The Final Meltdown In The District Of Columbia

I really wanted to avoid a third straight "manifesto". For as sick as you may be of reading them, believe you me, I'm more sick of writing them.

And while there's no "Manifesto Part III" coming on this site per say, "Manifesto Part III" spontaneously came out at Nationals Park on Wednesday night after Frankie gave up the grand slam to Justin Maxwell. It came out in part because I was able to move up six rows to get right by the field. I yelled at anyone in blue and orange, and I lost my mind ... plain and simple. It was two days worth of frustration which topped off a season's worth of frustration piled on to three seasons worth of more frustration. It's like a Famous Bowl from KFC ... a whole bunch of slop thrown in a bowl (or in this case, a Washington Nationals ice cream helmet).

I lost my mind to the point that I wouldn't be surprised if this ends up on You Tube somewhere down the line. But as I've said, the anger was misplaced. These players, for the most part, have no business being in the majors much less on a pennant contender. The players that are bonafide major leaguers that are still here are either physically beat up, mentally beat up, or have been possessed by the soul of Aaron Heilman. Or in Frankie Rodriguez's case, all three. These are traits whose fault lies very little with the players on the field. (As I know from personal experience, when Aaron Heilman's soul envelops your body, there's very little you can do.)

The anger really belongs to the person who manages this team, the person who put the team together, and most of all, the people who own this team. But with the latter three not even in town (I think), and our manager rushing off to most likely record new bits for Dial-a-Joke, the players were all that were left. So they caught the brunt. And you must understand that Maxwell's grand slam topped off two days of baseball hell. First came Elijah Dukes' catch where you can clearly see me in the front row hoping to catch a home run, which basically makes Dukes Michael Jordan, and me Orlando Woolridge. I was posterized.

Then I realize that that former Yankee punk Tyler Clippard was the winning pitcher. Tyler Clippard has seven major league victories in three years. I was a witness to two of them. I loathe Tyler Clippard ... irrationally, but still.

Then came Wednesday. I was with an old buddy whom I hadn't seen in years, and never down in his new home in the Beltway. The last game we went to together was Game 5 of the Subway Series. We tried every single rally hat in existence, and some that weren't invented yet. We switched hats for the last inning, and if Mike Piazza's last out had cleared the fence, we were keeping each other's hat.

We didn't try that in the bottom of the ninth on Wednesday (since it worked so well the first time), but he was confident that we had the game in the bag as Frankie was facing Ryan Zimmerman. If he was confident, that was good enough for me. I needed an excuse to wash away all of the nonsense of the season and pretend, just for a few minutes, that it was a big game and we actually had a shot of winning it. Zen awashed me ... until BB-Rod and Maxwell combined to make it all rush back to me.

That's when I flipped out. Look, I realize it's not my birth right to see a win every time I go on the road to see the Mets. But for crying out loud, give us something this month ... anything. One warm and fuzzy memory to take to the winter? Just one? Especially when the all-star closer has a two run lead in the ninth?

No. The Mets are the Washington Generals. Think about it: The Nationals, a team with 100 losses and zero to play for, are running around like they've won the World Series and throwing pies at each other, happily throwing t-shirts to the fans. Meanwhile the Mets are playing because the schedule says so ... and they look like it. Who's fault is that? Johan Santana beat the Rockies 7-0 on July 30th. Since then, they have the worst record in the N.L. The San Diego Padres, with guys who should be in A ball, are 33-23 since that date. The Reds, similarly horrible, are 31-26 in that span. Oakland? 32-25. All aforementioned teams had nothing to play for by the time July 30th rolled around, like the Mets. Yet they've decided to show up. The Mets? 18-41. How long are we supposed to lean on all these injuries as a crutch? Eighteen and forty-f***ing-one. That's when cornstarch was patented!

Your manager has put a ton of stock and spent team meetings discussing finishing strong and playing to win. What has that gotten you? 18-41!!! And where has it gotten Nick Evans?

Get comfy, Nick.

You mean to tell me there's no at-bats for Nick Evans on an 18-41 team? There's room for Maxwell and Ian Desmond on the Nats. But Nick Evans can't break this sad sack lineup?

