Inspired by @firejerrymanuel: only teams not to make playoffs since 2006: Jays, Royals, #6org, Mets, Marlins, Pirates, Astros. #teamsuicide

— Joelsph (@CajoleJuiceEsq) October 3, 2012

Turns out I forgot the Padres in that tweet, but it’s not like that helps. That’s a depressing list.

Toronto Blue Jays – This is easily the best team out of the list, with the unfortunate status of playing in the AL East. I still can’t see the Orioles repeating what they did this year, but the Red Sox aren’t going to be a doormat for long. The only hope for this team is waiting for the Rays to run out of their top draft picks. But maybe they’ll move by then and make more money and sorry Jays fans. Douse yourself with inflammable maple syrup and light yourself on fire.

Kansas City Royals – The team of the future had two of its two big hitting prospects, Eric Hosmer and Mike Moustakas, have way below-average hitting seasons. They are still waiting for their pitching. It probably will not live up to the hype. Just end it all now.

Seattle Mariners a.k.a. #6org – I made the mistake of actually thinking they were a decent lock to finish 3rd in the AL West. Turns out Billy Beane is still ten times better than Jack “Savior” Z. “I am a false prophet; UZR is a superstition.” I guess fans can wait until King Felix gets hurt to finally drink bleach.

New York Mets – A team headed by broke owners who have no desire to sell the team. Sure, some might say they’ll be able to spend after 2013 due to the contracts of Jason Bay and Johan Santana ending, but almost every time someone writes about the Mets finances it’s bad news, despite a Madoff victims settlement I thought boded well for the Wilpons. Maybe they’ll just let the contracts come off the books and spend the money on shitty bullpen help again. Much like with #6org and King Felix, I’ll wait until David Wright is gone before putting a gun in my mouth.

Florida Marlins – No one fucking cares. Edit: Notice I said Florida Marlins. God, they suck.

Pittsburgh Pirates – This franchise’s streak of 20 straight losing seasons is the new 56-game hitting streak. It’s more impressive than whatever record Drew Brees just broke last night. Teams just fall into winning seasons every once in a while, like the Marlins, or the Orioles this year — even the Royals have had them in 10-year intervals the past 20 years (they are due for one in 2013!). This is an organization that signed a couple of Indian dudes because I don’t know, Slumdog Millionaire. But hey, your city identity is wrapped up in much more successful teams, so maybe just bang your head against a wall repeatedly until you are Sidney Crosby.

Houston Astros – A team totally and completely screwed by having to move to the AL. I hope to one day — like one of their recent hires who live-tweeted an eviction like a douchebag — to live-tweet them getting relegated to AAA. I just subblogged. Go swim in the ocean during a hurricane.

San Diego Padres – I like how this team ended up with neither Adrian Gonzalez nor Anthony Rizzo. Yet much like the Marlins, I can’t imagine anyone gives a shit. Your perfect weather has made you sports-dead inside.

HONORABLE MENTIONS (COLLAPSES EDITION):

Texas Rangers -5 games up with 9 to go. And then you get swept by the A’s to finish the season, losing the division and being relegated to a one-game playoff against the Orioles, facing Joe Saunders, and you lose that game too. Time to die of a drug overdose. With 9 games to go, even the 2007 Mets were only 1.5 games up on the Phillies, the 2011 Red Sox were only 2 games up on the Rays, and that brings us to…

Atlanta Braves – With 9 games to go, the 2011 Braves were 3.5 games up on the Cardinals. If the current two wild-card format were in place last year, the Braves would have still had a one-game playoff against them. Unfortunately that was not the case, and then this year they finished 6 games in front for the first wild-card, but managed to be victimized by St. Louis again, with the help of umpires. Impale yourself on a tomahawk?

Remember last week? That was pretty cool, huh? I haven’t even been paying all that much attention to the playoffs due to a combination of busyness and the knowledge that nothing will top last Wednesday night. The simultaneous collapses of the Red Sox and Braves, along with the all-but-impossible comeback by the Rays, have been discussed endlessly already, and I feel like most people (other than Red Sox and Braves fans) have moved on. So while the framework of this post will be the events of the end of the regular season, it’s really just about how freaking awesome baseball fans are. I guess “people with the same interests as me are the coolest” could also work.

Baseball lends itself to absolute obsession. Something like football — or even soccer over in Europe, from what I know about the schedule — is more compatible with, you know, having a life. Football allows you to set one day of the week away (and ok, Monday night, too) to turn into a worthless slob on the couch and watch either your local games or the Red Zone channel if you an ADD-addled fantasy player. Baseball is there almost every night you come home from work and on the weekends, too. This constant availability aligns perfectly with platforms like สนุกกับการเดิมพันกีฬาที่ยูฟ่าเบท, enticing fans to elevate their engagement through sports betting, adding an extra layer of excitement to each game.

