So far so good...

Game 3: Mets 9 Marlins 2
Dickey vs Vazquez

I'm not gonna give a recap of this game but let's instead take a look at what we've learned about Terry Collins' 2011 Mets before they head on over for some Philly Cheesesteaks:

K-Rod may be going to anger management but he's still rocking the goggles and he's still having an extreme difficult time saving games. Okay it was just one game so far but he looked awful against Florida. But again it was one game, and even that Mariano Rivera messes up from time to time so I'm not turning on Frankie just yet.

Isaac Benjamin Davis got off to a rocky start with a few hiccups at first base which was and is shocking since he was the man last year that would make incredible plays diving into the stands. But since that first not so hot game he appears to have his hitting and defensive prowess back. He definitely has the potential to hit 20 homers (perhaps 30), bat .300 and rack up 100 ribeye steaks.

RA Dickey probably is our ace with Johan on the DL. No matter how many times he gets into trouble, he's the one Metsies pitcher I can watch without half covering my eyes when the bases are loaded. He has no trouble keeping his cool and he gets out of jams. Plus his post game locker room interviews are always worth watching. This man is brilliant and it's always just nice to hear his take on a game.

Beltran is hitting. That is what counts. Plus he's Duda's Yoda. According to Burkhardt, Carlos keeps an eye on Lucas and gives him advice to improve his hitting. They also have had dinner dates!

Eamus or Murphy at second?! The biggest fear with Daniel Murphy at second is the fact that he won't be able to turn double plays. He really didn't get a chance to do that yet during his one start but he looked absolutely fine at second. Eamus got his first hit in game 2 and he's looked pretty great defensively. It's a tough call.

Reyes and Pagan are still fast as can be and defensive badasses.

David Wright is looking like pre-getting hit in the head Davey. He's hitting, okay his defense hasn't been perfect but his swing is looking marvelous. I am thinking this could be a season where Wright doesn't strike out in consecutive games, gasp.

Willie Harris is proving to be a great pickup. So far he's pinch hit successfully, he's homered, he's played great defense and he's proven he can actually help the Mets and not just rob them of victories like he did as a National.

Jonathan Niese has had the tendency in the past to pitch great but to start out a little rusty. He does give up first inning runs but he also can then bounce back and give the Mets 6 scoreless innings.

Big Pelf looks like he is just picking up where he left off last season and that's no good. If he can get himself centered and back into his early 2010 form we really could have a pretty good pitching staff that could give a lot of teams trouble.

The Mets as a team have proven so far that just like last year they can fight back. They don't give up and that's great to see. Even when K-Rod blew the save game 2 they bounced right back in that top of the 10th and regained the lead. Does that mean we might see another 20 inning game, perhaps?!

Run support has been an issue with the Metsies. So many games last year we saw great pitching outings but the squad couldn't hit. Dickey for some reason was the one pitcher who seemed to always get run support and that has continued thus far.

In general Florida just kicks the Mets asses. Last year it was no picnic playing the fish so taking a series on the road from them is a great start.

On the road the Mets just couldn't win and they already have one road series under their belts so that's pretty neat and promising.

SNY still is all about the Geico and Fiberama commercials....

Keith hasn't fallen asleep or made that many funny comments yet but he has said "Cheese" so I think there's no reason to fear he's lost his unpredictable/very entertaining booth mojo. Just for now he seems very professional and that's great but we need some random tangents about authors or musicians or Sag Harbor just in case this season gets really ugly.

I know we don't have big expectations for the Metsies but you know what maybe they'll surprise us. A 2-1 start is not that shabby at all and I guess the real test is coming up. Philadelphia and that ridiculous pitching staff will be quite hard to defeat but you know what anything is possible in the world of sports. So for now let's just take it game by game and hope Collins' Metsies surprise us this year!

My Brief Brush With Fame at Citi Field

Last Friday, something happened at Citi Field that has never happened before. Never in the history of the Mets has this happened! And on that fateful night, it happened twice.

I was on the jumbotron[1].

Twice.

After literally hundreds of games - at Shea and at Citi Field (and numerous away parks and minor league games); on field level and in the Upper Deck; in street clothes, suits, and Mets gear; as a cute kid and as an adult; with hot girls and with unattractive dudes - I finally made it.

It just goes to show you that things happen when you least expect them.

For one thing, I gave up my partial season ticket plan last year when it turned out that the Mets were terrible and my idea of having nice seats in the upper deck behind home plate turned out to be a losing investment. If that weren't enough, despite being an enormous Mets fan[2], last Friday's game was actually my first game of the season.

But back to the story.

In addition to it being my first Met game of the year, I am pretty sure that I was being "that guy" at the game. I showed up late to the game, getting to my seats in the fourth inning. I had gotten hung up at work - an unfortunate side effect of being a grown up. I arrived at my seats in the middle of the inning (cardinal sin) with a bunch of beers. I didn't bring my scorecard to keep track of the game. I was being uncustomarily "bro-like." We were sitting in the Pepsi Porch, so the seats were real nice.

In between half-innings, either in the fifth or the sixth, the stadium did their patented "Boogie Cam." It's the second best "cam" of the game - miles behind the Kiss Cam and ahead of the lame Smile Cam. As the Boogie Cam splashed across the jumbotron, my friends and I noticed a very cute girl on the screen ... turns out, she was only five or six rows behind us. With the camera primed, we started to boogie.

