I Sat Through the Mets-Marlins 15-inning "Instant Classic" and it Was Painful

A team that may or may not have any actual fans thanks to the most odious owner in professional sports.

It would be hard to ask for a better pairing for an 15-inning, five and a half-hour marathon, that wrapped up well past midnight on the East Coast.

That’s what we got Monday night/Tuesday morning when the Marlins beat the Mets 4-3 in front of a few hardy souls at Marlins Ballpark in Miami. How they were able to stare at Miami’s day-glo orange jerseys for five consecutive hours without losing their grasp of reality is beyond me.

Realistically you’d have to be an utter diehard to have sat through this one for its entirety, even if you love an angry, sarcastic Keith Hernandez who was barely able to contain his disdain on the SNY telecast. In the bottom of the 14th with two runners on and no outs, Juan Pierre swung away — flying out to left — prompting an anguished groan from the noted Civil War buff.

This was probably about as Mets a loss as Mets losses come.

Fortunately most smart Mets’ fans had long since gone to bed or flipped over to a “Seinfeld” rerun on WPIX by that point.

Nearly any other possible form of available entertainment would have been an improvement on these two teams trading zero-after-zero on the scoreboard. Even people with a sick fascination for marathon baseball games probably saw their patience tested by the 13th inning.

And it does sometimes happen: you stumble on an extra inning game and something makes you want to watch until it ends.

The six remaining fans in the outfield seats at the end of this deserve commemorative t-shirts.

Here’s some fun with numbers from this one, which actually began with a nice matchup of young righties, Matt Harvey and Jose Fernandez:

Total hits: 27
Combined number of pitchers used: 16
Mets’ batters with RISP: 1-for-17
Combined LOB: 27
Placido Polanco’s night: 0-for-7
Marlins’ GIDP: 5

Oh, and the Orioles/Marlins game from Seattle that started three hours later than first pitch in Miami, wrapped up before this one did.

The Mets took the lead in the top of the 15th via Ruben Tejada’s two-out infield single off Jon Rauch — the Mets first and only hit with runner’s in scoring position.

Those scrappy Marlins wouldn’t back down, and scored two in the bottom of the frame, winning thanks to Nick Green’s sac-fly off Shaun Marcum.

This one went so long SNY had to dip into its reserve advertising, including TV’s Richard Karn riveting endorsement for the Pocket Hose.

The condensed version of this game might as well serve as the entire Marlins 2013 Season DVD.