Friday, October 13, 2006

where the bright lights and the big city meet

So we ended up in our Game 2 seats tonight, upper level boxes. I didn’t lug the camera tonight because, to be honest, the pictures from the upper deck just aren’t going to be all that worthwhile. But this being Game 1, I was at the wrong angle for the player introductions as well as the wrong height and, of course, I didn’t have the f’ing camera ANYWAY. I start snapping with the cameraphone and then give up because it’s pointless.

Our neighbors to our left and right are the same from the NDLS: parent and son, and the other side full of rowdy beer-drinking Dominican/Latino families. By the end of tonight they are inviting us (well, me anyway; TBF is a curmudgeon at heart) over to their house tomorrow night to drink tequila and watch the game on their 42-inch TV. I think they are awesome.

The next box over houses a gentleman I start to refer to as “Darth Maul” because he is wearing a hideous, seemingly homemade mask (which he does not remove ONCE the entire night), batting gloves, and has a Mets flag. He is in the third row of the boxes, so he has zero chance in hell of getting on camera, and the fact that he does not remove the mask, combined with his need to hit everyone sitting around him on the head with his flag, does not make him any friends.

Funniest moment in the Cardinals lineup: they’re going down the row, when all of a sudden TBF interjects: “Wait for this” and the crowd boos Looper so loudly you can barely hear the introduction. Priceless.

Moment #2: at the end, Tony La Russa is introduced, and proceeds to walk down the lineup glad-handing the team. “You don’t see Willie doing that lame [expletive], now do you,” I say.

Aaron Neville, a musician who I am Supposed To Appreciate, and whose value to the New Orleans music scene I do not question - but yet, do not and cannot like - sings the Star Spangled Banner and does a passable job. Question: why do they put up the words to “God Bless America,” a short song whose words are easy to understand, but don’t for the National Anthem?

The scoreboard is dark for a moment of silence for both Buck Owens and Cory Lidle. Not too much; enough, just enough to remember, but not overshadow.

CELEBRITY WATCH: On the way into one of the NDLS games, I was POSITIVE I saw Matt Dillon walking into the ballpark, and was about to launch into my best Cliff Poncier imitation, but then thought better of it. Surely, it could not be him. As we are celebrity-gawking in the seats next to the dugout, there he is, two rows behind Tim Robbins, who in TBF’s estimation had THE best seat in the ballpark: front row of the special boxes, just off the on-deck circle, dead center. TBF wants to hate him, until I point out that we like Tim Robbins for many reasons (politics, taste in music, taste in baseball teams), and also note that he seems to have a scorecard in hand. He is also wearing an OLD Mets jersey, #4. Any ideas who this could be for?

I walked into Shea announcing that I felt GOOD about tonight. “Of course you feel good about tonight,” TBF counters, “We have Tommy G. pitching tonight.” And, yes, Tommy got us out of situation after situation and delivered enough 1-2-3 innings to assuage most of your indigestion.

“The Team, The Time, The Thanks.” This was ADORABLE. Clips of each Met saying “thank you” to the fans, in Spanish and English. Cliff was the best & had the most fun with things. “The MVP is *you*,” Mr. Reyes said, turning it around on us. They should put this up on the web site.

Speaking of Mr. Floyd, he has a new song, which I did not catch, but will be sure to run over to his blog tomorrow to beg the name of. He did not, however, have a new ankle, and although we know Cliff can exaggerate sometimes, Willie was not buying it and he came out after this particular at-bat, replaced by Mr. Chavez, who would be giving Mr. Beltran his money’s worth as MVP tonight. That diving catch - well, I’ll say it: Cliff wouldn’t have made it. Not because he didn’t want to, but because he probably couldn’t have. And what is this bs with pitching around DWright to get to Endy? People are going to start paying for that.

Shawn Green has now rated his own scoreboard graphic (along the lines of “The Glaviator” “Reyes of Light” etc.): “Green Day.”

(I know, I know.)

Nice to see Willie going out to argue with the umpire when Mr. Green got called out at second.

It rained in the upper deck, twice. Each time I got out my poncho, and each time it stopped before it was necessary to struggle into it. The weather got progressively windier as the night went on, but it didn’t get truly cold until the very end, and by then we’re standing up anyway so it doesn’t matter that much.

