You're a Mets fan. For the second straight year, your underachieving team was eliminated from postseason contention on the final day of the season. At home. Against the Marlins. Again. For the next 4-6 months, you'll have to listen to the media hammer down on your players and your manager, interrogating the team chemistry, the leadership in the clubhouse, the starting rotation and bullpen, and how a team of such talented players could blow a division lead in two consecutive years.

The collapse wasn't as bad for the Metropolitans this year as last, though. The spectacular meltdown of 2007 was the stuff of storybooks and eulogies. This year, they were bitten by the injury bug. And everyone knew the bullpen was going to stink. Especially when closer Billy Wagner went down with the injury.

Even manager Jerry Manuel said that the bullpen was a "roll of the dice" every time he made the call. "We knew [the bullpen] wasn't quite something that was going to hit on all cylinders," Manuel said. "When you don't have people in established roles in this time [of the year], you're gambling." That's probably not the sort of thing you want your fearless leader to be saying to the press, but Manuel is as fed up as the fans.

The relievers deserve most of the blame for this early ending in New York. They have been miserable all year, while somehow managing to be only the tenth-worst pen in the NL, statistically speaking. In a fitting microcosm, the team's postseason hopes were put into the hands of Scott Schoenweis and Luis Ayala, with the score tied 2-2 in the final game of the season. Win and you're in. Lose and we all drown ourselves in Flushing Bay. Just for fun, the depressing duo gave up back-to-back solo homers in the eighth inning to seal their team's fate. And the first one was a meatball to pinch hitter Wes Helms. Ouch.

After the game, third baseman David Wright spoke about a second straight season of disappointment. "It's always going to be grouped together. Last year, for lack of a better word, we collapsed. This year, I think we hit a little rut in the wrong time to hit a rut."

Since it was the last game in historic Shea Stadium, the Mets had scheduled a ceremony after the game to honor 45 of their former players, some of whom had won championships for their city. Tom Seaver, Ron Darling, Davey Johnson... The fans wanted none of it though, filing out the doors of Shea for the last time as soon as the final pitch was delivered. With the spectators bailing out so quickly, all that was left to greet those former Mets greats was the booming echoes of GM Omar Minaya's voice as it reverberated through the now-vacant expanse of the soon-to-be-demolished stadium.

Carlos Beltran summed it up simply in the clubhouse after the game. "It is what it is, guys," he said. "I have no more words."

So, what do you do when you're at a boring baseball game watching your team choke away another playoff berth down the stretch run of another brutal season? Turn your attention to the drunk fans, of course. I stumbled on this video of Mets fans keeping themselves entertained during another drubbing. Enjoy: