Author: Shannon Shark @metspolice

Promotions are cool.  I’m glad to see the Mets having lots of them.  Thinking back to the late 70’s, I loved getting a batting helmet or a bag or anything. I also think the ethnic nights are fun*.   You can find a facts-only list with dates here.

Pyrotechnics night:   cool, fun.  I used to love fireworks night as a kid.  Glad it’s back.

Santana Koozle: lame.  Does anyone actually use a koozle?  That’s the thing you put around your beer bottle so your hand doesn’t get cold.  Is that a big problem?

Opening Day Apple Bank: that’s interesting.  Don’t get me wrong, happy to have a bank to give to Junior, but I’m surprised there’s a giveaway on opening day.  I’m not at all complaining, but I find it interesting.

Magnetic Schedule: these wind up on the fridge every year.  Funny how I never stumble across an old one.  I think I need to talk to Mrs. Mets Police and Mommy Mets Police.  It’s not like I don’t keep stuff – I still have my 1982 Mets calendar.

Lunchbox: cool.  Do kids still use lunchboxes?   Mine don’t.

Bay Bobblehead: who doesn’t like bobbleheads.

Scarf: scarf?  April 10th.  I hope it isn’t black.  Ditto Ski Cap night.  I wouldn’t mind a ski cap.

Beach towel: let’s see…blue and orange are summer colors.   They wouldn’t give us a sun-absorbing black towel would they?  I would use a white and blue one for sure.

Drawstring bag: cool enough.  I like those old nylon ones we used to get.  I have some around.  One handle always seemed to break.

June 26th Cap Day.  I wonder what kind of cap it will be?

July 30th: t-shirt.  always cool.

Will Haitian night be a fundraiser? The Mets will celebrate the diversity of New York with pre-game activities during heritage dates including: Haitian Night (Wednesday, April 7); Asian Night (Wednesday, May 26); Greek Night (Saturday, June 5); Chinese-American Night (Friday, July 9); Irish Night (Saturday, August 14); Polish-American Night (Tuesday, August 24); Italian Night (Wednesday, August 25); Taiwan Night (Friday, Sept. 17); and Oktoberfest (Friday, October 1).

* I still hate when the jerseys say Los Mets.  If they made the Los the same size of the Mets it would look better.  Or if they wore Nueva York (so you wear the city at home, the world won’t end).  But to wear “The Mets” is silly, and in the Mexican League the Tigres wear “Tigres” not “Los Tigres.”

Recap: last year I remember nitpicking the schedule.  Maybe I was just on the rag.  This year, I really like it.  I mean there’s no banner day nor old-timer’s day but we’ve well discussed that.  When I buy the team I’m bringing in “Throwback Lee Mazzilli Poster Day” to confuse everyone born after 1980.

If someone has the energy (Media Goon, I bet you’ll be the one) someone should match these up with the 15 game plans so we can determine if the Mets decided their main customers should have caps and scarfs or not.

Did Fred go out of his way to pick the ugliest black Mets-wear possible?  Has Omar been reading my Alternate Mets Caps series?

From today’s News.

You will enjoy this link to 11th and Washington where njbaseball has some photos of a game from 1991.  If you look closely enough you will see me in the crowd (working).

It was suggested that I observe that the fence looks better when blue and unadorned by advertisements.   I agree, but I think that ship has sailed.

As you check out the picture gallery, note my continued observation that most Mets fans don’t wear blue caps to game, and never did.

More pics here.

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Good observation from Ceetar in the comments:  the Mets have announced that tickets go on sale on March 7th, that’s just two weeks from now and there’s no talk of a lottery for the opener.

Can we assume there will be no lottery for Opening Day tickets?

Let’s think this through:

1.  The Mets just haven’t announced a lottery for Opening Day tickets YET.  Totally making stuff up, they could hypothetically send out an email on Monday announcing a Thursday lottery, then a pre-sale sometime the next week.

2.  Is it possible that they’ve decided a lottery isn’t warranted?  Could ticket sales be that far down?  As negative as I can be accused of being, that would surprise even me.   My memory gets foggy as I age but I think even in the dregs of the 90’s there were Opening Day lotteries.

Below is how it went LAST YEAR LAST YEAR LAST YEAR LAST YEAR

REGISTRATION PERIOD BEGINS:	10:00 a.m. ET, Tuesday, 2/17/2009
REGISTRATION PERIOD ENDS:	11:59 p.m. ET, Tuesday, 2/24/2009
RANDOM DRAWING:	on or about Wednesday, 2/25/2009
SELECTED INDIVIDUALS NOTIFIED VIA E-MAIL BY:	Friday, 2/27/2009
SALE FOR WINNERS:	selected individuals will be notified of sale dates via e-mail

Again that was LAST YEAR’S LOTTERY.  That was for a brand new stadium.

Looking back at 2007, in an old stadium with life left, coming off a playoff year, the lottery was happening by February 5th.

This policeman’s guess is that there is no lottery this year.  That makes me wonder about ticket demand.

Busy Saturday…

I don’t have anything more to tell you other than what several of the beat writers tweeted…Fred Wilpon described the off-season as “torture.”   I am off to swimming lessons (Daddy Saturday) so I bet I will be futzing with twitter @metspolice and here’s a good list of beat writers and cool Mets peeps to follow.

In other news, Mrs. Mets Police found the ever so elusive Shamrock Shake…visit my non-Mets Shannon’s Other Blog for more.

If you’d like to get Mets Police free in a daily email or in Google Reader you can and if you’d like some non-Mets stuff (often baseball, and occassionally Shamrock shakes) cut and paste this into Google Reader or just bookmark Shannon’s Other Blog.