly 2/3 of their remaining games to finish ahead of the Braves. (If they win 2 out of 3 they'll end up at 89-73). So my question is, do you think this is possible or did the Mets screw themselves out of another year this past weekend?"

Well, Kathryn, the Mets sure didn't help themselves any by being swept by the Braves this past weekend. And I think it's asking an awful lot for the Braves to win only half their games the rest of the way. But that's what we, as Mets fans, have to hope for. And to be honest, 2 out of every three is not a stretch for the Mets, depending on how Victor Zambrano pitches on Thursday afternoon. I believe we've already seen Kris Benson's worst start (on Saturday against Atlanta), and Tom Glavine is not likely to pitch as poorly as he did on Sunday. Al Leiter has been awesome, and Steve Trachsel has strung together a few pretty good outings in a row. So if the pitching keeps them in games, starting with Zambrano's first start in a Mets uniform on Thursday, who knows what the Mets are capable of.

Here's another e-mail, this one from Dave, in Brighton, "Longtime reader firsttime writer.
10 GB. At what point do you fire up johnnyjets.blogspot.com?"

Well, Dave, johnnyjets.blogspot.com will be frequently updated during training camp, and I will direct your attention there through this site as I write about the Jets. But the deficit's 8 games. So we can't give up hope on the Mets just yet. Thanks for the plug on johnnyjets.blogspot.com.

Here's another e-mail I received, which I believe to be a ruse: "Nice blog, man. Thanks for the kind words. Keep it up!
-TGBWEL"

TGBWEL, of course, stands for THE GREATEST BALLPLAYER WHO EVER LIVED, and the name on the e-mail was Jose Reyes. But I think someone, namely Kathryn from Watertown, is playing a cruel, cruel joke on me.

OK. This is a regular weekly event, so if you want to share your thoughts, drop me a line, johnnymetsmail@yahoo.com

Just a note on Bob Murphy, who died Tuesday of lung cancer. Murphy could also be known as TGBWEL - THE GREATEST BROADCASTER WHO EVER LIVED. There was nothing like sitting by a radio on a summer day/night, listening to Murphy broadcast the Mets. He may have lost a bit over the years, but just hearing his voice was reassuring, even when the Mets sucked. I don't really know how to express how good he was. If you're a Mets fan, you know. If you didn't grow up listening to Bob Murphy call the Mets, I don't know how to express what you missed. But I'll try. Imagine listening to a baseball game, and having the perfect picture of the game painted for you. And imagine not even thinking about who was describing the game to you. I hope that begins to give you an idea of what made Bob Murphy so great.