***

Let me digress for a second. Can I tell you that we got free t-shirts on Tuesday and free fleeces on Wednesday for the Fan Appreciation Day that we don't have (sorry to keep harping on that, it bugs the ever loving crap out of me.) Now I want you to tell me what you see, or more importantly, what you don't see:


What? A giveaway not slathered with the words "Spongetech" or "US Gold Dot Com" or some other corporate sponsor? You mean teams that give away things to their fans just for the sake of giving them away still exist? Wow!!! Look, I understand the ways of the world ... corporations pay for these things so that you can enjoy them. Bla bla bla. Then how can a smaller market team that draws nothing like the Nationals able to do this? Did they just have some leftovers lying around? Or do the Nationals just simply ... appreciate their fans? What do the Mets fans get?

We get our owners packing up the pitching rubber from Citi Field and presenting it to Mariano Rivera to commemorate his 500th save. No Mets hall of fame inductions since 2002, but Mariano Rivera gets our pitching rubber. "Congratulations on kicking us in the groin, can we bronze your foot?" I mean, what's next ... are we going to plate Luis Castillo's glove in gold and present it to Mark Teixeira for hustling all the way on the dropped pop-up? Or maybe we could dip the broken bat that Clemens threw at Piazza in encrusted diamonds and present it to Roger when he's inducted into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame. Ooh, I know! Let's take the DVR that I recorded Wednesday's game on, have me sign it, encase it in glass, and send it to Justin Maxwell so that he can watch his home run over and over and over again. And let's honor Adam Dunn for his bases loaded walk since we didn't sign him.

Oh, they'll decrease the ticket prices ... what a convenient announcement to make after looking like dogmeat this weekend. But now they have a built in excuse if they do indeed cut the payroll. See, trust nobody.

If the team wants to show their appreciation to their fans, here's an idea for the rest of the season: three forfeits. Just don't show up. Nobody will know the difference.

I'm sorry, I guess this was Manifesto Part III. But I'm just getting started. Once this wretched season is done, there will be plenty more to discuss. You can count on that.

The Runt Of The Win Litter

Don't get me wrong, I'll take it. When a win is left on my doorstep, I'm not leaving it out in the cold, even if it's the equivalent of the runt of the litter. A win is a win.

But forgive me if I'm not ready to plan a parade route just yet.

Yes, the Mets finally won a game on this road trip against the putrid Washington Nationals ... but make no mistake, "putrid", and not "won" is the key word. The Nationals out-odored the Mets tonight, what with dopey plays by Cristian Guzman and Adam Dunn losing a ball in the lights and some horrific umpiring affecting both sides by a rookie named D.J. Reyburn (whom I'd still take over the Angel Hernandez crew). But the Mets were lucky that their own blunders didn't come back to haunt them, and they would have if they had been playing anybody else besides the Nationals.

Another problem with Steve Phillips' misguided criticism of Carlos Beltran is that anytime someone has a fair gripe with Beltran, it's seen as siding with Phillips. So let me give you this disclaimer: I'm not siding with Steve Phillips.

That established: I do have to criticize Beltran. And though it seems that I'm stealing Marc Malusis' thoughts from the SNY postgame show, I swear to you I thought of it before Malusis said it ... and I'm taking it a step further: It's not only the fact that Beltran got thrown out at third base trying to stretch a double into a triple after he took a Cadillac tour to second base thinking the ball was a dinger, because that's bad enough.

But if you're going to show some leadership in the lockerroom and rip the team's effort through the media by saying that everyone has to play better (and by saying that the Pirates are barely a major league baseball outfit which has earned him the title of "School in Summertime" in Pittsburgh), then it has to start with you. Make no mistake, I loved that Beltran said what he said. But that's only half the battle. The example has to be set on the field. Getting yourself thrown out at third because you weren't running hard out of the box is the wrong example to back up your words. As much as I hate to use a cliche like "actions speak louder than words", it applies here. All Beltran did was give people fuel for their argument that Fernando Martinez not running on a pop-up is part of an organizational "lack of hustle" rather than an isolated incident.

And to go back to the problem of playing dumb, David Wright tagging and going to third base on a fly ball to left field is a dumb play ... whether he went on his own or whether Razor Shines sent him in the second inning ... dumb, dumb, dumb. Let's face it, Wright was out except for the fact that Reyburn couldn't see a lake from a rowboat. If that was a veteran umpire there, that's a 1-0 loss and Wright never gets a chance to win the game in the 10th. Especially when this team is racked with injuries, it has to play smart to give itself a chance to tread water. They aren't going to be so lucky next time.

