Pick a Horse, Any Horse

As if you needed another reason not to be too emotionally involved with the Mets the rest of this season, yesterday Johan Santana went down with an injury and the Mets completed what appears to be an entirely middling trade involving Billy Wagner.

I mean, it's hard to imagine things going any worse for this team. The best there is to hope for is that the Mets lose as many games as possible from here on in and position themselves for the highest draft pick they can manage. There are 10 teams worse than us, it's probably too late to catch the Nats and Royals, but there's still time to come in 27th!

Now, if the idea of rooting for a team to lose each night isn't appealing to you, I'm happy to report that there is an alternative. Actually, there are a 15 alternatives -- that's right, there are 15 teams out there with a puncher's chance at making the playoffs: the Yankees, Red Sox, Rays, Tigers, White Sox, Twins, Angels, Rangers, Phillies, Braves, Marlins, Cardinals, Dodgers, Rockies, and Giants.

Ahh, but which one to choose? Five of them we can discard completely out of hand: the Yankees, Phillies, Braves, Marlins, and Cardinals. These teams are either innately loathe to Mets fans (the Yankees), have done something esepcially crippling to us recently (the Cardinals), or have caused tremendous pain over a number of years (the Braves, Phillies, and Marlins).

That leaves 10 remaining teams worthy of your affection. Here's where it gets personal. For me, there's nothing to grab onto with the Tigers, Twins, Angels, Rangers, or Dodgers. Those teams just do nothing for me.

That narrows the number down to 5: the Red Sox, Rays, White Sox, Rockies, and Giants. I'm going to discard the Giants because of the Matt Cain incident, and the Rays (sorry Nails) because I just can't get into them and because it was fashionable last year for Mets fans to start rooting
for them.

Still with me? We're down to the final 3: the Red Sox, White Sox, and Rockies. This is where it gets hard. As much as I enjoyed pulling for the White Sox on account of my old friend Papa, I'm going to have to let them go. Not enough there for me to get excited about.

That means it's Red Sox and Rox. I want to pull for the Rockies on account of Denver D's, but my heart's with Boston. A Yankee hater through and through and a product of the Massachusetts university system, I get the whole Red Sox Nation thing. I appreciate the fans' passion and their underdog history.

The whole underdog thing has gone by the wayside more recently, but hell, this year they're sure an underdog to the Yankees, and as always, priority number one around here is keeping the curse alive. The Sox have a better chance at doing that than the Rox.

But hell, who said you had to pick one team anyway? Sox in the AL, Rox in the NL. 2007 REMIX!!!

- A.F.O.M.G.