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Pretty much a lost day if you’re a fan if one of these teams.  After a very disappointing game this afternoon, the Mets turned it on tonight and won an extremely important game.

The offense was non-existant during the first two games of this series, but they got it going against Cole Hamels. They hit him hard all night long.

Carlos Delgado mashed the ball tonight.  He’s up to 33 homers and 100 RBI, which means he’s very much alive for the MVP race.  His comeback story is simply amazing.

Johan Santana did what an ace does, stick with it and give your team a great chance to win.  He got off to a poor start but finished very strong.  He still hasn’t lost since the end of June.

David Wright continues to struggle.  The Mets need him to bust out of this slump fast.

And Pedro Martinez did not look good in the opener.  You’d love to believe he’ll turn it around in October, but it’s tough to have any confidence in him right now.

All in all, the Phillies needed this series more than the Mets, so you can’t be furious our boys lost two of three.  Winning the final game was huge to maintain a two-game lead on the division.   Also, if they lost tonight, whispers of a September collapse would start rearing its ugly head again.  This could be a big week for the Mets with two home series against the Nats and Braves, while the Phillies play the Marlins and the Brewers.

This was much closer than the score appears.  It’s one of those rare games where you aren’t even that upset the team lost.  The Mets have been playing really well lately, and they just ran into a guy (Brett Myers) with lights-out stuff tonight.

Myers was electric tonight.  He was getting the curve over and had a good fastball, striking out 10 guys.

The promising thing was the ninth inning for the Mets.  Every at-bat was a good one, and Lidge was fortunate to close the game out.

Mike Pelfrey was excellent tonight.  He just continues to get better with each start.

Greg Dobbs barely hit one over the fence for Pelfrey’s only allowed earned runs.  That was huge since the Mets would have easily scored a run in the ninth, but David Wright played it safe on the base paths as he should have since his run was meaningless.

Wright had a nice at-bat in the ninth too, which you hope carries over to tomorrow’s game.  He really looks Arod-ian with runners on though.  Not good, Mr. Wright.

Let’s hope Pedro can get it going tomorrow so Santana can go for the series win on Sunday night.  Don’t want to let the Phillies close within one game.

Big series this weekend against the Phillies.  Just wanted to point how dominant the Mets have been over the past month.  They haven’t lost a series since leaving Houston on August 3rd, which was 10 series ago. 

The Mets have a shot to really put the Phillies to bed this weekend.  If they can sweep and open up a six-game lead, it might be all she wrote for the Phils.  Also, keep an eye on the Cubs and Brewers.  The Mets are only six games behind the Cubbies and a game behind the Brew crew.  I’d love to see the Phillies catch up and pass the Brewers in the Wild Card so the Mets would get to play the NL West winner in the first round.  Here’s a quick, yet very confident prediction.  The NL pennant winner will not come out of the NL West.

Ted’s bold prediction looks even bolder considering what happened this week.  He thinks David Wright is set to explode against the Phillies.  After more than 48 hours of rest, I hope that’s all David needs to get his head on straight.  So look for Mr. Wright to come through against the Mets’ NL East rivals.

I’ve never been prouder in 2008 to be a Mets fan.  The Mets put an absolute hurting on the Brewers this week to cap off an extremely successful 6-2 road trip. 

As Gary Cohen said, the amazing part of this road trip was that the Mets blew the first game after having a 7-0 lead.  I did write in that recap that I saw the season going one of two ways…the Mets continue to fall or they wake up and stop giving away games.  Well I’m glad the Mets chose the latter.

What was also nice was the Mets finally won a game they didn’t have to sweat out.  Some of the bullpen guys were given a rest so they’re ready for the big Phillies series.

Ollie Perez was pretty sharp after an awkward first inning.  He continues to be the best third starter in the NL the past few months.

Good to see Ryan Church get it going.  He was the team’s MVP before he got hurt, and he’s showing signs of getting out of his slump.  His first inning grand slam took the Brewers out of this thing nice and early.

What’s also amazing is that the Mets are winning without any production from David Wright.  He looks absolutely terrible right now.  They need to get him going before the playoffs.

Well besides opening up a three-game lead on the Phils, the Mets closed to 1.5 behind the Brewers just in case they need a Wild Card spot, and they’re only six games behind the Cubs for homefield advantage in the NL.

Things are looking bright for the Mets and I think after this weekend they’ll look even better.

What an amazing road trip as Ron Darling just said.  The Mets are 5-2 on this eight-game swing so far, and they lost the first game by blowing a 7-0 lead.  Gotta be proud of the boys.

Jon Niese had moments tonight where he looked real good, but he just fell apart in the fourth.  I hope the Mets give him some more chances so his confidence doesn’t get killed.

But the story of tonight’s game was the outstanding play of the bullpen.  They threw seven, yes SEVEN scoreless innings tonight.  That’s 10 scoreless since the new guys came on board.  Like I told Ted, sometimes these guys get motivated when they know their jobs are on the line.

Extra points for Nelson Figueroa and Brian Stokes.  These are the hot hands Jerry has been talking about and I think both of them will play crucial roles in getting this team to October.  Hopefully they won’t need them tomorrow so they’re nice and rested for Friday.

Endy Chavez gets some credit for this win too.  He made an outstanding throw to nail Ricky Weeks at second base in the eighth inning.  Then he got the game-winning RBI with a sac fly in the 10th.  The fringe guys have been awesome for this team during this recent stretch.

If they can sweep the Brewers, they would have a whole lot of confidence when these teams likely meet in the NLDS.  Tomorrow is a monster game, and I have a lot of faith the boys can get the job done.

