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As they would be here, if they didn't constantly produce slime in six different languages.

I got out of a ridiculously long church meeting at 9:30 tonight, the only solace being I'd hear Howie if the sky waves were bouncing right. They were, but instead I heard Steve telling me about the Metropolitans, punning about Hugh Hefner and sounding awfully happy.

By the time I got home, I saw the tarp, and the mid-8th stasis we were still in, and then began the 1965 Mets Yearbook.  This team can't televise Banner Day live, but it has an awfully good archive for when they don't have infomercials scheduled, that's for sure.

The '65 Mets are probably the team I know the least.  They lacked the novelty and Marvelous-dom of the inaugural season; the '63 story of Snider I picked up in some discarded East Meadow library book in the 70s; the All-Starry tales of '64; and the 9th place triumph of '66. (All the ones after that, I witnessed personally.)  And there were all the young dudes, being pitched as the Expressway to the Big Leagues, few of whom I recognized, much less remembered. A quick journey over to MBTN certainly helped:

Hey hey Johnnie.  Nobody on a New York NL team was going to get assigned number 24 without some forethought, but Johnnie Lewis got it to open the 1965 season, and wore it from then through the first three months of my debut '67 fandom, without creating a single stir in my brain cells before tonight.  The Yearbook announcers featured him prominently, though, as if he Mays just have been the answer to this team's outfield and offensive struggles.

Orrrrrr not.

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Speaking of Johnny....  Moments later, the '65 Yearbook turned to Number 20, the big 19-year-old catcher named Greg who at least I had heard of- mainly through Casey's ulti-Met putdown of him ("he's 20 years old and in ten years he has a chance to be 30"). But Goose wasn't the only staunch member of the Mets' Kiddie Katching Korps: John Stephenson wore number 19 that year, meaning that in an inning or so he had a chance to be within one uniform number of the great Greg Goosen.

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Moving right around.  Some guys in this retrospective looked familiar, but were mathematically wrong. Suh-boda, for instance. The Yearbook showed headfirst dives and other inanity by a Number 14 that was definitely too young to be Gil Anybody. Sure enough, that was Rocky, when first assigned the #14 he would later wear with the hated enemies across the river some years beyond.    We also saw a Dueling Acting Manager, following Casey's hip injury, wearing the odd number 51, accepting the fans' love for the Perfesser on his birthday, who turned out to be my first year's #9, Wes Westrum. 

It was round this point that SNY cut back live to the tarp, which, Yahoo tells me, is still down and the game not yet out. I'm sure there are stirring moments with Dick Selma and Frank McGraw I haven't gotten to yet, but I still have notes to record from that stupid church meeting and besides, the game's back on:)

Among all the "classic" rock albums of the 1970s, one of the first that fits in both essential categories for me- "can remember buying" AND "will admit to owning"- is the self-titled one by Fleetwood Mac from 1975. It was by no means their first; years later, I acquired Bare Trees, from their Bob "Not The Dodger Pitcher" Welch era; and their blues roots with the dudes on the tin go back way beyond that. Still, this was the first of the Buckingham-Nicks era, and the haunting windup of its first surprise hit was hitting WPLJ and PIX-FM, enough to make me ride my bike to a head shop on the Turnpike in Wantagh to score a copy.

The title of that first single- this one



- came back to me yesterday, driving my umpteenth load of College Crap around or, in this case, from Rochester after we finally got the kid moved out in the late afternoon. Johan had taken care of negocios in short order earlier in the afternoon, hockey was off for the weekend and hoops awaited, so it was all Sports Talks on the radio with Coaches, Colemen, Claytons and Some Dude on Fox Sports. One of them brought on Some Other Dude from USA Today, to talk about all the important stuff in the game- the Red Sox-Rays blood feud, Pujols's furniture finally getting feng shui'd sufficiently for him to resume hitting, and his views on the various races. The NL East, he said, was the most interesting of the six, as four of the five teams all still looked like they had a shot at winning the division.

