I resolve to be a better Mets fan in 2010

Tonight the ball drops – both in New York and here in Grand Rapids – marking the end of a year that I’m really not all that sad to see go.

A new year marks a new opportunity to take stock in what we as Mets fans think, do and go about our business.

We Mets fans survived 2009, and it was rough. We can get 2010 off to a great start by changing some of our behaviors to cleanse away the stench of the last decade and embrace this shiny new one.

It’s a tradition to use this day to make resolutions. Here are my ten resolutions for 2010 Mets fans. Please hold me accountable.

1) I resolve to not freak out every time another team signs another team signs a player the Mets didn’t particularly want, and think that the other team’s general manager is smarter or better than Omar.

OK, the Giants signed Mark DeRosa. He’s kind of old and hurt, and there really wasn’t a position for him on the Mets. So we really shouldn’t get all worked up worrying that Omar missed out on a guy we shouldn’t be chasing in the first place.

2) I resolve not to get all worried when a free agent the Mets are after has not been signed by a deadline set by New York Daily News sports columnists.

Opening Day is in April. It’s a good idea to have Jason Bay and people like him in uniform by that date, and maybe even a little earlier. But just because the News shows a back page photo of a crying child in a Mets cap in December does not mean that Bay will never sign, or that the season that starts four months from now already is a lost cause.

3) I resolve to not whine and get upset every time Bob Klapisch writes a column taking cheap shots at the Mets.

As reporters, we are always amazed when people purchase pit bulls, make them pets, give them names like “Diablo,” and then are shocked when the pit bull eats the neighbor children.

Pit bulls eat children. It’s in their nature. It’s what they do. They don’t stop being pit bulls because you make them a pet.

Bob Klapisch is a known Mets hater. He will not change. He cannot change. I must stop reading his columns and being shocked when he does what he does.

4) I resolve to not complain about the lack of Mets history and colors on display at the Mets' ballpark.

I’m pretty sure the Mets are the ones playing at Citi Field. It’s not that hard to figure out, especially when I see Oliver Perez is on the mound and he’s given up five walks by the third inning.

So I don’t need blue and orange trim in the mens room to remind me I’m in the right ballpark or posters of Tom Seaver to remind he played for the Mets, because I have a lot of those in the basement baseball room. I don’t have a live-sized Tom Seaver statue in the basement, however. Hint, hint.

5) I resolve to not complain when Derek Jeter gets undeserved praise for doing things people on my coed softball team are able to do -- without much fanfare.

Well, who are we kidding.

6) I resolve only to complain about things Derek Jeter actually does or says, as opposed to super-powers assigned to him.

That’s a little more realistic.

7) I resolve not to get drawn into nasty arguments with Phillies fans.

Hey, they’re a rough, disagreeable lot. Make no mistake. They like to fight and wear mean-spirited t-shirts.

We need to show Phillies fans compassion. It must be difficult to root for the most losing team in the history of professional sports. Let them yell and boast about their three division titles.

But we must not engage them, unless they say bad things about David Wright or question Jose Reyes’ health or make implications about Daniel Murphy’s fielding or take issue with K-Rod’s save celebrations or make snide remarks about the orange button on our caps or the drop shadows on the jerseys or suggest that Johan Santana is not the best pitcher in baseball or call attention to Carlos Beltran’s big mole.

If any of those things happen, the gloves are off, understandably so.

8) I resolve not to panic when a Mets player goes on the disabled list.

OK, when they ALL go on the disabled list, it’s a cause for concern. But 2009 can’t really happen again, can it?

9) I resolve not to hate Curtis Granderson now that he’s a Yankee.

Curtis is still a really nice guy who cares for the community. Now he’s just a nice, caring guy in a really ugly uniform with overrated teammates and fawning columnists.

10) Speaking of uniforms, I resolve not to get suckered in and buy the ugly new batting practice cap just because Major League Baseball decides it can get fans to buy more caps by changing the design every two years.

I am SO sticking with this one. Unless there’s a good sale on MLB.com or if I somehow get the new jersey and need to cap to match. But I standing firm and I mean it.

There! I shouldn't have too much trouble sticking with those simple resolutions.

May your 2010 be filled with happiness and health, filled with a summer of celebrations!

