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" There&amp;#039;s an unwritten contract that every fan signs with his or her crappy team. It&amp;#039;s a multi-faceted agreement: Religious devotion even through the rebuilding seasons, the memorizing of trivial statistics, the shelling out for overpriced beer on the nights you go cheer in person, the high-fiving of strangers after home runs, the draining anguish yet quiet acceptance of missing the playoffs once again. In theory, your investment will some day pay off in the shared glory of a championship. Your illogical fandom of a perpetually shitty team is supposed to have a faint glimmer of vindication. It has to, right? I signed my deal with the Mets in the spring of 1993. I was five-years-old when my dad indoctrinated me into the cult of the damned by dragging me to a springtime game in Flushing, Queens, at the now-demolished Shea Stadium. That night, the Mets were getting shellacked. Again. They would lose 103 games that season\u2014their worst record since 1967\u2014and my dad figured we could cut out early. As the story goes, I just sat there, transfixed by a team that featured such immortal malcontents as Vince Coleman, Jeff Kent, and the combustible Bobby Bonilla. I refused to leave my seat. We stayed. Fast forward 22 years, and, so far this season, that childhood contract I signed with the Mets has become akin to the annual deferred payments of $1.19 million the poor suckers are still doling out to Bonilla through 2035. I&amp;#039;ve been a returning customer for past services rendered (two championships that I wasn&amp;#039;t alive for) in exchange for, well, not much (three lousy playoff appearances: &amp;#039;99, &amp;#039;00, &amp;#039;06). Many fans in many parts of the country can relate. I&amp;#039;ve grown accustomed to the self-fulfilling prophecy of a Mets season. Even when things are looking up, the other shoe doesn&amp;#039;t so much drop as it kicks you, the fan, in the balls, over and over again, like a crazed mule. For as long as I&amp;#039;ve been alive, the Mets have been a highlight reel of pain. Roll the tape:  Endy Chavez miraculously steals a home run from Scott Rolen in the 2006 NLCS ... then Carlos Beltran stares down a called third strike with the bases loaded at the end of Game 7. Johan Santana has a feel-good return from shoulder surgery in 2012, throwing the team&amp;#039;s first and only no-hitter on 134 pitches ... and subsequently blows out the same shoulder months later. Matt Harvey captivates the city in a way that no Mets ace has since Doc Gooden ... then requires Tommy John surgery on his pitching elbow before he finishes one full season in the majors. And then there&amp;#039;s Bernie Madoff, whose comically unsustainable gains for Mets owners Fred and Jeff Wilpon turns out to be a massive Ponzi scheme that has, among other casualties, crippled the team&amp;#039;s finances for much of the last decade. So you could say I&amp;#039;m weary of the team&amp;#039;s unbelievable start to the 2015 season. The Mets won 11 straight going into this past weekend&amp;#039;s Subway Series against the Yankees in the Bronx, with fans riding a wave of optimism that hasn&amp;#039;t been seen since Pedro Martinez&amp;#039;s jheri curl dribbled down the back of a Mets jersey in 2005. On Friday morning, the Mets were 13-3\u2014the best team in baseball. I had to see it to believe it.  Friday night, I migrate with the crowd out of the subway toward Yankee Stadium when I hear the familiar chirping: &amp;quot;Tickets? Selling tickets?&amp;quot; Curious, I ask one of the hawkers, middle-aged with a short salt-and-pepper afro, if the Mets are a hotter ticket thanks to their winning streak. Reigning Rookie of the Year Jacob deGrom, the long-limbed, expertly coiffed co-ace to Matt Harvey, is on the mound tonight. It&amp;#039;s my first time in the new Yankee Stadium since it opened in 2009. It&amp;#039;s underwhelming. Structurally, the park is a gilded knockoff of the original, with an air of detachment from the franchise&amp;#039;s rich history. In New York, the Mets have always been the counterculture alternative to the Yankees&amp;#039; corporate, buttoned-down ethos, and that contrast manifests itself beautifully during this game. My Stub Hub ticket happens to be in the section right below the &amp;quot;Bronx Invasion,&amp;quot; a throng of Mets fans in orange shirts who take over at least five sections of the left field upper deck. While those paying $800 to sit down on the field level could not look less interested, these Mets fans are easily the loudest in the stadium, keeping the &amp;quot;LET&amp;#039;S GO METS!&amp;quot; chants going strong throughout the game, even as our offense fails to muster more than five hits. At one point, a Yankees fan wanders into this Mets colony, only to be practically run out of the stadium as the orange and blue faithful scream, &amp;quot;YOU ARE LOST! YOU ARE LOST!&amp;quot; That&amp;#039;s not to say that Yankees fans don&amp;#039;t have their moments of primal redemption. In the first inning, deGrom gives up one of those lazy fly balls to Mark Teixeira that somehow turns into a home run in this bandbox of a stadium. Several beers deep, the Yankees fans in my section erupt like a pack of gorillas, hurling obscenities, grunts, and other assorted animal noises towards the Mets section in a distinctly Bronxian lilt. Two more Yankees pop-ups that would be harmless outs at the cavernous Citi Field (which replaced Shea) land in the stands. The game quickly turns into a rout. But the cacophonous Mets fans keep the ruckus going well into the cold night. I decide to venture into the section to be with my people for the final four innings. At this point, the winds are howling in the 400 section and the sale of liquid warmth will soon be prohibited (notwithstanding the chants of &amp;quot;WE WANT AL-CO-HOL!&amp;quot; from the Mets fans). George, a stocky gentleman with &amp;quot;Da General&amp;quot; emblazoned on the back of his blue No. 5 jersey, with an orange doo-rag, blue and orange Nikes, and an assortment of gold jewelry that would make Mr. T blush, assures me through slurred speech and beery halitosis that this is our year! Eddie Boison, known to Mets fans as Cowbell Man, is on his feet with every pitch. Boison preaches a righteous sermon of Mets piety, practiced over his 25 years of fandom. &amp;quot;Loyalty no matter what,&amp;quot; he tells me, his face turning serious. &amp;quot;Win, lose, or draw, the Mets are always my team.&amp;quot; I strike up a conversation with a fan named Jake, boldly wearing a Mets onesie with his buddy, Ben. Jake tells me that they hope to turn them into &amp;quot;playoff onesies&amp;quot; this season. Several fans draw comparisons to the inimitable camaraderie of the &amp;#039;86 World Series team, particularly the young, elite pitching tandem of Harvey and deGrom (not so much tonight), and the development of young sluggers like Lucas Duda. We&amp;#039;re all here, on a near-35-degree-night in the nosebleeds at the rival ballpark. The 11-game winning streak is about to end, but Mets fans are nothing if not hopeful. Onesie Jake is undaunted. The very next day, the Mets crush the Yankees 8-2. The day after that, they lose by two runs. As of Monday morning, the Mets are 14-5\u2014still the best team in baseball. It doesn&amp;#039;t feel real. &amp;quot;This isn&amp;#039;t the beginning of the end,&amp;quot; Onesie Jake said on Friday as we stood there watching a loss. &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s the beginning of a lot to come.&amp;quot;  Jake paused, realizing that he just tempted the baseball gods.  &amp;quot;But this game sucked, so who knows?&amp;quot;   "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/sports/a34626/mets-2015-team/>