It has been quite the roller coaster season for the New York Mets and their fans.
At the start of summer, the team’s prospects looked bleak as their record sat at a disappointing 24-34. They seemed firmly out of the playoff picture.
But around early June, their luck changed. Since then, the Mets have won the most games in Major League Baseball. Some fans say the winning streak was ignited when Grimace, of McDonald’s fame, tossed the first pitch on June 12.
Others say it’s their new rally cry, “OMG,” a chart-topping Latin American hit tune sung by none other than Mets veteran infielder — and part-time pop star — Jose Iglesias. And of course, their success has been fueled by stellar play on the field, led by the Mets’ star shortstop, Francisco Lindor.
“Part of being a Mets fan is the pain,” said Alex Fontini, pictured left. “And there’s no pain like it.”
Courtesy of Alex Fontini
After a summer of unexpected delights, the high point was Monday. On the last day of the regular season, the Mets defeated their division rival, the Atlanta Braves, 8-7, in a wild back-and-forth game that saw the Mets pull ahead for good on a clutch ninth-inning two-run home run by Lindor, clinching a Wild Card spot in the postseason.
“It was one of the most emotionally draining and exciting sports experiences of my life” Alex Fontini, a longtime Mets fan and Brooklyn resident, said about Monday’s game. “I thought I was going to have a heart attack.”
Many were expecting the worst on Monday, due to the Mets’ history of anguish and oh-so-close moments, including World Series losses to the New York Yankees in 2000 and the Kansas City Royals in 2015. The team hasn’t won a championship since its dramatic Game 7 victory over the Boston Red Sox in the 1986 World Series.
Heartbreak is something many Mets fans point to as a key piece of their identity.
“Part of being a Mets fan is the pain. And there’s no pain like it,” Fontini lamented. “The Mets have come up with so many ways to destroy me.”
“They can do it if they put their mind to it,” said 92-year-old Mets fan Dot Guiheen.
Photo by Cat Edwards
Yet this gallows humor exists alongside a surprising amount of cheerfulness among fans.
Rob Devigne, born and raised in the Bronx, was 9 years old when he attended his first Mets game during the team’s inaugural season in 1962. He’s seen his fair share of disappointments.
Even so, he remains cautiously optimistic about his team.
“We go through such down moments that you just have to enjoy the upside,” Devigne said.
In fact, he already views this season as a success.
“But that doesn’t mean I’m satisfied,” Devigne said, adding that he’d be thrilled for any step the Mets take toward advancing in the playoffs.
Others expressed more confidence in the team’s chances.
“They can do it if they put their mind to it. They really can,” Dot Guiheen, a 92-year-old Mets fan on Long Island, said over the phone. She was at the last World Series that the Mets won in 1986, and would love to see the team go all the way again this year.
With another come-from-behind, 8-4 win over the Milwaukee Brewers in Game 1 on Tuesday evening, the ball club is one win away from advancing to the second round of the postseason. Their next game, against the Brewers, is Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. EST.
And MLB playoffs are famously unpredictable; a wild-card team has reached the World Series in each of the past two seasons.
So why not the Mets?