(And speaking of lucky: Brad Lidge made Mets fans really lucky tonight. Two outs, nobody on, one run lead, and Lidge blew it. Something tells me that if the Mets finish behind them again, it isn't going to be because of the bullpens.)

(And speaking of bullpens, welcome back to the party Sean Green ... and just in time, too.)

***

In injury news, Jose Reyes is undergoing a new procedure to help him heal faster called "Platelet Rich Plasma Therapy."

As usual, the crack staff has exclusive footage of the team administering the procedure, seen at the 0:48 mark:

Murphy's Law Of Physics

Here's something I don't like about Citi Field:

It's the one thing that makes me wish I had paid attention in physics class during my senior year of high school.

Seriously ... I completely checked out in that class to the point where my teacher would tell everyone in the class who failed that they would have a chance to get a 65 automatically if they passed the regents exam. Me? I was simply told: you failed. When I asked about passing the regents, teach said "I don't think you'll have to worry about that option."

Well not only did I pass the regents, I got something along the lines of an 85. (I actually visited my high school the next semester to rub it in his face, but he wasn't in that day. He was obviously ducking me. Well how you like me now, teach?!!??!? Yeah, I'm still bitter.)

Daniel Murphy's video reviewed home run, the fourth review in the past five days and the first second one where the original call was reversed, tested my knowledge of physics. Now, if I had paid attention in class, I could come up with a reasonable explanation as to why that call was reversed despite the lack of evidence that the ball hit the Subway sign. But I was busy trading baseball cards and drawing cartoons so that this is the best I can come up with:

Fly balls hit at the trajectory that moves toward an outfield wall don't land on the warning track, bounce straight up, then die. In a driving rainstorm where the umpires are too boneheaded to stop the game in a timely fashion, a ball could hit the warning track and then die. But not bounce straight up. So even though you couldn't see the ball hit the Pepsi Porch facade, the way the ball acted told you that it was a dinger. Had to be.

(Editor's note: More proof that this blogger shouldn't have passed physics, or is just blind. The ball indeed did hit the wall. But that trajectory did change and bounce at an angle that a ball hit that fall shouldn't have bounced. I stand by that this was a home run, and I also stand by that physics is hard and that I should have paid more attention in high school.)

Obviously, the three umps that went to look at the video understood physics, and made the correct call. Of course, if there were seats where that Mo's Zone quirk is, it wouldn't have been an issue.

Physics are an important component of life and baseball. Umpires understand this better than they understand a strike zone. And they understand this better than me.

Adam Dunn understands physics ... he was explaining the Murphy home run to his teammates in the dugout after the play. He also understands enough physics to understand that force x distance = a home run long enough to avoid replay and hit a damn bridge (off Johan Santana no less). Like Rick Vaughn says: "You hit it, you name it." I think Dunn can name the bridge after himself now (which would work well if the Mets sign him for the 2011 season.)

But Daniel Murphy's physics are the law at this moment with his five rbi's which led to a 7-4 Mets win. Murph is doing his best to make sure that when Nick Johnson leaves town tonight with the Nationals, he doesn't come back too soon. A few more games like tonight and it'll be mission accomplished. Now that he's more comfy at first base, don't be surprised if these kind of games creep up more often.

Oh, and about finding a new nickname for Fernando Martinez: No nicknames until you run out pop-ups and break this organization's penchant for bonehead plays. Is that a deal?

Trade Derby

You want to make the home run derby even more interesting?

Invite the slugging outfielders who are rumored to be going to the Mets in a trade. You can still do four from each league:

National League:

• Adam Dunn
• Matt Holliday
• Jason Bay
• Xavier Nady

American League:

• Raul Ibanez
• Casey Blake
• Juan Rivera
• Jose Guillen

Trade value determined by performance in the derby.

Touchdown Jinx

Excellent. Sports Illustrated's jinx is alive and well.

It figures that the Mets would celebrate the return of the New York Jets by putting up a touchdown against the team formerly known as the New York Giants ... and more importantly, against starter Tim Lincecum.

There's probably something perverse about saying that this win might be just as important if not more so than the three wins against the Phillies. Tuesday night was a classic letdown game for the Mets, first home game after an important and/or successful road trip. To have this version of that game go against a pitcher such as Lincecum would normally spell double trouble. It's kind of like when a pitcher coming off injury would throw seven innings, but the real test is how he feels the next day.

