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.

The sages opine, tiredly, that Nelson Figueroa is a flash in the pan, a footnote in the season, someone we will forget come July, when he will stop performing. Others have this set up as the feel-good story of the summer. I think the truth lies somewhere in between, that Figueroa is both more than we hoped for and less than a miracle. For now, I am happy to have someone as a proud example of someone who never gave up, someone whose family is out there cheering him on loudly and proudly. I love that Billy Wagner gives Nelson his private box for every game he starts. There are so many bad stories in baseball, it seems to me to be okay to put the spotlight on this one, even if it seems over-emphasized. There is enough to be tired or cynical about in baseball already. When there is a chance to feel good about something, it would seem like a good time to seize the moment.

Coop and I discussed how the story of the Mets’ failings keeps being (amongst other things) that the irregulars get on base, where the regulars consistently leave them stranded. Today, everything clicked on all cylinders. The irregulars hit; the regulars brought them home. The irregulars surprised us; the regulars slid back into their groove a little bit more.

And then there is C-Del, Mr. Delgado, who earlier in the game I had christened with Coop’s nickname for Moises Alou last year, “Mr. Contribution.” She does not like Delgado, but wants to see him do well, whereas I both like Delgado and obviously want to see him do well. Friday night, I was responding to my neighbors’ deathknells about him being finished with the thought that Delgado’s problems are entirely mental. I don’t think it’s that he’s hurt and not telling anyone. He just can’t get over the mental barrier, whatever it is.

Except, perhaps today he did. And while I understand why he refused the curtain call (although I do not buy the “I hit a home run with no one on base in the seventh inning,” so he didn’t deserve a curtain call excuse entirely - he is too smart to not understand the subtexts) it would have gone a long way towards a little healing and reconciliation on both sides if he had just given us a wave. I don’t condone the booing and I don’t think it’s going to help him or anybody, and I was whining about the Mets not having gone after Teixeira last year (the problem of where we would put him, exactly, just a minor detail in my mind at the time), the fact remains that he’s not some scrub or some despicable guy with low moral character you really wish wasn’t on the Mets. It’s Carlos Delgado. He talks with a New York accent after being here as long as he has. This is a not a guy worthy of hating. Or booing.

Every time a ball would head for the outfield, Coop and I would be all, “Yeah… whatever… oh, wait… no, seriously?” And then have to get up to our feet, and clap, and cheer, and sit down and comment about how we never thought that ball was heading out. 

And by the time Delgado hit that second home run, we were hugging. If you think that’s stupid or girlish then you can, in fact, go to hell. Most guys would kill or die to date a woman who would consider the fact that a baseball player hit a home run to be a huggable event.

Memo to Ryan Church: How is a Christian dude reconciling the Ozzy and death metal? I know there is CCM heavy metal, but that is not what he is playing.

7th inning announcement: “Everyone, wave your foam fingers!”
...and most of Shea promptly starts doing the tomahawk chop with them, turning them upside down so they more accurately approximate a tomahawk. I do not think this is what the sponors of today’s game had in mind, but I find it delightful. I tell Coop the story TBF told me, that in Atlanta they sell foam tomahawks - that are manufactured on an Indian reservation. And that the Chief was quoted as saying, “As long as people will buy them, we will keep making them.” (This is, however, reason #4215 I can never ever go there.)

And then Billy Wagner comes in and is Billy Wagner, and it’s “Takin’ Care of Business” and we all leave Shea a little happier, a little lighter, a little more hopeful, fans singing that goddamn Braves tomahawk chop song as they stream down the ramps. Let us hope this is a harbinger, let us hope we will not let Johan Santana pitch like a champ and then not back it up with offense, let us hope that the Mets have no intention of letting the Pirates walk all over us. Two games out of three against the Braves is huge. Now let’s take three out of three, it’s the PIRATES after all.

I am almost sorry I am not going tomorrow night. TBF is on the road covering the Springsteen tour down south (work obligations made it impossible for me to take the assignment as well), and there is a little imp sitting on my shoulder urging me to head back out to Flushing tomorrow night.

Hmmmmm.

[The Flickr set for today is here.]