Tuesday, April 29, 2008

LEX JOE METS. [04-29-08]

April 29, 2008
Santana v. Snell

At 6pm sharp, I logged off at work, changed into my #57 t-shirt, and prepared to walk out the door.
The New Girl at the office looks at me. “You should stay, have some pizza.”
“Sorry, but I have a date with a handsome Venezuelan gentleman who’s a two-time Cy Young award winner, I can’t stand him up.”
Considering that I was standing there in a Mets t-shirt with SANTANA across the back, I thought the joke would be obvious. It went right over her head.

Poor Ian Snell, I thought on the way out to Shea. Here he thinks he’s going to New York to face Oliver Perez, and then, boom, a little rain and now you’re facing Johan Santana. I found the entire situation serendipitous, because 2008 was looking to be a repeat of 2006, where, despite going to 35+ games, I never saw Pedro start once. It was looking to be the same pattern for Mr. Santana, so I was delighted to have his start bumped a day.

My guest at tonight’s game was my friend C. who publishes the delightful blog Scatter O’ Light. She is a sports fan with a respectable Mets lineage and a world-reknown expert in Mr. Paul Hewson. [end plug] We arrived at Shea just after the anthem. The minute I reached our seats, I pulled out a sweatshirt.

It was not a great night for pitching, and a lackluster night for offense, with a few exceptions. Shea was chilly and shivering and the players were clearly not ready for it.
“But he pitched in Minnesota!” Miriam said at one point.
“In a dome,” I feel compelled to point out.
“Oh.”

Fourth inning: my new gloves (photos at a later date) came out, but are then removed to applaud Ryan Church. Now, I think, we just need to wait this cold out. It is the kind of night that you can be excused for hoping that it goes quickly, that we win in an efficient fashion, that there is little drama if any. That you forget that it is a live sporting event and even though they can try to choke the life out of baseball, it is still played by human beings and will therefore never go exactly according to plan.

Sunday, April 27, 2008

FIGMENT. [04-27-08]

Sunday, April 27: Figueroa v. Smoltz

I will be honest and say that the whole reason I was excited about going to this game was because I was going with Coop and because it was Foam Finger day. I wasn’t going to chalk Saturday’s W up to anything except luck. Once again, the irregulars get on base, and once again, the regulars fail to get them home. I am angered at morons who boo John Maine and morons who slaughter Aaron Heilman, to the point that when I get off the 7 train this morning, I want to go into the Team Store to buy a Heilman shirt except I am not sure that they exist (why would they? nevermind, don’t answer that).

I thought we were in for an afternoon of catching up with the baseball game in the background. I love taking photos from the Coop box. Maybe the Mets could surprise us.

And surprise us they did.

WILD THING. [04-25-08]

Friday, April 25: Pelfrey v. Jurjens

When the week began, I was on the hook to attend all three games this weekend: Friday on our plan, Saturday in the upper deck on TBF’s Saturday plan, and Sunday with the delightful Ms. Coop as her guest for Foam Finger Day. Halfway through the week, I gently suggested that we should sell the Saturday tickets, because I did not see how I could possibly get through three games, accomplish anything else, and not be completely exhausted once the weekend was over.  In hindsight, I’m sorry we didn’t go on Saturday, and this is yet another reminder that going is always better than not going.

I didn’t take the camera on Friday since I didn’t want to deal with the logistics of dragging it and clothes to change into to work. Instead, I asked TBF to bring some scoresheets along for me. It is part of my 2008 Baseball Resolutions to finally learn how to keep score. Before you all go off on me about how easy it is and little kids do it, realize that I am learning how to keep score from the TBF School of Scorekeeping, and see his hand-made, edited painstakingly over the course of years scoresheet below:

Friday, April 25, 2008

NEW METS CW11 COMMERCIAL.

No, this is not going to be another patented MetsGrrl diatribe against the utter lack of creativity in the Mets marketing office. 

In fact, quite the opposite. Instead of putting Mets footage against yet another song by old British guys that no one on the Mets would ever listen to (except maybe Paul Lo Duca, and he can make the Nationals listen to that now), CW11 bucked the trend and picked a NEW song. By a LOCAL band.

However, this is going to be a shameless plug, since the song in the commercial is written and performed by my close personal friends The Shalitas ! Their fantastic song, “Must Be True,” is in the background of the new CW11 commercial you will start seeing all this coming weekend!

A few years ago, I wrote this about the band:
Imagine the Debbie Harry of “Rapture” with more sass, imagine Sheena (of ‘Sheena Is a Punk Rocker") in the Shangri-La’s; imagine the Crystals meeting Sleater-Kinney. Ladies and gentlemen, meet the Shalitas.

