Wednesday, May 31, 2006

5-30-06, Mets vs. Diamondbacks

Really, it was supposed to be a different kind of game. Wasn’t it?

*sigh*

Soler just couldn’t seem to find - well, find ANYTHING tonight. Although I was at batting practice this afternoon, Milledge hadn’t arrived yet, so I can’t tell you anything more about him beyond the fact that I liked his vibe, as nebulous as that might sound. We’ll see how this plays out, and what happens with X when he returns.

Honestly, the highlight of the day was getting my photo taken with Mr. Met and some of the shots I got at BP - no action shots, mostly candids, stuff like this (my favorite):

And if I had to vote for a Boyfriend Of The Game, it would be Mr. Cornelius Floyd, whose slump seems to be permanently behind him.

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Monday, May 29, 2006

Mets vs. Arizona, game 1

This game was a turning point for me because I didn’t spend half the game watching it with my hands over my eyes. We’ll come back, TBF is always text-messaging me, their bullpen is shit or heart of the batting order up next, no worries.  Tonight I was much more even-keeled about things, which scared the cat a hell of a lot less.

Mr. Floyd’s slump was officially over a week ago, but he is rounding the curve big time right now. It is a joy to see. And, of course, Agent #005, DW, my jersey’s namesake - what isn’t there to say?

However, to egregiously borrow from Bat Girl, tonight’s Boyfriend Of The Game was none other than Mr. Paul Lo Duca. I bought my 16 t-shirt after the second game in Milwaukee, and he’s kept earning it. I know what I’m wearing to the game tomorrow.

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Tuesday, May 23, 2006

May 23, 2005: Mets vs. Phillies

So now, as TBF puts it, the concept of Triple Happiness (Mets win, Braves lose, Yankees lose) has changed with the advent of the Phillies in the 1-2-3 running. Rivals now, and it will not likely be so friendly in Shea Stadium South for the rest of the year. We thought it would be an interesting game, but not that, once again, I would be walking out of Shea Stadium five hours later. I had, luckily, made an executive decision that I would be driving to Tuesday games from now on (the connecting train is bearable on Friday, but mid-week unnecessarily long and tiring).

Around the 6th inning, LA comes up from the loge to say hello. We chat briefly, and I decide to go downstairs and watch the rest of the game with them; catch up. Little did I know I would be watching an entire other game from the blue seats. LA’s other half abandoned ship somewhere around the 10th inning, as she had to be at work early the next day.

As Shea emptied out after each inning, it became apparent that we had more than a few Phillies fans in our section. And were soon overwhelmed with taunting.

“Is it Philly sucks, or Phillies suck?” I ask, rhetorically. “Are we taunting the city, the team, or both?”
“CHEESE STEAKS ARE DELICIOUS! CHEESE STEAKS ARE DELICIOUS!” the fans - wearing EAGLES jerseys - offered in response, as the game dragged on. And on.

To stay extra innings on a school night takes a certain kind of determination, or some kind of statement somewhere that I.will.never.leave.a.game.early.for.any.reason, or You Never Know What Might Happen. I think I fall inbetween both of those, but I am also someone who will never ever leave a concert before the encore just so I can beat traffic (okay, I did once, but I didn’t leave the building until the last note had been played).

10. 11. 12. 13. 14, and another 7th inning stretch. 15.

Oh, my god. We’re going to be here ALL NIGHT. They are playing with us, playing “Rock Around The Clock” and “After Midnight” and, well, okay, it’s funny.  (This was also the night that we were greeted with “Welcome To the City of Blinding Lights” on Diamondvision as we entered; that song has a definite future in sporting events beyond the World Cup.)

16. LA is pacing in the row behind me. I am tromping on peanut shells in my row.
Mr. Beltran comes to the plate, and—

For five seconds, we are thrilled, and then for the next five, as we wait for the victory dance on the field which is more a dance of relief, we, too, straggle wearily out of Shea.

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Sunday, May 21, 2006

SUBWAY SERIES 2006

It was, at once, less epic and more epic than I imagined it would be And I mean “epic” in the traditional definition of the word: Webster puts it as “extending beyond the usual or ordinary especially in size or scope”. It was David vs. Goliath, it was the underdogs triumphing against evil. The Mets spent the previous week downplaying the entire series which was a colossally right thing to do, because the mindfuck would have otherwise overpowered them to the point where the MFY’s would have triumphed.

You can say it’s just another game, that interleague play is stupid at this point, but in a town like New York, which has a cross-town sports rivalry that DOES NOT EXIST ANYWHERE ELSE IN THE COUNTRY (don’t start. just don’t. because you know i’m right), it’s not just another game. It starts on the streets, on the way to the game, when an elderly Hispanic gentleman wearing Yankee gray tipped his hat and said, “Best wishes to your team in the series.” The gaggle of Polish kids in Yankee colors who avoided my subway car - lone threatening Mets fan that I apparently appear to be. It was the 7 train rounding the corner at Court Square and riding in the front car in the front window, two Mets fans dressed to the nines and flying the colors. It was the way the Mets fans and the Yankees fans angled themselves to be at opposite ends of subway cars. 

