Wednesday, January 31, 2007

WE’RE READY FOR OUR CLOSEUP

Really.

You know, they film EVERYTHING in our neighborhood. Law & Order. The Black Donnellys. Commercial after commercial. Dennis Leary is sending people to knock on our door to beg us to let them film Rescue Me (and they take up our parking for days on end).

But freaking $#@! Yankees fan obnoxious $#@! SPIKE LEE (who except for his directorial efforts I can’t be bothered with) can’t even film in his own damn borough?!:

REYES APPEARS IN COMMERCIAL: At 8:45 a.m. yesterday, Mets shortstop José Reyes sat shivering on a sidewalk in Greenwich Village.

Next to him was Twins starting pitcher Johan Santana, who was grilling a hamburger. It was about 20 degrees outside, and the wind chill made it seem like the low teens.

So what were Reyes and Santana doing there?

Along with five other players — Minnesota’s Justin Morneau, Detroit’s Justin Verlander, Boston’s Jonathan Papelbon, St. Louis’s David Eckstein and the Yankees’ Robinson Canó — they were filming a commercial for new baseball caps under the direction of Spike Lee.

The hats, manufactured by New Era, are designed to absorb sweat more efficiently, and they have a new black underside to the bill intended to reduce glare. Over and over, from 7 a.m. till noon, the players filmed the ad with 10-minute breaks from the cold.

“I got an idea about how to stay warm,” said Morneau, the 2006 American League most valuable player, as he shuffled between the street and a dressing room at the back of the store. “I could find all the White Sox hats and light them on fire.” MICHAEL S. SCHMIDT

Via Bat-Girl.com.

Tuesday, January 30, 2007

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE METS TICKET OFFICE

To Whom It May Concern:

The next time you’re going to throw a little shindig for prospective season-ticket buyers, give us a call.

I can assure you that you will not find more enthusiastic prospective season-ticket buyers than myself and TBF. I guarantee that we discuss the possibility of purchasing a full season at least twice a week - more if that week includes overtime hours, a yearly bonus, a lottery ticket purchase, or a trip to Atlantic City.

Plus, I assure you we know how to behave in the Diamond Club. We would not sing “Jose, Jose, Jose” to Jose Reyes, propose marriage to David Wright, or ask Tom Glavine to make a phone call to a Braves fan (we promise that the cell phone would ONLY be handed to a card-carrying Mets fan). And I would make sure TBF didn’t harass Mr. Met and give him pointers as to where, exactly he should be pointing that t-shirt gun.

Just keep us in mind.

Love ya,

MG
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Sunday, January 28, 2007

it’s a beautiful day

The first tickets of the year have arrived!!!

Thursday, January 25, 2007

GO WILLIE

I like Willie Randolph.

I liked Willie when I first started venturing out to Shea in 2005. We used to drive out to Shea most times that year, and TBF would always ask leave to listen to the pre-game Manager’s Report as we headed out to Flushing. I didn’t understand much of the baseball talk, but I know enough about marketing and spin and positioning and PR to appreciate his careful responses and his measured tone. And you just need to understand people to appreciate his professionalism and his intelligence.

In 2005, this was our call and response:
MG: “Willie doesn’t look happy.”
TBF: “Willie never looks happy.”

It started as a serious observation, and then turned into a joke. However, in 2006, we had far less occasions to break that particular bit out.

Heck, even my father, who we’ll refer to as Dodgers Fan Dad (DFD for short - and, yo, we’re talking about the o.g. Dodgers, not the Brooklyn Dodgers of Los Angeles) likes Willie. DFD and TBF had a spirited discussion over dinner during the holidays about Mets Managers We Have Known. DFD, of course, maintains that he doesn’t really like baseball much these days, and that he is not a fan of any team—but buttonholes TBF every single time we go to visit to discuss the Mets’ running game, Jose Reyes, or Mr. Willie Randolph. “The players seem to respect him,” DFD declared. 

Speaking as a novice, now that I’ve gotten to know him better, I like Willie Randolph for all the same reasons I originally liked him, but I continue to admire him for his demeanor, his equanimity, his attitude of telling the truth when it needs to be told, for elegantly putting down a dumb question from the media without anyone realizing that’s what he’s doing, for defending his players when he thinks they deserve it - and for putting them in their place firmly, without grandstanding, when they deserve that, too. He’s not a jerk. He’s not a blowhard. He’s not a loudmouth.  I am never embarassed by the manager of my favorite baseball team.

Well, except maybe when TBF is standing up in the mezzanine at Shea yelling, “WILLIE! WHAT ARE YOU *DOING*? WHERE’S THE PINCH RUNNER?!”

Congratulations, WR.

Wednesday, January 24, 2007

dear chicago, you’ll never guess

Bye, Cliffy.

Yeah, we all knew this was coming, and yeah, I already said my goodbyes. And yeah, I’m glad he’s going to Chicago, he’ll be happy there.

But I’ll still miss him in left field next spring.

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Monday, January 22, 2007

sharp dressed man

”Dress Like David”? How - pedestrian.

How about “Dress Like Pedro”? Now, *there’s* a concept.

Friday, January 19, 2007

“walking to new orleans”

This is, quite possibly, one of THE BEST PICTURES EVER.

NEW ORLEANS, Jan. 18 “A woman wearing a pink cowboy hat covered in rhinestones walked down Bourbon Street on Wednesday night and spotted a character with equally outrageous headgear.

“Hey there”, the woman shouted. “Who are you?”

