Verducci Says Torre Doesn’t Rip People

 
The book is not a first-person book by Joe Torre, it’s a third-person narrative based on 12 years of knowing the Yankees and it’s about the changes in the game in that period. Seems to me the New York Post assigned this third-person book entirely to Joe Torre and that’s not the case. In fact, if people saw that Post story they probably noticed there are no quotes from Joe Torre in it. Joe Torre does not rip anybody in the book. The book really needs to be read in context.
 

Anybody who knows Joe, especially during his time in New York, knows he’s a very honest man and he is very honest in the pages of this book. People also know Joe Torre doesn’t go around ripping people and he doesn’t do that in the pages of this book.

 

I can’t wait to read this one either way.  There’s definitely buzz and it’s looking it will be a spring training distraction in both the Dodgers and Yankees camps.

Fun With "New Jets Stadium.com"

Oooh this should be fun, I just found out that http://www.newjetsstadium.com/stadium.php exists.

 From the ease of travel to the increased legroom of the seats, it was designed from the start with the fan in mind.


Ease of travel, hmmm.  I think I will click the transportation tab.


Improvements include:
• 40 traffic lanes into and out of the stadium, nearly triple what you have today
• A newly-engineered loop road system to streamline your entrance to and exit from the lots
• Dedicated parking lots and access roads for club seat PSL owners
• Reconfigured parking lots with over 28,000 spaces

Well that sounds nice.  Of course you bozos in the upper deck can sit in traffic while the factcats use the express lane.  


No car? No problem. Hop a train from New York’s Penn Station or New Jersey’s Hoboken to Secaucus Junction, and in less than 20 minutes you will arrive right at the southeast gate – just 100 feet from the new stadium. You will be in good company: this new 2.5-mile-long train line can accommodate over 7,000 people an hour.

It only took 35 years for someone to think to add a train to the Meadowlands.  Well done.  Let’s see what else we find.  Oh, the PSL payment calculator! 

It wants me to pick a section.  Let’s pick section 337.   Cool, no PSL.  Oh but it will cost me $125/game to sit on the 40 yard line in the uppers.  Let’s be cheap and sit in the end zone:  90 bucks.

These “lower prime” seats look nice.   The PSL is “only” $20,000 but the Jets are nice and will let you pay it off as part of a 15 year payment plan for just $1,869 a year.  I’m bad with math but 15 times $1,869 is $28,035 so I hope you have an extra 20 G’s sitting around to save yourself some interest.  Maybe one of you finance guys can tell me if the Jets are providing a good rate (apparently it’s 8% for this option).

The waiting list, if you’re interested, is free.  I seem to recall there once being a $50 charge to be on the list, but there isn’t today.

This interests me from the FAQ section:  

HOW LONG DOES A PSL LAST?

PSLs are good for as long as the Jets play in the new building in its
current configuration. 

So say you had paid for a PSL all those years ago, and it now had one season left on it.  Would you have kept the tickets this year or last, or would you have tried to pawn the PSL off on some loony Favre fan?

WHAT IS THE TIMELINE FOR THE SELLING PROCESS?

Seat selection is a rolling process over the next few months. It will happen in two phases, each ordered by seniority. In Phase 1, season ticket holders are being offered the opportunity to purchase PSLs for clubs in order of seniority. If club seats are
available after all current season ticket holders have had the chance to purchase them, club seats will be offered to waitlist members in order of when they joined the waitlist. In Phase 2,
season ticket holders who did not purchase a club seat PSL will be offered PSL and non-PSL seats in seniority order, followed by waitlist members in order of when they joined the waitlist.
Below is one of the great non-answers of all time.  It’s so lame you have to laugh.
WILL TICKET PRICES GO UP IN THE NEW BUILDING?

Ticket prices for the 2010 season can be viewed here.


Finally don’t forget, $20,000 will get you “upscale cusine offerings” mentioned below.  No more beer and a dog for you.  Enjoy your sushi as you sit out in the cold wondering why the hell the NFL didn’t insist they build a retractable dome.  
WHY SHOULD I PURCHASE PSL CLUB SEATING RATHER THAN NON-CLUB SEATING?

