Ok, I had more Mets-centric places to be than here the last week, but couple of things...
#1 - The Timmy Trumpet stuff is stupid and weak. The Mets WON when Timmy Trumpet was there. TWICE. They won when he came back to New York to do Jimmy Kimmel. They're 3-0 when Timmy Trumpet is in New York. So that "jinxing" them is just stupid talk radio nonsense.
Also, the whole "OMG, the Mets played Diaz's song when he came in for a non-save situation!" is dumb. It's his song. Every player gets their song when they come to bat or in to pitch. You bat down 24-0, you get your song. The only difference is that the Mop-Up Guy's Song didn't go viral two months ago, and wasn't shown/tweeted about when they came in while losing to the Padres.
It's no different than any NHL goal song. If the Leafs are down 6-0 and score at home, it's "You Make My Dreams Come True," same as any other goal.
#2 - The Mets didn't "choke" anything at all. The Mets were up 10.5 games on June 1 ... and played SIX HUNDRED BASEBALL after that. Including .659 baseball from July on.
They GOT CAUGHT. The Mets were a veteran team of old guys and Atlanta was on a World Series hangover the first month or so. Thinking the Mets "choked" is the take of someone who's really dumb and didn't understand expectations.
#3 - The Mets not being better down the stretch than the Braves... coincides to the day with Starling Marte breaking his finger. Marte had a great season, he's one of our best hitters vs lefties (a huge weakness!), plays great D. He's out, we use Tyler Naquin or Louis Guillorme instead? Of course they're worse. Marte airmailed that throw against the Padres... because the dude had a split on his finger, but tried to play because it's the playoffs and Naquin kinda sucks.
#4 - The Mets won 77 games in 2021, and signed five guys aged 33 or 37. The fact that they were hotter earlier in the season is a big pile of "duh." They're old! People just changed their expectations based on the June standings and that they did that without Jacob deGrom. The Braves are calling up Michael Harris and Vaughn Grissom and Bryce Elder. The Mets farm is terrible because our last GM traded away 20 prospects in two years.
The last owner was stupid, incompetent, and mortgaged the future to try and win before he went broke. This year's Mets team was lipstick on a pig: The Mets have elite guys in their top 8 roster spots, but are ridiculously thin and spots 9 to 180 in the organization are bad.
#5 - Before the season, the Mets were torn between "full rebuild" or not! But having deGrom and a few other guys on the roster, they said screw it, let's just try and buy a team that wins in the regular season and hope Jake/Max take over in the playoffs. Because we have the money. That's why their trade deadline was four scrubs because they refused to trade their only good prospects.
The Mets are really rebuilding. Just under the surface, like the 2013-2016 Yankees. They signed a bunch of 30-year old, has been guys, made the playoffs and then in 2016, those guys started to leave and everyone talked about the "baby bombers" like Judge, Sanchez, Gregorius, Castro, etc. That's what we're doing, but more focused on pitching.
The Mets know they aren't a loaded team. They are basically trying to do what the 2010-14 Giants did: Great pitching, two good core offensive players, and get good years from old veteran hitters around them. If Jake/Max pitch like Cy Young gods, then they're a contender. But Max's oblique and Jake never getting stretched out and just being a two-pitch guy... not good enough. Not a young Madison Bumgarner to carry us.
Also, WTF was with Musgrove cheating?