The nightmare before Christmas

We went to a Christmas party where everyone was asked to bring a gift to "regift."

We brought gift received a while back that just wasn’t our kind of thing. But what came back home keeps me awake at night in fear. It leads our pre-holiday Deezo Friday Five.

1) This frightens me. It really does.

Ignore for a moment the cowboy caps and bandannas. I think that was the previous owner’s attempt to use humor to dull the horror.

Let’s start with the fact that this is a statue of babies. I realize that Ann Geddes has made an entire career of photographing babies, sometimes in odd settings or costumes. I don’t care for her work, but I get that some people do. But rather than I book you can flip through, this is a sculpture standing about a foot tall.

Then, they’re naked babies. Anybody who has had babies around the house knows that naked, they are armed and dangerous. Your rug or clothes could be soiled without a moment’s notice. I see naked baby artwork and all I can think of is how we needed to keep the Bissell Little Green Machine plugged in and ready to go at all times.

Then we have the pose. Babies don’t stand. They just don’t. When they do, they’re called toddlers and their legs are longer, and not the stubby newborn legs we have here.

And here, we have a baby standing on one leg. And what exactly is he — or she, we can’t tell by the pose — doing with that other leg? I don’t want to know.

But note the truly startling chain of events that had to happen here for this...thing... to end up on my mantle.

First, some one had to roll out of bed and decide that he was going to carve a statue of two naked babies doing who knows what and not only call it a productive day, but actually show it to someone else.

Then, someone had to see this and say, "Hmmm. That’s lovely. We should buy this, mass produce it and offer it wholesale."

Then, some shop owner had have seen this in some distributor’s catalog and say, "Hey, I gotta get me some of those naked three-legged baby statues for the store."

And then, and this is the part that scares me most, some shopper looking for a gift for someone they liked saw this, paid actual money for it, wrapped it and offered it as a present."

I can only imagine the tact required by the receiver to open this and not immediately hurl it out the window.

Of course, if they had, the thing would not be on my mantle right now wearing red cowboy hats and bandannas, so I guess I should be ticked off.

I understand that taste is subjective. Not everyone understands why I think like Kiss and Twisted Sister.

But I’m counting the days until next year’s regifting party, because I know what we’re bringing.


2) The sculpture is only slightly less scary than our trip to the immigration office in Cozumel, Mexico.

I love getting my passport stamped. Given my obsessive nature, I started looking for the immigration offices the moment we set foot in each of the countries on the cruise.

As the harried staffer in Grand Cayman told us, I’m not the only one who feels this way. You’d think each country would have an employee armed with a stamp pad sitting at a table as you disembarked.

But no. In Cozumel, the office was on the fringes of downtown, away from the places tourists flock. And since there were not street signs as we know them, our little map was not entirely helpful.

We were a block from turning around and heading back — running back, actually — when we found a small white building with a locked door and bars covering the glass.

An employee opened the door a crack to ask what we wanted — at least I think that’s what he asked. My Spanish is limited.

I held out the passport and made the international gesture that says "please stamp this so we can get back to the tourist area to buy a straw sombrero and more $1 Coronas from guys in coolers."

I will say that the stamp is really cool.


3) I’m not a casino guy by any means, but I’m expecting high-roller treatment should I even step foot in another gambling den.

This is because percentage-wise, I made more on the cruise ship’s casino than anyone else in the family.

Oh sure, my brother was walking around with a stack of cool chips after several stints at the black jack tables.

But I held high a dollar bill, and announced that I was feeling sassy and lucky and was going to hit the nickel slots.

I learned that most of the slots today are video screens with no moving wheels. I also learned that they quickly eat your nickel. I was down to about 30 cents when the screen showed three sticks of TNT in a row, blinked a lot and indicated that I my 30 cents was now up to $1.50.

Kenny Rogers has no clue when to throw a strike to Bleeping Andruw Jones, but he knows when to walk away and when to run. And I printed out my coupon — the machines don’t spit out nickels any more — and fled with my winnings!


4) One of the fun parts things about foreign travel is seeing the different traffic signs.

But this one in Ocho Rios is a classic. "Keep fatalities down, drive, ride and walk good."