Please direct your eyes to the chart on the right. Look at that time commitment. So try to imagine what it’s like if a person is a baseball fan in the sense of attempting to follow all 30 teams — usually for fantasy knowledge purposes. I know that I became a better and more intelligent fan once I delved into fantasy baseball head-first a few years back. The result is being able to talk to any other baseball fan for practically an infinite amount of time. Not that I wasn’t able to do that already, but now I can do it with fans of any team almost as well as with Mets fans. I would joke about the Astros possibly being an exception, but past Tuesday night is evidence against this.

After a Sunday where I had a great time hanging out with fellow Mets fans during a Fangraphs (and River Avenue Blues and Amazin’ Avenue) meetup that turned into a middle school dance where girls and boys were replaced with Yankees and Mets fans, my hunger for real life baseball discussion had been whetted. While our Mets fan contingent did talk a bit about the depressing topic of our chosen team, there was also plenty of discussion about the on-going football games and good television shows. If I truly wanted to immerse myself in baseball, I would have to watch teams that still actually mattered, so Tuesday night on my home after a late class, I decided I should go to Foley’s NY to check out the four games that would help decide whether the Red Sox and Braves would provide schadenfreude for the rest of the country.

I had already been there before and knew that it is baseball fan heaven, with every television showing a baseball game, signed balls lining the walls, and a Don Zimmer fathead in the bathroom watching you piss into the urinals. I sat down at the bar and saw that the four televisions situated along its length were showing the four relevant games. There was probably no place on earth I would have rather been. Oh, I’m sure the MLB FanCave had all the games on, but fuck that place.

The night didn’t get really good until an older Astros fan sat down next to me and started berating the Cardinals fans sitting a few stools down on the other side of me. I just laughed and told him that I was with those “pussy Cardinals fans” for tonight, considering I wanted the Braves to miss the playoffs. From then on, we talked about 1986 (even though I was born during that season), Roger Clemens being an asshole, Nolan Ryan being a steroid user, Carlos Beltran being a clutch player, “Harvard turds” ruining baseball with stats, and how much the Cardinals suck. All right, it was mostly him talking, but it was immensely entertaining. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to turn away at some point to talk more to the attractive girl with an Irish accent who had sat down next to me, but the Texan would not stop talking. He had now moved on to other things, like his brother who had written for SNL and had made some YouTube videos. By the time the siege on my attention had been lifted, it was too late to stick around any longer, unless I wanted to get home on the LIRR as the sun was coming up. I wasn’t upset though, as I was able to have a conversation with a fan of the terrible organization that is the Astros for the sole reason that we shared love for baseball. Sure, his opinions might have been all over the place, but sometimes you have to hear from people outside of the saber-twitter-blogsphere, right?

Sometime during the night, I overheard a girl ask about a Cardinals fan meetup at Foley’s. It explained the Cardinals fans strewn around the bar, and also made me think of God Save The Fan, which I had recently read (and I’ve been meaning to write a review of along with the book I bought it with on Amazon, The Postmortal). In it, Will Leitch talks about finding a bar in Manhattan to watch the 2006 NLCS with other Cardinals fans (this is where I stopped reading the book). I told myself I’d ask him on Twitter whether he was talking about Foley’s. But not before I was at Foley’s again the very next night to watch the same eight teams play four games on the last night of the regular season.

The bar was a bit more packed on Wednesday night, though. When I managed to find a seat at the bar after a little while, it was pretty much in the same spot as before. This time, I was situated next to a Cards fan. This might have had to do with pretty much everyone at the bar being a Cards fan. There were a few Red Sox fans, too. If you magically appeared in the bar, I’m pretty sure you couldn’t have guessed it was in NYC. This Cards fan was surprised that I was rooting for his team, considering 2006; I told him that the Braves were like a sadistic bully that beat on Mets fans for most of their childhood. Comparatively, I still remember thinking the 2006 NLCS would just be a bump in the road. Sigh.

