Mets Dig In At Valley Forge on the Mississippi

Mets Face Darkest Hour in St. Louis; Willie Randolph's Valley Forge and Private Hellcopyright c 2006 Evan Pritchard

Down two games to one in a series they were supposed to walk away with, the Mets tonight face a fierce enemy, a plethora of key injuries that would cripple most teams, and freezing cold weather. Team commander in chief Willie Randolph must be looking to George Wasington for inspiration right now, and the history of Valley Forge, a turning point in the American Revolution for a sign as to what to do.

It is supposed to get down to freezing here in the New York area tonight. We can only imagine how cold it will feel in St. Louis, surrounded by the enemy and a big cannon named Pujols. Pedro Martinez, Orlando Hernandez, and now Steve Traschel, all with crippled legs, lie in the medic's tent, staring at the ceiling, or bent over, playing harmonica. The Mets big guns have been pretty silent of late, and no reinforcements in sight. Randolph has penned the orders for Oliver Perez to take charge tonight, a pitcher who has lost 13 battles so far this year, winning only three, and after that, the exhausted Tom Glavine. It doesn't get any less better than this.

The Mets position players look like The Spirit of '76 as well, by the looks of Floyd, Beltran, and others. Our guys are pretty beat up, hoisting that orange and blue flag over their shoulders, limping along. Oliver Perez must have the pitching performance of his career, or the Mets must come to life in a fourth-of-July explosion of power, if we are going to continue as a Mets Fan Nation and attack Detroit by surprise.

Perez' ERA is 6.38 so far with the Mets this year. He has 41 strikeouts in 36.2 Met innings, and only 17 bases on balls. Our optimism is on shaky ground, but certainly not delusional. He has one complete game this year. The best news is that he has not made an error this season with the Mets.

Just before New Years, 1776, Washington was in Pennsylvania and needed to attack the Red Coats at Princeton near the banks of the Delaware. He was outnumbered and his team was having trouble getting on base. It was freezing cold. Washington hid his numbers from the Red Coats, waiting for an opportunity to surprise them. According to Met fan and historian Kenneth Gale, Washington had his men leave a broken wagon in the center of town, piled with full kegs of rum and then ran away, not leaving a note, but sure that the British would not be able to pass up the opportunity so close to the holidays. Eventually, the British found the kegs, passed them around, and soon were roaring drunk. Lets' say they got over confident. It was then that Washington crossed the Delaware, attacked, and took them all prisoner without losing a man. That's the legend of Valley Forge. The Shotglass Heard Round the World.

Perhaps Willie Randolph cleverly had Traschel give up all those runs on Saturday on purpose (5 in one inning plus); to make the Red Coats from St. Louis over confident and drunk with a feeling of long ball power. I'm sure they are partying around the Arch and drinking lots of Anheiser-Busch products. And now he is hiding his numbers by announcing Oliver Perez as the starter, when actually he has the reincarnations of Babe Ruth and Walter Johnson warming up under the stands.

Perhaps Perez will go back to his 2004 Pittsburgh form, where he went 12-10 with a terrible team, with a 2.98 ERA with 239 strikeouts on the year. I can imagine him pitching a no-hitter tonight, blasted by wind, frozen snot on his uniform, his fingers bleeding from the cold, and then falling down after the last out in a fetal position on the grass, revived by medics rubbing his hands and feet, saying "We won we won!"

You remember how Valley Forge turned out; that's when Corporal Tug McGraw said the immortal words "You Gotta Believe," just before keeling over into some shoe leather stew, and our guys took his words to heart and stayed alive long enough to regroup and renew their contracts. Thus it will be for our beleaguered Mets this time. It is our manifest destiny as Mets fans to win games and spread across the face of North America with our unique brand of Chutzpah! This is it! We must win tonight. We are the Miracle Mets! We are the Amazins! This is our Valley Forge, our time to convince the unbelievers! We will be victorious!

And if we're not, there's Glavine and Maine and pray for rain, but better timed rain this time, please!

And if we are swept up by the exigisies of fate in St. Louis, and lose all three, there's always next year, when our pitching staff will return from their respective well-padded graves. And we'll look back and say.....

WASN'T THAT A TIME!