6th inning. Here’s Lo Duca, the guy who gets the upper deck—the people’s seats, as TBF refers to them—on their feet every time. I expect Lo Duca to get a hit; I expect Lo Duca to make something happen. When Beltran got to the plate, I was hoping, but then I thought I was just projecting because I was impatient and just wanted SOMETHING to happen already.

SOMETHING was a ball heading towards the Banco Popular sign, one of those balls that seem to suspend in mid-air and time seems to halt while it flies. Beautiful. I sigh, and then jump up and down and high five TBF and the Dominican girls next to us.

The en masse taunting of Weaver towards the end of his outing was classic New York and completely and utterly obnoxious, matching the “Cardinals: Taste Like Chicken” sign someone had behind the visiting team’s dugout. It was a spectacle and it was awesome to behold. I shouldn’t enjoy it, and other parts of the country would likely chastise us for our unsportsmanlike behavior, but it was beautiful.

I’ve really been enjoying the snarky intentional commentary offered through some of the music selections when the opposing pitchers get taken out. “Another One Bites The Dust,” “Should I Stay Or Should I Go,” and tonight’s selection, “Under Pressure.” I love this and wish there was more of this attitude allowed during the regular season. It calls to mind one of my favorite baseball stories from TBF, how an organist for one of the Chicago teams, who, after a series of questionable calls by the umpires, started playing “Three Blind Mice.”

The 7th inning video blaring “Desire” by U2 is one of our favorite parts of the playoffs. Tonight I goaded TBF into an impromptu singalong, except that I forgot (or rather didn’t bother to remember) some of the lyrics.
“Oh my god, what are you singing?!”
“Not sure. The spirit’s more important than the letter. At least the tune is right.”
I want one of those signs in the video, DESIRE with the Mets logo underneath it. (Hint, hint, hint.)

The 8th inning abomination known as “Sweet Caroline” has gotten worse, if you could possibly imagine that. They now put the lyrics up on Diamondvision, along with illustrative video footage - including Mr. Met. I’m sorry. Mr. Met would not be singing freaking “Sweet Caroline” anywhere but at Fenway.  GET RID OF THIS. People only like it because they are DRUNK at that point.

Wagner at the end was not as flawless as we wanted and needed him to be, but in the end he got the job done, and we all breathed a sigh of relief, stopping to watch the celebration on-field for a split second before leaping out of our seats and towards the nearest exit ramp, determined to not get caught in another human quagmire on the way to the 7.  Nice idea, but unless we’re going to become Those People who leave the ballpark during the 8th inning, it’s never going to happen.

We are back once again tomorrow night. I can’t wait.

Thursday, October 12, 2006

he’s one of all of us

In 2003, when I was still living in Seattle, a band from Portland lost three of its four members in a van accident on I-5. I didn’t know the band, I had never heard their music, but it didn’t matter - the event, the loss, the tragedy of it, still broke my heart.

Cliff, predictably, makes some good points about Cory Lidle’s passing:

“Whether I played with him or not, he’s one of us. And he’s a human. He’s one of all of us.”

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

the missing subtitles from cliff’s PSA

Have you ever seen Cliff’s kidney disease public service announcement? Well, I bet you’ve never seen the subtitles for it:

Cliff, let’s hope we see you in the NLCS lineup tomorrow. If not, I’ll look for you in the World Series.

[Thank you Zoe, co-president of the Cliff Floyd Fan Club, for the screen captures!]

Sunday, October 08, 2006

joe strummer would have been a mets fan

Game 2 put us in the front row of the upper deck boxes, section 22, just a little out from third base. These came from the post-season rights to TBF’s Sunday plan; my plan’s mezz tickets were traded to get us in last night. I am tired and cold and definitely coming down with something, and have brought every article of clothing possible: Mets ski cap. Army surplus fingerless gloves. Brand new scarf I ran into the Gap to buy earlier today. Polar fleece hoodie. Long sleeve shirt. My vintage ‘86 jacket. I didn’t have to break out the handwarmers until about the 5th inning. I am just warm enough, although I wish we’d had room for a blanket.

My voice is fading and my throat is sore, and with a five hour job interview lined up for 10:00am the next morning, I have to conserve my voice. So we can’t talk much to fill up the time before the game, because I have to talk quietly and it is hard to hear over the crowd murmur. We have time to kill, and we are the only one in the boxes right now, and none of our friends are here yet. So we’re kind of sitting there, quietly observing, when TBF gestures at the scoreboard.
“One of the things I always liked about the Shea scoreboard is that it had places for Left Field and Right Field umpires - but the only time those are ever used are in the playoffs.”
I look at the scoreboard. No, of course I’d never noticed before.
“And I always wondered, for years, when I would be at Shea and see those boxes used.”
I look at his newly-revised scorecard (of course he only uses his own, evolved over years and now managed in Publisher and PDF), and he has slots for RF and LF umpires, even though the rest of the year those fields sit unused. And once again I am envious, and sad, because of all the years I missed, how it just can’t feel the same for me to sit here right now as it does for him, and I’ll never know what that’s like.

