Lucky for them, the Mets will finish out the season at home. Although, if they keep up losing like this, the angry noises coming from a hostile New York crowd could add to the tension. “I would like to think it’s an advantage, an ideal situation,” third baseman David Wright told reporters in New York. “But we’re not capitalizing on it ... We’re not clicking on all cylinders … We’ve had numerous chances to close this thing out and it slips away. We rebound, it slips away, we find a way to rebound.”

It’s not only in New York where the cracks are showing.

Twice a day — maybe more — Lou Piniella, the Cubs manager, keeps telling anyone who will listen that his team will not fall victim once again to a century’s worth of bad fortune. He swears the Cubs will hold on to their division lead. He swears that the long-suffering Cubs fans will not add another  horrid chapter to a 99-year-old legacy of torment and heartache.

“There is no curse,” Piniella said before Tuesday’s game.

The Cubs then went out and lost a two-hitter to the worst team in the National League, 4-2.

Time is running out, and if I was a betting man, here’s what I’d put my money on:

• The Mets will hold to their division lead.
• The Cubs will not. There is a curse. There is a curse.
• Philadelphia will find its way into the playoffs, and Charlie Manuel will save his job and win manager of the year.
• San Diego is in trouble. Too many injuries in the outfield and all of their final games are on the road, including the last four in Milwaukee.
• The Brewers win the NL Central because they finish the season at home, where they are 20 games above .500.
• The Colorado Rockies will win the NL West, knocking off first-place Arizona with the season-closing series in Denver this weekend.

Slide show   Week in Sports Pictures Pain on the skating rink, flying high on the hardwood, upsets on the football field, and more. more photos

A year ago, the last team you could have imagined won the World Series. The Cardinals finished the regular season with a paltry 83 victories. They lost 10 of their last 14 games, and had a seven-game losing streak that stretched into the game’s final week. Somehow, they survived all of that, got into the playoffs and found a new life.

Twelve months later, the mad rush toward October baseball is back in full affect. It doesn’t matter what we think. It doesn’t matter what insurmountable odds are piled up against these players. Miracles can happen and usually do.

Except for the Cubs.

There is a curse. There really is.

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