The stakes for tonight's MLB Wild Card game between the San Francisco Giants and the New York Mets just got way higher. Okay, not really. Still, civic pride is now on the line for our cool Twitter dads/mayors Bill de Blasio and Ed Lee, who got into it on the net this afternoon, betting on the outcome of the game with bagels and coffee. Eventually, each camp goaded the other with photoshopped images: De Blasio as Willie Mays, the New York/San Francisco Giants hall of famer, and then Lee as Mays in Mets uniform (he played for them for one year, the last of his career, and the Mets apparently never plan to let anyone forget it).

The Giants and Mets take the field for tonight's big game at 5 p.m. PST, with the Giants having just swept the Dodgers on their way to clinch the Wild Card spot.

Previously: In Even-Year Fashion, Giants Roar Back To Life And Clinch Wild Card Spot

A's 5 Reds 3- Dan Haren won his ninth game as the A's beat the Reds to take the series and insure themselves of a winning record in interleague play. The A's hit a home run (by the resurgent Jack Cust), played some small ball, were patient at the plate, and did all those things that winning baseball teams do. But while the Reds are kind of easy picking, the A's are off to Shea to take on the Mets. That should be kind of fun. Enjoy A's fans.

Mets 4 Giants 2- The big news yesterday wasn't the Giants loss, but the loss of Armando Benitez who somehow got traded to the Florida Marlins for Randy Messenger. Messenger is pretty non-descript as a pitcher except for the fact he's 6' 6". The deal probably had to be made as the pitchfork brigade was banging on the door and demanding heads and some of those people holding pitchforks were fellow teammates. In a way, the whole thing is like when the Giants got rid of Livian Hernandez after the 2002 World Series, not necessarily because he was a bad pitcher, but because Giants fans were so ticked off by his blowing Game 7 that the Giants had to get rid of him. It also makes the series against the Marlins in July suddenly interesting because it could be Giants' fans first opportunity to kiss their favorite reliever goodbye.

Anyways, Brad Hennessey will be the new closer and we can dig it.

As for the game, once again Matt Cain was the recipient of some bad Giants O as they only got three hits and two runs. No, Cain didn't pitch a great game but it's hard to pick up a win if the team isn't hitting.

Giants 3 Mets 0- They say that one of the most important things about being a baseball player is the ability to keep things in perspective and to, as they say, "take it one day at a time." And that's just what the Giants did. One day after a loss that had many Giants fans reacting as if they had just lost Game 7 of a playoff series, the Giants stepped up, kept their cool, and won they only way they know how-- have their starting pitcher throw shutout baseball and score just enough runs to win. All this courtesy of Barry Zito who pitched the way you'd expect a very high priced #1 ace to pitch-- an eight inning, six hit, 122 pitch, shutout. Benitez, didn’t get into the game because he apparently has a bad knee which he got from warming up yesterday and by "bad knee" we mean will not appear until everyone’s stomach doesn’t feel queasy anymore.

A's 6 Rangers 1- Dan Haren is the man, a man with an ERA of 1.64. Yesterday he pitched eight innings and gave up only four hits and one earned run. The big news, however, wasn't Haren's now standard great start, but the reappearance of an old friend, Milton Bradley who played in his first game and immediately started hitting. Bradley's reappearance, however, meant that the great Jack Cust era is probably over as he's come down to earth from his hot, hot start and is now showing signs of being who he really is-- a journeyman minor leaguer. We hope you enjoyed it.

After games like last night, Sports Talk radio can kind of be essential listening. Misery loves company after all and there's a lot of misery out there in Giants Land. Yes, the baseball season is 162 games so one loss don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world but sometimes one game means more than others. Like last night's game.

Now part of it was because it was a hell of a game-- great pitching, stellar D, and enough nail-biting escapes from imminent danger (on both sides) to tear apart the insides of any fan. As we said earlier, it felt like a playoff game. Then there's the fact the Giants essentially threw out their B Team to face the best team in the NL and the kids played the Mets even throughout the 12 innings. They earned and deserved the win. They didn't get it.

And then there's Benitez. Benitez has earned the ire of Giants fans and us for the past few years for blown save after blown save. And he's drawn ire of his past employers as could be seen by the glee Mets fans had in booing him upon his entrance into the game. It's not just a matter of the blown saves either it's his demeanor. He has just awful body language. If somebody screws up on the field, he glowers. If the inning starts off badly, he starts having the "uh oh, here we go again" look. He also has a tendency to blame others for his mess ups, like after the game over the weekend in which he told everyone that he "did his job" after another blown opportunity. Whatever it is that makes closers have ice-cold veins and the cojones to deal with the pressure, Blownitez does not have it. On Murph & Mac on KNBR this morning, they started reading a list of "Top 10 Benitez Blown Saves" (can't find it online) which was a long list of f---- ups in a variety of playoffs and World Series games, including the "homerun" in the infamous Jeffrey Meier game. He also gave up the J.T. Snow homerun in the second game of the 2000 playoffs.

Picture by mdoeff on McCovey Chronicles

Mets 5 Giants 4- Man, we don't even want to talk about this game. In a tight, dramatic, overstuffed games that felt like a playoff game, the Giants finally took the lead in the 12th inning only to lose because Armando Benitez balked. Twice. Now, balk calls are extremely rare to begin with, but two in one inning? You can't come up with a bigger way in which a relief pitcher could blow a save-- a walk, two balks, and a home run—it's all on Armando. Sure, one of them was tickity, tickity, tack but Giants fans are pretty much grabbing pitchforks these days and we're pretty much grabbing a few too. His blowup ruined what would have been a nice little win as it featured another good start by Timmy, some clutch hitting by the kids, and a sparkling defensive gem by Omar and Kevin Fransden.

