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With his 121st hit of the 2011 season, Jose Reyes now has as many hits through 81 team games (78 played) as five Mets did in complete seasons, including Jeff Kent in 1994, the strike-shortened year Kent led the Mets in hits; Mike Piazza in 2004, when Piazza was the National League's All-Star catcher; Paul Lo Duca in 2007, Tommie Agee in 1971; and Ed Kranepool in 1976, the year Kranepool surpassed Cleon Jones for most hits in a Mets career. He has passed the 120 total of Jason Phillips from 2003, when Phillips established himself as Mets first baseman, and John Milner from 1976, when Milner hit three grand slams.

BEST SINGLE-SEASON BATTING AVERAGE IN METS HISTORY Through 81 NYM Games 1969: Jones -- .352 (.3519) 2011: REYES -- .352 (.3517) 1998: Olerud -- .330

METS HITS IN A SEASON Through 81 NYM Games REYES 2011: 121 Johnson 1996: 109

METS ALL-TIME HIT LEADERS Through 6/30/2011 1. Ed Kranepool 1,418 2. JOSE REYES 1,240 3. Cleon Jones 1,188 4. DAVID WRIGHT 1,182

Collins very proactive in the postgame taking the responsibility for Byrdak not being ready. Wonder if that was code for throwing Debus under de bus.

Your opinion, please. These are the last three paragraphs of Martino's game story in today's Daily News: They also clinched a series win and, at 41-39, rose to two games above .500 for the first time since April 5. This is a team that was not expected to contend, and is still not contending - but it is playing respectably, and enjoying the moment. What does this modest success mean, and how far will it take this team? It is useful to remember that, exactly one year before Wednesday night's game, the Jerry Manuel Mets were 43-34, and that record did not even represent their peak. They finished the year 79-83, lousy enough to cost the manager and general manager their jobs. Our point? These Mets have not proven anything yet. Is a game story supposed to have a "point"? It's not a column. He can have a theme or a thread but I don't care what he thinks is "useful" or what his opinion is as part of a game story. In my Happiest Recap research, I'm surprised at how often through fifty years of Mets history game stories (and columns) are peppered with sentiments like this. It's as if "dismal until proven able" is embedded into the DNA of Mets beat writers. It's even more acute today in that there is increased impatience to figure out the endgame of any given moment. It's not enough to say "the Mets won, the Mets are winning, how might this set them up for the next few games?" It's "what about the rest of the season?" or "how will this affect next year?" We all do that to some extent, I suppose. Specifically, Martino's showing himself to be a tool. WTF does last year's record have to do with this year, other than yeah, you never know if a team can keep it up? If this were the same roster and manager and GM, it might be relevant. It isn't so it's not. It's also sad that these guys (the Martinos, et al) have to rush to their default judgment that the Mets suck as a rule, thus you, gentle reader, should not be fooled. Fooled by what? Does Martino have a handle on the future that nobody else does? He can offer an informed opinion from watching the Mets every day. So can I. So can you. Other than a credential dangling around his neck, thus giving him entree to ask players inane questions after games, I'm not gleaning anything particularly insightful from him, certainly not, "hey, Mets fans, your team hasn't clinched a pennant." Well who the fuck thought it did?

With his 119th hit of the 2011 season, Jose Reyes now has as many hits through 80 team games (77 played) as Richie Ashburn had for all of 1962 (135 games played) and George Foster had for all of 1985 (129 games played). He has passed Art Shamsky's 1970 (118 hits in 122 games played). h/t UMDB

The Tigers have players named Austin, Casper and Alburquerque, all of them more or less western cities. And they still lost 16-9!

Pagan 2.0 Paulino 1.5 Murphy 1.0 Bay 1.0 Hairston 1.0 Reyes 1.0 Turner 1.0 Beltran 1.0 Tejada 0.5

BEST SINGLE-SEASON BATTING AVERAGE IN METS HISTORY Through 80 NYM Games 1969: Jones -- .352 2011: REYES -- .349 1998: Olerud -- .328

METS HITS IN A SEASON Through 80 NYM Games REYES 2011: 119 Johnson 1996: 107

Leyland's next nightmare: Jose Reyes � SS Justin Turner � 3B Carlos Beltran � RF Ronny Paulino � C Jason Bay � LF Angel Pagan � CF Scott Hairston � DH Daniel Murphy � 1B Ruben Tejada � 2B Chris Capuano - LHP

smg58 wrote: How many triples did that team hit? 31, led by Teddy Martinez with 5

Your organizational hitting leaders through June 28: Gregory Pron, Kingsport, .423; Juan Carlos Gamboa, GCL Mets, .407; Julio Concepcion, Kingsport, .382; Juan Lagares, St. Lucie, .344; Carlos Leyva, GCL Mets, .333; Nestor Moreno, Kingsport, .320; Cam Maron, Kingsport, .316; Josh Satin, Binghamton, .314; Pedro Zapata, St. Lucie, .309; Kirk Nieuwenhuis, Buffalo, .298.

Edgy DC wrote: Tempted to do a vicious and violent merging. Let's enjoy our once-in-a-lifetime ride with wild abandon and multiple threads.

He's already got the lot of them beat when it comes to base hits. The 1972 Mets played 156 games and none of them collected more than 96 hits. 2011 Jose Reyes has played 76 games and has 117 hits. And he's about to topple More Entire Teams.

Olerud was just finishing up his only bad month -- only sub-.300 month -- of 1998 that June, when he hit .222. He really did pour it on late, batting .413 in September.

As you probably know, Cleon Jones batted .340 in 1969, an unassailable team record for nearly three decades. Then John Olerud came along in 1998 and batted .354, smashing Cleon's record and establishing a standard I for one never thought would be neared. But it's half a season just about and it's being neared. Let us track how the Mets' most above-average player is doing when it comes to average. BEST SINGLE-SEASON BATTING AVERAGE IN METS HISTORY Through 79 NYM Games 1969: Jones -- .354 2011: REYES -- .349 1998: Olerud -- .326

METS HITS IN A SEASON Through 79 NYM Games REYES 2011: 117 Johnson 1996: 105

METS ALL-TIME HIT LEADERS Through 6/28/2011 1. Ed Kranepool 1,418 2. JOSE REYES 1,236 3. Cleon Jones 1,188 4. DAVID WRIGHT 1,182

Reyes 3.0 Beltran 2.0 Bay 2.0 Dickey 1.0 Pagan 1.0 Thole 1.0

sharpie wrote: Mets scored 14 runs last time Harris was batting second at DH. Maybe that's the ticket. Yeah, but the misconception of Harris as totally worthless is more fun. Well, maybe not as much fun as scoring 14 runs...

Is there some new rule I haven't heard about that says you can't use a DH to generate offense?

Verducci's prayers are answered. Derek Jeter runs bases, 'feels good' "Derek Jeter breathes air, exhales" is also guaranteed to get a smile from him.

Mike asked Omar what he's doing with himself. "Quality time with my family," Omar said, as if that was his goal. Then he was gone to take the whole brood to Arby's.