Author: Shannon Shark @metspolice

OK I’m four years late on this, but this was my first time at Citizens Bank Park that didn’t involve Jimmy Buffett.  Left during the rain delay and I’m all the way home now, watching the conclusion on the big screen.

Here’s the best part of the Phillies park:  YOU CAN EASILY PARK!!!!

Oh my goodness, what a pleasure to jump off I-95 forty minutes before a sold out game and cruise right into plenty of parking.   It was just as easy to get out.  None of this Shea traffic, or the monstrous Yankee traffic.  

For those of you who haven’t been there, they have the baseball, football and hockey arenas all within a four square superblock area.   So I parked in the lot of the hockey arena.  There was also plenty of parking at the football stadium.  So smart. 

So easy I even called a friend and asked “Why does New York have to suck?”

Shea/Citi is a reasonable location and it’s not that hard to get to and not that hard to get out of – but why the hell are the Yankees moving across the street to that terrible location that’s a real pain in the neck to get in and out of, and why are the Giants charging people $20,000 for a seat license in a stadium with no rail line.  Still.  After 30 years. 

Well done Mr. Philadelphia Stadium Planner.  

I’m sure Citifield will be nice…it has to be better than Shea.  I wonder if it has the “open deck” style that the newer stadiums have.  I could see that being quite quite cold.  (Oh yeah, three new stadiums and zero domes – why does New York have to suck?)

While at the game I kept an eye out for overpriced $35 Stars & Stripes hats.  Not one.

Charlie (The Enemy) Samuels dressed the Mets in the road grays with the S & S hats – and as always, the Mets Police were right, this combination looks nice, unlike thehideous black combos they wore the first two games.   In fact, the Mets could wear these all the time and look nice.   Maybe they should ditch the black for a darker “Citifield Blue” if they really want to sell merchandise.

ESPN write about a great site called Cool Standings.  

Basically it simulates the season one million times a day, uses some stats you can read about there – and spits out a number.

The Mets have a 9.2% shot at the division, only a 5.2% shot at the Wild Card for a total 14% chance of making it.   

I hope that Cool Standings are wrong and that the Mets do make it, but then again I was the guy who spent most of the 1990’s telling friends the Mets “were done” on April 30th because Bobby V always had them 8 games back.   I was also always right.

Yankees fans (10%) might hate this site, but it’s looking good for The Rays and for Joe Torre’s Formerly Brooklyn Dodgers.


http://www.coolstandings.com/baseball_standings.asp?i=1

I was looking at the standings (I need to know how the Rays did, they won), and I see that the Formerly Brooklyn Dodgers are a half game out.  I thought that might make Fred Wilpon happy.

I was wondering who manages that team – turns out the guys name is Joe Torre.   Joe was an available manager during the past offseason when Omar decided to keep Willie Randolph.  

I always think of the great fireworks game from 1985 when I think of Juky 5th.  Sure the game started on July 4th and lots of people brought this up yesterday, but I want to sleep in this morning so here’s a generic pre-post.

MLB.com’s 30 years of TBS

July 4, 1985 — Braves-Mets July 4th marathon game (fireworks at 4 a.m. ET). Rick Camp kept the Braves alive with his two-out 18th-inning homer and then allowed the Mets to end this marathon contest with five runs in the 19th inning. After this twice rain-delayed game concluded at 3:55 a.m. ET, some Atlanta citizens were awoke by the Independence Day fireworks display.