CitiField gets all Metty n' shit

[Ceetar]

There was a lot of "Oh, I put down all this money for tickets without even having a thought about how the view would be! I don't like it! Waaah". right away too. So much of the complaining was of a nit-picky difference of opinion type thing. A lot of it still is.

I'm not surprised they were on the defensive, especially at first. They spent a lot of time building what I feel is an amazing stadium, and people were harping on minor things. (which isn't surprising. We always know better, whether it's which players they should sign, how to treat Reyes' thyroid, or how to build and decorate the stadium)

Also, I don't know if this is anyone's fault, but they were racing the clock to get the building functional in terms of #1, playing baseball. It would've been semi-disasterous had the Mets had to play a series at Yankee Stadium because they didn't get the entrances paved or something silly like that. There was a ton of changes between when I was there for the Red Sox exhibition and when I came back for the first real homestand. I suspect things like Hall of Fames and banners got pushed aside. Sure, most of us would've rather them chosen to prioritize the HoF over the Team Store, but that's business.

Also, regardless of the team's record, the August 1st game better sell out. (still cheap seats available) For all the clamoring about history, it's be insulting if the fans don't sell out the game honoring it.

[Ceetar]

I'm gonna take credit for it btw, but your album (and this thread) has now been pimped out to Mets Police, The Real Dirty Mets Blog, Metsblog, and Lennon's Newsday blog, to name a few. (Credit given to at least cranepoolforum all around)

[Guest themetfairy]

Ceetar - I'll disagree about Citi Field being amazing. Don't get me wrong - I like it, and it's very nice. But I've been to every current major league park (save for Minnesota, which I will catch up with this season), and Citi Field is not amazing.

I also don't feel that the poor sightlines are a nit-picky thing. When you are building a brand new stadium, making sure the fans can follow the action should be a priority. Considering how many ballparks have been built in recent years, and how few seem to have this problem (at least to the degree that Citi Field has), I don't think you can really call this a World Class Ballpark. It's a nice place, but it wasn't built well enough to ever be considered one of the best.

[Gwreck]

Ceetar wrote: There was a lot of "Oh, I put down all this money for tickets without even having a thought about how the view would be! I don't like it! Waaah". right away too. So much of the complaining was of a nit-picky difference of opinion type thing. A lot of it still is.

Of course it's all opinion. I never understood the comments that the outfield walls should be blue but I certainly read about that gripe a lot. Your characterization of things as "nit-picky" is incorrect, particularly when you cite paying customers' complaints re: tickets. (The difference of course being that one is paying to watch the game, and the ticket prices guarantees that, whereas it doesn't grant any special right to have pictures of Mets players in the concourse).

Also, I don't know if this is anyone's fault, but they were racing the clock to get the building functional in terms of #1, playing baseball.

Sure, but a failure to incorporate team history into the ballpark was a failure of planning and not due to time constraints. Take the HOF space as an example. They didn't plan for it and then announce that it was "coming soon;" but unfinished due to construction delay; they simply didn't plan for it at all.

Also, regardless of the team's record, the August 1st game better sell out. (still cheap seats available) For all the clamoring about history, it's be insulting if the fans don't sell out the game honoring it.

How many tickets are sold to that game is not an accurate measure of how fans feel about the team's history.

[Gwreck]

Ceetar wrote: I'm gonna take credit for it btw, but your album (and this thread) has now been pimped out to Mets Police, The Real Dirty Mets Blog, Metsblog, and Lennon's Newsday blog, to name a few. (Credit given to at least cranepoolforum all around)

"Pimped out?"

The photos at the top of the thread came from a different discussion board and did not originate here. Such is the problem with "crediting" things elsewhere. Howsabout people come here if they want to read what's written here.

[Vic Sage]

Ceetar, put down the kool-aid...

first of all, the Mets repped the stadium with alot of "there isn't a bad seat in the stadium" nonsense. That led me (and many others) to believe that purchasing the tix i could afford (i.e., the upper LF corner) would still afford me unobstructed views. I don't think purchasers of such tix were "nit-picking" or whining when they showed up to find that they couldn't see a medium fly to LF or deep flies to Cf or the power alleys. They sacrificed sight-lines for "intimacy" and ended up with neither... at least for those of us upstairs.

And the notion that they left stuff undone out of a rush to get ready for opening day is laughable. If they had actually planned for a Mets HoF, they could easily have put a banner on the space allocated for it saying "coming soon!", or other place-holder info. But there was no such space allocated.