This next day, the Mets felt fine. Mike Pelfrey felt more than fine (think how good he would be if Rick Peterson was fired last year). And coupled with another Phillies loss, the Mets are all of a sudden just three half games behind the division lead. Best part: Carlos Beltran (three run dinger in the first inning) is slowly simmering and looks like he could be at the starting gate of his latest hot streak. There's no better time for Carlos to rev up with Ryan Church on the DL again with persistent migraine headaches (sounds better than concussion symptoms, doesn't it?)

And speaking of which, this latest run has basically clinched what Omar Minaya is going to do the rest of the way ... he may not buy, but he's certainly not going to sell. There really isn't much that Omar can do going forward with the bulk of the AA and AAA prospects gone in the Santana deal. If Carlos Beltran stays hot, he may not have to get anybody. But if Omar really wants to up the ante with the Phillies, who were denied in their pursuit of CC Sabathia, then he has to at least kick the tires on somebody like Adam Dunn. Because if Omar really has learned from his previous ways, then he's not going to continue to trust that Moises Alou all of a sudden has a healthy streak in him.

But I digress, for now. For now, the Mets are hot, Tim Lincecum is not, and Chris Russo is crying tears. This is a man who said on Tuesday that he'd rather win one out of three from the Mets and have Lincecum be a dominant winner than win two of three and have Lincecum get tagged. Hopefully, he gets neither.

***

Unfortunately, I need to note that the night started out with a fumble, as "Jets Night" wound up as a small disaster. The "meet and greet" with former Jets players, which was to celebrate the Jets time at Shea Stadium, was due to start at 5:30. At 5:40, the line to get into the tent at the picnic area hadn't moved, and wouldn't move until about 5:45-5:50. The Jets then signed autographs until about 6:30, when they had to go to the field for their pre-game ceremonies ... introductions, the removal of the number, and the first pitch.

Here's where whoever was handling the event blew it: When the players left the tent in the picnic area, everyone still waiting on line were told (via megaphone) that the players would return after their on-field ceremonies to continue signing autographs. The wait lasted 45 minutes, but instead of the players returning, it was official looking people with stacks of stuff and a big jar full of pins.

Needless to say, people were pissed. And Jets fans are not the people you want to get pissed off at you. I kept asking the officials if it was "bad news" ... they gave me that look that said "yes it is ... we just can't verbalize it yet".

The Mets did their best to appease the people who waited the 45 minutes only to not get any autographs, by giving everyone four free tickets to a future Met game, and a pin. Okay, but they were giving them out in two different lines, and one of the guys tried to kick me out of the tent after getting my tickets because I wanted to go to the other line to get a pin, like I was going to keep going from line to line so I could get 60 tickets to this game and sell them on eBay and then get my own infomercial on how I got rich and you can too. I just wanted a freakin' pin!

They relented. I got my free pin to go with my free tickets. Would you believe the Mets had loads of these pins lying around for just such an occasion?

It's hard to say who exactly was to blame for this ... usually in these autograph situations, there are always some people near the end of the line who are going to go home unhappy. And four free tickets is a pretty decent way to say "we're sorry". I just wish there was more information on the Mets/Jets websites to begin with on when picnic area seating opened, and exactly what was going on and what time the thing was going to start (and it would have helped to have it start on time) instead of just saying that it was a "meet and greet". I wound up neither meeting, nor greeting, anybody. But I did get to sit in the Shea picnic area for the first (and probably last) time.

I'm only hoping that it isn't a sign of what the Jets' actual season is going to be like.

Former Super Bowl winning Jets John Schmitt and Emerson Boozer, who for some reason was wearing a Blair Thomas era jersey. Blair Thomas never played at Shea Stadium.

Hardcore Insanity

What some people refer to as "hardcore", others refer to as "insane".

When I broached the idea of seeing four major league baseball games in a span of 48 hours, with about 14 hours of driving inter-dispersed among the 48 hours, I sat on the fence...teetering back and forth about whether this was the act of a couple of hardcore baseball fans, or whether it was the final step towards the looney bin.

So was all the effort worth it? Was it hardcore? Was it insane? (Warning: what you are about to read is an epic...split up into digestible parts, but epic nonetheless. Not epic as in good...just long. Be prepared.)