Mr. Met froze on a balcony above the street. Usually, he does not leave New York and therefore does not require an introduction. But in New Orleans, a city known for its costume parties, he just looked like some guy who decided to dress up as a baseball.

Eager to make the woman’s acquaintance, Mr. Met tossed her a string of beads from the balcony, keeping with local tradition.

One hopes that the recipient kept with true New Orleans tradition, which does NOT require one to, um, reciprocate to Mr. Met.

(And if she did, you know he would totally make one of these faces:

The story continues:

Although the Mets stock many of their top prospects at Class AA Binghamton, outfielder Lastings Milledge could start this season in New Orleans

Right now. 10 - no, 20 - no, 100 - reasons putting LASTINGS MILLEDGE anywhere near the French Quarter would be a bad idea.

1. Signs everywhere reading COCKTAILS TO GO
2. Dumb drunk frat boys on spring break
3. Do I need to list any more? But feel free to contribute in the comments.

...and they could send the injured pitcher Pedro Martinez here for a rehabilitation start as he prepares to return to the majors.

Putting Martinez on Bourbon Street is a recipe for excitement.

No, the drag queens who work behind the counter at one of my favorite places, the Clover Grill (hamburgers cooked under an American made hubcap!) are a recipe for excitement. Let’s be real: if Pedro goes to Nola, he’ll be in bed by 9pm.

But could we please keep the party duo [formerly trio] of Lo Duca and Wright [and Floyd, once upon a time] away from this locale ENTIRELY?

...or at least give me and TBF advance notice so we can join them. We love getting into trouble in New Orleans, and can’t wait to make time to go visit the Zephyrs. New Orleans *and* baseball? Now, that’s our kind of vacation.

Read the rest of the NY Times story about the Zephyrs here.

Sunday, January 14, 2007

that old familiar feeling

The DV-R is a source of some consternation in the MG household. Despite the fact that we fully embrace technology to the fullest (I had my car wired for my iPod in 2003, the apartment has wifi, etc., etc) we are total newbies at the concept; aside from setting it to record Gilmore Girls last fall when we were Otherwise Engaged on Tuesday nights, there’s been no attempt to exploit it to its fullest possibilities - until this winter.

So now, we have a DV-R full of Law & Order and The West Wing (TBF, but shared) and a bunch of movies from either Sundance or IFC (mine), and as a result, there’s recently been some contention for space on the box.

The problem is, at the bottom of the list of recorded shows you will find a series of baseball games.

With October dates.

For a long time, it was generally understood that we wouldn’t talk about the fact those games were there, and then every once in a while, TBF’s OCD would get the better of him and he’d start asking me about them and I would say I couldn’t talk about it yet and we’d vaguely snipe about it for three minutes and move on. Because, truth be told, he couldn’t talk about it either.

But about two weeks ago, TBF started making noises about missing baseball, and while flipping through the list of shows, paused on one of the games. And I thought I heard him watching one of them when I was in the other room.

A few nights later, he suggested that we take a look at them, and see what we wanted to keep and what we wanted to get rid of. Time Warner had a free premium channel promotion over the holidays and we had recorded a bunch of movies that we hadn’t watched yet, but didn’t want to delete. Having about 4 3-hour baseball games taking up space on the DV-R was making it a little difficult.

We started with Game 6 of the NLCS, and I realized that I’d never seen it, because I was at a concert that night. And once TBF realized that, he kept going: “Oh, you HAVE to see this.” “No, wait, just one more--.” We kept fast-forwarding through the game, and started to get into it again, and it was like a spring thaw. I could watch baseball again and it didn’t hurt. In the oddest way, it felt good to just see their faces again. You don’t really know them, but you saw them two times a week (or more) and they are just so familiar. Hey, it’s Lo Duca! Look, Carlos Delgado. There’s that high-beam smile from Reyes. You don’t know them but your brain tells you that you do, so it’s a similar reaction to seeing a friend you don’t see all that often approaching you as you walk down the street.

So we lock the games on the DV-R and resolve to sit and watch them start to finish, soon, but not now. However, we want to watch something now. So TBF picks up the remote, saying, “How do you say ‘baseball’ in Spanish again? Gotta be something on here.”

===

When we were watching our selected highlights, I announced that both John Maine and Endy Chavez would be my Mets boyfriends this year. I can’t tell you why - okay, that’s not true, I can. I like Maine’s work ethic and attitude and he handled the press great last year, he wasn’t arrogant but he wasn’t overly cowed or humble or apologetic. And - using a quote from dear Zoe that didn’t make it onto Mets Weekly: “Johnny Maine pitches a no-hitter - and then walks back home to the Ramada Inn across the street.”

Check out this GREAT photo of Mr. Maine Adam Rubin took at Mets Mini-Camp:

And Endy?  Maybe it’s the spirit of #30 that I see in him. No one’s ever going to watch Endy and think, Gee, he could have tried just a little bit harder.... And, this is why, while cruising through Baseball-Reference.com, when I noticed that Endy was the ONLY Met who didn’t have his page sponsored, Mets Grrl ponied up the cash.

Thursday, January 11, 2007

there is no point in writing about the John Thomson situation

Because Metstradamus has the definitive word.  No one else needs to write anything else, because it will just pale in comparison. And those of you who have written about it should just delete your posts and link to Metstra.

No, seriously.

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Wednesday, January 10, 2007

Our Endy in the Off Season

[via, via]

Okay. We have at least a dozen Spanish-language channels on our cable service. Can we not get this stuff to watch in the off-season? It’s got to be on Time Warner SOMEWHERE, right? Right?!

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