Flushing Hits the Fan

Historical Perspective on Bad Moves by the Mets Front Office

2010-02-13T17:10:00.000-05:00

This was a comment on an article about the Rusty Staub/Mickey Lolich trade in 1975 that I posted earlier today on ohmurph.com.

When they traded Staub for Lolich, my other friends in high school who were Mets fans and I had a collective groan. We had seen if before when they traded Ryan, Otis and others for the likes of Joe Foy and Jig Fregosi. What we did not know was how we would keep seeing it again. Mike Vail blowing out his ankle was just an example of how the Mets would make a poor decision and have it followed by bad luck. Planning on him being the big bat was much like planning on Daniel Murphy as your opening day left fielder last year. That bad decision was followed by the rest of the team being injured around him as the left field experiment failed. Of course you could say he was the big bat, his 12 homers led the Mets!

Belting Out Hits

2010-01-30T13:47:00.001-05:00

I became a Mets fan at age 5 in 1964. It was the same year that Jane Jarvis and the Mets opened a couple of miles from my house in Flushing. Listening to her “belt out hits on the Thomas organ” was an integral part of the Shea experience from my earliest memories until my college days. Whether it was an Irish jig she played for Tug McGraw’s warm-ups, or her beloved Jazz, we did not realize then how lucky we were to have her.

Hold Comments at Bay

2010-01-06T15:04:00.006-05:00

Now I would have addressed the pitching first, but the Mets never seem to ask me what I think. Let's hold the negative and look at the positive. There are some promising signs with Jason Bay agreeing to tend the fallow leftfield in Flushing. This is basically a good signing of a solid ballplayer. It also means that the Wilpons actually may not have been cleaned out by Bernie Madoff.

Maybe we can get a real number 2 starter after all. However, the thought of Joel Pinero does not warm my heart. That is unless Dave Duncan comes along with him.

Hot Stove, No Buns in the Oven

2009-12-15T22:52:00.005-05:00

As the hot stove has heated up, the Mets are still in the woodshed looking in to the kitchen. They have not made a meaningful deal or signing. I get the impression that some of the offers out there are to appease season ticket holders. Many season ticket holders are at this point holding out themselves. The Mets have pushed back the renewal date for season plans from December 4 to December 31.

This seems to confirm the word on the street that the fans are intending to "stay away in droves." Many fans share season ticket packages to defray costs. Two years of heartbreaking losses and one of pure disaster have taken their toll. Fan partnerships are short of partners. Longtime season ticket owners are faced with the prospect of either giving up their seats, or paying the 4 or 5 figure cost themselves. It seems that everyone I talk to is looking to add a partner or two. Everyone is window shopping, but no one is buying - like the rest of the economy the savings rate is up. As a result the Mets were forced to the extraordinary extension of the renewal deadline.

When the Mets announced ticket price reductions I was underwhelmed. It was reported in the media as an average reduction of 10-20 percent. The tickets I know about were down only 6.5%. This added insult to fan misery. The Mets could not even reduce prices without a swing and miss. I thought that a credit for renewals as a reward for fan loyalty was the way to go. The Mets dumped tickets last year by selling them at discounts on stubhub. This was at the expense of the season ticket holders who could not sell their extra tickets without taking huge losses.

There is a lot of anger out there. However, front office can get away with the tin ear that listens to the fans. All they need to do is build an organization that is dedicated to winning and execute a plan to make it so. I know, I am a dreamer, it comes with the territory.

The Good, the Bad and the Smugly

2009-10-26T09:15:00.005-04:00

The Yankees are going to the world series. I must admit that the Yankees and their millions have done a much better job than the Mets in putting together a good team. Yes the Yankees are a good team, the Mets not so much. Admitting that, for me, is a bad thing. It makes my skin crawl, but not so much as watching the smugness of the Yankee fans on TV, in the Subway and in general walking around what is otherwise my hometown.

The Yankee fan has come to expect, as if by divine right, that the post season is actually an extension of their regular season. The extended regular season will end in a devastating failure should the Yankees somehow, someway, end up not winning their 27th championship. It is a fate too horrible to contemplate for the Yankee fan. Fortunately, for them, such contemplation is not a part of their psyche. Why should the Phillies even try? The stars are aligned for the precious Yankees, it is preordained, right?

I have reached a new low. I am looking for the Phillies cap that is leftover from one of my kids little league teams.

So, not.

2009-10-19T21:40:00.004-04:00

Just received this from Stubhub:

Earlier today, an email promoting New York Mets postseason tickets was sent to you. This, unfortunately, was a mistake. We regret the error and apologize for any inconvenience or confusion this may have caused.

