THE METS weren’t supposed to be here, 12 games clear of the rest of the NL East, with more wins than any other team in National League. They were supposed to be better this year. They were supposed to compete for a playoff berth. They were even supposed to be in play to knock the Braves from their 14-year first-place perch.
They weren’t supposed to lap the field in 2006. But here they are.
The Yankees weren’t supposed to be here, either, entering the second half of the season with more doubt attached to their October itinerary than at any time in the last 13 years.
They were supposed to score a thousand runs.
They were supposed to be ahead of the Red Sox by now, sure, but at the very least they were supposed to have the wild-card as an easy fallback.
But here they are, too.
It doesn’t matter how they got here, doesn’t matter that the Mets have been helped immeasurably by the league they play in, that the Yankees have been hurt greatly by the league they play in. What matters, is that they are where they are. And that they’re headed wherever they are headed. Which could well be to a place that New York City has never seen before.
Because by the time this season is done 3 ½ months from now, it is entirely possible that the Mets and the Yankees will have given us the greatest baseball season New York has ever known. Both teams are set up to give us precisely that. Both seasons are set up to give us precisely that. Both schedules are set up to give us precisely that.
And there are 7 ½ million people, give or take a spare thousand here and there, who will have witnessed every second of it, 4 million in The Bronx, 3 ½ million in Flushing, all of them pouring into two doomed stadiums knowing that what they are watching could very well be the Good Old Days.
Right in front of their eyes.
The Yankees’ present predicament makes it increasingly likely that if they are to make the postseason for a 12th straight year, it will be as a division champion. Which means that for the first time in exactly 50 years, we could have two first-place teams in New York City (assuming that the Mets don’t try to follow too closely in the footsteps of the ’51 Dodgers, of course).
To get there, the Yankees will have to survive a five-game gauntlet at Fenway Park in August, and a four-game minefield against the Sox in September, and already those games feel like the most important regular-season games the Yankees have played in years. So you’ll have that as warm-up.
And if things do play out perfectly? If we do get another Yankees-Mets World Series?
One thing’s for certain: the teams are a more even match now than they were in 2000, when the Mets may have won more games during the regular season (thanks mostly to a ghastly September swoon by the Yankees) but wound up winning only three of the 11 games the teams played against each other in the summer and the fall. This time, they’re 3-3 so far, which sounds just about right. Because the teams seem as evenly matched as any two teams could be.
That’s what’s easy to forget about all the Subway Series the Yankees and the Dodgers engaged in back in the ’40s and ’50s; it wasn’t just that you had neighboring teams playing in the Series, they played great Series. Four of the seven times the Yankees and Dodgers played between 1941 and 1956, the Series went seven.
So as we speak, right now, you’d have to say that there is currently a four-way tie for the greatest baseball season in New York history:
1947, 1952, 1955 and 1956.
Two-thousand-and-six is now officially on the clock. Enjoy the next 3 ½ months. It promises to be one hell of a ride. Maybe the greatest one ever.
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WHERE THEY STAND TODAY
NATIONAL LEAGUE EAST
TEAM — RECORD — GB
Mets 53-36 –
Phillies 40-47 12
AMERICAN LEAGUE EAST
TEAM — RECORD — GB
Red Sox 53-33 –
Yankees 50-36 3