They are the smartest, toughest, most righteous women singing doo-wop in 2008 that you will ever meet.

AND THEIR SONG IS IN A COMMERCIAL FOR THE METS!!

I am proud to say that I took Kazual Shalita not only to her first Mets game, but to her first professional baseball game ever.

If you dig the song, you can buy it on their MySpace page. Shop early and often.

Thursday, April 24, 2008

HUMOR ALERT.

There’s no point in writing about the game, is there? Instead, let me bring you this classic hilarity from the geniuses at Fire Joe Morgan. A choice excerpt - which had me cracking up so loudly on the B61 bus that people actually edged away from me - follows. Today’s target: Wallace Matthews [Bronx cheer]

Here’s the meaty part:

-- but better than the living embodiment of heroism, Derek Jeter.

Read the rest of it - it will crack you up no matter what team you root for.

--
Who’s going to the game tomorow night? I wonder if the Mets will show up.

Monday, April 21, 2008

SANTANA BULLPEN SESSION, 4-20-08.

While we were making our last minute plans to head to Philly on Sunday, we also made tentative plans to head to Pittsburgh in August. Why? To let me get decent photos of Santana. So imagine our surprise and delight when we walked into CBP around 5:30 on Sunday, strolled over to the bullpen, and saw #57 working out.

[more, after the jump]

SATURDAY TICKETS FOR SALE

CORRECTED PRICES since TBF gave me the wrong numbers originally.

Tix are in Upper Reserved Section 8, Row H, seats on the aisle.

Saturday April 26 v. ATL - $20/pair
Saturday May 10 v. CIN - $20/pair

Can Express Mail, transfer via mets.com, meet you at Grand Central, deliver in Midtown, etc.

email metsgrrl at gmail dot com.

PHILLY UPDATE.

We got home at 1:15am and I was in bed at 1:30am (and then we had to get up at 6:30 to return the car) so no report until tonight.

One preview:

I GOT TO WATCH A BULLPEN SESSION WITH JOHAN!!!

In *PHILLY*!

Which will only mean something to those of you who have been to CBP and realize how close the bullpens are to Ashburn Alley.

Sunday, April 20, 2008

YOU KNOW WHAT’S NOT A GOOD THING TO DO?

It’s a good idea to NOT check the Phillies web site at 1am and see if there are any tickets for tonight’s game. Because then you will find seats right behind home plate and what are you supposed to do? Not go?

Full report tomorrow.

Friday, April 18, 2008

FRIDAY MUSINGS for 4-18-08.

Last night’s event with Mets By The Numbers and Benchclearing went swimmingly well, I thought, despite some initial nerves and a minute or two of, WTF am I doing up here interviewing baseball writers about baseball books. But I am good at the interviewing thing, pretty good at the writing thing, and not so bad at the baseball thing, so it all turned out well. Thanks to those who attended, and thanks again to Word Books and Jon Springer for the opportunity. For those of you who didn’t show and live in the area, just see if I buy you a hot pretzel at Shea this year.

--

We didn’t see the game tonight.  I know, Santana-Hamels, but our hearts needed a little solace.  If the car would have made it to Jersey we would have been down the shore, but lacking that we headed for Rockaway, sharing earbuds on the train there and back, getting the last out of the 9th inning two seconds before the A train went back underground. Once we got home, I watched the Reyes collision, just to reassure myself that he was doing okay.

--

A few favorite press quotes:

Adam Rubin

”I see when somebody’s not happy,” Beltran said. “I didn’t think he was happy. I told him, ‘I want you to be the Reyes you’ve always been.’ Him being quiet, that’s not him. … We don’t care if other teams get offended.”

Said Reyes: “Everything is back.”

Thank the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Also from Rubin:

Billy Wagner had the line of the night. Referring to the booing from the Citizens Bank Park fans as he entered from the bullpen, the closer quipped:

“When I ran in, I thought (Scott) Schoeneweis was with me.”

I *like* Billy Wagner.

Jayson Stark:

PHILADELPHIA—As you watched Johan Santana overmatch the Phillies on Friday in his first visit to Philadelphia as a Met, it was hard to resist asking this question:

Suppose he’d been a Met last year.

Hey, Jayson: Suppose my mother was a bus. We could all go for a ride in her.
--
Tomorrow we will miss the game because we will be arriving in Jersey for the family Seder right about the time of first pitch, and although TBF mumbled something about sitting at the other end of the table and stealthing an earbud, I don’t think that’s gonna work. I freely confess that a big reason I agreed to go was so that TBF and I wouldn’t decide to head to Philly at the last minute.

A happy and kosher Pesach to all you readers of the Hebraic faith.