MVN - Most Valuable Network

Unfortunately, three baseballs hit by Milwaukee Brewers did not heed this advice on Saturday - Photo by Jessica Bader/Flickr.com

Took the 7 Train: April 12, 2008

Took the 7 Train is a new feature you’ll see here from time to time. While Hands Down is my usual game recap format, I’d like to do something a little different for the games I am fortunate enough to attend.  Sometimes, these posts will include various multimedia goodies to go along with observations of the ballpark experience. Read on for my thoughts on attending Johan Santana’s first start at Shea Stadium as a Met.

If I buy tickets to a game less than a week or two in advance, one of the major factors influencing which game (or games) I choose to attend is the scheduled pitching matchup. This is especially true in years when the Mets don’t have such a strong rotation (watching Steve Trachsel throw over to first a dozen times per inning is far less tedious when you’re not paying for the privilege), but it still impacts my purchasing decisions when the Mets have three or even four solid starters. Johan Santana is a superstar, and I wanted to watch him pitch in person as soon as I possibly could. Shortly before Opening Day, I looked at the Mets’ schedule and tried to figure out when Santana’s first home start would be. With the Mets using a five-man rotation even in the early days of the season, all signs pointed towards Santana making his home debut on Saturday, April 12. When my school advertised $3 upper box tickets to this weekend’s series against the Brewers, I waited in line at the campus box office the day they went on sale. A few days after I bought the tickets, I realized that Ben Sheets, Milwaukee’s ace, was also scheduled to start that game, and I became even more excited. Visions of a pitchers’ duel to rival the Pedro Martinez/Brandon Webb showdown I attended nearly two years ago dominated my thoughts.

Despite a few rotation shake-ups (Pedro’s injury, a rainout in Atlanta last week), Santana remained on schedule to start April 12. When that wonderful morning arrived, I breathed a sigh of relief at the weather report (thunderstorms were forecasted earlier in the week, but thankfully failed to materialize), took my baseball purse out of storage (I have a specific purse that I always take to games; I use it only for that purpose, and it’s filled with ticket stubs from games I’ve attended, a bunch of pocket schedules I received when I bought tickets at Shea the day of a game, and the scorecard pencils from Mets victories - pencils used to score a losing effort get thrown in the trash on the way out of the ballpark), and hopped on the subway, accompanied by my younger brother. As we walked down the steps of the Willets Point station, I took out my camera and started snapping pictures of Citi Field, in awe of the progress that has been made since the last time I went to a game.

After a bit of browsing in the new team store just past the station exit, we made our way into the ballpark, did some more browsing at the team store we were familiar with, and found a spot on the field level where we could take some pictures. I got some good pictures of the Brewers taking batting practice, as well as a few of Nelson Figueroa signing lots of autographs. I took note of how the new ballpark rising in the background affected the view at Shea; it looks cool even on TV, but it’s just incredible to see when you’re there.

Being the dork that I am, I made sure to get a video of Santana walking out from the bullpen

and another of his warmup and his first Shea pitch as a Met

When Johan was able to work around a poor play by Damion Easley in the top of the first and the Mets scored a pair of runs in the bottom half of the inning, the stage seemed set for a fantastic game. Alas, actual events failed to live up to that promise. Sloppy defense (the aforementioned Easley flub, a misplayed bunt, and David Wright’s constant struggle with routine plays even as he makes the spectacular ones) forced Santana to throw many pitches in the early innings, and a left-handed flyball pitcher is not a good thing to be against this Brewers lineup, even when the pitcher in question is Johan Santana. Throw in a questionable decision by Willie Randolph (when a starter is at 110 pitches and has just issued a four-pitch walk, that may be a good time to go to the bullpen; of course, that mistake pales in comparison to letting Jose Reyes play in cold, damp conditions Friday night when Reyes mentioned his hamstring tightness to Willie before that game) and some lousy behavior by some of the fans in attendance (in addition to the usual run-of-the-mill drunken arguments and attempts at starting the wave during important at-bats, there was a disturbingly high level of booing at the end of Santana’s day), and it wasn’t one of my favorite days at Shea. However, it’s nowhere near as painful to watch my team get shut down by a legitimately excellent pitcher (Wright’s home run in the eighth inning made him the first batter since the second inning to reach base against Sheets) as it is to watch them struggle against some of the pitchers who have given them fits in recent years.

Even though I was unhappy with both the outcome of the game and the behavior of some of the people sitting near me, I can’t be too upset. There will be plenty of opportunities for me to see Santana pitch the way he did on Opening Day, and there will be many more games that I just have to go see because there’s no way I can pass up that pitching matchup.

You can check out the rest of my photos from this game here. Most of them are of the Brewers taking batting practice - I’m too busy keeping score to take pictures during a game.

This entry was posted on Saturday, April 12th, 2008 at 10:59 pm and is filed under Willie Randolph, Nelson Figueroa, Took the 7 Train, Damion Easley, Johan Santana, Jose Reyes, Milwaukee Brewers, New York Mets, David Wright, Ben Sheets, 7 Train. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.