You are a Mets fan, which means you’ve spent the winter getting bludgeoned by all the easy punch lines (“You’re the one!” “My condolences!” “Can I lend you 20 bucks?”) and all the sorry headlines, you’ve been forced to throw your Reyes gear into the incinerator and aren’t quite sure yet what to do with your No. 5 jersey.
You are a Mets fan, so you followed Sandy Alderson’s Twitter account and while some of what the GM said made you laugh, you did find yourself asking, to no one in particular, “Why does this man think this is a laughing matter?” And you watched Fred Wilpon’s farce of a press conference, the one where he waved the fivers at you and joked about it, and after you were done seething you asked — again, to no one in particular, “Why doesn’t this man get it? Why doesn’t he even try to get it?” You are a Mets fan, and you’ve spent blocs of seasons this way before, knowing with your brain that there will be no pennant race for you this summer even as your heart screams, “What if Wright and Bay and Duda and Murphy hit the way we know they can hit? What if Johan is really back?
What if the bullpen is better than we think? What if the kid, Tejada, gets off to a hot start? What if …” And by then, no one in particular is listening.
You are a Mets fan, and so you have been trained to believe that anything can happen, even the craziest stuff imaginable. If you are old enough, you saw them go from ninth place to first in the space of a year, then win the most improbable of all World Series. You saw them go from last place to first in the course of a month in 1973, then push the dynasty A’s to a seventh game. You saw the ball trickle through Buckner’s legs. You once saw the Mets qualify for a World Series with an outfield of Benny Agbayani, Timo Perez and Jay Payton.
You are a Mets fan, so you have been lashed by heartache. You are still hurting from 2008. You still spit at the mention of Tom Glavine’s name because he shrugged his shoulders on the way out the door in 2007, a day that is the worst you’ve ever spent as a sports fan. Intellectually you know Adam Wainwright’s curve was unhittable, but you still wish Carlos Beltran would’ve take a hack at it, for kicks and giggles if nothing else.
You still feel ill thinking about Mike Scioscia and 1988, and Terry Pendleton and 1987.
You are a Mets fan. You wear your old-school cap (the one with the blue button on the top, not orange) even though you know the moment people see you they will ask, “Why do you do this to yourself?” And if you are less than a committed Mets fan — and there aren’t many these days (the fence sitters are mostly with the Yankees or with the MLB TV package darlings-of-the-week) — then you shrug your shoulders and don’t say anything, or you join right along and bash for bashing’s sake.
But if you are a Mets fan? If you are a real Mets fan who realizes that you do not swap your devotions in lean times and abandon them in hard times, who will go to Citi Field this year because the thought of not going is anathema, who will follow every game no matter where the roller coaster ride of 162 games brings you?
Then you have a different answer.
“Because I have seen things,” you will say. “I saw a baseball bounce off the top of a wall and stay in play. I watched a ball bounce off Cleon Jones’ toe one day, and roll right into Gil Hodges’ hands. I saw Willie Mays hit a home run his first day as a Met, and I heard the ovation Mike Piazza received his last day as a Met. I saw Tug McGraw flap his glove against his thigh. I saw something called a grand-slam single. I saw an Imperfect Game that resonates in memory more than a hundred real perfect games put together.
“Because,” you will say, “I have seen the young Seaver, the young Doctor, the young Straw, the young Reyes. Because I have seen Keith Hernandez as a young man make me shout by fielding a bunt and throwing to third base, and I have seen Hernandez middle age make me laugh with an acerbic comment.
Because I saw Gary Carter in his prime. Because I saw Koosman get Davey Johnson to fly out, and I saw Jesse Orosco — traded to the Mets for Koosman — strike out Marty Barrett. Because when something like that happens again, I want to be there, and I want to care about it.”
“Because,” you will say, “I am a Mets fan.”
michael.vaccaro@nypost.com