They were caught with their pants down, and reacted badly at first (besides D.Howard's reaction, remember the to-do when Doc Gooden signed the wall in one of the restaurants? You'd have thought he defaced the Mona Lisa).

Yes, the fact that they finally came around on building a Mets stadium instead of a Dodger retcon is better than if they dug in their heels. But lets not pretend it was anything but a reaction to intense public outrage by their customers that finally brought them around. They get no brownie points from me.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Yeah, sorry these are not my photos and I definitely don't deserve any credit or wish to take any and apologize for having created that impression. I thought the whole world had seen them already.

[Ceetar]

Yeah, sorry these are not my photos and I definitely don't deserve any credit or wish to take any and apologize for having created that impression. I thought the whole world had seen them already.

Well, now they have. Which is kinda the point anyway. :-D


Again, it's a difference of opinion. The Mets chose to cut out a Upper type deck and moved the cheap seats in. There are some pretty bad seats, but I definitely prefer when I'm sitting in say, 524 row H, to be able to see the action closer, even if that means sacrificing a small corner of the OF. And there are a lot of sections that are just fine. I had the opportunity to renew my plan for 2009, and the seats were coming up in the LF OF section, and I thought to myself "Hmm, I don't really know if I'll like the view from out there. I'd rather go to the stadium game by game and see where the preferred views are". I did that. I now know to request RF over LF in the outfield, to avoid the back half of the left field landing. To me, that closer view was what they felt was more important than cramming 60k people into the place. If it was up to me, I would've built another deck of 15 thousand people, but it's not up to me. But these things are decisions based on the owners, and that's their right. Whether it's the color of the walls and seats, or the height of the wall or anything else.

Yes, they did a bad job with the Mets history stuff. Maybe you're right, maybe they had no intention of having a museum. Maybe they were just gonna hang the flyers and the banners outside and be done with it. (i.e., no more than they had at Shea)

And i do think the att endance of the Hall of Fame induction game is a big deal. How can so many clamor about wanting to see history at Citi Field and then not go and see iti n the flesh?

Amazing is subjective. To me, Citi Field is amazing. I don't sit in the bad seats (something that all ballparks have), I love the beer and food options, I love the way the stadium looks, both inside and out. And, of course, the Mets play there, which pushes it over the edge into my favorite stadium to watch a game at. But even objectively, I'd say I'd consider PNC or SF park as 'better', but that's about it.

[Frayed Knot]

Dave Howard also went on the air claiming that there were no 'obstructed view' seats at CF (even after photographs and eye-witnesses said otherwise) but did admit that there were instead some seats with 'limited sight' - as if there were actually a distinction between the two other than just pr bullshit.

Not that that subject is the same as the lack of identification topic I was discussing earlier, but trying to talk their way out of that one shirley didn't help make their case that:
'oh yeah, we planned all along to put up a NYM HoF and memorabilia , er, ... and we're going to do it just as soon as we get around to it and we'll even let you know where it's going to be, umm ... soon'

[Guest themetfairy]

but I definitely prefer when I'm sitting in say, 524 row H, to be able to see the action closer, even if that means sacrificing a small corner of the OF.

I agree that there is room for differences of opinions. But I would personally prefer to see the entire field, even if that means being less "intimate."

And for the record, it's not just the cheap seats that are affected. I saw a game in the Ebbets Club last year, and there were obstructed view seats there as well.

Yes, every field has good seats and bad seats. But I do not know of any other recently built ballpark that has so many seats that lack views of the entire field of play. That is an architectural error of great magnitude, IMO.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Ceetar wrote: Frayed Knot wrote: John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: How hard was that? To do? ... not very. Ah, but to think of !! ... now that takes a bit more initiative. To be fair, a lot of that couldn't have been done when Citi Field opened. They didn't have the plaza done, or the grass grown, or even it completely paved. They didn't have all those trees and lightposts up yet that those things are hanging from.

The plaza wasn't done or paved or grass-filled because the Mets didn't want to do or pave or plant the plaza or install the light posts. At some point in time, they didn't have a rotunda to name after Jackie Robinson and to fill with perpetual Brooklyn Dodger video loops either but they still managed to complete that project in time for opening day.

I think that the plan viv-a-vis Mets memorabilia and tradition was to do nothing unless the fans revolted. Personally, I think that anyone that believes that ownership overlooked this matter is naive.

