Damn Benitez . . . he can't go more than an inning; he just can't. I thought at the time that the Mets should have dealt him to the White Sox for Keith Foulke last May/June when Foulke was struggling, while they had the chance. Benitez spoils a well-pitched outing by Tom Glavine. We also see the problem with having (1) limited depth in quality relievers, (2) aging starters who can't go too deep in games, and (3) not enough offense to blow people out now and then: with Mike Stanton overworked and unavailable, Benitez had to be pushed too far, and he got burned.

Nobody'd be happier than me to see this team succeed, but I have certain ideas about how to build a good baseball team, and this team violates those ideas in so many ways that I basically have to root against my own analysis to pull for them. It's frustrating as anything. I'm not ready to give up being a Mets fan, as Bill James did with the Royals (the Royals have far exceeded the ordinary bounds of penury, idiocy and suckitude), but it does get me down sometimes.