and everybody's happy!

There was the 3-0 win against the Tigers, and Friday's game against the Yankees, but until about a half hour ago it had been over 2 weeks since the Mets had beaten an opponent by more than 3 runs. As fate would have it, the Mets 7-1 June 2 victory over the Diamondbacks also happened to be the only other game the team won during that stretch, but still. Even the two other Met wins that prevented them from being on a 15 game losing streak headed into last night were only a little bit satisfying.

But oh, what a difference some good starting pitching coupled with production from the middle of the order makes! Last night the Mets actually looked like the Mets, circa 2006-most of 2007 so far, rather than doing their best impersonation of the Mets, circa 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2002, 2003, 2004...you get the idea.

Carlos Delgado has looked a little too much like another big first baseman who played for the Mets recently...not naming any names

Really, though - the Mets can lose the next 2 games to the Twins and on Wednesday we can be right back to square one talking about how much the team sucks right now, but they did look good last night. John Maine pitched brilliantly, (7 1/3, 4 hits, just one run) Carlos Beltran hit a well-struck RBI double in the 8th, Delgado had a home run and would have had a 2 run double in the 5th if not for a circus catch in left by Jason Kubel (who?), the Mets even had a big 2-out hit in the sixth (Lo Duca's 2-run single)...there really isn't anything that I could find to complain about if I wanted to.

Aaron Heilman even pitched a scoreless inning

But I said on Sunday night that I was withholding further judgment on the state of the 2007 Mets until Wednesday night. Here, then, this is me withholding judgment. Last night's game doesn't get cast in bigger picture terms until the entire Twins series gets cast in bigger picture terms after tomorrow's game.

This was good, though. It wasn't a stop the bleeding win, but a win win, a dominating win, a win that on the part of the Mets almost said "we may have lost 12 of 15, but we don't care because the teams chasing us are the Braves and the Phillies and all we have to do is play decently again and we'll have our second straight division title under wraps."

Last night, the Mets were definitely more than decent enough.

next game: tonight, Jorge Sosa (6-2, 3.42) vs. Johan Santana (6-6, 3.19). I have no expectations.