What a bad, bad, bad, bad way to lose a game.

Rangers 4 A's 0- Ron Washington got his first third victory over his ex as the Rangers shut out the A's. The A's only have themselves to blame as they gave up three unearned runs in the sixth. Also they were unable to score against the eminently beatable Mike Wood, he of a 7.02 ERA. The A's left nine on base and had bases loaded in the first but couldn't get anyone to bring anyone in.

You may not be interested in strategy, but strategy is interested in, you.
To a man we are told is the smartest man in baseball, Tony LaRussa, who finally overcame years of being the most annoying and most overrated manager in baseball to not choke and win a non-earthquake related World Championship.

Where force is necessary, there it must be applied boldly, decisively and completely. But one must know the limitations of force; one must know when to blend force with a maneuver, a blow with an agreement.
The Phillies, Mets and Indians all have kick-ass offenses yet questionable pitching. Didn't Marx say that good pitching beats good hitting everytime? Or was that Stengel.

Fascism is nothing but capitalist reaction.
Fascism comes out of a result of the failures of capitalism. True socialism could never approcah fascism because the fate of the working class is in their hands. Sort of like the collective bargaining agreement.

“Technique is noticed most markedly in the case of those who have not mastered it.”
Supposedly, the Detroit Tigers pitchers spent a lot of time this spring training learning how to cover the bag.

If proved true, none of this is any good. It could lead to civil and in some cases criminal penalties.

In the blogging world, there's something called a "Keith Hernandez" moment. This refers to a scene in Seinfeld where Keith Hernandez, ex-star of the '86 World Champion Mets, did something a little screwy but just pawned it off with the line "I'm Keith Hernandez." Meaning, of course, he could do whatever the hell he wants because he's Keith Hernandez. So if true, consider this Jobs' "Keith Hernandez" moment. After all, he's Steve Jobs.

Apple is once again claiming that there's nothing really to it and they've conducted their own investigation into the matter and came up with nothing. Or at least if there was something, it was the boo-boo of a couple of other people (damn temps). And we all know companies who conduct their own internal investigation never, ever cover things up.

But between this and the other investigation, we have a feeling this story isn't going to go away for awhile.

Quick note on todays ALCS game-- the game is scheduled to start around 1:30 PST. The reason MLB is giving is because it's supposed to, yes, snow late Friday night and they'd like to get the game in before winter hits. The not quite said reason is because the Mets/Cardinals have to make up their rained out Game 1 and Fox would rather show the Mets/Cardinals game in prime time than the A's/Tigers game.

Okay, yes, the A's are getting the shaft. Again. And yes, it's vaunted East Coast bias. Again. But the other option was to have both games play at the same time and shunt one of those games to F/X. Better a day game than being shunted to the channel of "Nip/Tuck" and "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia." Well, we like those shows but there's that stigma of being pushed aside and thrown from network TV to basic cable.

Truth is, we kind of like playoff day games. No, you can't watch most of the game (stupid work) but there's something cool about it. And not in that romanticized way all the old-timers get when they talk about about day games. We think it's kind of fun because you have to work at it to pay attention to the game. It makes it an active thing. You have to bring in a radio to work, or run some web site on your computer, or set up a special server to get the live feed. Or you just take really long lunches at bars (always a good thing to do). Plus, there's the vicarious thrill of doing something you might not necessarily should be doing.

In other words, we kind of dig on it being a day game.

Remember those halcyon days of 2005 when it became apparent the Giants season was not going to go as expected and everyone on the team started in with the kvetching? Well, it's happening again. First up to start in with the kvetching is the Giants' closer, Armando Benitez. Benitez complained to a writer about the negative vibes in the clubhouse, boos from the stands, negative comments from the broadcasters, and disrespect from the manager. Other than that, he's doing fine.

The trouble started last week, after Jason Schmidt's 16K throw-down. When Schmidt put the first two runners on base, Felipe didn't have his designated closer warm up, that being Benitez, but instead had Jeremy Accardo warm up. Thus the dis. Armando met with Felipe yesterday to go over everything and afterwards, Felipe announced to everyone that Benitez is not just his closer, but the organization's closer, which is manager-speak for "we ain't paying this dude nine million to scratch his balls and spit sun-flower seeds all game." His whining, however, has brought forth the ole "smallest violin" joke from writers, bloggers, and fans.

Now here's why statistics can often be such a sticky widget. Benitez's numbers are really good but anyone who has watched him come in can attest to the fact his appearance brings with him nothing but agita and angst and much gnashing of teeth. His performance against the Mets, in which he gave up two solo home runs in the 10th inning, one to a guy named Lastings Milledge, was just hooorible.

We can't actually recall watching Benitez come into a game and not screw it up. Even when he does get the save, he usually teeters on the brink of screwing it up. But then again, we can't actually recall him coming into many games. Wherein lies one of the problems-- you need to have the lead to bring in the closer and the Giants' haven't had much in the way of leads. Closers do better the more they pitch and Benitez ain't pitching. It should also be said that Felipe uses, abuses, and throws away his relievers like pieces of kleenex drunken frat boys use at the Lusty Lady.

Eh, sorry for the image there-- we're a little hungover.

Of course, there's one easy solution to fix all of these problems-- the bad vibes, the lack of use, the booing-- just, win, baby. Which, sadly, seems to be a problem these days.