The Mets are 4.5 games behind the Brewers in the wild card race. I would love to win the division. But the reality is that the Mets need to be ready to beat everyone who stands in their way this season. And if the Mets can't defeat the Phillies then the brew crew is next in line. Let's Go Mets!

After this very important series with the brewers, we play teh phillies in obviously the hugest series of the year and then we have cake the rest of the way until the cubs in the second to last series of the year. entering this crucial series vs. the brewers with a slim 1 game lead, and with the phillies playing the laughingstock nationals, the mets just nead to tread water. if we exit this series identical to where we were in the standings when we entered it, with just our 1 game lead, we should be very pleased. then as long as do well vs. the phillies, and are able to leave the phillies series either slimly above or tied with the phils, we should have it made. not to jinx anything, especially with what happened last year, but after the phillies series we get the braves nationals braves nationals, in that order. if we have a lead STARTING that stretch, it would take another serious collapse to blow it or even not add to it against such lame teams. we wrap up the year against the cubs, another toughy, and then the marlins, who are decent but falling out of contention fast. also, 5 of those last 6 sereis i just mentioned are at home, and the phillies have most of their remaining schedule on the road. so if we can hold our own against the phils and brewers this week, hopefully still leading once we're through, i would be confident that we would be able to make the playoffs against such lackluster teams with the play we have seen recently.

the bats looked very un-clutch in the middle innings, coming away from severa must-score situations empty handed, but delgado saved us in the 8th inning once again with a big homer and church gave us some insurance. that coupled with another excellent outing by johan (have we ever seen him even sweat this season, much less struggle? consistent excellence means that in my mind johan should be a cy young contender) and a rock solid bullpen effort aided by recent roster-expansion call-ups was good enough for the W. the phillies are down 6-3, and if the nats can hold em off it would be great because for some reason a 2 game lead sounds sooooooo much more secure than a 1 game lead.

Report Card:

Starting pitching- A.

Lineup- B.

Bullpen- A+. using figueroa is a great idea and i'm glad omar thought of it. i say we give stokes, smith, figueroa, rincon, and parnell all the shots with our bullpen for a while to see if they can carry the load better than schoenweiss, feliciano, sanchez and heilman have.

I was really impressed with the bullpen today and Johna had a great outing. However, we have to be able to score in the middle if we're gonna take this division. We cannot continue to get by while only scoring in the 1st and 8th inning. And most importantly, we have to be able to drive in runners with the bases loaded. Hell, we should at least try to score with a runner on third at least 90% of the time.

The Brewers have been very hot lately. Although there were many runners left on, the Met pitching was strong and it shows that the Mets can find ways to win. And another dinger for Carlos Delgado. It's too bad that Beltran came up with what seems to be a minor injury today, bruising his knee. That's really too bad since Carlo Beltran was really heating up.

Let's not overlook the amazing confluence of events that has Philadelphia hitting a hot Washington team. When has THAT ever happened? Last thing I wanted to see was Philadelphia steamroll over them for 3-4 games or whatever they're playing. We play a contender, they play a last-place team but WE pad our tenuous lead by a game!

This is most definitely crunch time. The Mets get another win over the Brewers last night but those damn Phillies are keeping pace. It's no time to back off the throttle. Beltran is awakening and this is the time to prove the Mets mettle. We can do it. Lets Go Mets!

Not to jinx anything, but that's 3 consecutive great wins against one of the best teams in the NL. perez gave us another excellent start, the bullpen was lights out (though they only had to work for 2 and 1/3 innings) and the bats exploded. great all around. sweeping the series, especially against such a great team, is a huge boost of confidence and momentum heading back to Shea to take on the Phils. hopefully the phils will lose tonight and we will climb to 3 games ahead, but even if not you have to be happy with our teams performance.

Report Card:

Starting Pitching: B+.

Bullpen: A.

Lineup: A.

Keep up the good work mets!

...when I log on at work to check out the night's matchup and prepare to keep one eye on the Gameday thing on mets.com only to find out that I didn't know it was a day game and we already won, 9-2. Sweet.

At the right time. This was a big sweep of the Brewers because it gives the Mets the win (4 games to 2) in the season series. That's real important just in case there is a tiebreaker necessary. And the Phillies lose so the Mets are now up by 3 games in the division.

Nice to see Ryan Church break out with the first inning slam. And scoreless innings have been rare coming from Duaner Sanchez lately. Perhaps something has been corrected in Duaner's mechanics. I sure hope so.

You have to think the Phillies series is a win-win situation. We're outplaying them now and defeating them head-to-head. A 3-game lead makes the outcomes anywhere from acceptable to outstanding:

W.......L.......NL East Lead
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0.......3.......Tied.........Unlikely but how much of the year would we have killed to be even?

1.......2.......2.0..........Lose the series and still be where we were yesterday? Sure.

2.......1.......4.0..........Another two games off the magic #.

3.......0.......6.0..........Unlikely but not as unlikely as a Philly sweep. We're the ones undefeated in September; they're the ones who had a tough time in DC.