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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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Bobby Valentine At Citi Field?

Many Mets fans wanted Bobby Valentine hired to manage the Mets again at Citi Field.  Well, there is still a chance he could manage here; The Boston Red Sox just need to make it to the World Series this year and he’ll be in the dugout managing the American League Club at next year’s All-Star Game.

 

It requires rooting for the Red Sox of course, which isn’t something I’ve ever had trouble doing.  The enemy of my enemy is my friend after all.

 

The perfect scenario is Valentine manages the All-Star Game as the losing manager from this year’s World Series, and that Terry Collins manages the other team.  An interesting twist would be if somehow the Nationals make the World Series and we get a Valentine vs. Davey Johnson matchup at Citi Field.

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Canadian Optimism

Memorable series in Toronto?  Perhaps not.  The Mets flirted more with last place than with first this weekend, but they got out of the country with a win and perhaps that’s a step forward.

 

No NL East team swept this weekend, providing the Mets some solace.  The Mets also have managed to squeak out some wins while they’ve been struggling, perhaps doing some good towards minimizing the damage.  Avoiding long losing streaks is a good way to avoid undoing all the progress you’ve made during winning streaks, and simply being 4-6 over the last 10 instead of 2-8 has done that.   A good way to have a winning record is to win more games when you’re playing well than you lose when you’re playing poorly, since all teams do both for at least some portion of the season.

 

It’s important to minimize the length of said losing streaks as well, and for the last couple of decades the National League’s favorite way to do that has been to face the Pittsburgh Pirates.  The Mets will travel to Pittsburgh for a three game set, and while it’s true that they’re not a good team, it’s important to note that they rank 3rd in the NL in team ERA and the Mets will be facing their two best pitchers in Bedard and McDonald.  The counter argument is of course that the Pirates can’t hit a lick and the Mets will be tossing the top of their rotation as well, with Johan Santana, R.A. Dickey and Jon Niese getting the starts.

 

It’s worth noting that the Mets are three games over .500 more than a quarter of the way through the season and haven’t been a losing team even for one game all season long despite being almost universally picked to finish last.  It isn’t because everything has clicked either.  The starters have probably been better than expected overall, but they’ve been prone to absolute disaster starts as well.  The bullpen is incredibly streaky, and it almost seems that as Frank Francisco goes, so go the Mets.  The offense that should’ve been the Mets best feature has been spotty, although David Wright is hitting for two.  Ike Davis has been pretty much a disaster and the two positions that the Mets really didn’t have any depth, shortstop and catcher, are two positions the Mets faced injuries at .  Both Ruben Tejada and Josh Thole went down while putting up strong offensive numbers, and their backups certainly aren’t up to par.

 

And still the Mets roll on.  Time to take care of some Pirates.

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Junk Drawer Mets Games

Chris Jaffe of The Hardball Times recounts some odd and interesting Mets games over the years in what he calls “50 years from the Mets junk drawer”

 

Check them out, some random oddities in there that are entertaining.  Here’s a couple of random games I can think of.   What have you got?

 

6/14/2008 against the Texas Rangers. I don’t know if this counts since it ended up being a rain-out, not a game.  It did lead to the second-to-last true Mets doubleheader played at Shea Stadium though, on Father’s Day. Nathan’s did a hot dog eating contest before the game, and then the Texas Rangers used the Shea tarp as a slip-n-slide.

 

Another fun one was a game against the Orioles in which David Wright hit a Grand Slam into the Shea visitor’s bullpen off of Adam Loewen and the Orioles left-fielder mis-played a ball that ended up bouncing up his sleeve and getting caught in his jersey.

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Tonight’s Must-Win Mets Game

Well obviously it’s not a must-win, it’s May 9th and the 31st game of the season!

 

Still, there’s a certain symbolic worth to winning this game.  It’d be a sweep of the defending division champions.  It’d be beating their second ace pitcher.  It’d be answering a losing streak with a bigger winning streak.