We sat there talking about the state of the Mets, how much money Albert Pujols will get this offseason (and from which team), the young pitching staff of the Rays, the embarrassment that is Carl Crawford, among other things. Meanwhile, the Rays had spotted a huge lead to the Yankees, the Cards had crushed the Astros in the first inning, and the Phillies-Braves and Red Sox-Orioles matchups were tight games. I downed beer and beer, sharing a bucket of bottles with the Cards fan, while watching the drama unfold with hardcore baseball fans all around me. To be a Cards fan out to watch the game in a NYC midtown bar on a weeknight means you are most likely dedicated. And at one point, I turned around to see the very guy who I wanted to ask about his Cards fan NYC bar story.

As Leitch seemed involved with a conversation with a lady, I struck up a conversation with his buddy (who looked vaguely familiar and whose name I cannot remember now). But once I mentioned that I wanted to ask Leitch something, he introduced me as awkwardly as possible to embarrass me. I probably deserved it. The minute I mentioned God Save The Fan, Leitch apologized for it being out-of-date already. Even when I said the only reasons I bought his book were its bargain price and Amazon recommending it when I bought The Postmortal, Leitch was suitably self-deprecating. I guess that should probably be expected from a guy whose first book was titled Life as a Loser. Leitch was also surprised to hear I was rooting for the Cards, but I told him how I want Braves fans to feel my pain. I bet some Braves fans think they’ll be back in the playoffs next year and for years to come (like I felt about the Mets in 2006), but maybe Jason Heyward won’t become a Hall of Famer and maybe Tommy Hanson will have injury issues. Or maybe the Mets will become the best te. . . nevermind.

But once again, I was able to effortlessly strike up a baseball conversation with another person, albeit a much shorter one, before I returned to my seat and my original Cards fan companion for the night. Leitch really did seem like a nice guy (he even offered me a beer!), which makes sense considering the transformation Deadspin has made since he gave up his editing duties. Despite Buzz Bissinger ripping him on Costas Live years ago for lack of integrity, the site has only gotten progressively more grimy under A.J. Daulerio. But I know Leitch and other people support him, so whatever, I won’t make this about how Deadspin was better with Leitch was editor. I mean, it was, but let’s get back on topic. Is there a topic here?

Oh yeah, despite Evan Longoria going into beast mode, the Rays were still trailing the Yankees; the Phillies-Braves game had gone into extras; and the Red Sox were looking like they were going to win their game against the Orioles. Then the timeline of madness that I can’t remember nor be bothered to look up broke out, starting with the Phillies beating the Braves to knock the latter out of the playoffs, making the Cardinals fans go crazy. Then a little while later, Dan Johnson hit a 9th-inning, game-tying home run with two outs and two strikes. Then a beer later, the Red Sox choked away a 9th-inning lead for the first time all year. Then only a few sips later, Longoria hit another home run to send the Rays to the playoffs and Red Sox home. It was a blurry night of cheers and high-fives by then, as I guess everyone not from Boston was happy to see Red Sox fans suffer again. It’s like order was restored in the baseball universe, and I was in the NYC nexus of it.

The Braves were facing off against the Phillies B-team while the Padres and Giants were fighting over the NL West. If you didn’t have a horse in the race, you were most likely rooting for the Braves and Padres, because then the magical three-way tie would be accomplished, leading to Game 163 for the NL West between the Padres and Giants and then to a Game 164 (well, 163 for the Braves) between the loser of that game and the Braves for the Wild Card. It would be insanity.

But I didn’t trust the Padres. They had been free-falling in the month of September, and even though they were throwing out Mat Latos, he had obviously run out of gas a few weeks earlier after putting together an incredible barely-classified-as-sophomore season. I was rooting for the Braves to lose. I didn’t want to take any chances; I needed to make sure the Braves had to at least play one extra game to reach the playoffs.

Shockingly, the Phillies weren’t able to win a game where they used Danys Baez. The Braves came tantalizingly close to blowing an 8-2 lead, but unfortunately Billy Wagner was able to come in and shut the door. The Padres would have to win if we were to get extra baseball.

It was not to be. The Padres couldn’t even manage one measly run, losing 3-0, completing a devastating collapse. And yes it was a collapse. Everyone’s idea of a collapse has just been totally skewed by the once-in-a-generation collapse of the 2007 Mets. The Padres blew a 6.5 game lead in a little over a month — that’s pretty damn hard to do.

So one of the best stories in baseball this year has disappeared for good, while the Braves are back in the playoffs. FUCK THIS. Someone wake me up when the Braves are about to be eliminated by the Giants. Or if the Reds actually have a chance of beating the Phillies.

Perhaps I could’ve come up with a more clever title…

The first game of the 2009 MLB regular season was played by the Braves and Phillies, the two teams I want to lose most. And it was announced by the three men I least want to hear. Yet I loved it, because it was FUCKING BASEBALL, HOLY SHIT. The rest of the year is total garbage compared to the seven months in which major league baseball is played. So it’s probably a good thing that it constitutes more than half of a year, or else life would pretty much suck.