[Ceetar]

You can't really pave and plant trees when you have construction vehicles and trucks in and out (or a pile of former-stadium rubble). It was also winter, and not the best time for planting.

Personally, I think describing the Wilpons as Dodger-loving don't care about the fans and are out to screw us in every way is just silly.

Maybe I'm stupid for thinking that some of this stuff would've showed up regardless. In the end though, I'm not a fan of the Wilpons or the Front Office, i'm a fan of the 25 guys on the roster playing ball, and having a place not filled with standing water and cold reheated food and beer-flavored water to watch it in.

[metsmarathon]

i think it can be fair to forgive (some of) the initial lack of metliness throughout the stadium due to the fact that it still wasn't entirely finished as of opening day, and surely there were things they were still getting around to.

but they lose credibility in that the hall of fame is in previously used space. they did not plan for it originally, it is clear. if they were kindof smart, they could've floated a notion of "oh, we were gonna stash it here, but based on the fan outpouring, we realized that it wouldn't be nearly big enough for the level of fan interest that we've clearly underestimated. that's why we had to steal space from teh team store. the hall of fame was gonna be nice - see these hastily rendered pictures - but now it's gonna be hella better!"

[Guest themetfairy]

In the end though, I'm not a fan of the Wilpons or the Front Office, i'm a fan of the 25 guys on the roster playing ball, and having a place not filled with standing water and cold reheated food and beer-flavored water to watch it in.

I can definitely agree with that.

I will always be a fan of the Mets and Mets history, even if I have issues with the current ownership and the way they do things.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Frayed Knot wrote: Frayed Knot wrote: ...when the wall of complaints started hitting last year, it became pretty obvious that ownership and those surrounding it never considered doing much to hi-light NYM history and, as a result, were totally blind-sided by it all. If it's fair to ask, what specifically made this so obvious? By them seeming so blind-sided to the fact that there even were complaints, - or that even as they put on their best after-the-fact claim to have had these things in mind all along (like a NYM HoF) they still had no answers as to when they might surface or even where they might be put, - or that they designed and supervised a stadium from scratch that not only didn't set aside room for such mementos but even somehow managed to barely acknowledge team colors and logos And I'm not even one who believes that ol' Freddie is sitting around trying to re-make the Mets into some modern-day version of the Dodgers that he still pines for. But they do tend to give the impression of owners most interested in what will sell tickets in the here and now (We've got Reyes & Wright and [insert name] our new FA!!) with very little thought as to the history of the team - particularly as to that part of the history which pre-dates their buying into the team or even prior to the era of Wilpon majority ownership. All that said, I'm have no intention of continually harping on this and acknowledge that they're doing a good job in "fixing" things. I just wish they'd realize things on their own a bit more often without having to be shamed or cajoled into it.

We're approaching circular logic here. I ask "What made it so obvious" that they were blindsided and you open your answer with "By them seeming so blind-sided."

That and all the fake quotes that kinda sorta paraphrase something we think we remember David Howard or somebody else saying tells me were drowning in confirmation bias.

Under any circumstances, it's got to be considered good if they responded to complaints with an extensive effort.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Edgy DC wrote: Under any circumstances, it's got to be considered good if they responded to complaints with an extensive effort.

Not if ownership's plan was to intentionally minimize Mets history pending fan reaction. And to me at least, this is more likely than the idea that they "forgot" or "overlooked" or "didn't realize".

[Gwreck]

Intentionally? Really? I'm totally on board with the incompetence/we can't be bothered thing but I'm not sure I was ready to attribute their failings to a deliberate plan.

[batmagadanleadoff]

You can attribute the lack of Mets history at CF last year to whatever you want to. Really. Your guess is as good as mine. This is all a matter of opinion and speculation without first hand inside information on the matter. Me -- I'm not buying any explanation that's premised on ownership's failure to fully consider the issue.

[Guest themetfairy]

Edgy DC wrote: Under any circumstances, it's got to be considered good if they responded to complaints with an extensive effort.

I don't think anyone is saying otherwise.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Not if ownership's plan was to intentionally minimize Mets history pending fan reaction. And to me at least, this is more likely than the idea that they "forgot" or "overlooked" or "didn't realize".

Firstly, I disagree.

Secondly, if that was somehow the plan, it would still be good that they responded to complaints with an extensive effort.

