It's been a bad last twelve hours for the Astros. First, Gerry Hunsicker signs a free-agent relief pitcher in Rick White, only to find out later that he's not a free agent but still under the control of the White Sox. Then, Houston (61-53) rallied with three runs in the fifth inning to tie Thursday night's game with the Mets, but Brad Lidge (4-2) couldn't preserve that tie, giving up two huge runs in the sixth and in the seventh. Meanwhile, New York reliever David Weathers, who's earned the title of Astro Killer over his career if anyone has, allowed the second of Jeff Bagwell's two homers in the game, then went back to his old, maddeningly-effective ways against the Astros, shutting them down completely in the rest of the seventh and the eighth, before Mike Stanton saved what turned out to be a frustrating, water-cooler kicking 5-4 loss that gave a series win to the worst team in the National League and sliced a game off Houston's already-slim lead in the NL Central.

Tim Redding didn't pitch all that badly through five innings, but it was he who set the theme of tonight's game. Houston could not keep the ball in the park. Timo Perez homered deep to RF leading off the second inning. Marco Scutaro homered off the facade in LF in the fourth to build the Mets' lead to 3-0 after New York had gotten a cheap run in the third on a couple of hits and a Morgan Ensberg throwing error.

Steve Trachsel, on the other hand, although he was walking guys, was also pitching a thoroughly-professional game in the early going, making key pitches when he needed to. With runners at 1B and 2B in the fourth, he made Craig Biggio look like that statue in Haliburton Plaza, freezing him on a called third strike. Biggio also just stood there on a called third strike strike in the sixth, but that was by RP Grant Roberts, and there was no rally in the making when it happened. Biggio has managed a decent OBA thus far this season, but his strikeout total continues to climb. I haven't dug fully into the numbers yet, but I'm pretty certain that Biggio will set a Houston record for strikeouts by a leadoff man this season, or come very close to setting such a record. The Astros mounted a comeback in the fifth, however, fueled by a base hit from Ensberg and Bagwell's first homer of the game, a full-extension opposite-field shot to RF. After Lance Berkman grounded out to 2B on one pitch, Richard Hidalgo tripled up Tal's Hill (it's remarkable how many three and four-base hits we've seen out that way the last two nights) and came busting home on a sacrifice fly to shallow LF from Geoff Blum.

Brad Lidge, though, wasted the work of the offense. It wasn't his idea to do so, of course, but that's what he did. When the Mets connected off him, few as those times were in the sixth and seventh, they killed him. Tony Clark crushed a homer to RF with two out in the sixth to break the tie. Then, in the seventh, Jeff Duncan tripled to RCF, way beyond Biggio's limited CF range, and came scurrying home on a Roger Cedeno sacrifice fly. That triple was not the only damage the CF Duncan would do to the Astro cause Thursday. He also made three outstanding defensive plays: catches on balls hit by Hidalgo in the seventh (after the second Bagwell homer), a looper by Brad Ausmus in the eighth that would otherwise have dropped in for a hit, and Biggio's fly leading off the ninth. But if there were new Astro killers at work in Duncan and Cedeno, there was also the one of long standing in Weathers, who survived Bagwell's blast to LF leading off the seventh and, indeed, recovered rather quickly his strike-throwing form after that hit. He retired six straight after giving up that run, extending to gigantic proportions his career-long success against the Astros. Ever since Weathers was a Brewer, he has given up next to nothing against Houston; I mean nothing. (From 2000 to 2002 alone, he was 3-1/1.42.) His work set up an easy ninth for Mike Stanton, who retired the top of Houston's order in order and left yet another bitter taste in my mouth, if no one else's, and a sorrowful feeling in the pit of my stomach, as New York leaves town

I hate the Mets. Absolutely hate 'em. It's got nothin' to do with '86 or any of that business. I just don't understand why they have the success they do against the Astros, any time, anywhere. Whether it's a big home run or a catch on a would-be bloop hit or a strikeout in a key spot, it just kiils me the way the Mets can do whatever they need to do against the Astros whenever they need to do it. The sizeable Houston lead in wins in the overall series between the two franchises was built up in the Sixties; since then, it's been as if former owner Joan Payson's passionate wish after 1969, to beat Houston, has turned into a Met curse. For most of the years following New York's first World Series title (Houston beat them ten out of twelve times that year) it's been hard going, not only in the Mets' recent fine seasons of 1998 to 2000 when Mike Piazza and Edgardo Alfonso blasted the Astros in the Dome with big hit after big hit, but even in New York's lean years. Take 2003, for example. The Mets don't have anything, no pitching, no hitting, not a bloomin' thing. They've lost darn near seventy games this season, yet they walk into Houston's home park, wipe out the Astros in one game and then take the third game using, for the most part, raw, near minor-league-quality players, youngsters we may or may not see again next year. If I were the Astros in the clubhouse tonight, I'd be furious about the way the team played, blowing its early scoring opportunities, not getting the offense moving until the middle of the game and then screwing up all that effort with poor relief. It's a statement of the obvious, but there are times when the obvious needs to be said: the Astros cannot allow losses like Thursday's to happen, not down the stretch, not against a team as bad as the Mets. They not only have to find a way to come back and win such games, as they tried to do tonight, they also have to find a way to render such comebacks against zero teams like the Mets, the Brewers and the Reds unnecessary. If you believe in the theory that teams play to the level of their opposition (a theory not really proven by empirical fact but terribly tempting to believe in nonetheless), then there's hope for Houston this weekend against the Expos. Yet, for those of us who don't put much stock in that theory, Houston has put itself in a tough spot by losing two of its last three to the cellar-dweller of the NL East. Montreal, a much more talented club in every way than New York, could come into Houston's park and do even more damage, possibly even drop the Astros out of first place by the close of play on Sunday.