About once a year, my mother would hand down to me a parable that her father handed down to her. It involved two brothers who agreed to go into business together and how they began dreaming of all the success they would experience and all the fine things, like a horse-drawn carriage, they would buy with their profits. The more they talked about it, the more they disagreed with each other over who would do what and who would get what from the partnership. Their argument boiled over until all their hypothetical riches came tumbling down on top of them before cent one was earned. The parable ended with one brother screaming at the other, "Jakey, get out of the buggy!"

The moral of the story is Mike Jacobs kicks ass, but so did Mike Vail and Gregg Jefferies and Benny Agbayani and Jason Phillips even...and in case you were wondering where I get my aversion to presumptuousness vis-à-vis winning, now you know.

OK, that necessary dollop of downer delivered, let's have a party. Better yet, let's move to Arizona, all of us. Our team is already at home there. I haven't seen the Mets smile this much in the dugout since they had the teamwork to make the dream work. Gotta be that dry heat. Cleared up their sinuses and whatnot.

Seriously, we'll just trade locales with the Diamondbacks. How does Faith and Fear in Flagstaff grab you?

Here's the difference between now and earlier in the season. In May, the Mets had a pitcher throw seven innings of one-hit ball and they demoted him immediately thereafter. In August, the Mets had a rookie hit a three-run homer in his first at-bat and resisted the urge to do the same. Fool them once, shame on them, fool them twice and sooner or later they'll get a clue. For a team whose three greatest players arrived by fluky circumstances (Seaver: drawn out of a hat; Hernandez: trapped via a White Rat snit; Piazza: Rupert Murdoch's budget bravado ran amok), it's only fitting that Mike Jacobs should have gotten here accidentally and been allowed to stay only most reluctantly.

In August, the Mets also recalled that one-hit pitcher, the fella who pitched Wednesday night. Met management sure is stupid-lucky sometimes.

On a night when there wasn't much to get upset by, I'm going to stand up for the base choice made by Victor Diaz. Yeah, yeah, I know, the code and not rubbing it in and letting sleeping Snakes lie. I don't buy it. I watched this team hold Dog Night for the better part of the last five years and I'm not talking terriers. Guys didn't run to first. Guys didn't move up. Guys didn't pay attention, not even in the World Bleeping Series. Look at what was going on tonight as the score was building to absurd and lovely proportions:

• Beltran ran hard on a grounder when he "didn't have to"
• Floyd ran hard on a grounder when he "didn't have to"
• Reyes ran hard on a squib when he "didn't have to"

It is so gosh darn refreshing to see players wearing Mets uniforms uniformly hustle. The ineptitude of the Diamondbacks had a great deal to do with the jumping ugly of the past two games but it takes two to blow out. The Mets are rolling (after waiting out an April-to-August roll delay) and that's a result of playing the game the right way. Playing the game the right way means that if you're a young player and you're on second with less than two out, it is your obligation to make a habit of tagging up when a fly ball is hit to deep center. It is Victor Diaz's obligation to hustle every moment he is on the field unless his manager or a designated lieutenant informs him it is not in the team's best interest to do so (for example, not flashing the steal sign when up 17 runs). If Victor Diaz is not yet so schooled or jaded in the so-called unwritten rules of the game, I applaud him. Hone that instinct, don't curb it. He'll figure out game situations eventually.

The Diamondbacks don't like it? They shouldn't let so many Mets get on base. But really, for our sake, they should continue to do just that. I don't particularly care if they like it or not. They deserve what they get for firing Wally Backman. Shoot, this is a team that lost 18-4 after Tony Clark called a clubhouse meeting that lasted 90 minutes. As motivational speakers go, Tony Clark is no Tony Robbins.

And oh yeah -- BOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

Wham! Biff! Sock! Pow!

Wright. Reyes. Jacobs. Castro. Matsui. (Matsui? Yes, Matsui.) Seo.

As Willie Randolph indicated with his finger to his lips at the end, nobody wake up this team. Nobody rouse David Wright to express their admiration of his march into the elite precincts of the National League. Nobody stop to discuss how much they're enjoying Jose Reyes's wild abandon, sudden power and continuing education in pitch selection. Nobody have a heart-to-heart with Ramon Castro about if he'll soon have more RBIs than hits. Nobody -- this means you, Ed Coleman -- suggest to young Mike Jacobs that he's Roy Hobbs. Nobody ask Jae Seo how he learned to channel Bob Gibson. Nobody tell Kaz Matsui that hey, we've missed you. And nobody wake anybody else up to marvel that we're clubbing with practically no contributions from Beltran or Floyd. Everybody just keep on rolling. Don't think, Meat, just throw. And hit. And field. And cheer, or boo, or sleep, or whatever it is you're doing at home.

On the flipside, I imagine the Diamondbacks' part of the blogosphere ain't exactly a happy place right now. If any D-Backs bloggers stuck around for the whole thing, in fact, my hat's off. (And hey, we know the feeling.) That second inning was the worst frame of defensive baseball I can remember in years: It included a wild pitch, the right fielder stumbling and turning a fly ball into a double, the center fielder breaking the wrong way and allowing a bloop single, and then -- as if that weren't enough for a week of muttering -- Jackson and Clayton somehow allowing two runs to score on an inning-ending double play. Two runs! I've never seen that. It never occurred to me that I might see that.

Nor did I ever imagine going to a seventh inning with three different guys in the lineup missing one hit for the cycle. Baseball being baseball, of course, Reyes didn't get his double and neither Wright nor Jacobs got their triple. 18-4 demolitions being 18-4 demolitions, Wright and Jacobs hit home runs instead. I guess it would have been silly to stop at third and refuse to go any farther.

The only fly in the ointment was whatever the hell it was Victor Diaz thought he was doing tagging up from second in a 17-0 game. An inexcusable move, and I held my breath at the thought of all the self-destructive macho dominoes that could have started falling there, and I suppose still might. Here's hoping Willie gives Victor a thorough dressing-down, and/or sends Pedro, Ice or one of the vets to discuss not showing up the opposition, letting sleeping dogs lie, and all the other cliches Victor should know by now. I'm kind of a fan of brawls, but here's hoping Pedro doesn't feel the need to defend Met honor (even though poor Kaz hardly deserved being the plunkee, on the best night he's had in an age). The possible consequences range from suspensions to brawl-related injuries, and we can't afford either. Victor was in the wrong; it shouldn't have been Kaz that got hit, but for the sake of the team and what we're trying to accomplish, best to walk away.

Besides, when you score 18 runs on 20 hits, your honor's pretty unassailable.

P.S. Kudos to MSG for some very nice TV work tonight, from Pedro showing Zambrano the circle change (Victor! Listen to this man!) to spying on Willie's attempts to stay stone-faced to the footage of Mike Lowell catching Luis Terrero with the hidden-ball trick to the late shot of the D-Backs president sitting by himself looking rumpled and mournful. Excellent work all around.