But I think you've long since made it clear that you don't intend any further feints at objectivity in the matter of the management. And that's disappointing, because you are one of the posters I appreciate most on almost all other matters, aggreeing and disagreeing.

[Guest Edgy DC]

themetfairy wrote: Edgy DC wrote: Under any circumstances, it's got to be considered good if they responded to complaints with an extensive effort. I don't think anyone is saying otherwise.

Au contraire.

[Guest Edgy DC]

By the way, I love how this looks like Casey's in the pokey and a little unsure of how he's going to get himself out.

[stevejrogers]

Never mind...

[batmagadanleadoff]

Edgy DC wrote: ...you are one of the posters I appreciate most....

I know.

[Vic Sage]

that's what Han Solo said to Leia as he was being lowered into the carbonite freezing tank.

[G-Fafif]

From the release last August announcing the first wave of Mettyness:

To improve sightlines in the Promenade Level, the Mets are lowering the LED ribbon boards hanging on its fa�ade by approximately one foot. The first phase of work on the boards on the Left Field Landing has been completed. In addition, the metal edging on the glass railings at the bottom of the stairs and aisles throughout the ballpark are in the process of being removed. "In our ongoing effort to serve our fans, we proactively sought their feedback - through direct dialogue and e-mail, and via online and in-person research," said Dave Howard, Executive Vice President, Business Operations, New York Mets. "These new enhancements are a direct result of that communication and are designed to make the Citi Field experience even more exceptional." The Mets also have begun installing photographic imagery of famous Mets and historic moments in team history on the Field and Promenade Levels to complement the banners on the exterior of the ballpark. The team championship banners are also on display on the Left Field wall.

It did take a lot of fan feedback to get the Mets to move on items that the club ignored in opening Citi Field; crediting it makes the organization seem like responsive (or "proactive") heroes. They were so hard into "not a bad seat in the house" evangelizing that they ran into their own sightline problems: they couldn't see that everybody couldn't see everything from everywhere.

In all their anticipatory interviews, including the three SNY "isn't this great?" preview shows, there was no explicit acknowledgment that more was coming, no "and if you like this, you're gonna love the Hall of Fame and Museum, scheduled for Opening Day 2010." While I'd expect them to hype what they have and not emphasize a lick of the negative (like the lousy views from left field to which they had to attempt to fix four months later), it wouldn't have been out of line to tell us Even More Great Things Are On The Way. But they didn't. It just wasn't important to them at least as far as what they were projecting. I sincerely believe the Mets were so worried about putting across the idea that Citi Field was a break from the Met past (Shea, essentially) that it didn't occur to them that the Met past was important to their customers.

But y'know what? They did get a clue, however they got it, and Citi Field, judging by the photos to which JCL directed us, appears to be better off for it, which means we'll enjoy it more, and everybody wins (or wins as much as they can with Beltran and Reyes on the shelf). So thank you to the Mets fans -- and Mets customers -- who got the Mets' attention. And thanks to the Mets for listening, processing and acting, which strikes me as kind of a strange sentiment given that we're the customers and they should be thanking us. Alas, this is not a normal business relationship we have with them. The only alternative we have to not going to their games is, well, not going to their games -- and we don't want to do that. There is no other team across the street where we could take our commerce (technically there is, but you know what I mean). We want to love everything about them and it pains us when we honestly don't.

[Frayed Knot]

"I sincerely believe the Mets were so worried about putting across the idea that Citi Field was a break from the Met past (Shea, essentially) that it didn't occur to them that the Met past was important to their customers."

Yup!

[batmagadanleadoff]

Vic Sage wrote: that's what Han Solo said to Leia as he was being lowered into the carbonite freezing tank.

I know.

[Guest attgig]

this brick just got called out on metspolice:
http://metspolice.com/2010/03/23/incorrect-info-on-new-1986-world-series-fan-brick-at-citi-field/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+metsblogfeed+(MetsBlog.com)

Sid Fernandez did not get the win, though he had exceptional relief work... =P

they can't even get history on the bricks right! lol

[metirish]

this brick just got called out on metspolice: http://metspolice.com/2010/03/23/incorrect-info-on-new-1986-world-series-fan-brick-at-citi-field/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+metsblogfeed+(MetsBlog.com) Sid Fernandez did not get the win, though he had exceptional relief work... =P they can't even get history on the bricks right! lol

An easy mistake to make when you are pouring over microfiche..........fucks sake Mets