A clandestine undertaking on behalf of Israel, the Jets and the Jews.

 
The Elster Jinx

Elster claims to be a fan of the Mets, Jets, Rangers and Knicks. I can't speak about the life of an unfortunate Knicks fan, but as a long-suffering fan of the Mets, Jets and Rangers, one thing I know is to never publicly express optimism (and to try to even refrain from thinking optimistically), for something terrible is surely about to happen.

This appears to be lost on Elster. Just two days ago, in a post about the Mets, he wrote that "there is just something about this team that makes it different than some of the disasters of years past." He offered a few reasons, and said that "most importantly, when you can give the rock to Billy Wagner and his sub-1 ERA, you know that the game is pretty much over. What a pleasure as a fan it is to know that if the Mets are up in the last inning, you can breath a sigh of relief."

I was going to remind Elster that Wagner had already blown two saves in the ninth inning, but he's been a tad touchy about my corrections, and I didn't want to upset him further.

Of course, the Mets lost on Tuesday night. Last night, I went to Shea, sitting through the steady rain (unlike the vast majority of wimps there, who apparently confuse rain with tear gas). With the Mets up 3-1 going to the 9th inning and the Pirates showing little sign of offensive life, in came Wagner.

Of course, Wagner proceeded to promptly give up two runs, including run scoring singles by light hitting Jose Hernandez and Ronny Paulino, both of whom had no problem catching up to Wagner's fastball, a rather disturbing sign.

So much for knowing "that the game is pretty much over" and breathing "a sigh of relief."

This is not the first time Elster has jinxed his purported teams. On March 24, he informed us that "the Jets are relatively close to signing a deal with free agent lineman John Runyan." A few hours later, Runyan signed with the Eagles.

Similarly, the Rangers won their first game after the Olympics, prompting Elster to celebrate and write that the Rangers had incurred "no ill effects of the 2 week Olympics layoff" and that "this spells good times." Good times, indeed. The Rangers immediately went into a complete collapse.

G-d help Chad Pennington if he successfully returns from his rehab and wins a few games for the Jets next season. I can already envision Elster's post proclaiming Chad the comeback player of the decade, and in the very next game, Pennington crumbling to the ground after D'Brickashaw Ferguson is beaten by the defensive end.
posted on 5/04/2006