Mets Top 10 Wins of 2016, #2 – August 29 against Marlins

Our Top 10 Mets wins of 2016 continues with #2, a 2-1 win against the Marlins on August 29.

I chose this game because it changed our fate. As I dissect it, however, I find its role in 2016 ever the more fascinating — from the Rafael Montero angle, to the fact Jose Fernandez started it for the Marlins.

I am pretty sure, without even looking it up, that this was his last start at Citi Field before his death, and that floored me. I had almost forgotten about that heavy angle, which hit myself and all in baseball like a ton of bricks, and me personally while I was walking all the way from my home in East Flatbush to the game that Sunday in September against the Phillies — one that turned into a 17-0 win the day before we were supposed to face him.

We have been surrounded by so much death lately and generally in 2016 that we have become numb to it, and Jose Fernandez‘s death had not since been front and center in my mind till this very moment. With so much that this August 29 game meant baseball-wise to the Mets, we take this opportunity to also honor Jose Fernandez, a talent gone from the face of the Earth at a much too early moment in time.

2016 has been a heavy-hearted year, but there is sweetness mixed in with that bitter. We celebrate life while surrounded by its end, and we celebrate the game of baseball, and that spirited competition Jose Fernandez loved so much.