Well, it was fun indeed to beat up on the Yanks over the weekend and for the Met fans to have unequivocal bragging rights around the office today. It is fun to see the Yankee fans stammer and try to change the topic when the subject of baseball comes up. My mama always taught me to be humble but it is indeed hard to resist at least a little needling.

But the real shutting of their mouths, the real passing of the New York crown to the Mets, will come from winning it all. True, the Yanks have not won the series this century but neither have the Mets. Even 10 games out in May, they will still yammer on about their 26 championships as if they personally watched Babe Ruth's called home run and Lou Gehrig's farewell and DiMaggio's streak and Larsen's perfect game and...well, you get the picture. We've all heard it before, ad nauseum.

Beating the Yanks 2 out of 3 is a minor victory. Taking it to the Braves this week will be a major one. True, it's only May and the standings don't matter much. But a game now is worth the same as a game in September, sure would be nice to win it now so the September ones don't count as much.

We have the Braves 2 1/2 games back heading into the series. A disasterous series will see us losing the lead to them. But if Sosa, Perez and Glavine do what they are capable of and quiet their bats at least as well as the Red Sox just did, if Wright continues his torrid streak and Reyes and Beltran sharpen up their eye (both looked rather lackluster over the weekend) and Delgado picks it up and the bench continues to do what the Met bench does, we can open up a five game lead on them, and we can put them away by the All-Star break like we did last year.

The Braves have taken both series from us so far this season, winning 4 of 6. It's time for the Mets to assert who belongs atop the NL East. Let's go Mets!