Game One: Quadruple "A"

My brother warned me that the Great American Ballpark was a really nice minor league ballpark, kind of like those players that dominate AAA ball, but can't quite climb the Mendoza line in the majors. I can't go quite that far in assessing the Reds' home, but there is definitely a minor league feel to the park. It's intimate, it has fireworks, and it's very...very...red. It's easy for a camera to spot a Mets fan in the crowd, as black and orange seem to clash with all the red seats, the red shirts, and the blood spilled by Reds fans as...

All right, maybe not quite that red. But as you can tell from the picture above, there were plenty of Mets fans at GAB on Tuesday night. And the boys at Faith and Fear in Flushing would be happy to know that one of those Met fans was sporting the now classic number shirt seen in many cities around the world, and now in Ohio...though I wasn't fast enough to grab a picture of the guy, you guys will just have to trust me that he was there.

We spent the first three innings in the Riverfront Club, which is basically fancy food, real plates, and free beer. What's better than that? (If you go, try the cream of shallot). How about the kid waiter who watched Paul Lo Duca's first home run with us, not batting an eye when we clapped politely?

"I don't care who you root for, as long as I get paid. I'm actually a Mets fan anyways."

This was quickly followed by the poor kid getting admonished by his boss for not keeping the tables clean.

Then there was the bitter Reds fan sitting at the bar who noticed my Pedro jersey and starts in with the bartender...her rant went something like "blah blah blah blah blah all these Mets fans blah blah blah blah blah blah they're just like Cub fans blah blah blah blah blah blah".

OK then.

Then it was off to our big time seats about 22 rows up from the Reds dugout, and sitting next to a Cincinnati celebrity...namely: Rocco Castellano, a fitness instructor and attitude adjustor who has been on local radio, and is not only good people, but he's actually a Mets fan from New Jersey. Wearing a Pedro Martinez jersey in enemy territory, it was good to have a fitness instructor on my side (because I'm too anemic to defend myself, as you know). As for the attitude adjusting, I wonder if Guillermo Mota has been a recent beneficiary of Rocco's expert teachings. If not, he probably should be.

Definitely make a pilgrimage to the place for no other reason than the fact that you can run to the bathroom and get back to your seat without missing a pitch. You couldn't do that at Shea unless you used an empty cup at your seat. And also, try the deep fried twinkies. Just stay away from that chili/spaghetti mess unless you have had tetanus shots.

We were lucky to be present at the game on the all-important 26th anniversary of Woody Woodward almost being hit by a ten pound sack of flour at Dodger Stadium. And it was another not so great day in Reds history 36 years later...as not only did Lo Duca hit his second dinger of the night, but my brother spent the entire night heckling Adam Dunn. Good times had by all (especially the guy in his fifties who was literally dancing in the street after the game because Orlando Hernandez threw him a baseball and he caught it), as the Mets had their first five game winning streak of the season (you know, I heard that no team ever made the playoffs without a five game winning streak), and my road record ran to 5-0. But as you know, all good things...

Game Two: What's Up Old People?

We knew it was going to be one of those special kinda days when we rode the elevator with Thom Brenneman at Wednesday afternoon's Mets/Reds tilt. Say what you want about Brenneman (and I have), but the guy not only called Boise State's Fiesta Bowl masterpiece, he has now also called Appalachian State's massive upset over Michigan. That's cache, my friends.

We traveled up to the upper deck to find my niece, at the game with her schoolmates...and along the way found a Reds usher clapping wildly for Aaron Harang as he was announced as the Reds' Roberto Clemente award candidate (and seeing how empty the upper deck was that day, we have strong suspicions that the usher was, in reality, Aaron Harang's mom.)

So my brother finds his daughter in the upper deck among her schoolmates (great school system in Cincinnati...as soon as the class saw us two mooks in our Mets jerseys, the teachers spurred their kids to chant "Let's Go Reds" at us. That's some mighty hospitality there...must be that "midwest polite") and gives her a Mets hat to wear. She then asks her daddy with a big smile on her face: "Are you going to watch the game with me?" My brother...still stinging over the fact that his daughter had him in the bathroom at GAB while Pedro Martinez was striking out his 3,000th career batter on Monday...said "nope, I just came to give you your hat".

That's good parenting.

What he probably wanted to say was that we had much better seats than the class. For reference, here's approximately what row Q gets you at Shea Stadium:

Meanwhile, here's row Q in Cincinnati:

Not bad, eh?