All, of course, except the Mets, who were playing "over their heads."

The host came back to that odd-servation in time, and called out his guest for this Monday Morning quarterbacking.  How could he write off a team playing 5 over .500 despite so much injury early in and even before the season?  The answer, as with so many of these pundits, came down to money.  He just didn't see how the Mets could compete later in the year when their rivals' deeper systems and far deeper pockets would be able to add depth and overcome injury down the road.

I couldn't take him Rhiannon' off at the mouth like that.  Yes, this team is short on depth and way down in the power department, but with the reorganization of Santana, the R.A. of sunshine that is Dickey and the upsides-and-comings of Jon and Gee, we've got at least four strong components to The Chain of a starting rotation that I'd run out any day against anyone else in that division. The hitting, when it is there, is coming from surprising group of role players and callups who are determined to be Never Going Back Again to the Bisons.

They remind me a lot of the first World Champions we produced, who rose above .500 in this month of 1969, and resolved, through their sheer collective will, to achieve their Dreams of a title.

As for what these naysayers have to say? What Makes You Think You're The One with the inside knowledge?  I'll get back to you, and your sweet Little Lies, in October.

Someone at the conference asked me, after my presentation about The Decline and Loss of the Mets Radio Network: So- how do YOU listen to games on the radio? I gave the only honest answer:

I don't, really.  Syracuse is the closest station on a signal that doesn't get near here, so I'm essentially dependent on atmospherics to bring in WFAN, which, thanks to a Toronto station at 680AM, usually doesn't go well around here until well past 8 p.m.

Last night, though, the gods conspired in a mostly-good way, and after a very long day of helping our daughter haul furniture to a storage place prepatory to moving out of her college apartment today (you can read about THAT happy story here, and then here), I was back on the road in her car a bit past 8 last night, and there were Howie and Josh to tell me all about it.

It was my first FAN listen-in since reading Dana Brand's second book about the Mets, which devotes a chapter to "The Guys in the Booth." As I listened, I was more mindful than ever of his kind words about our radio guy's presence:

Howie, on the radio, is the Man. Howie uses the full resources of the English language to describe ordinary things in a way that no one else has thought of. Howie remembers more about his childhood and adolescence with the Mets than any of the rest of us aging baby boomers do. Howie can smell horseshit as it enters a room and no matter how hard someone is trying to hide it.

So it went, listening to him, and really appreciating that about him, as he and Josh Lewin unfolded what proved to be a nice coming-back effort against a team which had no business beating us the night before.  They tackled plenty of the horseshit as it arrived- about the media frenzy over Ike Davis (Dr. Rose's prescription: Relax! And it seems to be working!), and about this team's ridiculous lack of power (fun fact of the night: our last two home run leaders topped out FOR THE SEASON at 12 and 15, and the latter was all done by Carlos Beltran before he checked out for the season on the 30th of July). But they also conveyed the kind of joy Dana talked about conveying to him as his "friend of the highways."

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I was- and am- also mindful of another highway involved on yesterday's last Friday in May. A year ago, that was May 27, and I was stuck in the back row of a courtroom in Olean, New York, surreptitiously reading my Facebook on my laptop and getting to the Faith and Fear piece about Dana's death.  Words cannot convey the shock, and sadness, that fell upon me in those seconds. Yet those were soon joined by determination- to compile all the other recollections of the man- and by hope- that the conference he'd been planning would still become a reality.  In time, they were also accompanied by new and stronger friendships, and by the addition of Sheila, and Sonia, and the sisters (always liked me my alliteration) to our close circle of crazy people.  I'm sure I would have met them all in time, but I am immensely grateful to have met them even under the worst of circumstances, because that so often brings out the best in all of us.

Yesterday was also an Olean day- I had a case on the calendar but we settled it weeks in advance- and I still wound up with miles of travel. This time, again, bound to my team, his family, all our friends- by the singular play-by-play voice of what still is the WFAN Mets Radio Network.

