No more baseball. Thank goodness for football, because I think I’d go out the window if I had only hockey and basketball for sustenance once the world series is over. Defenestration. I think that’s what it’s called. I must not be alone in thinking that either. Going out the window, that is. Imagine it happened quite frequently at some point. Enough to motivate someone to actually come up with a word for it. Think about that. We do lots of things every day that there isn’t a word for but should be. Throwing a pillow at the TV after Jerry Manuel starts Wilson Valdez at short, for example. Gotta be a word for that.

Anyway, the Phillies won yesterday—outlasting the Marlins 7-6 at Citizens Bank Park and avoiding a series sweep to end the season. I guess the secret to beating the Marlins turned out to be sitting all your regulars, because that’s what the Phillies did yesterday as Ryan Howard, Chase Utley, Jimmy Rollins, Shane Victorino and Raul Ibanez all rode the pine. Josh Johnson must have been licking his chops as he warmed up to start this one, huh? Turns out, not so much.  John Mayberry, Paul Hoover and Miguel Cairo combined to blast the Marlins, who finish the year at 87-75–6 games out of first and 5 back of the wildcard.

Washington fans have to be feeling pretty satisfied with themselves this week, huh? After laying a 3 game sweep on the Mets, they go into Atlanta and sweep the Braves out of town too to finish the season on a 7 game winning streak. Still couldn’t break 60 wins, however, as the Nats finish up the season 59-103. That’s 2 years in a row at 59 wins. Whatever word there is to describe what the Nationals are, “good” is not one of them. Let’s hope Stephen Strasburg gets here quickly, huh? The game ball in this one had to go to J.D. Martin, who matched Derek Lowe down the line and shut down the Braves over 6 innings, scattering 6 hits and allowing a single run in a game that the Nats went on to win in extras 2-1.

Finally, the Mets. I actually can’t write any more about them. It hurts too much. Watching Nelson Figueroa out there yesterday though pitching his complete game shutout only made it harder to endure these next months without baseball. The playoffs and World Series will be fun, don’t get me wrong. And my Giants will make it bearable until January or so, but thinking about what could have been this year in Queens just brings me down. Maybe the Mets would have choked again this year, and you know what, I’d have preferred it to the dead from the neck up baseball I witnessed this year from basically mid-May. Sweeping the Astros to finish out the string here was nice, but watching the Phillies and Dodgers stumble to the finish this year got me thinking about how the Mets likely would have made it close.