You only get so many chances

If the Mets go on to miss the playoffs, tonight's game will turn out to be the perfect metaphor for exactly why. You only get so many chances.

I tuned in during the bottom of the seventh inning, with the Mets down 6-5 after Oliver Perez gave a 5-1 lead back to the Cubs. With Jerry Manuel taking a gamble, the light-hitting Ramon Martinez dropped his first hit as a Met into a perfect spot in the right field gap for a leadoff double. Jose Reyes put down an average bunt, but Ronny Cedeno mishandled the throw covering first, and the Mets had runners on first and third with nobody out.

You almost can't even get too worked up about this inning. Daniel Murphy lined out, doubling Jose Reyes off first - unlucky. David Wright's flare to left went a little too far, settling in Alfonso Soriano's glove for the final out. Nothing you can do about supreme misfortune, although I contend Reyes should have been running there, to prevent exactly such a situation.

Mets bullpen holds the Cubs, we go to the eighth inning. Carlos Delgado leads off with a double. Carlos Beltran comes through with a flare into center - this one drops and it looks like Delgado might be able to score, until Luis Aguayo, most likely self-conscious and perpetually casting doubt on himself for all the other terrible decisions he's made in the third base coach's box, makes another one, holding Delgado. Still, the Mets have first and third with nobody out - again.

Ryan Church strikes out. First and third with one out. Ramon Castro comes to the plate - Beltran steals to take out the double play option with the slow-footed Castro up at bat. But Castro ends up grounding out anyway, the runners hold, two outs. Endy Chavez pinch hits for the pitcher's spot and is intentionally walked to bring up Ramon Martinez again. Luckily, Martinez works out a walk, and the Mets don't totally waste the threat. 6-6. Jose Reyes is up with a chance to give the Mets a lead...but grounds out to end the inning. 6-6.

The bullpen holds again in the ninth, giving the Mets another chance to pull it out, and then victory looks certain when Daniel Murphy leads off with a triple. Wright, Delgado, Beltran coming out. On 3-2, with Keith Hernandez insisting that a strike ends the game (in the form of a Wright hit), Wright chases a pitch out of the zone. One out. Delgado and Beltran are walked, but that means the bases are loaded for my man Ryan Church. Church hits a sharp ground ball, but the Cubs get the force at the plate. Two outs. Ramon Castro, looking less-than-confident, swings through strike three to send it into extras.

So pretty much, despite putting a man on third with nobody out in each of the last three innings, the Mets scored a total of one run. On a bases loaded walk. It was like a bad re-enactment of Groundhog Day. And if you've read the recap, you know what happened in extra innings tonight. You only get so many chances, but the Cubs finally took advantage of theirs and put the game away with a three run rally in the top of the tenth. The fans left - I honestly don't blame anyone who did - and the Mets went silently in the bottom half.

As I've written many times in this space, we've grown accustomed this year (since Jerry Manuel took over) to the Mets somehow finding a way to respond to these gut-wrenching, "you can't lose that game" type of losses. But if the Mets couldn't find a way to win this game, they might as well be SOL.

You're only handed a victory on so many silver platters. The Phillies lost - this game would have tied us up in the loss column. The Brewers won, so this was a must-win for the wild card chase, although with the way we've played the Cubs' b-squad this week, if we do win the wild card and have to face them in the NLDS, we're out of the playoffs in three. Mark my words.

The point, though, is that for all the resiliency, for all the excitement and the tenacity this team has shown at times, you've still got to put it away. What happened to the Mets? One month ago, they would have pulled this one out.

This isn't a repeat of last year. No, last year's team was complacent and lazy - that's not what's befallen the '08 Mets. It's something far different - something that cuts beyond Jerry Manuel, beyond Omar Minaya, and falls squarely on the shoulders of everyone in the Mets locker room right now, from Jose Reyes to David Wright. This year's story, if it continues to play out as such, is one of possession and loss. Something within the Mets - calling it fire, or desire, or killer instinct doesn't quite do it justice, but something - something gave them an ability to find wins in difficult places, to play .600 ball over the summer and make themselves relevant. They were tough. Gritty. But that's all gone now. Whatever that something is, they had while they were storming back over the summer, and now they've lost it. When it came time to cash in tonight, this team looked totally afraid and inept. That's something that Jerry Manuel can't change. The bottom line is: if the Mets want to make it to the playoffs this season, this whole team better grow a pair, and fast.

If we fail to make it happen in these next four days, I'll be at a loss for how to respond. How do you even care about upgrading a roster that, despite its shortcomings, was still good enough to make the postseason? Any future move the Mets make, any success they have from April to August, will bear the cross of two consecutive September crap-outs. A new manager won't fix that. Minaya's four-year extension has nothing to do with it. It's something the players have to deal with on their own, exorcise by themselves, the sooner the better. Just ask the Cubbies. Which reminds me: are we really about to have our season ruined by the team that hasn't won the World Series since 1908?!? Lord have mercy.

I'd love to believe, and the Mets have pulled bigger ones out of their you-know-where before, but I just don't see it happening this season. You only get so many chances, and right now, we suck.


(Image courtesy nydailynews.com)