My sense of better judgment says to let this one go, as too easy and/or easy to offend.

But then, when has THAT ever been something I've been known for listening to?

Fine then;  let's have at it:


It was an incongruous sight for a baseball stadium: tens of thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jewish men, all dressed in black suits and white shirts, filing through the gates of Citi Field on Sunday, wearing not blue-and-orange Mets caps but tall, big-brim black hats.

There was no ballgame scheduled, only a religious rally to discuss the dangers of the Internet.

More than 40,000 ultra-Orthodox Jews were expected to attend — a sellout in a season where the average attendance at a Mets game has been barely half that. The organizers had to rent Arthur Ashe Stadium nearby, which has 20,000 seats, to accommodate all the interested ticket buyers.

The organizers had allowed only men to buy tickets, in keeping with ultra-Orthodox tradition of separating the sexes. Viewing parties had been arranged in Orthodox neighborhoods of Brooklyn and New Jersey so that women could watch, too.

I resisted the following format at first, but then remembered that this religion has an even longer track record of using Top Ten Lists to make a point, so without further ado:

Overheard at the Citi Field Rally today:

10. "Frank Francisco doesn't fucking close on Shabbos. Or, since he's not Jewish, apparently not on any other day, either."

9. "Lucas Duda? Isn't that the night before Shemini Atzeret?"

8. "Truly this is a holy place- the players run from right to left!"

7. "Have you ever seen such long lines at tallis bag checks?"

6. "Cowbell Man has the day off, but Red Heifer Man is working the Promenade."

5. "Dad! Can I have my picture taken with Mr. Mitzvah?"

4. (An actual quote from the article: Shlomo Cohen, 24, of Toronto, said he used the Internet for shopping, business and staying in touch with friends — “Everyone needs e-mail,” he said. Mr. Cohen said he came to Citi Field on Sunday because the rally was a good way to remind his community to keep temptation at bay.)  I wouldn't worry about Bay tempting much of anybody this year- least of all an opposing pitcher with a hanging curveball.

3. "Okay, everybody, let's all stand for the seventh inning kvetch!"

2. "Moshe! Put down that treyf from the Shake Shack!"

And the number one overheard line at the Citi Field rally:

1. "If we really wanted to stamp out evil, why didn't we all show up at Yankee Stadium, parade around the walls seven times, sound the shofar and smite the place?"

That was one of the many 1970s advertising slogans that's burned into my brain from watching Mets games back then. I'm pretty sure my first-ever suit- an ice-cream vendor 70s special- came from their Mid-Island Plaza outlet. Though the Bond chain is long dead, the Bond exercise remains a part of sports motivation, and with the Mets returning to Canada for the first time in years this weekend, they made the most of it by injecting a flavour of the national indoor sport:




(Here's the direct link to that if my site is blocking shots from the NHL.)

The first sight you see is Jason Bay in a Hartford Whalers jersey. Since he's about as relevant to the current pennant race as the Whale is to the NHL Adams Division's, I guess that's a good fit.

Terry Collins is rocking a Red Wings jersey. They were eliminated in the first round this year.  Plenty of Rangers, a couple of Isles, even a Shark and Panther here and there, but no Sabres love, not even from the huge contingent of Bisons on this trip.

In the end, the bond more-or-less broke. One blowout loss, one fairly tight defeat in a duel, and today's recovery for Gee with Frank somehow doing better throwing into a strike zone measured in meters.

I didn't see a single pitch of it despite it being the closest Met game to me since 2006. Friday was a long workday after having the previous day and a half ripped from me in a medical miracle of stupidity; and today, my family was all in Rochester to see the debut of our daughter's first publicly-screened short animation film at RIT.

That leaves yesterday's game, and I've already said quite a bit about that.

I'd advise the Rangers and Devils to stay away from Mets jerseys for the rest of the week. Just sayin'.