Sincerely,

The StubHub Team

Finally a team that screws-up more than the Mets. I am not sure what confusion it could have caused. A few hundred fans showing up at Citifield for the game seems unlikely even for someone brain dead enough to send out e-mails about Met playoff tickets.

Mets are in the Playoffs!

2009-10-19T20:58:00.007-04:00

It is to good to be true! It was all a bad dream! This e-mail arrived in my inbox today:

Where do you want to sit?

Be there alongside your New York Mets as they chase baseball immortality. Go to StubHub, where you’ll find a fantastic selection of tickets to every playoff game – so you experience the championship chase live and in person. Check it out. Go to StubHub and get the seats you want today.

I can't seem to find the event on stubhub anywhere. It is not a mistake, right?

Time for a Holliday in NY

2009-10-08T21:47:00.005-04:00

Watching the Cardinals-Dodgers tonight brought me back to the Mets 2009 season. A muffed fly ball in the outfield leading to a walk-off loss for the Cardinals was so familiar I had flashbacks. Now we can be sure that Matt Holliday will be in the starting Mets line-up in April. If there was any doubt if he had the right stuff for the Mets outfield, he showed it tonight with a Murphy-like performance.

Excellent Thai

2009-10-06T14:58:00.000-04:00

Excellent Thai is just that. Located at 3650 Main Street it is well named. We lucked out and got a parking spot right in front. Try either the vegetable curry casserole or the chicken curry casserole. You may need a spoon to get all of that sauce! Try the minced beef too, but if you do not want it spicy be sure to tell them.

The food may not help you remove the burned in after image in your brain of Luis Castillo and the dropped pop-up that became a walk-off error against the Yankees, but it couldn't hurt.

Flushing, the day after

2009-10-05T23:20:00.000-04:00

If you find yourself in Flushing and do not know what to do with yourself now that the torture is over for the season , think about exploring the great Chinese restaurants just one mile from Citifield. They are much less expensive than the Danny Meyer fare that the Mets turned to indigestion all season. I would vote for Szechuan Gourmet on 37th Avenue myself, but I will post others as I try to forget the 2009 baseball season by gorging from one end of Main Street to the other.

Good Grief, Counseling

2009-10-05T22:41:00.000-04:00

For some reason I continued to watch Mets game after Mets game this year (think fly drawn to a bug zapper). I tried to tell myself "well it can't get any worse." However, I continually sold the Mets short. I should have realized that they had not exhausted ways of losing horribly. Walk-off dropped fly-balls, hit-by-pitches with the bases loaded and grand slams seem to have become commonplace if not even expected. Watching yet another horrible loss to, of all teams, the Nationals, I realized that I have finally reached the last stage of mourning for the 2009 Mets, acceptance. It does feel good when you do finally stop hitting your head against a wall.

All of my enthusiasm for this Mets season evaporated long ago, just after my denial and anger phases. After realizing there were no options for fixing the team, depression set in and stayed. All I could think is this: is it the Mets or is it their fans that are continually pushing that rock up the hill only to see it fall down again like in a Greek myth? It is probably the Mets players pushing the rock. For Met fans like me, I think there is a better analogy. It is Charlie Brown and Lucy. Each year Lucy would offer to hold the football for Charlie Brown to kick. The result was the same each year. Lucy would pull the football out at the last second and Charlie Brown would go flying as he kicked at the football that was not there. Charlie Brown was wise to this, but each year somehow Lucy convinced Charlie Brown that it would be different this year. The result was always Charlie Brown airborne and screaming once again. Charlie Brown is the archetypal Met fan.

Now I think I heard in college that Sisyphus, the guy in Greek mythology pushing that rock, was an existential hero because he accepted his lot and continued his burden. Can the same be said for Charlie Brown? I could try to channel Camus to answer the question, but what did he know of Charlie Brown? I think the difference between Sisyphus and Charlie Brown is that Sisyphus knows that his lot will be no different and chooses to go on anyway. Charlie Brown on the other hand is always convinced that it will somehow all be different this time.
According to Einstein (he had to be in this somewhere), repeating the same action and expecting different results, is the definition of insanity.

So put this all together with some postulate that I think I learned in high school geometry and it proves that we Met fans must be complete loons. Some may say that Mets fans are only happy if they are miserable, but I reject this. I still remember all too clearly the euphoria I felt when I was at Shea Stadium for game 7 in 1986. Should we Met fans embrace Charlie Brown as our existential hero? Good grief, no! Lucy will not convince me that next year will be different. That is unless next year includes a big bat in left (Holiday?) and at first (Nick Johnson? - it is a thin class in 2010), a real number 2 starter (Lackey?), and management that is committed to winning. Unfortunately, like Charlie Brown, I want to believe it will all be different next time, but Lucy will have to work hard to get my hopes up anytime soon.