It was hard to know whom to root for in this afternoon’s Game 2 of the second Subway Series of 2006.  On the one hand, the Yankees needed the win, and I am a Yankee fan.  Should be cut and dried, right?  The Mets did not need the win.  Even simpler.  But Steve Trachsel was pitching for the Mets against Randy Johnson and the Empire. 

Forget the typical pleas for the so-called underdog.  Please.  The Yankees represent, among many things, my willing concession to the intertwining of power, money, and success.  (I was recently gratified to find a similar sentiment expressed on the webpage of a politician I liked.  I’ll have to look up his name.)

I started following Trachsel when he became a Met in 2001, as soon as Floraine Kay suggested that I keep an eye on him.  She has a good eye.  (Check out her Saddleshoe blog, linked to the right on my Blogroll.)  Year after year, he threw pretty good games only to lose them either because the Mets’ line-up was on strike, or because the fielding behind him was anemic.  Factoring in The Great Unravelling that followed the 2000 World Series, Trachsel — who already felt betrayed by the Cubs for letting him go to begin with (he split 2000 between Tampa Bay and Toronto) — walked into a clubhouse that was infected from top to bottom with mindgames, machinations, and backroom deals.  What I remember is that the callers to the Joe Benigno WFAN show, which was on late nights back then, could say nothing good about this man.  Sell him, get rid of him, he stinks, and much more colorful, less creative suggestions were made, and he wasn’t even bad.  Good?  No.  But neither were the Mets as a whole.  I’m not sure what they hit behind him that year, but he was 3rd in winning percentage among the 4 pitchers who earned decisions in 20 or more games (also Leiter, Appier, Rusch).  From last in ERA in his first year with the Mets, he went to first in 2002, with 3.37, beating even Leiter who had 3.48.  He and Leiter both posted .500 seasons, not bad in a season when the Mets won less than 47% of the time and had the worst fielding percentage as well as the highest number of errors commited in baseball. 

Circling back to yesterday’s post, 2002 was when I first grew suspicious of some of those who call themselves "diehard Met fans" because they truly sound as if they hate the Mets.  I may boo less than the average fan, but I can identify a [self] hater when I hear one.  They are still calling-in to WFAN with the most insulting commentary on one of their steadiest pitchers, who never let himself get embroiled in the soap operas, even during the most turbulent years. 

So, am I glad Trachsel won, holding the Yankees to 2 in front of Brian Cashman and George Steinbrenner for over 6 innings?  YES.  Did I hope the Mets’ bullpen would give up the game?  YES.  (In light of a post earlier this week, I must confess that I share in some guilt:  As soon as A-Rod hit his 25th home run off Aaron Heilman in the 8th, I knew any hope of a comeback was futile.  Is that backward logic, or what!)

 

I am, by the way, worried about Trachsel’s health.  Willie Randolph saw something and pulled him immediately in the 7th.  It turns out that his groin tightened after a fielding play, having aggravated an injury that has nagged at him for a couple weeks now, according to Marty Noble, the MLB.com Mets correspondent (Another article, with more detail about the injury, is here.)