Cardinals 6 Mets 5

It’s official: the Mets will finish the 2011 season with a losing record. Great job, guys. Don’t worry about the won-loss record, all that matters is you battled. Yeah.

The blogosphere is abuzz about a single sentence uttered by Sandy Alderson on Tuesday night’s SNY broadcast.  “If we make changes, they’re not likely to be subtle,” Alderson said about changing the outfield wall dimensions.

And the Blogs can’t contain themselves (or hold back on the Ronald Reagan references):

• TedQuarters wonders how new dimensions would change the team’s strategy.
• Real Dirty Mets looks at how new dimensions would affect the pitching staff as well as the lineup.
• Metszilla is opposed to tearing down that wall.
• Metsmerized is more concerned with building a pitching staff than a new outfield wall.
• Rising Apple illustrates that there is more to Lucas Duda than just raw power.
• Amazin’ Stories talks about the persistence of Jason Bay.

Keep checking out Mets Today for more talk about walls (and the Mets).

In case you missed it, Sandy Alderson appeared with Ron and Gary during the top of the third inning in last night’s Mets-Cardinals game. The Mets cooperated, scoring three runs, giving Alderson the time to respond from some frank questioning from Cohen.

Alderson admitted that the 2012 closer may not yet be in the organization and that the team will not use next Spring Training to decide on who gets the role. He blamed the recent dreadful homestand on the numerous blown save opportunities by the bullpen. Alderson also dwelled on the concept that this as-yet-undetermined closer may currently be a minor league pitcher on the verge of a breakthrough.

Alderson spoke highly of both Ruben Tejada and Dan Murphy, noting the Mets slide from contention began when Murphy was lost for the year. He praised Jason Bay‘s determination to work himself back to past performance and indicated that the starting rotation, plus Johan Santana will be much the same as this year. He also said that his staff will recommend changes to the dimension of Citi Field.

Cardinals 11 Mets 6

If this were 1960, the season would now be over. Unfortunately for Mets fans suffering through a meaningless September, there are still 8 more games to go.

This was really MUCH closer than the final score indicates. And I know I’ve typewritten these exact words several times this year, but trust me — it was really and truly a close game, for most of the contest.