Wednesday, November 19, 2008

CRANKY.

TBF called the Mets today.  He’s still waiting for a call back.

What’s infuriating isn’t just that the Mets don’t have anything to tell him, it’s that they can’t be bothered to get a coordinated statement together to give to fans when they call. Why doesn’t every ticket rep have a statement that they can read and a FAQ they can refer to? Why, instead, do they just put him on hold and then pretend to try to find someone who can give him an answer, when they know of course there isn’t anyone because there isn’t an answer because they don’t have to do a goddamn thing they don’t want to do because they have our money and they hold us hostage and if we don’t buy the tickets, someone else will. And the media will never report on it, and all the Mets will do is send out another press release about the Super Silver Golden Glittering Excelsior Suite being sold and how the economy is not impacting the Mets.

[So we were talking the other day about Wachovia Center in Philly. That name just changed not that long ago, and now it’s likely going to have to change again. And so what does it mean for Citi Field and the 20k people who just lost their jobs at Citicorp? Not that it matters what it’s going to be called, because only rubes that go there twice a year, or people who are blind sheep are going to call it Citi Field anyway. The rest of us are going to call it Shea or “going to see the Mets” or “see you out in Flushing” or anything other than the worst possible name for a facility since Enron Field.]

And how offensive is it really to the rank and file buying Mets tickets to keep harping on how the economy is not impacting the Mets? Because it’s certainly going to impact the majority of the people coming to see the Mets. However, that’s not the majority of the people that the Wilpons care about.

This is about the time I start to get irate that here Mr. Wilpon Sr. is building his homage to the ultimate People’s Park, Ebbets Field, and yet the field is meant for anything BUT the people. At least at Shea you could stand on the subway rotunda and catch a glimpse of a ball in midair. Where will the modern-day Knothole Gang get their peek into the rarefied confines of Citi Field?

I haven’t been doing this long enough to get sad and jaded yet and I am. It’s not even because the Mets lost. It’s not even because the Phillies won. It’s not because of the retention of Luis Castillo or the Hot Stove season that’s turning into the Barely Tepid Hotplate season.

IT’S BECAUSE THE METS HAVE $758 OF MY HARD-EARNED MONEY AND SOMEHOW THEY HAVEN’T FIGURED OUT WHAT THEY ARE GOING TO DO WITH PARTIAL PLANS. DO YOU KNOW WHAT WOULD HAPPEN TO ME AT MY JOB IF I DIDN’T PLAN FOR CONTINGENCIES? No seriously. THIS IS YOUR JOB! THIS IS WHAT YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO BE DOING! Do you realize that the NATIONALS handled this better than the Mets are? No seriously. The freaking NATIONALS handled this better.  The Mets are supposed to be a world-class organization. It’s like watching the Curly Shuffle on repeat.

I am angry that they are ruining 2009 for me already. I am angry that unless somehow magically we get a lovely fan-friendliy 40 game plan with decent seats that I can take photos from and full post-season rights (or some kind of decent post-season rights) that we are going to give up and buy a handful of tickets. That we won’t be able to sit with the denizens of the late Section 12. That I won’t have a standing date with David Wright and Jose Reyes, or a reason to run out of the office at 5:15 sharp on a regular basis.

I hate the Wilpons for ruining that. Because there was no reason. All it would have taken was a little effort. I’ll give the last words over to MG reader Rickey24 from their comment in another post:

From my perspective, it is beyond ridiculous that the Mets haven’t yet figured out these details by now.  These decisions should have been made this past summer.  Instead, they spent all of this season trying to sell as many full season ticket packages as possible.  Now, they are scrambling to figure out a way to market their various partial plans in the most efficient way possible so that they ensure that people are motivated to buy each of their partial plan offerings as opposed to just a select few.  Combine the Mets’ Ticket Office’s usual ineptitude with the task of trying to market partial plan offerings distinct from last prior years and you get this clusterf**k that we are all experiencing now.  The sad thing is that any combination of us could have handled the transition of partial planholders from Shea to Citi Field better.