G-Fafif

A phlegm of Phillies.

It wasn't just the Mets back then. The Astros celebrated their 25th year in 1986 and the Mariners, founded in 1977, celebrated their 10th year. All the patches looked weird, but that was the concept du jour. Then, for whatever reason, the minimal celebration of the 30th anniversary (at least in the official yearbook) took place in 1992, and the more substantial 40th anniversary was feted in 2002. My theory on the latter was they might have done it in 2001 except they had NATIONAL LEAGUE CHAMPS as their hook and decided to save 40TH ANNIVERSARY for another year, though I've never had that confirmed. Hunch from dealing a little with Metsfolk: Not that much thought went into "we did it this way in '86..." vis-a-vis the Fiftieth. Somebody looked at a calendar, did the arithmetic (perhaps with a calculator) and then went to lunch.

LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: The team that Reyes came to was that "win now" team in "fuck it, why not" mode. Piazza and Vaughn were done for the year (and longer, in the latter case); Alomar and Benitez and Burnitz were in the shop window, weeks from being dealt. A distraught Mets populace embraced Jason Phillips as Vail-of-the-moment, fer Chrissakes. The rebuild had already begun; JoseJoseJoseJose was the distraction. Least happy year of my lifetime fandom, which is saying something. Jose's emergence was shortstop soup for the soul that summer, no matter how undercooked. And I bought my first REYES 7 t-shirt because the Clubhouse Shop didn't have PHILLIPS 23.

Met Hunter wrote: Since this is the 50th season, and its a celebration of the best of 50 years, shouldn't games this year be able to unseat ones from the past? Think of how many times that happened in the 25th season. We reserve the right to call audibles.

metirish wrote: Didn't Reyes hit a grand slam his first game? First week.

Full context: 3. The Eternal Son The culture of major league baseball is a jumbo platter of deep-fried masculinity: it�s like a y-chromosome throwing a bachelor party for a penis with a beard. It�s all about fathers, sons, brothers, uncles, grandfathers, great-grandfathers, sons of sons, etc. And the Yankees take this tradition (as they do most traditions) outrageously over the top. George Steinbrenner cast himself notoriously, for decades, as the classic tyrannical father � curfews, grooming fetish, knee-jerk abuse � which makes sense, given that he bought the team largely to impress his own tyrannical father. (His father, somehow, remained unimpressed.) When Steinbrenner surrendered control of the team, he left it, fittingly, for his two sons to scrap over � even though there were two very accomplished daughters in the picture. One son, Hank, is named after his unimpressed grandfather and has apparently adopted the personality and even the dress code (light jacket, turtleneck) of his father. The other successor � just in case the Shakespearean resonances weren�t already strong enough here � is named Hal. In the great Yankee patriarchy, Jeter is the eternal son: the precocious boy who follows the rules, knows his heritage and honors his elders. His career has been guided by a little sweat lodge of symbolic fathers: Steinbrenner, whom Jeter always addressed as Mr. Steinbrenner; Joe Torre, whom he referred to explicitly as a father figure; and the benevolent ghost of Joe DiMaggio, who pioneered Jeter�s signature combination of natural grace on the field and private dignity off of it. Jeter�s simmering drama with Alex Rodriguez, meanwhile, is exactly like a sibling rivalry, with the insecure little brother struggling in his perfect older brother�s shadow. The psychological gulf between the two is often traced to their childhoods: Jeter grew up with a father; A-Rod didn�t. As silly as it seems, American culture needs St. Jeter. In an era of flawed sports icons � Kobe, LeBron, Lance, Tiger, Favre � he might be the last of the unblemished, not just now but forever. We�re practically holding our breath, rooting for him to make it through these last few years: please no steroid revelation, no creepy sex scandal, no prima-donna meltdown. It is his public duty to always be the Great and Pure Young Yankee Shortstop, eternally 22 years old. He has been frozen in time his entire life. This might explain why he�s aging less gracefully than you would have expected: refusing to give up the shortstop position, complaining about contract negotiations after the worst season of his life, building a Florida mansion so huge that the locals call it St. Jetersburg. Youth, for Jeter, is less an age than an existential state. He is every father�s son. And we love him for that.

Question for G-Fafif: Did you already assemble the list? Or are you working on it as the season goes on? Aside from #1 and #163 (the two easiest choices), I wonder what other games were "obvious picks" and what ones were the toughest to figure out. The list is a work in progress but it's well along, close to the two-thirds mark. I've been doing a little here, a little there for about a year. It has been my habit to think of "obvious" choices and pencil them in ahead of time, covering roughly a third of the board, maybe a little more. When due diligence comes around, though, I occasionally discover some choices weren't so obvious after all. The fun/stress is in discovering two dynamite choices occurred in the same game number and then sorting them out. Still, I've been pretty lucky to find some of the more famous standout games that occurred in close calendar proximity did not directly clash. Right around midseason you'll get a sense of this. Game 1 was, I suppose, fairly obvious, but I took a while to commit to it because, as noted in this thread, every Opening Day win lingers in the mind as absolutely wonderful. In my heart, I leaned toward what to me was the quintessential Mets Opening Day, but for historical purposes, the one that was chosen couldn't be beat. Nor should it have been.

