Opinion

NEW YORK — One by one, these hitters who make up the relentless Kansas City Royals lineup are reducing this game to its smallest common denominator.

This thing isn't over yet.

That's what uneasy Mets fans are telling themselves as the World Series shifts to Queens for Game 3 on Friday (8:07 p.m. ET on Fox), with the Kansas City Royals holding a commanding 2-0 lead.

But it also has the benefit of being true. Yes, the odds are stacked against the Mets. Of the 50 teams that have fallen behind 2-0 in Fall Classic history, only 10 have come back to hoist the trophy.

When the Miami Marlins decided to go ahead with their hiring of Don Mattingly as their next manager, they gained instant credibility. Of course, that is a thing they badly needed.

NEW YORK — You don't bother asking Omar Minaya if the New York Mets are still his team, because you know they always have been. You don't need to ask if he feels good about the World Series coming back to Queens this weekend, because you know he does.

"No doubt about it," Minaya said this week. "For the neighborhood, it's great."

After holding serve on their home field, the Kansas City Royals will have a chance to win their first World Series in 30 years by winning two of the three games against the New York Mets at Citi Field starting on Friday. 

While two teams spend the next week battling for the 2015 World Series title, 28 other organizations are focused on finding ways to get to that point next season.

The good news for those looking to improve their rosters is the upcoming class of free agents features a bunch of impact players who can instantly turn around fortunes. The challenge will be getting those stars to sign with plenty other competition for their services.

It is the baseball equivalent of losing American Gothic. Misplacing the master tape of Springsteen's Born to Run. Suddenly being unable to locate the Empire State Building or the Washington Monument.

Forty years after it was played, the clinching game of the 1975 World Series has become lost in the fog of time.

The New York Mets are officially in trouble.

It was the Johnny Cueto show in Game 2 of the World Series Wednesday, and the pitcher threw a complete game and allowed a single run and two hits on the way to the 7-1 victory. The Kansas City Royals now lead the Mets 2-0 in the Fall Classic and are two victories away from their first championship since 1985. 

The list of starting pitchers set to hit free agency this winter reads like the notes in the margin of a Cy Young Award ballot.

One arm, though, could turn the market on its head—and he's currently signed through 2016.

If the New York Mets are going to win the 2015 World Series, they'll need to claw their way out of the 2-0 hole they've dug themselves against the Kansas City Royals.

Yeah, it sounds bad. But some of you may remember it's nothing the Mets haven't done before, as they had to fight back from a 2-0 deficit the last time they won the World Series back in 1986.