But before we got back to our row Q, I took this picture in the concourse of a painting featuring the Big Red Machine:


You'll notice the former Met in the lower right corner...that's correct, George Foster. I took this picture thinking "oh, here's an opportunity to rip on Foster in my next blog entry for never, ever diving for a fly ball in a Mets uniform".

Wouldn't you know that a few feet to the left of the picture that I was going to segue into a George Foster joke, was George Foster himself? Yes...George Foster was signing autographs for the throngs of people waiting in line to buy his signature on an 8X10 for $25.

Well, actually, it was more like the throng of person waiting for his autograph...so you know I couldn't let this opportunity go by without getting a picture with the man, and getting a personalized 8X10. George Foster...who once hit a triple in a Mets uniform, but was now wearing a Reds jersey during this session, was taking a picture with little ol' me. That's when this exchange occurred:

GF: Try not to beat up on us too bad today, OK?

MD: You know when the Mets signed you, it was the first step in the Mets
becoming relevant again.

GF: I thought I was the only one who figured that out.

Still confident after all these years.

(Foster would later do an interview on the Diamondvision, and when asked to give a message to the senior citizens on Senior Citizens Day, the 59 year-old Foster's inspirational message was: "What's up old people!")

The game featured temperatures that reached 105, the Mets being shut down by some guy named Tom Shearn, and Joey Votto getting his first major league hit, a bomb off of John Maine (along with the appearance of maybe the greatest name ever for a baseball player: Buck Coats.) And I gotta say: I've never had so much fun at a 7-0 beating in my life. Consider that for the final three innings, we sat here:

This picture was taken right before my conversation with Jose, which was basically me asking Jose if he was enjoying his day off, and Reyes nodding his head and flexing his muscles...telling me he needed to get stronger (probably more mentally than physically, I'd say).

Mets fans had taken over the rows behind the dugout, having a good time talking to their team...but wondering why Moises Alou wouldn't smile at them. Rest assured that Moises isn't a dour guy. He's just afraid that if he smiles, he'll pull a face muscle and be out for three weeks, so he's just thinking of the team in this instance.

A funny thing happened during the ninth inning down 0-7. Mets fans were getting up a "Let's Go Mets" chant. Certainly a far cry from some of the seemingly constant complainin' about the team back here in New York to hear a group of fans blissfully backing the team with the stench of the Phillies series seeming more and more like a distant memory. It was a glorious thing. But it had to be interrupted by a higher calling, which was my brother heckling Mike Stanton:

"Hey Stanton, Prince Fielder called, he wants his pants back!"

No matter that he was closing out a day game doldrum for the Mets, we had to extract our pound of flesh from a Hall of Hate charter member (my only regret was that I couldn't tie a Krispy Kreme to a fishing pole and dangle it in front of Stanton in hopes that he's chase it. Next year.)

Game Three: Free Parking

Here was the challenge of the day...get from Cincinnati to Chicago in four hours, find parking, and get in our seats by 8:05 for our first ever trip to Wrigley Field to see the Cubs and the Dodgers. Who could blame us for thinking we had a chance...as not only did we hear on the radio that batting practice was delayed by a thunderstorm, but that the Braves had come back to defeat the Phillies 9-8 after being down 0-5 when we left GAB, keeping the Mets lead at five games. This prompted my brother to call a Phillies fan to rub it in, with me doing the tomahawk chop in the background.

Yes, things were coming together.

The festive atmosphere we anticipated at Wrigley caused me to start singing the Amy Winehouse song "They tried to make me go to rehab but I said 'no, no, no'" for the better part of three hours (my brother probably needed rehab after acquiring that earworm from me). Unfortunately, we missed most of the festive, rehab-free atmosphere of Wrigley as we didn't get to the park until the bottom of the fourth (while missing some guy from Reno 911 throwing out the first pitch).

Then it took two innings to park the car.

Luckily, we ran into a couple leaving the game who my brother subconsciously willed into giving us their parking sticker so that we wouldn't have to find the missing parking attendant and give up upwards of forty dollars to park and watch three innings of baseball...as we didn't sit down in Wrigley until the bottom of the sixth. (So let this be a lesson to those of you thinking of trying this kind of trip: Cincinnati to Chicago is impossible if you want to see every pitch. Can't be done. Believe me, we tried. Any faster, and we would have had Jackie Gleason and Boss Hog tailing us.)

