Apparently Bobby Parnell is struggling with numbness in the middle finger of his throwing hand, which probably explains his struggles this season better than the old “not cut out for New York” argument that has somehow reared its head.

Terry Collins didn’t say what the Mets would do, but with Jason Bay going 4-for-4 with two home runs in his rehab start tonight, it seems like a safe bet the outfielder is ready to go. And since the Mets should be about as desperate for Jason Bay as any team ever has been, it wouldn’t be surprising if Parnell is placed on the DL and Bay activated before tomorrow’s game. Bay was initially supposed to be back Thursday.

The other thing: A bunch of Mets fans seem really eager to show Scott Hairston the door, and I certainly hear that. He has looked awful at the plate and underwhelming in the field. The last time I said a guy needed more time he got cut (specifically: today), but I have to figure the Mets will have a longer leash with Hairston. Unlike Brad Emaus, Hairston has years of experience to show he can be a capable if unspectacular part-time outfielder. Cutting him because of 28 miserable plate appearances (again) seems a bit rash.

Terry Collins suggested Hairston is trying too hard to hit home runs with the Mets struggling like this, and Hairston agreed that was probably the case. The first step is admitting you have a problem, so maybe he’ll snap out of it. Of course, he struggled for almost all of 2010 too. So there is that.

I am dumbstruck. I am rendered silent by astonishment. If these Mets sucked any harder, they would… I can’t even come up with anything clever. They sucked really hard tonight.

And look: No one needs to remind me it’s early, and 17 games, you know, whatever. 0-1 in an NFL season. A bunch of these players can’t perform this poorly all year. There’s a whole ton of randomness at play. I get all that. I still don’t believe in any rational part of my mind that the Mets are going to lose 120 games like so many nabobs only-half-jokingly say.

But man, they’re getting harder and harder to defend. Scott Hairston makes Jeff Francoeur look like, I don’t know, someone who can actually hit a little. Tim Byrdak makes Pedro Feliciano look like Lefty Grove. Chin-Lung Hu is getting pinch-hit at-bats with runners on base.

When they hit, they don’t pitch. When they pitch, they don’t hit. On the rare occasion they both hit and pitch, they don’t play defense or run the bases. It’s  miserable.

Hell, it’s one thing when you lose to a hot Rockies team while Troy Tulowitzki is homering every time he even looks at the ball. It’s one thing when you can say, “Oh, well Josh Johnson, that’s one of the best pitchers in baseball.” It’s quite another when you’re embarrassed at the hands of the Astros.

I’m overreacting, I know. But I’m about to go downstairs and hear Terry Collins try to rationalize this one, again, try to say the Mets are better than this and insist the Mets will eventually win games. And it’s just getting boring.

Not the baseball games themselves; those are never boring. Just the whole routine. I’m bored of trying to convince Mets fans that the team doesn’t suck when nearly everything it has done on the field so far suggests otherwise.

I probably won’t stop. I’m just not really up for it tonight. At least Carlos Beltran is still totally sweet.

In some sort of vague follow-up to the Army of McGwires scenario much-discussed in this space, I polled Twitter earlier this afternoon about which Met readers would clone if they had to field a team of 25 of one guy.

There were a ton of votes for a slew of guys, from Tsuyoshi Shinjo to Bobby Bonilla to Joe McEwing to George “the Stork” Theodore, all of which would be entertaining for certain.

The clear winner was Johan Santana, presumably for his athleticism, followed by Ike Davis because everyone knows he can pitch. Carlos Beltran, R.A. Dickey and David Wright got a couple votes each, and several people voted for Justin Turner, apparently excited about the redhead’s first day back with the club.

Three people ironically voted for Jeff Francoeur.

Problem with both Santana and Davis is that they throw left-handed, which would make for a good deal of awkwardness at every infield position besides first. A healthy Santana, you’d figure, could compensate some with great range, but Davis would likely be something of a nightmare in the middle infield.

Shockingly, only one person voted for my choice: Jose Reyes. Reyes, I figure, has the athleticism to play anywhere on the field and the arm strength and accuracy to succeed as a pitcher. The Reyeses wouldn’t score as many runs as a team of David Wrights, but they’d likely prevent more.

Plus, think of the dancing! Imagine the handshakes a clone army of Jose Reyeses could come up with. It’d be amazing for their fans and infuriating for everyone else.

Usually I don’t like to include polls after I’ve already shared my opinion, but I figure you’re all smart people who can think for yourselves. So let’s hear it:

[poll id=”22″]

Remember what I said this morning about how Brad Emaus should get plenty of opportunities to prove his merit as a Major Leaguer? Forget all that. The Mets have DFA’d him and called up Justin Turner from Triple-A.

Seems like sort of a knee-jerk move to me. We’ll see if the Blue Jays don’t want Emaus and he can pass through waivers, but it’s hard to figure why 42 plate appearances would be enough to give up on a guy to whom they were willing to hand the starting second-base job not even a month ago.

Like I said during Spring Training, Turner has done more than Emaus ever did in the Minors and is probably a better hitter right now. The move likely improves the Major League roster, it’s just not great for organizational depth. If the Mets’ front office concluded Emaus is never going to be any sort of Major League contributor, then yeah, might as well send him packing. But it’s unclear why 16 games, no matter how bad Emaus looked, would convince them of that if Spring Training didn’t.

Anyway, the good news is this paves the way for the Murphman-Turner Overdrive scenario I suggested back in November. Turner and Daniel Murphy, in a platoon, should combine to hit like a pretty good second baseman. If they can cut it defensively, they represent a pretty big upgrade over Luis Castillo and some of the dreck the Mets have trotted out to second base over the past few years.

My thing is, any time that gets brought up, the misperception is, “This guy’s a head case” or, “There’s something wrong with him.” I know that two guys that Harvey talked to were Greg Maddux and Roy Halladay. There’s not anybody in baseball — that knows baseball — that can say those guys are head cases. I’m not saying we were talking about the same things. But even those guys, I think they understood the value of having somebody around like that.

– Mike Pelfrey.

Nice job by Adam Rubin at ESPN New York, chatting with Pelfrey about the way psychology is stigmatized in sports. As I’ve said before: Pelfrey admitted to seeing a psychologist to combat that stigma, and his reward is that every time he struggles we all assume it’s because he’s crazy. To me, I don’t know, his willingness to put himself out there seems like it would take a damn good deal of confidence and stability.