We could all use our own Ricky Ledee. We could all use a caddy to go in and play for us the day after we've had a big time the night before. We could all use a guy who might go 0-for-4 in our stead but nobody would notice and few would complain.

I wasn't technically hung over Tuesday. I mean half a metallic Budweiser and 187 milliliters of Pommery Pop? Get a good look — that's not a lightweight anchoring the right side of your picture.

Emotionally was another story. There was no way my head was leaving Monday night behind so easily. Nor was it hitting a pillow 'til dawn's early light. I recorded Mets Fast Forward at 5 A.M. but decided to sit up and watch it as it aired. Can't see Josh Willingham fly out to Cliff Floyd enough. Kind of defeated the purpose of setting the DVR, but I'll sleep when we're last.

While waiting for the rebroadcast, I read a very funny thread on a very busy Mets message board about what the back pages might look like Tuesday. The running joke was that the New York tabloids are so obsessed with the doings of another team that...well, read it yourself. I especially like #13.

It turned out the local papers did themselves proud. The News abandoned Cap'n Cock...y for one morning and gave us our poster boys, David and Jose, drenching themselves silly in the clubhouse. That was good. But Newsday devoting A1 to Our Fellas out on the field as the Toast of the Town? That's New York Long Island Honda Dealers Good!

Young David looks awfully comfortable with a bottle of champagne in one hand and a cigar in the other. Let's make sure we see some variation on that theme a few more times this year and regularly for the next 15 or 20.

Hey, you know what never happened? The Pirate series. It's a typical soap opera convention, one I recognize from my decade as on occasional (OK, mostly constant) viewer of The Young & The Restless. You have a very intense storyline on which everybody's lives are focused for a time and then, after it doesn't catch on, you just write the next episode like it never happened.

Pirate series? What Pirate series? Everybody in Genoa City knows the Mets romped to their clinching unimpeded and undefeated.

Adult beverage consumption did not end in Section 4 Monday night. Last Friday, when the air was thick with nonsense about the necessity of clinching in Pittsburgh, I visited my local liquorium and spent 14 big ones on a bottle of Korbel Extra Dry. (In 1999, I celebrated the Wild Card with a more inexpensive bottle of Rheingold Extra Dry...it was a very good year.) The California champagne — some would claim that its geographic origin makes it merely sparkling wine, but some also claim you can overcelebrate a division title, so some are morons — grew icy cold in the fridge over the clinchless weekend. This was not a bottle that had a chance of sneaking under the nose of Inspector Cloushea, so in the fridge it sat as the last out was made and the fifth title was earned.

Hung over or not Tuesday, the Korbel needed to come out and play. Mrs. Prince earned her taste, and not just in the Met abstract. When I called her on the way home post-clinching, I asked her if she watched. No, she said. Before I could ask what the hell is wrong with you, you just sat and watched three dreadful losses with me and now that we win, you don't even peek, she volunteered, "I was afraid if I did, they'd lose."

Wow. Nineteen-plus years of me and this have really done a number on her.

Anyway, we popped our cork in advance of the pregame show and, discovering we don't own champagne glasses, filled a couple of Mets beer mugs given me by Jim Haines a couple of birthdays ago. I felt compelled to compose a toast on the spot, telling Stephanie that I had never thought in terms of a divisional title per se, but I would have been surprised when we got married in 1991 if I'd been told it would take this long before we would see one together, and that it's all a lot more fun sharing it with her. Then we raised our mugs and swigged. We're not a drinking couple, but we are capable of gettin' swiggy wit' it once or twice a year.

Stephanie grew flush after three sips, but I began gaining momentum, refilling my mug and telling Avery, whose first anniversary as our kitty was Saturday, what a great cat he is...get your face out of that Iams and give Daddy a big kiss! It was shaping up as quite an evening, but at 6:32, half the power went out in our building and on our block. Very strange. The kitchen was light, the living room was dark, the TV was blank, the radio worked. It wasn't much of a power outage, yet it was powerful enough to put a damper on my drinking. How am I supposed to develop a taste for this stuff when I have to call LIPA and complain coherently?