 

And it’d put the Mets five games above .500, which is somewhere they haven’t been all season, nor all of last season.  They haven’t been five games over .500 since July 19th of 2010.   This was just after the All-Star Break when they rushed Carlos Beltran and Luis Castillo back and got steamrolled by the soon-to-be World Champion San Francisco Giants at the beginning of their run.

 

The Mets should have a fair shot at this.  Dillon Gee hasn’t quite gotten the results he’d have liked, but he’s getting a lot more swinging strikes than previous years and walking fewer.  This should be a good recipe for retiring the weak-hitting Philadelphia Phillies.  They have Cliff Lee going, but he’s going to be limited returning from injury and the Mets have been beating on the Phillies pen the last two games.

 

So it’s not a must-win game, but it’s still a game you’d really like to see the Mets get.

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Reversal of Fortunes

I don’t usually do game recaps, and I don’t usually buy into “they would’ve lost this one last year” arguments trying to compare this team to that one.  This game was too much fun not to keep talking about though.

 

Halladay gave up a hard hit ball to lead off the game that required a great catch to turn into an out, but after that he was pretty steady until the 6th when a tight zone and good patience by Andres Torres with two outs led to a walk.  Nieuwenhuis laced a single into left and that brought up our uncrowned Captain.  David Wright rocketed one down the line that Mayberry misplayed off the side wall and two runs scored to tie the game.  Meanwhile Jon Niese battled some control problems but only allowed those two early runs through five innings.

 

The Mets would battle and fight through the next couple of innings, having runners on base and not scoring and allowing runners to reach base but not allowing them to score.  Josh Thole may have suffered a concussion, which sucks.

 

If you believe in poetic moments and turning points in seasons there was a huge one in the 7th inning.  With two on and one out Hunter Pence grounded to second base where Daniel Murphy flipped to Justin Turner who threw to first.  Shane Victorino slid a good three feet wide of the bag to take out Justin Turner and was ruled out for interference.   You may recall a similar play in late August of 2007.  It was the top of the ninth in Philadelphia with Marlon Anderson on first and Endy Chavez on third with one out and the Phillies leading 3-2.  Shawn Green grounded out to shortstop and Anderson went in hard at second, keeping Rollins from turning the double play and allowing Endy Chavez to tie the game.  Except Anderson was ruled to have interfered on a play much less clear cut than last nights.  Instead the Mets lost that game, got swept in a four game series against the Phillies, and failed to completely bury them in the division.  That one game may have been the difference between the playoffs and what ultimately happened in 2007.  Who knows how things are different from there.  Now the Mets get one of those calls that helps them win a game and go back to three games over .500 and 2.5 games ahead of the last place Philadelphia Phillies.  Is it karma? The universe correcting it’s course back to one that features the Mets establishing a dynasty and perennial playoff team?  Is it the turning point in a season that the Mets were universally picked to finish last but haven’t been under .500 at any point?

 

Probably not.  It was a great win culminated by Jordany Valdespin collecting his first major league hit in epic fashion with a 3-run home run off one of the game’s best closers.  It instantly became a Mets classic, but it’s still just one win in May.  The Mets will face so many ups and downs and turning points this season that it’ll be near impossible to pinpoint this game in May when it all started going right.  Would the Mets have won this game last year?  Well..maybe.  After all, many people compared this game to the Omir Santos game winning home run off of Papelbon back in 2009.  2009’s team doesn’t seem like one that you’d describe as resilient, having been the first losing season since 2004.

 

Still, there’s a lot to like about this game.  The Mets hung in there against a tough pitcher.  Jon Niese didn’t let the wheels fall off.  Except for Torres misplay in the first allowing Jimmy Rollins an extra base, they played pretty crisp defense.  They made pitches when they needed to and exploited the Phillies weaknesses.  They took a four game losing streak and responded with a three game, and counting, winning streak.

 

Is this season going to be a gusty team that fights and scraps to stay above .500?  A scrappy contender that finds a way to get at least a wild card spot?  An overachieving bunch of rookies that show promise but ultimately revert to what they were predicted to be?   It’s too early to tell, but no matter where it winds up it’s going to be a fun ride.

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Mets Ticket Giveaway!

