The Loop
The New York backpages after the Mets' historic choke are beyond brutal
Tuesday night was a bad night to be a New York Mets fan. Aren't they all, you'll guffaw from beneath your $500 Dolce & Gabbana Yankees cap, blissfully unaware of things like pain, self-doubt and something called "budgets" (there you go, sound it out), but trust us, this one was not like the others. Up 10-4 headed into the bottom of the ninth with Nationals Park still reeling from a Pete Alonso-punctuated Metropolitans five-spot in the top of the inning, the Mets' expired cottage cheese tub of a bullpen proceeded to throw away the surest of sure things, culminating with a three-run Kurt Suzuki homer off, you guessed it, Edwin Diaz to complete the least likely comeback in the majors this season and probably a few before that as well.
If you thought the night was bad, however, the dawn offered little respite, with Mets fans waking up to one of their most time-honored pity parties: The New York backpage teardown, a tradition as old as the freaking Gutenburg Press. "POISON PEN" said New York Newsday, calling the limp surrender "crushing" in the understatement of the century.
"NATIONAL DISGRACE!" declared the Daily News, highlighting the Mets sickening, sinking sense of deja vu in blocky blood-red text.
But the best-worst treatment of them all belonged to the New York Post, who dubbed it the "WORST. LOSS. EVER." while brandishing the historical precedent of the failure—"Diaz & Co. do what no other Mets team has done: blow a 6-run lead in the 9th" and "806-1: Mets' all-time record with 6-run lead in the ninth or later"—like the Grim Reaper's scythe.
The collapse was so bad, in fact, that Federer's shocking upset at the U.S. Open and the adored Yankees beating up on some AL scrubs were relegated to the fine print. Through the darkness and beyond of the flames of eternal damnation, there is one bit of good news for Mets fans, though: At least now you don't have to watch another single second of the God d@mn, mother *%$$$%@, son of a &%^@ Mets ... well, until March, that is.