With less than two weeks to go before the All-Star Break marks the halfway point of the 2023 MLB season, the New York Mets are in a bad spot. Despite the many millions of dollars Steve Cohen spent in free agency over the last few years a combination of untimely injuries and subpar play have the woeful franchise sitting in second-to-last in the NL East. At 35-43 they are 16 games behind the Atlanta Braves for first place and the playoffs seem like a dim hope, even with many innings left to play in the year.
Chris "Mad Dog" Russo loves to take aim at the Mets when they give him the opportunity and Sunday night's 7-6 loss, in which the team gave up a four-run eighth inning to the Philadelphia Phillies, was such an opportunity. Unfortunately Russo had one segment where he tried to explain to the listeners how unlikely it was that New York could make a run for the NL East crown by talking about how many games they'd have to win and the Braves would have to lose in the second half of the year for that outcome to come to fruition. If that sounds confusing while you're reading it, it is even more confusing when you're listening.
Math is hard. Russo tried his best but overextended and ended up in a endless loop of just spitting out numbers. It happens to the best of us. Especially the ones who could not do math in sports and instead wanted to talk or write about sports instead, like this writer.
Long story short, the Mets are just about screwed. And it's quite likely there are no numbers that will change that.
This article was originally published on thebiglead as Chris 'Mad Dog' Russo Confuses Himself & His Listeners Trying to Calculate Mets' Playoff Chances .
