ikno's Sunday Night Read...
Mets, Cards familiar foes as '07 begins
Elite NL clubs ready to pick up where classic NLCS left off
By Marty Noble / MLB.com
Albert Pujols and Jose Reyes will once again renew one of baseball's best rivalries. (Chris Carlson/AP)
The Mets have spent the last 6 1/2 weeks on the east coast of Florida -- bleachin' and teachin', bussin' and cussin,' runnin' and funnin' -- and ignoring Jimmy Rollins when they could have been obsessing about the Cardinals instead. Who could have blamed them if they had turned -- excuse the expression -- redbird red with a severe case of pennant envy by now?
The way the Mets saw it, the team from St. Louis was in their place when it participated in and won the 2006 World Series. And since then, the Boys from Busch have been in the Mets' face, playing them four times in exhibition games.
Of course, the games meant nothing except to the misguided who believe success in March can counterbalance October disappointment. Still, on four occasions, the Mets were subjected to the introduction of those names -- Spiezio, Taguchi, Molina and Wainwright, the men who pulled the plug on them. And on their four visits to Jupiter -- they played the Marlins there, too, with St. Louis' banner conspicuously displayed -- they saw the Cardinals identified as World Series champions in letters larger than Clydesdales.
The Mets could have seethed, or snapped. Instead they placed blame where it belonged -- on their own uniforms -- and went about the business of preparing for their first game of 2007 against the ... well, against the very same team they played last.
That schedule-maker, what a kidder! Or perhaps, what a sadist! What a picked-up-where-they-left-off thing to do!
The opponents in the final game of the 2006 National League season meet again in the first game of the 2007 National League season, 164 days, one World Series and many World Series rings later. It's Mets at Cardinals on Sunday night at 8:10 p.m. ET. ESPN couldn't have asked for more.
And it didn't ask for this. Even before the Mets clinched the National League East championship, before the Cardinals made their way into the Elite Eight, the schedule was established. So it wasn't sadism, it was clairvoyance.
And now it's baseball, back for another year, back to fill a spring, summer and fall. It's back to grab you and hold you, delight and frustrate you, amaze and occupy you. Mets at Cardinals, at Busch, the site of the last pitch of the '06 season. All the pomp and circumstance. All that red in the stands.
Chris Carpenter will throw the first of the zillion pitches that will be watched, charted, analyzed, swung at, missed, taken, called, hit, tipped, topped, fouled off, popped up, lined, lofted, belted, bunted, grounded, dragged, crushed, stroked, smoked, slammed, pulled, sat on, spat on and inside-outed.
The first one will get to you. Everyone's a fan come Sunday night. Even the most grizzled guy will feel it. Julio Franco experienced his first big-league moment 25 years ago. He's already moved by the prospect of another.
"Are you kidding? I can't wait to get started," the Mets' and the game's senior citizen says. "Let's go, let's go."
"I'm looking forward to it. I'm looking forward for it to start counting," Carpenter says. "I'm looking forward to the first game. Here we go, it's time to go."
For Tom Glavine, the starting pitcher opposite Carpenter, the game is the first step of what could be his last season, and if he emerges as the winning pitcher, the 291st step toward 300 career victories. Glavine only wants it all this year -- 300 wins and another World Series. He and the Mets came so close last year. The Cardinals were the immovable obstacle and the irresistible force.
The last time a Cardinals pitcher threw a pitch of consequence, the bases were loaded and Shea Stadium was gnashing its teeth. Adam Wainwright struck out Carlos Beltran, the Cardinals' postseason nemesis of 2004. Sunday, it's Carpenter serving to Jose Reyes. Then, it's Glavine throwing to David Eckstein.
"I think Opening Day is special no matter how you look at it," said Scott Spiezio, who made himself the Mets' postseason nemesis in October. "But it's cool to get right in there and face a great pitcher and a team that came down to the wire last year with us. It shows you that it's no joke. We get right after it, right off the bat."
Only 14 men in the game's history have started more games than Glavine. This is his eighth Opening Day assignment, his fourth in five seasons with the Mets. There will be a sense of the routine, of course. But he anticipates being joined on the mound by a squadron of butterflies, more than what will accompany him in his subsequent starts.
"It's never been completely routine for me," he says. "I always feel them. And on Opening Day, the feeling is always a little stronger. It gets you; this is it, this is the beginning of what we're going to do for the next six months and, hopefully for us, a little bit longer. The excitement is part of why we do it."
Baseball Season begins in about 10 minutes...Enjoy!!!
ikno..