All club seats offer:
• The best seats in the house
• Access to VIP parking
• Climate-controlled lounges that let you come in from the elements
• Cushioned, spacious seating
• Upscale cuisine offerings
• The opportunity to purchase tickets to certain concerts and other stadium events (subject to availability)
• The right to transfer or sell your fully-paid club seat PSL after March 1, 2011 (see PSL Agreement for details)


Oh, one more thing:


ARE THE JETS NEW STADIUM POLICIES SUBJECT TO CHANGE?


All policies that relate to the new Jets stadium are subject to change. 









www.metspolice.com

Most Popular Stuff From The Week

People still like making fun of the patch, and uniform talk and pictures of Yankee Stadium and a dying Shea (also here) continue to be popular.

Those of you who vacation every weekend and don’t surf the internet may have missed hearing about Joe Torre’s book.  He must have done it for the money, right?   My guess is Joe will be a big topic on sports talk in the morning since the Super Bowl matchup is awful.

www.metspolice.com

Hey Hockey, Long Time No See

There used to be a great sport around these parts, and it was called hockey.   A lot of us used to enjoy it.

Back in 1994 my cousin was a big Rangers fan.  I liked blue and orange teams so I rooted for the Islanders.   The Rangers were on their way to winning a cup, and I needed to stop that from happening at all costs.   The Isles were useless in the playoffs that year but I fell in love with a scrappy Devils team and their awesome goalie Martin Brodeur – and these Devils seemed like they would be the ones to stop the Rangers from ever winning so I could keep on chanting 19-40 every time I walked past the cousin’s house.

We were really into hockey 15 years ago.   I bought a Devils jersey.  I would watch every game at his house.  I’d show up with Devil horns and bring Devil dogs.  Anything to keep 19-40 alive.  Back in those days I had to get up at 3:30 in the morning for work.  It didn’t matter, I stayed up for the NHL playoffs.

We all know that the Rangers won, and I lost – but hockey was alive.  It’s good for leagues when the team from New York is good despite what those in the flyover states think.   Hockey had a brand new contract with FOX, and FOX was proving itself to be really good at this sports thing.

Then the geniuses had a lockout and started the 1995 season late.  The Devils won it, but they swept in the finals which didn’t help the cause.  Neither did threatening to move to Nashville in the middle of a cup run.

Still we loved our hockey.   We played NHL 95 on the Sega Genesis like you couldn’t believe.   Messier came and went and came back.  Even the great Wayne Gretzky came to New York.   However, little by little hockey was slipping away.  

Eventually the NHL decided not to play a season and nobody cared.

Tonight is the All-Star game.  It’s 90 minutes away and I only now got excited enough to write about it.  I’m going to check it out and I hope I last more than five minutes.   I couldn’t tell you who is playing, I don’t know if I get Versus in HD (they keep telling me “you gotta see hockey in hi-def!”) and I bet I won’t recognize any of the players.

I have heard of Niklas Lidstrom but he decided he isn’t playing and the league has decided to make him sit out a regular season game as punishment.  I’ve heard of Sydney Crosby, but he isn’t playing either.

Well, I bet Martin Brodeur made the team.  Oh what’s that – he’s been out with an injury all season?  The Devils are somehow in first with the Rangers just a point behind.   You’d think someone would notice.

www.metspolice.com

Swanny, Stadia, Manny, Ollie

On another quiet morning in Flushing, I thought I’d take a look around the internet to see what’s out there:

Hotfootblog correctly observes that just about every Mets fan now wants Manny.  Why would a franchise not want to offer the customer the player that the customers want?  It boggles the mind.  It would be very easy for all parties to show up at the press conference and say “we heard how much you wanted him, here he is” and Manny can stand there in a black #99 jersey with a lame patch and I’ll keep my mouth shut.

Forbes magazine also thinks the Mets need to grab Manny.

The Subway Sqwakers blog and the Daily News both observe that as much sense as Manny makes for 2009, he may make even more sense for 2010!

Not surprisingly the Mets are upping their offer to Oliver Perez.   I don’t think any of us are shocked that this is happening.

Craig Swan is 59 years old now and has a dog powered scooter.

My favorite piece out there is from the Amazin’ Avenue blog which has a collection of Mets Sports Illustrated covers throughout the years.   The young Dwight Gooden makes me sad.   It’s a very cool collection, check it out!

Meanwhile in the Bronx, they haven’t signed Manny yet (who will be surprised when they do?) but the great River Ave Blues blog has this virtual tour of Yankee Stadium (and here’s one of Citi Field – what’s up with the yellow hat on the scoreboard).

www.metspolice.com