It would have been dumb in the extreme to drive to this game (not because of the traffic, we drive back roads and I don’t see it much) but I was glad to have taken the subway because it is part and parcel of the entire experience. Not just because some moron chooses to call it “the Subway Series” but because the subway is the lifeline of this city and the 7 train to Shea is pretty much exactly the way John Rocker described it once (without, of course, the gratuitously racial and sexist slurs). Add a game into the mix and you have Joe Yuppie and his buddies, ties stuck in their back pockets, drinking beer out of paper bags, German tourists who just want to see an American baseball game, a guy on a date with a girl who is going to freeze her ass off in her cute little date outfit, sandals, and woefully inadequate raincoat, and all the 7 train regulars who dread big game nights because it means the number of people that are jockeying for seats multiply, while they are just trying to get home quietly.

Watching the Yankees lined up in front of the dugout during the National Anthem induced almost physical pain. The sisters next to me when they arrived during batting practice: “It’s so WRONG to see them on our field!” For all of that—and given the amount of “Yankees Suck!” chants that erupt on any given night that the Yankees aren’t at Shea, the crowd on the mezz was more subdued than I had envisioned. It wasn’t for lack of Yankees fans around, even though this time apparently Mets fans did actually show up and represent for a change (unlike other series where the Yankees fans dominated because it was so easy to get a ticket).

But, then, the games. On our feet, pacing, chanting, wanting to get in the face of the arrogant Yankee fans but wondering if we really do have a leg to stand on, first place in the division or not. The ups, the downs. Randy Johnson, who, once upon a time, back in, oh, say, 1995, I actually quite *liked*. Heilman rescuing Gonzales. And then, back to David vs. Goliath in the real sense, DW faces Mariano Rivera AND shoots a ball over *Johnny Damon*’s head...

and there was much rejoicing. I stood there, watching the dugout erupt, watching David Wright practically skip down the first base line, and understood: no, it’s not just another game.

Sunday night I was by myself in the upper deck, grabbing a ticket off the drop because I really wanted to see Glavine pitch against the Yankees. Ooops. But, still, even surrounded by Yankee fans (who also can get in on a drop the same way I could), it was the same epic battle.  The David Wright home run, I saw it bounce into the picnic area and then I lost track, dancing for joy in front of my seat. Duaner Sanchez (who is my boyfriend’s NSMC, non-sexual man crush, a term stolen from the brilliant Bat Girl) coming through in the clinch, and Billy Wagner - who the Yankees fans had been yelling for all night - when he came out, he probably would have gotten booed—except that this action reminded us that he was OUR guy, and instead he got an ovation—Billy Wagner pulled it out. A very Willie move, and he had to come out and face them again. He had to.

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Sunday, May 14, 2006

Mets vs. Brewers, the weekend series

It is Friday night, and I am itching because the Mets are on the road and the only way I can see them is if I walk down to the Turkey’s Nest, and while there are women who visit this particular bar on their own, I am not one of them.

I pick up the phone. I call Time Warner Cable. I make inquiries. I decline and hang up the phone.

15 minutes later I do it again. “If I order SNY now, how long do I have to wait before I have it?”
“You’ll have service before you hang up the phone.”

That did it. 30 minutes later, I am watching first pitch in Milwaukee, and caught the whole series, or as much of it as I could, overcoming my I-don’t-like-watching-baseball-on-TV assertion. However, I may have been the one who managed to jinx the series for us - although TBF asserts that it is his fault, that he drove up to Milwaukee on Sunday to catch the game, and that he will never ever go see the Mets play on the road ever again.

Saturday’s game did earn Mr. LoDuca the purchase of a t-shirt with his number on it. Although I liked him so much better before Willie rescinded the facial hair ban.

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Friday, May 05, 2006

May 5, 2006: Mets vs. Braves

If you were there, you know, and maybe it isn’t so dramatic to you if you have been through one of these Great Adventure-style-rollercoaster of an extra-innings game before, but for me, it was some kind of great parable acted out on a baseball field.

The Braves. Again. After last weekend’s trip to our personal chamber of horrors - WHERE WE TOOK THE SERIES!! - to face them at home. 

I don’t have SNY at home - we are waiting for TBF to come home for good before we make that investment - but I can finally listen to a baseball game on the radio, and that combined with Gameday on the Mets web site is enough for me to follow. I find that, unsurprisingly, that I prefer listening to the game to watching it on TV, my imagination can put the tiny players on the field and make them move around like I’m playing Risk—or something like that.