Rather lost in the horror of last night's eighth inning- in which DJ Carrasco returned to his turntables, cued up "Party Out of Bounds" and served up a meatball to Todd Frazier that is still headed toward Buffalo (as Carrasco himself also apparently is)- was the happy joy of the bottom of the sixth.

I was in Phil Rizzuto territory for most of the game- you do not want to know why- but I did come back then, to see the score 2-1, Mike Nickeas up, and then, Mike Nickeas laying down. Daniel Murphy came rumbling down the line for his second suicide attempt in three nights, his death happily averted and the insurance run safely on the board. 

Yet fate went on to prove, as both Dan Tullis and Joel Clark will tell you, that you can never have enough insurance.

Still- I will try to remember those brief shining moments of Met Happy, in the sound of Gary's voice and the smile on Terry's face in the dugout, both elated by the guts of this team to pull off a suicide squeeze two out of three nights.

All of it, blown by the bullpen- and this time, long before Frank Squared got to screw it up. If they keep this up, maybe the whole team can be designated for reassignment to the Corona Park Little League. I understand their games only go seven innings.

I keep seeing posts about the resurrection of Banner Day, and now the All-Star Game's returning to Flushing. I can only expect that they'll next install a Thomas organ and try to hire Jane Jarvis back.

(Yes, I know she died two years ago, but these are the Wilpons, after all.)

Both of these events have strong nostalgiac pulls for me, even though I've never attended either and rarely watched the annual festivities back when they were annual and festive.  What they meant was always more important than how they turned out.

Banner Day was unique among 1960s ballpark events. This was before every half-inning got turned into a quickie carny- before dot races on scoreboards and Kiss Cams and outfield dashes between dead presidents and not-quite-dead slabs of meat.  Most of the early events were intended to give things of little if any tangible value to the fans, in exchange for getting a full house of fannies in the seats- be they bats, caps or, in my case, cheap-grade batting helmets.

That was the swag offered at my first game in July of 1967. After half a decade thereafter of schoolyard games with me using it as a real batting helmet (this was also before personal injury lawyers could advertise, so it had no WARNING- NOT A REAL BATTING HELMET label on it), the NY was long peeled off and magic-markered over, the brim and back were cracked, but the associations of joy of being There, that Night, that Place, that Loss of Course to the Astros, wound up being more permanent than even a Sharpie.

When they weren't passing out unnecessary plastic objects, they were instead offering glimpses- of current players on Camera Day, of their wives and kids on Players Family Day, and of our heroes (or, in the Mets' case, more Other Peoples' Heroes) on Old Timers Day. Still, the fans were the recipients of these fleeting (and in the case of my upper deck Camera Day shots, totally illegible) memories.

Only Banner Day stood out as the original, and far as I can tell only, annual event that was purely BYOB. You didn't get anything from the team; you brought your offering TO the team. For the love of the Mets, and the chance, however fleeting, to kick the same warning-track dirt they did. It certainly wasn't for the prizes, or your name on the scoreboard (you could get THAT just by buying a group-sales package), or the half-second of being seen on Channel 9 when most fans were filling their coolers or emptying their filled ones.

It bonded us. It made us unique among the 20 teams, and then the 24. And then it didn't anymore- but at last, it will again.

Alas, I will not be there- on the field or in the stands.  It's just too close to the conference commitment for me to take another trip away from house and home, with our daughter just getting home for the summer that weekend.  But I will watch, and watch for those of you who have been parts of this joyful Back to the Future that doesn't go back to the 1950s.

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Even more ephemeral, especially for me, is the connection to the return of the All-Star Game.  I was too young to remember the 1964 event, but by the time I entered fandom a few years later, the memories of it were still strong. Ron Hunt was our All-Star. Johnny Callison, despite being a not-yet-hated Phillie, was on Our Team that day, and his walkoff home run in the bottom of the NL ninth was still in the air whenever he returned to Shea. 

