Another question and answer blog — this time with MetsGrrl. You can read our answers here.
1. What do you think of Shea Stadium?
I have a love-hate affair with Shea. I love it because it is so improbably antiquated and because I fell in love with baseball there. I hate it because the seats require extreme force to push down, because the ushers are nasty, because the bathrooms on the upper deck flood during a weekend day game. But I love that the Mets have always played there, and that the Beatles played there. I saw the Who and the Clash play there, and I saw Bruce Springsteen there. Now I am just mad that I didn’t take advantage of having sat on the field level for Springsteen. I walked in through the visitor’s bullpen and then out through the Mets bullpen! I should have paid more attention!!
2. Will you miss it once the new park is there?
Of course I will, because I am a bundle of contradictions. I will hate that it has been torn down and is gone, and I will hate that my seats at the new ballpark will not be nearly as good as they are at Shea, at least for the first few years. However, I am reasonably sure that after a season of not having to jam myself into seats from the 70s and not having to spend half the game yelling at morons to not block my view of home plate, I will get over it.
3. Do you have a favorite section that you always sit in? Season tickets?
I have the Tuesday-Friday plan, which is 25 games this year. I am in the same seats we were in last year, which was my first year as a planholder. I went out to Shea in December when snow was on the field and picked the seats out. I sit in Mezzanine section 12, which is to me the perfect section, because we are straight up from third base, which is a great angle on David Wright and Jose Reyes, and we can see into the Mets dugout, which is always a source of great interest and amusement.
4. How do you get to the games?
“Take the train to the game” - the #7 train, which runs from Times Square to Main Street - Flushing. There is no parking any more (or less than none), because they are building Citi Field in our parking lot, so all the off-street parking is now taken. It takes about an hour for me to get to Shea from my office, which is downtown, near the Holland Tunnel.
5. Are there any fun fan traditions?
We sing “Meet the Mets” every single game, no exceptions. And everybody knows the words, and everybody sings along. Even teenagers there with their parents who would never be caught dead doing something so uncool. Also, I’ll put our fan participation level for the 7th inning stretch against anybody’s. Everybody, repeat, everybody, sings.
6. How do you feel about your in-game entertainment?
We have Jose Reyes giving Spanish lessons, which is the highest of high comedy. The best thing is to watch him and the other Spanish-speaking players while it’s on the Diamondvision. I worry someone is going to break a rib from laughing. Like your park, they’ve decided to try to institute an 8th inning sing-a-long to “Sweet Caroline” which is far more popular than I would like it to be. We boycott it. I hate and despise it. I want something New York-centric. The rest of the in-game entertainment is pretty crappy. I have a soft spot for the Kiss Cam, but that’s only because I want to be on it (and it never, ever goes to the Mezzanine). After going to Wrigley Field, where there is no Diamondvision, I can safely say that if they got rid of everything except “Meet the Mets” and The Jose Reyes Spanish Academy, I wouldn’t miss it at all.
7. Do you have a usual group of people to go to games with?
Strangely enough, most other people I know don’t follow baseball. I have TBF, and now, through writing the blog, I have met other Mets fans. And then of course there are the Section 12 regulars, who are awesome people. Pretty much it’s just me and TBF (aka my other half, for those who do not read MetsGrrl.com though.
8. Any fun/interesting player nicknames?
We call Ramon Castro “Melonhead,” because he has the largest head you have ever seen. Also “Darth” or “Lord Vader” since his at-bat music is the imperial march from Star Wars.
9. What player do you love to hate?
That should be obvious from the answers to #8.
10. Favorite baseball memory:
Right now, it is my trip to Wrigley Field this year. It helps that the Mets actually showed up and played that day. But the entire trip was magic for so many reasons. My second favorite memory is going through the 2006 playoffs with TBF. We were at every single home playoff game. No matter how it ended, we were there for the whole thing and went through it together.
11. Favorite Moment for the Mets:
After they clinched the NL East in 2006, we got in line at the merchandise stand to buy shirts. Of course, the Mets didn’t stop to consider that 50,000 people might be wanting to buy shirts, and they didn’t staff the merchandise booths with extra help, so it took us forever. But this was a good thing, because by the time we were done, we heard someone yell, “The Mets are on the field and they are letting fans down on the field level,” so we ran downstairs and watched the team celebrate on the field. Paul Lo Duca turned on the infield hose and proceeded to spray all of us until one of the groundskeepers turned it off. David Wright walking around with a bottle of champagne and a cigar, shaking hands with every cop, security person, groundskeeper, you name it. Lo Duca and Reyes clearly having one of those “I love you, man!” conversations. Shawn Green and his kids running around the infield. It was all on TV, and you probably saw some of what happened better on tv than we did from where we were standing, but I would never trade that moment for the world.
12. What’s your favorite baseball food, and do you ever get sick of it:
The sandwiches from Mama’s are worth the surcharge you pay for buying them at Shea as opposed to getting off the 7 train in Corona and walking to Mama’s to get them yourself. That said, nothing beats a Nathan’s hot dog. I do get sick of them, however. I love love love the Carvel ice cream with rainbow sprinkles in the mini-batting helmet, but if you saw my house and how many things we use the mini batting helmets for, you would understand why I have only had one this year.
13. My batting song would be “Even Better Than The Real Thing” by U2.
14. My favorite overlooked Mets player: Damion Easley! He’s just such a cool, composed, articulate guy.
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