But this game! Me understanding vividly why they refer to Trachsel as “the human rain delay.” Reyes/Delgado/FLOYD, “that tall glass of chocolate milk,” as per my seatmates.  I love watching Billy Wagner walk in, extended ridiculous theatrics and all. It’s perfect. Even the fact that you have seen it before doesn’t change it, it makes it better, like knowing that Bruce Springsteen is going to jump on the piano at some point during “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out”.

Somewhere around the 10th inning we got restless. People behind me are switching seats. “What are you *doing*,” one friend asks the other. “You’re gonna ruin our mojo.” He moves back.  We are all bemoaning the fact that beer sales were discontinued three innings earlier. By the 12th inning, we start surmising that if we, in fact, begin what looks like AN ENTIRE OTHER GAME, perhaps the beer regulation should be revoked.  TBF sends a text informing me that he believes there will be another 7th inning stretch in inning 14… which there is.

And shortly after which Mr. Wright brought it all home for us, 14 innings, I drift off to the 7 train on the phone to the baseball-fanatic-friends out West: “I just got out of my first extra-innings game.” I come back home to Brooklyn dazed and smiling and utterly unable to fall asleep, like a 10-year-old kid.

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Tuesday, April 18, 2006

April 18, 2006:  Mets vs. Braves

When I started learning about baseball, TBF introduced me to the concept of “Triple Happiness”: Mets win, Braves lose, Yankees lose.

The Braves. Our nemesis. Our division rivals.  I understand this well. I know all about John Rocker and Mr. Jones and who we are booing and why. (The booing. That is something that never happened in my baseball experiences out West. You would be ejected from the park if you booed. I know, because I did the first game I ever went to [along with a handful of other East Coasters] and we were chastised for un-sportsman-like behavior.)

So I understand, even more, the pain that ensues with a 7-1 loss. 

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Sunday, April 16, 2006

April 16, 2006: Mets v. Brewers

Easter Sunday. No point in trying to work, so I headed to Shea. Upper deck was $2 but I couldn’t sit in row V, so I sprang for a upper deck box seat. Mr. Met played Easter Bunny. Home runs from Nady and Delgado. Beautiful sunny day. I drive out to Coney Island afterwards for hot dogs and sea air.
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Friday, April 14, 2006

April 14, 2006: Mets vs. Brewers

My first encounter with a rain delay.  I headed for Shea a little late and when I transferred to the 7 at Court Square, my phone went off with a text from TBF, informing me that first pitch was delayed.  At that point, unless I wanted to go back home and get the car, or ditch the game (fat chance), I pretty much had to head to Shea and wait it out. This time I was in our seats since my loge-friends were on vacation - but at least our seats are under the overhang, by quite a comfortable margin. Unless there’s serious wind blowing rain won’t impact us all season.

I [heart] our seats. In fact, I like them more than LA & M’s loge seats, because we are straight up from third base, even if we are one more level up. There was an elderly couple in the seats next to me, keeping score, and they had binoculars. I know I have a pair somewhere, which would seem to be welcome equipment on a weekly basis.

The highlight of the rain delay was watching Mets Weekly reruns on Diamondvision, so I could see Wright and Floyd on MTV’s Total Request Live (something which, had I known about in advance, would have had *somebody* TiVO). Highest of high comedy.

Tonight I finally got to meet my compatriots for the rest of the year. The row behind us is a lot of very smart, very fanatic, very funny people, who know a fucking LOT about baseball. There was the token Yankees fan in full regalia in the front row of the section, and a random single guy in between us who felt the need to yell, “YANKEES SUCK!” about every 7 minutes - which would of course cause the MFY fan to get up and posture, various insults be yelled back and forth, and then the whole cycle would begin again in another 10 minutes: “IN CASE YOU FORGOT: YANKEES SUCK!” Again, highest of high comedy.

Yeah, we took the Marlins, 9-3.

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Friday, April 07, 2006

April 7, 2006: Mets vs. Marlins

The first game of the season! Finally.  This year, I am all about taking the 7 train and not driving, saving gas, conserving, plus it really is an easy commute from home… there is very little excuse (okay, at least there isn’t on the way out to Shea; coming home, waiting for the G train, I manage to come up with a long list).

You would think that after everything I went through to get my seats, that I would have been running upstairs to sit in them… but for some reason I chickened out and snuck into the Loge to sit with my friends who also have the Tuesday-Friday plan - let’s call them LA and M for short. I didn’t even go upstairs to watch some of the game from the seats. I think I was afraid to compare them to LA & M’s seats or that maybe I made the wrong decision (I had to do this on my own, since TBF was working out of town at the time).

But a chance to check out the new guys, and see the old favorites. It was big and overwhelming and reminding me how much I still have to learn about baseball.

Oh, and we won.

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