On the Mets beat

So much for the Barry Bonds treatment. Albert Pujols entered Tuesday's game as the most feared man in baseball -- 19 HRs in 37 games -- but Tom Glavine didn't blink in his staredown with the reigning National League MVP. Pujols, a career .529 hitter vs. Glavine, grounded meekly to the mound in the first inning, popped to short in the fourth and bounced to second base in the sixth. It helped, of course, that only once did Pujols come to the plate with a runner on base, and that was the first inning. On the other two occasions, Glavine had the luxury of Pujols leading off, which is the preferable way of facing him.

Pujols just didn't look like himself, either. Maybe it was the pitch he fouled off his left shin in the first inning, a painful incident that knocked the Cardinals giant to the ground, grabbing at his leg. Pujols returned but his night didn't get much better. In the eighth, after a 101-minute rain delay, Pujols slipped on the wet on-deck circle chasing Jose Reyes' foul pop -- falling flat on his back -- and the rubber disk was removed from the field immediatley afterward.