Before the game, they were showing some sponsored highlights, including one about my favorite between-inning feature from this past year: Learning Spanish With Professor Reyes. I would always grab the binoculars as soon as it started to watch the dugout, where the Spanish-speaking players would always congregate down near the end of the dugout and watch Diamondvision intently, laughing and poking fun at Jose. Pedro always cracked up when this was on especially.

I can peer through the upper level railing without having to get up and down, and this is good, because I need to conserve my energy. “Don’t let me yell,” I admonish TBF. “Not even if we’re winning? Not even if Cliff hits a grand slam?”
“Well, a little bit, then.”
I love this side of the ballpark because I can see into the dugout, and it still fascinates me: Endy and Cliff on one end of the bench, playing air percussion (or maybe it’s real percussion, it’s not like I can hear them from up here). Wright going down the bench to handshake and high five everyone, then hanging off of the roof of the dugout channelling nervous energy.  And then, who congregates around the dugout steps as the clock draws closer to gametime; it’s about who you would expect, Reyes itching at the bit to be up the stairs and out onto the field.

The game: For some reason I had no doubt that we would win. This was probably because I didn’t have the energy to stress over not winning.

Lo Duca’s hit bouncing above the fence.
“Was that a ground-rule double?” I ask TBF, carefully.
“Why, yes, it was,” he confirms, marking his scorecard with a big smile on his face.
Yep, I finally get it.

The mezzanine below us is loud and raucous. Every time Cliff is at bat:
“Cliff….”  “FLOYD”
“Cliff….”  “FLOYD”
I try to get our section to join in but do not have the voice to propell it further.

A gentleman behind us is calling out to Mr. Pedro Feliciano in a sing-song manner. This then turns into a song we begin to call “The Ballad of Pedro Feliciano”.
“ooooh Pedro…Feliciano….”
Louder now.
“Feliciano…hey Peeedrooooo….”
I guess you had to be there, but it was funny at the time.

The bus moving into the hitter’s eye that you have all heard about by now was greeted by a hearty chant of “MOVE THE BUS” from all levels.

Heilman comes on and this time, there is “London Calling.” “Joe would have been a Mets fan,” I decide. This goes along with realizations made recently that Townshend would have been a Yankees fan, apropos of nothing except random contemplation. No, seriously, though, Strummer would so have been a Mets fan. Joe would have been there through the bad seasons and the good seasons and would have rooted just as hard every year. C’mon, you can see it, can’t you? (If you even care.)

I shot a few photos of the on-field celebration at the end, but not too many; I wanted to go home. Unfortunately, so did everyone on our level, and although we are upper level veterans, never has it taken this long to get downstairs, and then up to the 7 train. The people on the train were happy and rowdy, trying to get the “Jose” chant going, trying to get a “Tom-MY Gla-VINE” chant going, and then when that failed, a “Close the door” chant, which finally gathered some enthusiasm.

I am happy, but exhausted and cold, and just want to go home.

The photo gallery from tonight is here.

LOS ANGELES

Sick and tired and sick and drinking apple juice and crammed into a corner of my couch, getting text messages from friends who don’t care about sports, much less live in New York and care about the Mets, rooting for us. The cat trying to climb into our laps, but I am curled up and TBF is keeping score and he is not happy.

But we won.

WE WON!

Fingers crossed for Cliff.

Yes, I still owe you a game 2 post and photos. But, the sick thing.

——-

Friday, October 06, 2006

and that’s how we do things in flushing.

Freezing, exhausted, fighting a cold, I’m home but I have a five hour job interview tomorrow morning, which has to take some precedence, so no update tonight.

The good news is I have the rest of the day off afterwards and I’ll be home to update and upload tonight’s photos.

Tonight we were front row of the upper deck boxes, a little past third base - what we gained from TBF’s Sunday plan. My god it was COLD, but worth every second.

More tomorrow I promise.