And speaking of creepy MFYness, this from Sam Anderson in Sunday's NYT Magazine on the Meaning of Jeter, or whatever the fuck: The culture of major league baseball is a jumbo platter of deep-fried masculinity: it�s like a y-chromosome throwing a bachelor party for a penis with a beard. The point of article was, of course, to deify Jeter (however ironically), but obviously the effect was a jumbo platter of deep-fried creepiness.

Keith Olbermann notes how absolutely creepy the posthumous Bob Sheppard introduction of Cap'n Intangibles has become: I revered Bob Sheppard and I revere his memory daily. But the post-mortem introductions of Jeter have, I think, become disturbing. The good news is, whether its random or spooooooky, Jeter has kinda sucked since the ghost of Sheppard began broadcasting from another realm. Since Bob Sheppard died last July 11 and the tribute to the absent and beloved Public Address Voice of Yankee Stadium became instead a memorial, Derek Jeter is hitting just .263 here with one homer, 10 RBI, a .338 On Base Percentage and a .349 Slugging Percentage in 43 games. There are various dates and causes to assign to Jeter�s midseason eclipse last year but Mr. Sheppard�s passing is not exactly a random one � which makes the stat all the creepier. As of that sad day, Jeter had had 161 home at bats. Thereafter he had�exactly the same number: 161 home at bats. But in the first half of his home 2010 season Jeter was batting .316, with six homers, an On Base of .380 and a Slugging of .472. Would it all turn around if Jeter had Sheppard�s successor Paul Olden announce his name, too? No, of course not. It would just be a little less�creepy.

"_________ is a breath of fresh air, a real departure from _________." Make several copies and keep handy. It's a phrase that never loses its viability.

Collins the Communictor > Manuel the Mute, according to Martino in the Snooze: Beyond that, those wounded last year by Jerry Manuel's lapses in communication have appreciated Collins' clarity. Manuel had a habit of surprising players by first criticizing them to reporters. One incident came last April in Denver, after John Maine surrendered eight runs in a game against the Rockies. Before speaking with Maine, Manuel told reporters that the righty's rotation spot was in jeopardy. Maine has long since left in a huff, but others remain from last year's mess. "It got so weird in here by August," said one player. "It's so much better now." It's a fair point, and an encouraging one, but if Maine was giving up eight runs in one game, he had bigger worries than what Jerry Manuel was or was not saying.

I'm always going to wonder what the photographer suggested to get them to pose like that. Or if the photographer didn't have to say a word.

Well put. Suck on it, Angels, Senators and Colt .45s.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: I think I can guess which will be number 163! No spoilers! Part of this (as explained in the setup posted last night) came from a conviction that sure, we remember Opening Day and maybe Closing Day and a couple in between at the edges (or just after, as you imply), but who the hell says, "That was the best 74th game the Mets ever played?" Nobody...'til now.

New seasonlong project commences today on FAFIF, entitled The Happiest Recap, saluting the spirit of Bob Murphy's signature phrase and the high points of fifty years of Mets baseball. Details explained here but essentially it compiles a "best" Mets season from every Mets season -- "best" Game 001 the Mets ever played; "best" Game 002 the Mets ever played; best Game 146 the Mets ever played...and like that until we have the "best" 163 games (a.k.a. wins) in Mets history. Not a "this date in..." exercise, but a dream schedule crafted from actual Met schedules. That is to say our 33rd game was some season's 33rd game. The fun (I hope) will come in the recalling and exploring 163 great games. "Best" in quotes above since the whole thing is by nature subjective, but the parameters involve choosing games that are Momentous, Exciting, Tremendous, Superb...you know, Mets. Anyway, we're posting them three at a time twice weekly, on Monday or Tuesday and again on Friday. The first three are up. They are, in case you're scoring at home (or even if you're alone)... 001: 1985 -- Gary Carter's Opening Day introduction 002: 1968 -- Jerry Koosman's first win as a second starter 003: 1969 -- Tommie Agee's blast to the stars Alternate choices are offered with each entry, as there can never be too many Happy Recaps.

