The Mets won what feels like their biggest game of the year Sunday, overcoming a few deficits en route to a 5-4, 10-inning victory sparked by an RBI single from Chip Ambres 36 about whom we’ll probably always say, “Remember that game in Los Angeles…?”

The 9th-inning rally to tie the game featured a trip around the bases for pinch-runner Anderson Hernandez, called back to the big-league roster for the first time this year and still wearing the No. 1 jersey he sported a year ago. Hernandez is back in action because Jose Valentin 22 broke his leg on a badly aimed foul ball Friday. That’s not the way we wanted to see the second-base problem solved.

Headed home again this week, the Mets are expected to reacquire Moises Alou 18 from a lengthy stay on the disabled list, and Damion Easley 3 from the bereavement list, though it’s not clear at this point who goes where to accommodate them.

Back in the 80s, when comedy was funny, the National Lampoon ran a recurring comic called Mr. Vengeance, written and illustrated by Buddy Hickerson, who today illustrates The Quigmans. This comic typically illustrated the title character suffering some minor misfortune in the opening panel, and devoted the rest of the comic to his hilarously violent overreactions to it, i.e.: “Sure enough, there is a blemish on his wax job. He decides to get EVEN!!” This comic was genius in that it made the same joke over and over again — varying only over the question of how mundane the slight, and how creatively violent the reaction, would be each episode. Mr. Vengeance would torture not only those “responsible” for his pain but, feeling rightous, anyone who’d done anything wrong. “Someone MUST pay,” was his credo.

I’m reminded of Mr. Vengeance today — and incredibly frustrated that I cannot locate a comic online* (”someone WILL pay!”) — as Marlon Anderson returns to the Mets tonight to debut against the club that recently released him, the Dodgers. May Marlon find rightousness in his revenge. May David Newhan take it out on AAA pitching: He’s the one DFAed to make room for Anderson. And may his remaining Met teammates take out their frustrations from the recently completed Padres series on the Dodgers.

That was NOT a nice way to lose a series and whatever momentum Tuesday’s win might have provided. And, really, shouldn’t be enough that Heath Bell has a good season in an important role with his new team? Is it necessary that he chase down anyone with a rolling tape recorder to detail all manner of abuses and excuses stemming from his time at Shea? To kick us when we’re down? Who does he think he is, Mr. Vengenance? To paraphrase another National Lampoon product of my childhood. “He can’t say that about us. Only WE can say those things about us!”

Well, as far I’m concerned the time has come to get mad. To take some revenge, even if it’s not on Heath Bell. To get EVEN!

It’s not clear what number Anderson will appear in tonight. Despite the ruminations below, one commenter thinks 23 is likely because 8 is still in mothballs, and it may very well be. Anderson wore 21 with the Dodgers earlier this year (not available here). Twenty-three happens to be available due to the relase of Julio Franco. Yesterday, he since signed with the Braves where he’s doubt planning some revenge.

*-Ironically the best I could do is find a site where a former collaborator of Hickerson’s takes his own revenge. If you can point out Mr. Vengeance online, or send a copy of a scanned comic here, I promise to leave you out of my next rampage.

The expected recall of Lastings Milledge for tonight’s second half opener accompanied the unexpected release of Julio Franco 23, the Mets’ elderly pinch hitter. It’s not like Franco had earned his slot this season, it’s just that, as with the pending Henderson story, the Mets tend to have more tolerance for struggles with track-record holding veterans and figureheads as they’ve shown recently. I guess this is life in the Omar Era. Milledge by the way returned wearing No. 44 and in possession of the same nice swing he first impressed with a year ago during Spring Training. This phrase has been uttered an aweful lot this season but perhaps that’s just the spark we need.

Speaking of sparks, Jose Valentin 22 was wearing a cast on his pinky and couldn’t play tonight, allowing Ruben Gotay 6 to further his case as the best option at the keystone. Mets officials say the injury came as the result of intervening in “an altercation” while The Internet appears to believe he broke it in a punching a wall. Let’s call it a Wall-tercation and perhaps, a karmic comeuppance for Valentin who a year ago was the guy the stealing the starting second base job from an underperforming and injured incumbent.

In an almost unimaginable flash of decisiveness and creativity, the Mets have apparently whacked hitting coach Rick Down and will begin the second half with Rickey Henderson as their hitting coach.

I know! It’s not like the Mets to go with relatively inexperienced braintrust, as evidenced by the piles of potential managerial material with Met bloodlines seeking their big-league opportunities elsewhere (Ron Gardenhire, John Gibbons, John Stearns, Wally Backman, etc.). And it’s not like they offer opportunities to those who leave them on bad terms very freely, as we noticed when Darryl Strawberry finally made it back to town last year. And it’s not like they go around firing guys, though Down ought to absorb at leastr some blame for an offense that has only been good in stretches since last August.

But Rickey is Rickey, nothing if not unique. He got the Mets to break No. 24 out of a limbo that, Kelvin Torve notwithstanding, dated back to Mays’ retirement in 1973. For the Mets in 1999, Henderson had what would be the last great year of his great career.

We’ll be watching to see whether they break 24 out of mothballs again for Rickey, or dress him in a coachy number like Down’s departed 54. Bet its the former.

Welcome back Rickey!

The Mets as expected activated Dave Williams 32 prior to Sunday’s getaway in Houston and the Astros summarily beat him silly. The question as to who would be demoted to make room was answered when Ricky Ledee 9 was optioned to AAA.

The 8-3 loss sent the Mets limping into the break still in first place, but hardly looking like a championship team. While injuries have been a part of the struggle, it’s the performance of the guys out there everyday — particularly the right side of the infield — that’s really been a drag. That and the fact that some Mets just seem … unhappy. There’s Reyes sulking after bouncing out and and failing to run out grounders. There’s Heilman and his hangdog expression. LoDuca blowing up at umpires and/or the press. Wagner flattening a teammate with a comment in the papers.