Thursday, October 05, 2006

“get off the plate a little bit, and allow yourself to be free”

The title quote comes from Mr. Cornelius Clifford Floyd, #30, one of tonight’s heroes.

Then again, where wasn’t there a hero tonight? Okay, so Valentin had one of his worst plays all season. And he can’t lay down a bunt to save his life.

But everywhere I looked, someone was doing something exceptional. Someone was rising to not just meet the challenge, but kick the living s**t out of the challenge in a dark alley.

On the 7 train at 2:45. At Shea by 3:15. Strangely, I am not hungry, at all. My heart was pounding as I left work and walked to the train, but by the time we reach Willets Point I am calmer. Having TBF around helps, but of course we are both so nervous we are bickering pointlessly once we get off the train and into the cattle chute that is the 7 train exit.

Our seats - arranged in a trade, game 2 extras for game 1 - are on the first base line, level with the visitor’s bullpen. We never sit on this side of the stadium. Mostly we prefer the third base side so we can see into the dugout, but these tickets were as close to an even trade as we could get. A little nervewracking - just a touch - until that first ticket scanned.

No stops. No detours. No snacks. No shopping. Seats. Scorecards. Notebooks. Cameras. Deep breathing.

Our section had great people in it. The hearty “SUCKS!” after each Dodger name was announced, a novelty for us. Aside from some seat-kicking children behind us (whose parents did intervene after two dirty looks) it was a great crowd of people to watch the game with. A guy in front of us started yelling, “He’s a bum!” every time a Dodger was at bat. This produced amazing results. By the end of the game, entire rows in our section were chanting: “Bum! Bum! Bum!” “It’s family-friendly, *and* it’s historical!” someone observed.

I was strangely calm once the game started; I think it helped the juggling of the camera with the new lens, and the notebook, and the new vantage point. I got so used to our third-base view, it was easy for me to watch baseball that way, I was accustomed to the rhythm. Now it is playoffs and standing up and sitting down and standing up again, and high fives and clapping so hard my hands hurt, and yelling so loudly my voice is raw.

TBF spent the beginning of the game in that quiet space which disguises gnawing anxiety. He said to me at one point, “It’s like Pittsburgh again, you thought they were going to lose from the first out,” but the truth is I didn’t. It was eerily calm inside after first pitch. He, on the other hand, did not breathe until that Delgado home run, which I lost track of once it went over the fence - 470 feet? did it go out into the parking lot as a souvenir for the firefighters called in to deal with a burning car?

So much to remember. That first at-bat. Heaping hope after hope upon John Maine. That leaping catch by Reyes. And of course, THAT play, which I don’t even have to talk about. I saw Green pick it up, I saw him throw it, I never saw Valentin touch it, next thing I know it’s careening into home plate and there’s Lo Duca and WTF?

and - CLIFF!!! Cliff hitting that ball. Cliff hitting his fist to his heart and then to the crowd as he crossed home.  And, later: Cliff on the smooch cam :)

Later, pitching around Cliff to get to Shawn Green.
Me: “That’s disrespectful to the Jews!”
Guy behind me looks up.
“Um, I can say that.”
“No, it’s okay, so can I.”

Willie taking out Maine just when everyone would have expected him to NOT take out Maine. However, it would have probably been good if he had taken out Mota when we expected him to take out Mota.

But did it matter, in the end? It didn’t matter, because we FOUGHT and we won. Delgado is going to be a POWERHOUSE. Reyes is going to settle down. Wright is going to find his groove. I can’t wait for Endy to find his, too.

But what was it like? I hear you ask. What was it like? Your first post-season game ever, in your first real baseball year ever.

The truth is that it was the usual blur of action and emotion and highs and lows, less of a rollercoaster than my first games were. I will confess that I somehow TOTALLY missed that Brad Penny was out there for a little while (although I pretended to be all-knowing when TBF pointed it out later. Hi, honey). I was jealous of Jessica’s nails - I could not get mine done in half blue half orange as I planned because I have client meetings this week - as it was I ruined the manicure I had.

I like the ritual but the ritual of these games isn’t familiar enough to me yet. (And I realize that most of you could spit back: Not for us EITHER, ya know.) I will not like having to sit through “God Bless America” at every damn game (before you flame me, it’s the forced faux patriotism I don’t like, and you know I’m right). I hope I am calmer enough tomorrow that it can sink in more - plus we can get there earlier.

This sucks. I hate it. It comes nowhere near to describing what it was really like. Maybe I will get this right tomorrow. But it is jarring and not lyrical or interesting.