Anthony DiComo pours on the poignancy regarding the potential end of the Jose-David partnership. For one of this generation's most exciting, talented and complementary tandems, the end may be drawing near. "I'm a big Jose Reyes fan," Wright said. "He makes everybody around him better, including me. So I hope he goes out there and has a great year and kind of forces the hand of the front office so they lock him up to whatever kind of extension. I hope that's the case." If not best friends, they are nonetheless tremendous teammates -- baseball's version of a quarterback and his star wide receiver, a point guard and his center. Each usually knows what the other is thinking. Each usually knows precisely when to encourage, to console, to goad, to ignore, to razz, to defend. It is remarkable considering that baseball is their only real connection. Reyes is 27 with dreadlocks and a family, splitting his time between Long Island and the Dominican Republic. Wright is 28, clean-cut and single, sticking to Manhattan and Virginia. Even on the diamond they are wildly different; Wright defines his game with power and a bit of speed, Reyes with speed and a touch of power. But they are each Mets to the core, the two longest-tenured players in Flushing and among the longest-tenured teammates in the league. "I feel we're like brothers, we've been with each other so long," Reyes said. "To keep that relationship is good. I'm Dominican. He's American. Different language, but we still get along good." We may get quite a few of these before the season (or trading deadline) is out. It's not going to be fun.

Lou Gorman recalled, as only Marty Noble could. Speaking to Lou on the phone, or, better yet, in person was a delight. His in-person greeting seldom varied -- "Good to see you, Mr. Noble, sir. Good to see you. How are you, Mr. Noble?" Most often, my calls were fact-finding in nature. They were cordial, occasionally fruitful, more often frustrating. General manager Frank Cashen liked his Mets tight-lipped. It was our job -- Danny's, mine and the other guys' -- to loosen those lips. Sometimes, I'd call Lou for no particular reason and just press the talk button. He could fill a notebook faster than anyone this side of Gene Orza, Ron Blomberg or Gary Carter. And Lou's anecdotes were good -- filled with insight and recaps of his favorite baseball episodes. Once in a while, a Mets fact might have slipped through -- don't tell Cashen -- but mostly Lou spoke of players he'd scouted, recommended, signed. The others went unmentioned.

The 2011 Mets: Dirty deeds done dirt cheap.

7. Marlins-Cubs, Game Six, 2003 NLCS. You know...Bartman.

Another of my all-time favorite bloggers, away tending to personal business most of 2010, is back and I highly recommend taking in his incredibly rational insights on a regular basis. Introduce (or reintroduce) yourself to Mike's Mets. A real human being, as they say. And continuing to entertain and inform me for a seventh season is Metstradamus, who gets off two great lines from the third game of the season. My distate for Hanley Ramirez aside ... no, to hell with that. I have a large distaste for Hanley Ramirez Willie Harris hit a home run in the first inning to get things started. With all of Harris' efforts to kill the Mets in the late innings, I'm shocked he knew there even was a first inning. Finally, from Patrick Flood, this one tickled me: If your bullpen is a wardrobe, then Rule 5 pitchers in April are sweatpants.

metirish wrote: One bunt does not make a **** . If only New Hampshire's license plates were a little wider, "Live Free Or Die" would be getting replaced right now.

Dodger and Giant owners come together, eventually, to condemn fan violence. San Francisco Giants managing partner Bill Neukom and Los Angeles Dodgers owner Frank McCourt issued a joint statement through the two clubs on Sunday, condemning an assault in the Dodger Stadium parking lot following Thursday's season opener between the teams. "This attack is unconscionable behavior that will not be tolerated in either of our ballparks or in either of our cities,'' the statement read. "Once apprehended, the attackers will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Public safety is the top priority for all of us and even one act of random violence is unacceptable. "Baseball is a family sport that has unified our country after times of crisis and tragedy. This senseless act of violence has no place in our society and certainly not in our national pastime. The Giants-Dodgers rivalry is one of the most storied in all of sports, dating back to when the teams played across town in New York City before their moves to California. This is a great rivalry between teams competing on the field of play. That's where it must stay." The savage beating by two men outside Dodger Stadium left Giants fan Bryan Stow in a medically-induced coma. The 42-year-old paramedic from Santa Cruz in critical but stable condition. Two other men with Stow were able to escape the attackers. Doctors at County-USC Medical Center put Stow into a coma to help deal with his head injuries after the assault. Police and hospital officials would give no information on his status Sunday, but Stow's paramedic partner told his hometown newspaper there had been no change in his condition.

Long Island's own still listed as a GCL Met. Hope he makes a real team eventually. He's only 20, but I'm growing impatient.

R.A. Dickey Postgame Interview Phraseology Countdown: April 3, 2011 5. "collectively" 4. "professional environment" 3. "problem set" 2. "eclipsed" 1. "microcosms"

Combine April 3 POTG threads, por favor.