I wasn't really paying attention as the Mets lineup stepped in DiFelices. When the lights came back on at 7:36, there was still a little Korbel left, but it was getting warm and my divisional buzz didn't need any more enhancement. The dregs went down the drain...the champagne, I mean, not Ledee.

Aw, no reason to be hard on this instant trivia classic of a batting order. They won, right? Of course they did. It is traditional; furthermore, it is historic. In the five seasons when the Mets have played games after clinching playoff spots (including 2000, but not 1973 and 1999), the Mets are 28-8 for the remainder of their schedule, including last night. No power outage or momentum stop for our fellas, even when the guys playing out the string are barely Our Fellas.

Avery, did I ever tell you what a beautiful cat you really are? Gimme another kiss!

Took the day off from work, largely so I could lie around the house being tired but happy. The Mets' starting lineup did too -- Emily and Joshua and I came back from dinner to find it was 2-0 Marlins, with Michael Tucker at the plate and nobody out. Tucker got a hit, Chris Woodward stepped up, Ricky Ledee was on deck and I realized that I had no earthly idea where we were in the batting order.

Woody doubled, putting runners on second and third as I got Joshua ready for his bath and watched with much vaguer than usual attention. Somewhere around helping Joshua remove a stubborn t-shirt (remember when you were little and they'd get stuck on your head?) I noticed Ledee pop out, Mike DiFelice come to the plate, and Tom Glavine busy himself in the on-deck circle. Ah, now at least I had my bearings -- though I was interested to see the top of the lineup. Would a single regular be playing? I hoped not. Let them have a relaxing night in the dugout. We're the NL East Champs. Home field isn't in question. Nobody except Tom Glavine cares about winning this game.

Then Scott Olsen coaxed a third strike past DiFelice.

"GODDAMNIT DIFELICE!" I bellowed.

Oh well. Kind of hard to break habits formed over 149 games.

And there's a lesson there. When your first eight are Hernandez, Chavez, Milledge, Franco, Tucker, Woodward, Ledee and DiFelice, and you still find yourself yelling at eighth-place hitters for not making contact, baseball's got you by the throat, and it's too late to do anything about it, not that you'd want to do anything so silly.

Tonight's game was proof of something we all know but sometimes don't like to admit: We root for laundry. But you know what? On nights like this, that seems perfectly sensible: A nice at-bat that ends with a solid single on a 3-2 pitch is a nice at-bat whether the man with the stick is Carlos Beltran or Lastings Milledge. And a bases-loaded single that brings home a go-ahead run is a thing of beauty whether it's just another line in Carlos Delgado's notebook, or a exclamation point on the far-briefer resume of Michael Tucker. Baseball played right is a pleasure to watch and cheer for, whether it's the best lineup in the National League doing the honors, or Willie's irregulars.

No mounted police on the field, no plastic over the lockers, no warnings not to enter the field. Just a simple, quiet, well-earned victory. And that can be a mighty satisfying thing too.

Addendum because I was curious: We're now 3-1 in meaningless JV affairs the day after clinching division titles.

* On Sept. 26, 1969, the Mets beat the Phillies, 5-0. Clendenon hit a homer. Koosman won his 17th.

* 1973 doesn't count -- our win in the first game of an Oct. 1 doubleheader with the Cubs meant there was no Game 2. If you want to get technical about it, we lost the first game of 1974. Tug got the L; Mac Scarce got the win for the Phils. Little did anyone know those two would soon be more deeply connected.

* On Sept. 18, 1986, we beat the Cubs, 5-0. HoJo had a three-run homer, pacing a lineup that featured Stanley Jefferson, John Gibbons and Dave Magadan. Rick Anderson pitched very nicely for the win; some kid named Maddux took the L.

* On Sept. 23, 1988, Doc took a 1-0 lead into the ninth against the Cardinals. But then Vince Coleman walked, stole second and came around on an Ozzie Smith single. Pedro Guerrero then brought home Ozzie with a sac fly, sticking Doc with his eighth loss of the season.