Some random comments:

The photo gallery is here, but here are some highlights:

Wednesday, October 04, 2006

i’ll be home when i’m sleeping

I woke up this morning at 5:30am, dreaming of baseball.

No, really. I had baseball dreams last night. And they were baseball dreams, dreams of balls soaring through the air and blue and orange running the bases and Shea roaring and the sun shining.

I went to bed early because I was tired and felt like I was coming down with a cold, so I mainlined Vitamin C and zinc and took some melantonin and got into bed just when the Tigers were starting to show some offense. The Mets were going to need me more.

5:30am rolls around and I’m wide awake, can’t go back to sleep, and know that TBF’s alarm is going off in half an hour, mine going off in an hour - but then I can tell that he’s awake.

“Guess what we’re doing today,” I said through the dark.
“We’re going to the playoffs!”

I am almost jealous of him right now. I met him at Grand Central last night so we could go home together, and he came down the escalator wearing his Mets hat, incongruous with his shirt and tie and fancy shoes. All I could think is that I could not possibly understand how he feels. He has been a Mets fan since about the age of 4. For a refreshing change, he doesn’t have to say goodbye to baseball in September. This year, he gets to just BE A METS FAN in New York City when the Mets are on top of the world, after years of not knowing what that feeling was like, of having that feeling and then losing it, of having that feeling and having it smashed to bits.  And this is the first time that playoff tickets were so easily obtainable, where he had them in hand, without having to call in favors or sell small children to get in.

I smiled at him.
“What?”
“You’re wearing your hat.”
“I don’t want anyone to think I’m a f’ing Yankees fan.”

But I knew the truth. He’s just excited.

So I wore my hat on the way in this morning, too, but no one on my commute route seems to care about baseball. Our neighborhood is filled with transplants from around the country and also, to the hipster, baseball is something to be regarded with derision.

In four more hours I get to leave work and head for Shea.

Over at Mets Walkoffs, my prediction is featured amongst other guest bloggers. You can add yours as well in the comments there.

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

TWAS THE NIGHT BEFORE

EXHIBIT 1: LIBERATION

EXHIBIT 2: LOYALTY

EXHIBIT 3: BE PREPARED

SEE YOU TOMORROW!

——-

NO PANIC ZONE

As much as I like to start my blog posts with some related (at least tangentially) song quote or title, and as much as “Panic In Detroit” was going through my head as I started writing, I didn’t want to use the first line of that song (as much as it might be amusingly semi-relevant), nor do I want to panic.

Okay. No El Duque. El Duque himself being the harbringer of doom, saying “It’s not a cramp.” Okay. Okay. Okay.

I’m just not going to panic. I’m not going to panic because the media is going to do a damn fine job of foisting their disaster scenarios upon us without us buying into it. What are we going to do - not show up? Not watch the games? Should the Mets just roll over and play dead because their starting rotation has been decimated? I mean, the Baseball Experts [thanks, Greg] have already decided that there is no point in playing any games, you should just give the trophy to the Yankees because they’re going to win all of the games anyway, no one stands a chance.

Am I foolish? Stupid? Newbie? Probably all of the above. But I am also a great believer in the will to triumph over adversity, that sometimes when you are put to the greatest test is when you rise above the strongest.  Here’s where not being jaded by previous years of defeat comes in handy: I am silly enough to BELIEVE.

That’s the word, right? That’s the word I saw the first time I came to Shea with TBF, the sign boards just below the box level. BELIEVE. You can be jaded about professional sports (and most of my friends are) but isn’t the whole point here that we can believe in something bigger than us, something improbable, something illogical, something that on paper, rationally, only dictates one possible outcome?

If you can’t believe in the impossible, what are you doing here? No, seriously. Isn’t this the whole point?

So that’s what I’m going to do.  Tomorrow I am meeting TBF at the back of the 7 platform at 2:45pm and we are going to Shea where we are going to cheer our Mets from our seats in the mezzanine. We’ll be there Thursday. We’ll be there for as many games as we have tickets for, because we’re going to believe that we’re going to use all of them.

Besides, TBF’s mom won the NLCS lottery today and we bought tickets for Game 7 this morning. We now have tickets for 8 out of 10 potential playoff games.

===

The A’s fans are calling the Commissioner’s office to bitch about that 10am start time. Hell, I’m pissed I don’t get to watch Zito vs. Santana. Send a note of support.