Oh My God… We did it… The New York Mets have stunned the Los Angeles Dodgers with a 3-2 victory to win the National League Division Series with an epic Game 5 showdown at Dodger Stadium. I’m so incredibly proud of this team, they’re so exciting, so amazing, so freaking awesome…
My dear Mets friends, words are not sufficient enough to describe what I’m feeling right now. The emotions are running the full gamut ranging from tears of joy to an exhilarating, heart-racing feeling that has me numb, euphoric, and tingling over. Wow… The New York Mets are going to the National League Championship Series to play the Chicago Cubs at Citi Field on Saturday night!
I never doubted them once, and even as Jacob deGrom allowed those two first inning runs I believed we’d find a way to persevere and fight back to win this game. I never felt at any point in this game that we were escaping LA with anything but a thrilling victory.
What can I say about Daniel Murphy that wasn’t said in a 2,000 word article this morning? How do you put a value on the so many intangibles this man brings to the table? There are great regular season players who squirm in the post season, and then there are warriors like Murphy who take their game to a whole new level and outshines everyone in the dugout on a stage like this. The Dodgers have Justin Turner, we have Daniel Murphy.
Seriously… Was anyone surprised that it was Murphy who hit the tie-breaking home run to give the Mets the lead they would never relinquish? Freaking clutch, unreal how freaking clutch he is. A triple short of hitting for the cycle and what about that stolen base that led to the other run!?!? Unreal, the man is unreal…
But deGrom, oh what a game by our ace deGrom… In our thread tonight I wrote, “You can only see the true measure of a man when you see how he responds after he falls… How he rises up.” And rise up is exactly what he did. This far, but no farther, he told the Dodgers, who couldn’t plate another run for the final eight innings.
What an incredibly gutsy performance by this young man tonight. Such fight, such moxie, such determination. To watch how he snuffed out four consecutive Dodger threats after that first inning sent chills down my spine. That’s the kind of guy you want by your side on a battle field. He was fearless and ferocious. You make me so proud, Jake.
And how about the youngster Noah Syndergaard? I thought Terry Collins was insane by letting him warm-up three different times in the game. But the kid takes the mound unfazed by all the drama and pressure of a critical do-or-die game, and breezed through a dominant seventh inning, striking out both Corey Seager and Justin Turner and having them both talking to themselves as they returned to the dugout. Tremendous performance by the rookie righthander who pitched with the poise of a veteran.
In the final act of the evening the Mets turned to closer Jeurys Familia, who has been their savior and MVP out of that bullpen all season long, and of course he pitches the final two innings of the game to earn a six-out save. Game over. Pop the champagne!
Unbelievable and yet very believable… The resiliency, the tremendous spirit, the non-stop fight… I’m literally shaking as I write this. I just want to scream and hug them all. What a feeling… What a night… What a series… What a team… I love you Mets…. I fucking love you… I can’t wait until Saturday, only one hurdle away from the World Series… Bring on the Chicago Cubs.