It’s time for May’s Mets Ticket Giveaway, courtesy of Seatcrew.com.  This week Optimistic Mets Fan is giving away two tickets to a game against the Milwaukee Brewers on Tuesday May 15th.

 

Seatcrew.com is a secondary ticket market similar to Stubhub with an important twist: There are no ticket fees for the buyer or the seller, which means lower prices on tickets for you.  For a full write-up, and a list of which games you have a chance to win tickets to, check out my post from the offseason.

 

So here’s what you have to do to win.  First, you need to have a registered Seatcrew account. All you need is an email address.  Second, you need to predict how many hits David Wright will hit against the Phillies in three games.  This means you need to have your guess in to contest@ceetar.com before Wright’s first AB tonight.  There is one catch: Since this is an Optimistic fan site, we’ll be playing by reverse Price is Right rules.  This means the person closest to the total without going UNDER is the winning entry.  If you guess 4 hits, and David Wright hits 5, your guess is ineligible.  Be Optimistic.

 

If it helps, the Phillies are scheduled to start Roy Halladay, Joe Blanton, and Cliff Lee returning from the DL.  My personal guess would be 6 hits, with 2 home runs if you’d like to use that as a guide.  Good Luck!

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Resiliency and Back to Intra-Division Games

The Mets are 10-5 against the other NL East teams this year and they have six more coming up this week.  It’s against the Marlins and the Phillies, the two teams behind the Mets in the standings.  They’re both capable teams, and the Mets face some good pitching, but it’s the perfect time to reassert their intra-division dominance and keep a winning record going.

 

The Mets have showed a nice resiliency this season with managing to avoid falling below .500 despite a couple of losing streaks.  4-2 would maintain their .667 winning percentage in the division as well as put them back to their 4 games over .500 high watermark.  With Tejada (likely as of Sunday evening) going to the disabled list the Mets could use some of that resiliency.  Jordanny Valdespin spent just enough time back in Buffalo to make sure he didn’t leave the oven on, and is on his way back to the majors.

 

The Mets do face some good pitching, but Roy Halladay hasn’t been perfect this year and Cliff Lee is making his first start off the DL.  Hopefully there’s some rust there.   The Mets miss Josh Johnson in Miami, but Carlos Zambrano, Mark Buehrle and Ricky Nolasco have been pitching pretty well.  Maybe this is the week Ike Davis and Lucas Duda start acting like the bash brothers I hoped they could be.

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Josh Lewin Plugs an Old Mets Sponsor

You guys will dig this quote from Josh Lewin.  He was talking about Chris Schwinden getting strikeouts in Wednesday’s game.  Specifically he was referencing Jordan Schafer’s league leading 31st strike out.

“When you’re having more than one, (Jordan) Schafer’s the guy to pitch to.”

When you're having more than one..

This amused me at least.  Schaefer, for those of you into the history of Mets sponsors, was a Mets sponsor (before my time) years ago and one if their tag lines was “Schaefer is the one beer to have when you‘re having more than one”.

 

In memory of the Mets sponsor (now owned by Pabst) the Crane Pool Forum awards the Schaefer Player of the Game (and month) awards to the most deserving Met, based on member voting after each game.  You’re welcome to join in the discussion.

When you're having more than one.. (winners? or beers?)

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My Paper: The New Age Mets Fan

As you probably know by now, Hofstra held Dana Brand’s 50th Anniversary of the Mets conference last week.  I wrote a paper on the new age of Mets fans, like myself, who have not seen a Mets World Series Championship.  I talk about the differences in rooting for the team without remembering them going all the way, without that light at the end of the tunnel.  I emphasize how different it is for us not to have lived through all the great stories told about the ’86 and ’69 teams and how a lot of the changes to baseball like the Wild Card or black uniforms are things we’ve pretty much always had.

 

Check out some of the other bloggers who were there, particularly Greg at Faith and Fear in Flushing who put a lot of work in making it a conference Dana would’ve been proud of. On the Black.  A Gal For All Seasons.  Metstradamus. The Eddie Kranepool Society. Mets Police. And probably a bunch I’m forgetting this morning.

 

You can read my paper in its entirety here.