But three innings in Wrigley was more than enough for one night (and in my mind, it still counts as two games in one day...pretty cool.) Night games in Wrigley, even if consumed in a small dose, are an event. What more could you want from a baseball game than an electric crowd, a beer, and national television?

How about not having a pillar in front of your seat?

No wonder I was able to get these tickets so easily online. No matter, because I scored my Derrek Lee bobblehead doll (which upon entering my apartment, immediately leaped from the box and hit a home run off of my Heath Bell bobblehead doll) thanks to our Chicago mole who was actually there early enough to be one of the first 10,000 fans to enter the park (don't worry, for his efforts I paid for his ticket...I'm a compassionate one).

The Cubs won in a laugher, which meant we were lucky (?) enough to hear the Go Cubs Go song that the team has adopted as a theme song. Here are the lyrics:

They're singing ...Go, Cubs, go
Go, Cubs, go
Hey, Chicago, what do you say
The Cubs are gonna win today.
Go, Cubs, go
Go, Cubs, go
They tried to make me go to rehab, I said: Go Cubs Go

Oh, sorry...I got my earworms mixed up.

After the game featured the only Wrigley reference to my Mets hat (the infamous travel hat, by the way) which came from a vendor who was selling a t-shirt on Waveland which referred to the sexual preference of the St. Louis Cardinals. He spots my Met hat and says:

"You must hate the Cardinals as much as we do."

Which was met by three simple words that came out of my mouth: "Yadier...f***ing...Molina".

In one respect, brothers in arms.

Game Four: One With...

Now Wrigley Field was great. But I did have a couple of complaints. The one Cub souvenir that I really wanted was a Cliff Floyd shirt. I figured that going into a Cubs shop across the street from the Field and seeing t-shirts immortalizing the likes of Matt Murton, Carlos Marmol, and Ronny Cedeno would up my chances of finding a Cubs shirt featuring a Chicago native. But alas, my efforts to find a "Floyd 15" shirt was futile. And as much as I love Cliff, I wasn't dropping a buck-sixty on an official "Floyd 15" jersey.

My other complaint were the bathrooms. Call me crazy, but relieving myself in a community sink isn't my idea of fun. (If you've been there, you know what I mean.)

But no Cliff Floyd tee, hijinks in the bathroom, and the lack of opportunity to boo the resting Jeff Kent for a second straight day were made up for by the hot dogs. Guys and gals, do yourselves a favor. Go to the hot dog stand and order a "one with". Just trust us.

And then, after Andre Ethier broke the Cubs hearts with a three run home run off of Ryan Dempster in the ninth (apparently, the Mets aren't the only team that has Dempster's number), it was time to end our trip, and take the long trip home. So was it worth it? Was driving and riding all these miles to see four ball games in 48 hours worth the effort?

Damn straight.

So I guess my vote is for hardcore.

But you know, we passed by Indianapolis on the way back home from Wrigley on Thursday night. We could have caught a quarter of the NFL opener on our way back to Cincinnati.

Hey, what do you think...we're insane?

Pig Beautification

"Oh the Butcher and the Baker and the people on the street...Where do they go?"

To beat the Mets!

At Shea Stadium.

Apparently.

At least that's where the Baker goes. That's where Scott Baker goes...you know, the rookie who came into the game with an ERA over seven, and probably needed to come up with a decent game to keep his spot in the starting rotation. As in, the guy that the Mets had a civic duty to pound all the way back to American Legion ball on Wednesday.

Yeah, that guy.

The Mets did manage seven hits in five innings, but just two runs which was not quite enough to overcome Oliver Perez's start...which featured five hits, four runs and five walks in just over five innings. The bullpen failed to keep the Mets close to the Twins, and yet another series goes by with the Mets being on the short end.

The John Rocker Appreciation Society and the Blunt Cigars both lost as well on Wednesday, so at the pig that was Wednesday's game is equipped with lipstick. (Did you know that lipstick is made that contains pigments? So it's like putting pigments on a pig!) But 3-13 since June 2nd is a pig that needs lipstick, rouge, foundation, exfoliating products, laser hair removal, corrective eye surgery, and perhaps the odd shower to get it looking healthy and clean again.

Or maybe the pig just needs one of these, one of these, or perhaps one of these. That'll do, pig. That'll do.