We did not actually expect to get on the screen, but when we got back, we were in full BOOGIE FORM. It was amazing. In fact, at the moment I saw myself on the screen, I didn't know what to do. I stopped the boogie. I looked at the jumbotron, at my friends, and back at the jumbotron. What do you do in the one moment in which more people will be looking at you than any other in your life?

I pointed at my Mets jersey (an Alfonzo of course), and then pointed to the sky. I don't know why, but it felt appropriate. Let's go Mets.

The story does not end there, however[3]. After a few inning detour to the speed pitch and Shake Shack, we settled back into our seats for the eighth inning (told you, was really not being a good fan today). The Mets trailed 4-2 as R.A. Dickey gave up a pair of solo home runs in the seventh. They went meekly in the eighth, and it was on to the ninth, where the Braves did not extend their lead.

Sitting in our seats, my friends and I were still basking in the glory of our previous incident on the jumbotron. A few beers in, and heroes in our section, we were having a great time. Before the bottom of the ninth, Citi Field displayed one of those "noise meters." It started low, with "clap" or something, moved up through "scream" and "dance" and ended with something wild. I of course, went up through the stages like a good fan, dancing and yelling and stomping my feet to help hype the crowd.

That is when we got on the jumbotron a second time. Whether it was the good seats, or the Alfonzo jersey, or the frenzied dancing, or the camera man remembered us, there we were again. This time, however, we were not on the jumbotron as part of a boogie medley - this time we were on the screen for about ten seconds, imploring the crowd to get up and make some noise for the final inning.

It only took Alex Cora and Rod Barajas about seven pitches to snuff out the Mets chances of winning, but that second time up on the big screen was euphoric. And this time, I didn't simply point at the sky and hold a pose. This time, with people from the surrounding rows bounding around like crazy (some kid actually fell into our row trying to get in the shot) we had ten seconds of fame. Fist-pumping, jumping, hand-clapping goodness.

The Mets lost, and ultimately I did not get to see that much of the game, but wow. What an experience.

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[1] Is it even still called a jumbotron? Am I dating myself here?

[2] I do operate a Mets blog, of course.

[3] It was also my first time seeing a knuckleballer.

On to the Next One...

I apologize for the infreuqency, brevity, and otherwise stinkiness of my posts lately. I started a new job at the end of March and, well, it's been rough to say the last (in a good way). It's not that I don't have ideas for things to write about, I just usually can't give it the treatment it deserves.

Before starting, I'd like to point out that you may have noticed a new blogger posting here recently. That's Danielle. Say hi! (Hi, Danielle). I don't have to tell you she's been doing a great job, so thanks for being our Angel Pagan and being the only one producing for us right now. Sadly, I think this might make me Jeff Francoeur.

Roger? He's Jason Bay (Canadian). Tonight, just a quick blurb again.

Did you know that by this time tomorrow, thanks to our "Maine Break", we will essentially have started RA Dickey, Raul Valdez, and Hisanori Takahashi in three consecutive games?

With the uncertainty that the Mets faced with Pelfrey, Perez, and Maine in the rotation, we at Fonzie Forever (I guess me) worked long and hard to convince the Mets that bringing in a starter, even a proven mediocrity, would be a better move than signing Jason Bay to a mega-deal because of the needs of this particular team.

So far, unfortunately, we've been proven mostly right.

Of Pelfrey, Maine, and Perez, I figured that, in general, our best bet would be to expect one improvement, one average performance, and one flame out. But even with that, and with Niese holding his own, that required another starter. And then another for when the inevitable injury struck.

Turns out, Pelfrey stepped his game up while Maine and Perez both faltered. Now we are left with two legitimate holes in the rotation, in addition to Jon Niese's injury and struggles. Hence, Dickey-Valdez-Takahashi.

Not to disparage any of those three. They have all pitched very well this year. But are they long term solutions? Can we expect to keep them up? No and no, I think.

Joel Piniero is currently sporting a 3.71 ERA in the American League. Jon Garland is at a 2.38 ERA, but that won't last because of his peripherals. Still, though, a 2.38 ERA is what it is - and it'd be nice to have seen that kind of pitching here in the early going of this year. Jason Marquis, the third of the mid-range options, is injured. So once again, very much a crap shoot among similar options.

In any event, if the Mets had any real designs on being competitive this year, they were absolute fools when it came to their plan for the starting rotation - which, incidentally, is the most important part of the ballclub. If the Mets didn't plan on competing, they were fools for throwing all that money at Jason Bay and then backloading the contract. They find themselves in the middle of the road, pants around their ankles.

So, we're left to ponder, with Gary, Keith, and Ron. And read funny and/or interesting recaps by Danielle. Ah hell. That's not so bad. I love baseball.

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I promise in the future to come back to this topic. I have in the past (but cannot find it) written about the importance of starters 6, 7, and 8 on any club which has plans of contending. And guys way smarter than me have done studies on it. Yes, often times clubs which succeed are the ones who have great pitching and great luck with health. But just as often, they are teams who have a great swingman, or a veteran tucked away at Triple-A, or a stud prospect who they didn't want to rush but is knocking down the door. Baseball seasons are long, and human beings were not made to throw overhand. But more on this some other day.