Tribute to Banner Day

I missed Banner Day, but every thing I saw about the event sounded amazing.   Check out posts from Mets Police and Faith and Fear in Flushing for the specifics.

 

I have no idea why they originally stopped having Banner Day but you could tell that people were excited to have it back.  300 or more banners were made.  All the announcers were talking it about it at different points throughout the day and the promotion got coverage in the papers the next day too.  What’s better than a promotion that not only gets covered but has the fans doing the actual promotion?

 

The fans did not embarrass either.  There weren’t a score of “Sell the Team!” banners or “So and so sucks!” proclamations.  I sense there was a certain reluctance to bring it back by the Mets assuming that Banner Day’s day had come and gone, and I admit I thought that might be the case as well.  The world today provides so many possible outlets for fans, that it wouldn’t have surprised me to learn that the desire to scribble some logos onto a bed sheet and parade around with it had been left in the previous millennium.  I was wrong.  The excitement I saw on Twitter and recapped by my fellow bloggers proves to me that Banner Day is the perfect promotion for Mets fandom. The winning banner was of an event and time period after Banner Day ended and the creators of the banner were what I call New Age Mets Fans.  Some common trait has been passed down from Mets fan to Mets fan that instills within us the desire to talk about and parade our favorite players and moments.

 

Optimism was present in many of the banners.  One of my favorites read, “The Mets are going all the way, Duda, Duda!” which I thought was clever and that I think I’m going to co-opt occasionally this year.   There were tributes to announcers, and players of the recent past as well as the distant past.  Current players got some love too, including a mock-up of a newspaper cover featuring R.A. Dickey’s exploits.

 

I wonder if the Mets were impressed by the enthusiasm and fun that went on that Sunday afternoon.   It did seem like they were enjoying the banners as well, so many they truly will bring this back as a yearly tradition.  It’s a fan-friendly event that really resonates with Mets fans and is the perfect event that was born of a fan movement way back at the Polo Grounds and not in a corporate meeting room somewhere.  It would be cool if it could be done while fans are already in the park.  There are rumors of scheduled doubleheaders being added to the schedule for 2013 to help facilitate the interleague everyday format, so perhaps they could again do it between games one Sunday afternoon.  Either way, I know I’m going to make a point to be there for it next year.

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