Who Am I if the Mets Are Good?

[batmagadanleadoff]

Who Am I if the Mets Are Good?

By Devin Gordon
Mr. Gordon is the author of “So Many Ways to Lose: The Amazin’ True Story of the New York Mets — the Best Worst Team in Sports.”


https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/23/opin ... -york.html

Long opinion NYT piece on the Mets.

Excerpt:

The New York Mets managed to put together a perfect season last year, despite failing to win the World Series. This should be impossible — a title seems like a prerequisite for perfection — and for any other franchise, for any other fan base, it would be. But when you root for a team that’s won just two championships in its 63-year history, and none since 1986 — a team famous not just for losing but for losing with cartoonish flair and bottomless invention — you learn to be a little flexible.

For Mets fans, 2024 offered an unfamiliar combination: a feeling of accomplishment unlike anything we’ve experienced in decades (that’s easy — very low bar) and the total absence of accompanying anguish (that’s much, much harder). Yes, the Mets wound up getting brushed aside by the stacked Los Angeles Dodgers on that team’s march toward its own championship, but a crucial part of what made 2024 so magical is what didn’t happen to the Mets along the way. There was no epic collapse or humiliating blunder, no scapegoats, no lingering resentments. The Mets had a crazy run of historic moments that I’ll be rewatching on YouTube for the rest of my life, and then we just got beat by a better team.

Then, somehow, the mood got even better. In December, Steve Cohen, the team’s billionaire owner, tempted the off-season’s marquee superstar, Juan Soto, into ditching the Yankees, our hated crosstown rivals. Then, for good measure, Uncle Steve splurged and brought back Pete “The Polar Bear” Alonso, a fan favorite. Mr. Cohen and his front office deftly navigated two wildly different contract negotiations — a leaguewide bidding war for a generational player and an awkward staredown over a homegrown hero — and came away winners both times. Pause on that for a moment: Mets fans can actually trust the Mets front office to make smart decisions! It’s no wonder that, three months into 2025 with spring training in full bloom and a new season nearly upon us, Mets fans are floating on air.

[Fman99]

Good read, except of course that it was not a perfect season. You can't call it that if they don't with the championship. It was a great season and maybe my favorite one since 1986.

[Johnny Lunchbucket]

The first three months were not compatible with the concept of perfection. I know they made the rest of the season look better but not perfect

[roger_that]

The first three months were not compatible with the concept of perfection.

The concept they were compatible with was "clusterfuck." Possibly "shit show." How can it possibly be overlooked how gutwrenchingly awful they were?

[stevejrogers]

The first three months were not compatible with the concept of perfection. I know they made the rest of the season look better but not perfect

At least now the overly optimistic fans can put away the “The 1986 Mets got off to a 3-5 start” every time the Mets get off on a slow start a week in!

[batmagadanleadoff]

I would like to buy a vowel.

[MFS62]

Good catch.

Who Am I if the Mets Are Good?

Mister Smiley Face.

Later