Another nice bounceback win for the Mets today after a tough loss last night.  Unlike in previous games, the Mets were able to get some huge tack-on runs in the 7th inning. 

Sadly, you knew if they weren’t getting those runs this team was going to lose.  But Jose Reyes and Ryan Church drove in some monster runs for the team.

Carlos Beltran slugged a long home run in the second inning to get the Mets going.  Boy would the Mets love to get him hot.

Good to see Nick Evans get in his first career homer.  Omar thinks he has 20-homerun power…I dunno about that, but I’m happy to see Evans doing much better lately.

Tomorrow is going to be a huge lift for this team.  They’re adding five pitchers to the equation with the September callups.  You gotta hope a couple of those arms can get hot and help carry this bullpen through the final month of the season.  Look at Bobby Parnell and Al Reyes to get some key outs over the next few weeks.

Just when we get two in a row in unusual fashion, the 2008 Mets we’ve grown to hate showed up tonight.  They score three runs in the first three innings and then do nothing as the bullpen blows it.

It’s amazing how many times they’ve lost a three-or-more run lead, yet have only come back from down three-plus runs one time.  Part of that has to do with the fact that they’re rarely down by three runs because their rotation is excellent and they score early runs, but you wish they would hold onto more games.

Mike Pelfrey was very good tonight against a team he usually struggles against.  He had one rough inning which unfortunately killed the team, but you’ll take 6.2 IP and two runs every time from Big Pelf.

The bullpen continues to be a disaster in progress.  Pedro Feliciano, as he normally does, can’t retire the first guy he faces so Duaner Sanchez has to work more than one inning.  Well he gets the job done in the seventh and then on cue gives up a solo bomb to former-Met Mike Jacobs.

Brian Stokes is pretty much the only guy in this bullpen who is getting the job done.  He might be the permanent set-up guy for a while.

Aaron Heilman was back to his old self after an amazing performance on Tuesday.  How do you walk in the winning run on a 3-1 pitch?  I mean throw a meatball and at least give your defense a chance.  Ugh, just terrible.

Now the Mets are back to clinging to a one-game lead after the Phillies won this afternoon.  Just another one of those games the Mets can look back on if they fall short of postseason ball by a few games.

On Tuesday night the Mets had their worst loss of the season.  Well tonight might have been their best win.  With no one on and two outs down by a run and Luis Castillo up, things looked bleak for the Metropolitans.  But all of a sudden, this is the team that scores down the stretch and comes back!

Three straight guys get on and Carlos Beltran steps to the plate.  Beltran has failed so often in situations like this and really has had an underwhelming season.  But with one gigantic swing of the bat, he changed all of that.  If the Mets go on to win the division, Beltran’s blast will be perhaps the most memorable moment of the season. 

The bottom of the ninth was dicey beyond belief, but Luis Ayala did something that many Mets relievers have failed to do this season.  He hung on for dear life and got the job done. 

The Mets are winners this Friday night, and the Phillies are losers.  We’re two games ahead, and it’s looking as strong as ever that we’re going to be playing in October.  Thank you Carlos Beltran!

Greg…ask and you shall receive. I love it. Everyone is complaining saying how can you do this mid-season? Well how would you like it if the umps blew a home run call against the Phillies that winds up costing the Mets the division. And honestly, if a call favored the Mets I wouldn’t want them to win like that anyway.

MLB noticed a problem, and they’re correcting it.  Good job by them.  And if the umpires weren’t so damn awful, we wouldn’t need to do this.  But the umps blew a call for Carlos Beltran in the third game of the season against the Marlins and then of course everyone remembers the terrible call against Carlos Delgado against the Yankees.  When you think about it, Delgado should have 31 homers nad 95 RBI….aka MVP numbers.

Well that was a stunner in the opposite way.  I’m shocked the Mets actually came back on the road and beat the Phillies late in a game.

I really though the only way the Mets were winning tonight was if Johan Santana threw a ridiculous game.  But actually Santana wasn’t very good tonight.  He gave up three runs in the first two innings, but he did settle down after that to pitch very four very strong innings.

Carlos Delgado gets the golden star for this game.  How clutch was the big guy!?  He got a two-out run scoring single in the first and then hit two solo bombs to tie the game.  He now has 30 homers and 93 RBI for the season.  He’s going to surpass his numbers in 2006 if he keeps his pace.

Big surprise that Daniel Murphy gets the game-winning RBI.  This guy has been awesome all year long, and he came through tonight in a big way.  That double to the opposite field off Brad Lidge was one of the biggest hits all season.

The bullpen has to credit for tonight’s win.  Brian Stokes, Pedro Feliciano, Joe Smith and Luis Ayala got the job done tonight.  These guys failed last night, but they were able to rebound and help give the Mets a win tonight.

I was pissed after last night’s loss and deservedly so.  This team gets off to good starts and then folds at the end of games.  But I have to give this team credit on one thing…they seem to bounce back from tough losses really well.  It seems like every time I go on a long rant about this team is so mentally fragile, they win the next night.  While they did score another run in the first tonight, they actually came back and outscored the Phillies from the 7th inning on, which is rare.  All in all, a split isn’t terrible but they really should have swept this team.

The Phillies go to Chicago for four games, which means the Mets should probably have a 2.5 game lead by the end of the weekend.  The Mets have a much-needed off day tomorrow and then travel to Florida for three.  The Marlins are basically baked so I’m expecting at worst, a two-out-of-three series win.