Braves 8, Mets 3.

I know it's March.

I know our 10-20-1 record has all the permanence and hold on memory as a sand castle surrounded by already-wet beach.

If there's a cup for the Grapefruit League championship, I know it's never displayed.

I know Jon Adkins is ticketed for New Orleans or another club. (I'm gonna go out on a limb and say he didn't enhance his trade value today.)

But cripes. Jeebus. Fuckola.

Braves 8, Mets 3 isn't going to make me happy in October or in March or if I'm playing Strat-o-Matic in January with a bunch of cards from the 1970s someone found in a shoebox at a yard sale. 10-20-1 isn't going to make me holler, "Save some of that for the regular season!" 10-20-1 and daily ass kickings up and down the east coast of Florida makes you start thinking about stuff.

What kind of stuff? This kind of stuff:

* It makes you start thinking that jeez, that bullpen sure looks patched together.
* It makes you start thinking that Moises Alou plays the outfield like a blindfolded man.
* It makes you start thinking that Jose Valentin sure had a crappy second half and Damion Easley's never had a good half and Anderson Hernandez's never had much of anything except one good catch.
* It makes you start thinking that Shawn Green looks like a backup first baseman, only he's the right fielder and part of the starting lineup.
* It makes you start thinking that Julio Franco looks like a coach, only he's the backup first baseman.
* It makes you start thinking that a team that pulled Darren Oliver out of a hat in 2006 might be pushing it expecting Chan Ho Park and Aaron Sele to grow big ears in 2007.
* It makes you start thinking that Tom Glavine and Orlando Hernandez are awfully old.
* It makes you start thinking that Mike Pelfrey is awfully young.
* It makes you start thinking that Joe Smith is a nice story this year, but Henry Owens was a nice story last year.

At 20-10-1 or 16-14-1 or even 13-17-1 you don't think about this stuff. You think about veterans who know how to prepare and youngsters who have said and done all the right things and will build on that, and from there you think about green grass and hot dogs and summer nights and then from there you think (with all the required propitiation to the baseball gods) about the possibility of fall nights and bunting and packed houses and all the marbles. But you don't think that at 10-20-1. At 10-20-1 every glass is half-empty (or two-thirds empty, in the case of this particular glass of cloudy, acidic suck), every rookie is raw and every vet is over the hill and every box score is filled with bad portents.

Even at 13-17-1, you just want it to be April and Opening Day, even if it will be the Cardinals with the banners and the rings and the red and the Mex and the guarantee that even if we win, we'll all be mildly pissed off about it.

10-20-1 is different. At 10-20-1, you don't want it to be April and finally Opening Day. You need it to be April and Opening Day.

Keep plenty of Pepto-Bismol on hand for the opening series of the year. You'll want the dark pink kind to combat that queasy feeling you'll get from seeing too much red.

On Sunday night, according to Paul Lukas' Uni Watch, the Cardinals will swaddle themselves in commemorative patches and gold trim to honor their 2006 World Championship. On Tuesday night, they'll be handing out rings to everybody who enters Busch Stadium — everybody but the Mets. And the night after, each of their fans gets a replica World Champions banner that measures three feet by five feet.

FEET!

That's a big ol' keepsake they're giving away to everybody. You could fit a lot of treasured but tiny 8"X6" TD Waterhouse 2000 National League Champions flags on that kind of square footage. That's on top of the mounted rings that go to all fans and the replica World Series celebration locker room cap for kids. Except that this stuff says Cardinals, it's a pretty awesome haul.

If my team showered me in such treasures, maybe I'd smile a lot and behave like a Best Fan In Baseball, too. If we'd won, you know the most we'd be getting would be a ceremonial wipe of the seat from a commemorative usher, redeemable only with the exchange of the first two George Washington photographs out of your wallet.

But if we'd won, we wouldn't care, because we'd have won.

Sigh.

Anyway, the Cardinals are doing it up right, which is their prerogative, but one component of their Salute To Themselves is a bit much:

The team will also honor its 1967 and 1982 World Championship teams in recognition of their 40th and 25th anniversaries, respectively, with such standouts as Lou Brock, Bob Gibson, Whitey Herzog, Keith Hernandez and Bruce Sutter scheduled to attend.

Which of those Cards is not like the other? Right. There's a Cardinal in there who became a Met on June 15, 1983 and we're not giving him back. I know it's just for an evening, for festivities' sake, for milestone purposes (and who wallows in a good milestone anniversary more than me?). I know we're not swapping him out retroactively for Neil Allen and Rick Ownbey. I know The Baseball Encyclopedia doesn't come with disappearing ink for everything he accomplished once his paychecks weren't signed in Bud.

But no sir, I don't like it. I don't like that Keith would forgive the Cardinals when a measly quarter-century has yet to pass. I don't like the way Keith yammers on a little too fondly about his Cardinal days during Mets telecasts. I'm a little worn by his yammering on about his Met days during Mets telecasts, actually, because I could use a touch more yammer about these Met days during Mets telecasts, no matter what kind of hammer Atlee Hammaker dropped on him for strike three when the world was young, but that's another story.

Keith the Cardinal was outstanding. Keith the Met remains iconic.
Keith the Cardinal won a World Series. Keith the Met won the World Series.
Keith was a Most Valuable Cardinal. Keith was The Indispensable Met.
Keith was their star. Keith was our Captain.

If Keith were entering the Hall of Fame (if only petitioning made it so), then which cap do you think he'd be wearing? Which cap do you think he should be wearing?

Keith is Ours as few have been even if we keep issuing 17 to every Dae-Sung and Lima that comes down the pike (pending massively wonderful revelations to the contrary, David Newhan ain't worthy either). The Redbirds renounced their Keith rights when Ratzog discarded him not eight months beyond that '82 championship they're suddenly intent on marking. St. Louis turned on Mex. Mex turned on New York and we were totally plugged into Mex. For all his Keithfoolery on the air, it doesn't take much to close one's eyes and picture in his prime the Second-Greatest Met of the First Forty Years — fielding, hitting, leading...always leading. Leading us in '84 and '85 and '86 as he targeted the gray at Shea and replaced it with sunny bursts of blue and orange. Those colors, like Keith, were Just For Mets.

Keith Hernandez invited back by the Cardinals? On one of his myriad days off from the booth, I wouldn't blink because I understand the concept of completism and squaring circles and players honoring their pasts because they are the fans' pasts, too (Ozzie Guillen would scoff at such sentimentality, but when doesn't Ozzie Guillen scoff?). That he's throwing out the first ball for our Home Opener makes me feel somewhat less queasy, but trotting out Keith Hernandez as their own on the night they raise their flag in our face after having secured it at the expense of us...pass the Pepto.