It seemed only fair to me, as the game got parceled out to the 70s cookie cutters (and I include Riverfrontavenue Stadium in that), that it would be destined to return once it had been around both circuits. Back in the mid-70s, I'd worked out the math and figured that, for sure, we'd get our turn again around 1988 or so- 24 years for 24 teams, right?

About as likely as Rich Stadium getting a Super Bowl.  For by then, the suits had turned the game into something you were chosen for, by making a pitch for the hosting. As the retro fields of the 90s arrived, and six more teams joined the 24, and the Evil Empire got yet another turn ahead of us, I wondered if the Mets would ever bring back the Midsummer Classic.

So the news that they did, and will? Makes me happy. Maybe happy enough to seek out tickets whenever they get put out- unless they plan to make a big deal about remembering how the Brooklyn Dodgers hosted it in 1949.

Mommmmm! They're making fun of usssss again!

I don't remember much of a fuss at 7,500, or 5,000, or any other particular Met millstone before this, but all of a sudden it's become the big thing to discuss. In addition to our local take on it above, the Wall Street Journal piled on, and I've only just discovered Yet Another Blogger who I don't recall seeing at the conference: this one, who's been watching the hits from coast to coast and countin' them up with all the inherent aggravation of coming out of an uptempo record and having to do a dedication to a dead dog.

I haven't read Dirk before, but I must say, he's thorough. He picked up on today's 8,000th gameday also being the 27th anniversary of a Sid-and-Roger combined one-one, ruined only by, who else?, a Phillie- Von Hayes.  The Phils are also relevant because after tonight's probable tombstone of negative, the next significant number in The Streak will be, not 9,000, but 8,945:

Why? That’s the number of games in which the Philadelphia Phillies went without a no-hitter between May 3, 1906 and June 21, 1964 – for 58 years, 1 month, 18 days.

The 8,945-game-long streak began one game after Phillies’ southpaw Johnny Lush threw a 6-0 no-hitter against the Brooklyn Superbas. It ended at Shea Stadium, when Jim Bunning threw a 6-0 perfect game against the Mets during a Father’s Day doubleheader at Shea.

That mark would be reached late in the 2018 season, when the Mets will likely be wearing something akin to those lame Mercury Mets jerseys.

No. Just no. No no.

Given the miniscule odds overwhelming it, though, wouldn't one from Santana on such an amazin' occasion, on our first trip to Dolphinmaster Park with them poaching on our shortstop, be just.... perfect?

No. Don't even want it. Let Valdespin boot one, or Johan walk the leadoff man (as R.A. did for the Bisons before setting down the next 27 men two springs ago). That would give one J. Reyes a chance to make some Met history, one way or the other.

I confess; I missed last night's game. We came out of The Avengers just in time to hear Josh Lewin begin the rundown. But, since then, seeing all of your glowing reports of the Met comeback at the Bank last night reminded me of these words, which our accidental-but-heroic blogger coordinator Greg used to begin his presentation at the conference weekend before last:

Three Mets fans walk into a ballpark…separately, but their respective tickets have them sitting in the same row during a game in which the Mets are momentarily behind. A pitch is thrown to a Mets batter recently promoted from the minor leagues in a game taking place toward the end of the season. The batter produces the latest in a series of several recently clustered base hits. The first Mets fan says to the others, “Mike Vail.” The second replies, “Gregg Jefferies.” The third chimes in, “Victor Diaz.”

I could parallel that to last night's experience and wonder which of those onetime flashes of pan, if not brilliance, might eventually be correlated to the Met of the moment, Jordany Valdespin. Instead, though, I suspect our hypothetical trio would instead be looking at the flame-engulfed pitcher's mound, and the conversation would rather have gone like this:

The first Mets fan says to the others, “Armando Benitez.” The second replies, “Billy Wagner.” The third chimes in, ruefully, “Frank Francisco.”

You'll have to (as you should have already) read Greg's paper, and his letter to Dana, in the links above to truly understand that, and yet I think, likely, you already do.

Papelbon. Puny god.