I felt dirty enjoying Braves home runs tonight. Last year apparently sealed the deal for me wanting to see numerous Phillies die in a fire even more than Chipper Jones. But seriously, how far did that McCann home run go? That shit was destroyed. Oh, and seeing Derek Lowe dominate for 8 innings was wonderful; I can’t wait to watch Oliver Perez do the complete opposite later this week. Sigh. My last comment on tonight’s broadcast would be that ESPN displayed OPS for hitters the first time around, and then it disappeared. I really thought some progress had been made. I should have known it was too good to be true.

Tonight was definitely not the true beginning of baseball season, though. Tomorrow is Opening Fucking Day, in which just about every team is going to be out there for the first time. The entire day will be filled with games that mean just as much as the last game of the season (I want this to get through to sportswriters’ heads). Johan Santana, C.C. Sabathia, Tim Lincecum and Roy Halladay are taking the mound. Best day of the year? I think so.

Today was a Mets game like two dozen others this year. The Mets had a 4-2 lead on the Braves going into the 7th, and Mike Pelfrey had run out of gas, walking the first batter. Then the bullpen wasn’t able to keep that runner from scoring. Not a surprise. But not a disaster either — that came in the next inning, when the Braves scored 4 runs, giving them a 7-4 lead. At one point, Keith Hernandez mumbled something incoherent under his breath. I wish I could’ve heard what it was. No doubt it had the word “suck” in it. I know I’ve said the Mets bullpen sucks enough this season. After last year’s debacle, maybe Omar Minaya should’ve worked a bit more on the bullpen. He got Johan Santana, but not the guys to finish games for him — as evidence by the SEVEN games that have been blown for Santana.

The bullpen needs to be cleansed. Ship Aaron Heilman the FUCK out of here. Scott Blowenweiss needs to go. Duaner Sanchez is done. Billy Wagner may never pitch again. Joe Smith and Pedro Feliciano are only good for lefty righty matchup bullshit, and even then they’re not that good. I guess the only guy I can say to keep is Stokes. I’m still on the fence with regards to signing K-Fraud, as I have to see what other bullpen help is out there to pick up. If the plan next year is to move Maine to the bullpen, then I definitely say no. Hopefully Kunz will pan out, even though he got his shit ruined this year. 

The other problem is that the Mets offense seems to score right off the bat and then takes the second half of the game off. And that’s why I had no hope of them coming back in the 9th. But then Carlos Delgado hit yet ANOTHER towering home run to cut the lead to one. Unfortunately, Carlos Beltran and Damion Easley followed that up with two strikeouts to end the game, eliciting Tomahawk Chops from the racist and borderline-retarded Atlanta crowd.

The Mets are now 1.5 games behind the Phillies in the NL East and 1.5 up on the Brewers in the wild-card. I hope I don’t leave Shea Stadium on Saturday with the Mets eliminated from the playoffs.

Edit: Looks like Jayson Stark did this post — complete with stats.

The Mets probably should’ve SWEPT the series, considering Tim McClelland all but gave the Mets the series opener, when he chose to fuck with Jair Jurrjens after he showed him up on a close call. Four straight walks, the last three with the bases loaded. I think Sunday was the only time the Mets actually scored runs by hitting well. They had ONE good inning on Saturday.

I still don’t know what to make of the team — I bet now they’ll lose a couple of games in a row to the Pirates. Oh, and Moises Alou might be hurt again before he has even managed to get back in the lineup. AWESOME signing there. The guy was hurt coming out of the womb, at 124 years old it’s only going to be 5x worse.

Meanwhile, considering the other New York team (usually a reference to the Mets), Wang is pretty good. (lol) No really, he’s been pretty great this year. He’s like the total opposite of Barry Zito. I just complained about the Alou signing, but wow. Zito is now 0-6 with a 7.53 ERA. I bet when I check my Yahoo! fantasy league tomorrow, there’ll be a notice saying “Barry Zito has been dropped by 23674 teams.” The Giants wish they could do the same.

I just wanted to make this post before Chipper Jones absolutely demolishes the Mets this weekend. It’s going to be ugly. Jurrjens, Hudson, and Smoltz lined up for them. Oh God. I didn’t even realize it was that bad. Pelfrey, Maine, and Figueroa need to pitch at least 7 innings to win. I really don’t see it happening.

And Delgado sucks at first base too, by the way.