Aside from the immediate grammatical issue — it should say "well" or even "safely" instead of good — how does one ride in a not good manner?

And this is in a country where, you are encouraged to climb waterfalls covered in jagged rocks. I'm not sure they're all that concerned with my safety.

And above it, a billboard for margarine?


5) It is so on with the Phillies.

Pitcher Cole Hamels isn’t content to just sit back and enjoy his team’s rain-soaked World Series victory.

No, he’s appearing on WFAN calling our Mets "choke artists."

"That’s kind of what we believe and I think we’re going to always believe it until they prove us wrong. Yeah, for the past two years they’ve been choke artists."

Hamels is an idiot. Because if the Mets choked, that means his Phillies didn’t earn their division titles, we gave them away.

Hamels also forgets that he pitches in a league where pitchers bat, and goodness knows some of our pitchers don’t have great control. And some of them have very good control, if you know what I mean.

A smart player says "The Mets are a good team, but we were a little better." I bet Cole Hamels has naked baby statues, but they’re wearing little Phillie caps.

Broadway Brett, Coney Island Joe and the rest of the Friday Five

There’s a good chance we’re done traveling for the summer. All this time on the road has provided for adventures, but I’m behind in many things, including blogging.

Let’s just say we got some spring yardwork taken care of this week, and the underground sprinklers are good to go — after four tips to Lowe’s and more profanity than even the Mets bull pen can generate.

We even have a semi-late Deezo Friday Five to offer:

1) I have a love-hate relationship with Topps’ Heritage sets.

I love the idea of putting modern players in old-fashioned designs, especially with the level of detail that Topps provides. They’re usually beautiful cards.

But the downside is that they’re way too expensive and the sets are filled with short-printed cards, making them more expensive and impossible for me to ever assemble a complete set.

This year, the company’s Bowman Heritage has some photos that are so brilliant that it hurts. Topps had fun tinkering with the backgrounds. Some of the cards have old stadiums such as the Polo Grounds and Ebbets Field, and others have city icons.

Check out Tom Glavine’s card, which combines both elements of Shea and Citi Field under construction. Too bad Glavine is a known Met saboteur.

Then I saw this sweet card of Joe Smith with the Coney Island Wonder Wheel in the background. Clearly this is the best card of the year, possibly second to the 1972 Topps Tom Seaver.


2) Having trouble deciding who this shirt is aimed at. A real Phillies fan would want nothing that looks like a Mets logo, just like I wouldn’t even consider anything reading "Yankees" on my body.

Maybe this is for a Phillies guy who knows he should be rooting for the Mets, but just can’t bring himself over to the right side.

Or maybe it’s for someone who lives in Jersey between both teams and is just, well, confused.


3) Speaking of shirts, I’m convinced that Cafe Press has a shirt for everything.

A little back story here. My daughter and her fifth-grade friends started a little elementary school publishing empire, producing books based on the same characters, Mr. Otter and Mr. Otter Jr.

One day I read one of her books and was startled to see a passage where Junior was unhappy that someone at a fast food restaurant incorrectly filled his kiddie meal order and casually circled the place and lobbed a hand grenade through the drive-through.

The rest of the book had other acts of random mischief that prompted my son to say that, if the book was made in to a video game, it would be called "Grand Theft Otter."

I was contemplating counseling until learning that the rest of the authors were boys and the body counts in their tomes was far higher, and my daughter was just writing to appeal to their tastes.

Nevertheless, the idea of casually tossing a grenade has become sort of a family inside joke.

Then poking around Cafe Press one day I discovered a design of an otter, holding a hand grenade. Part of me was horrified that someone else would link otters and explosives, and the other part wondered if we could sue for trademark violations.



4) My softball team picked up a little hardware this year. And we were so close to something so much bigger.

After demolishing our opening round opponent, we faced the goon squad of the league that, as far as I know, has never lost game. I also think they play dirty, so there is some bad blood there.

We were having the game of our lives, winning through the top of the sixth as the skies darkened. The thugs tied the game in the bottom of the sixth, and lightening started to flicker and thunder roared. After much debate and confusion, the umpires suspended the game.

We resumed a week later, missing some of our best players and still held the punks scoreless for two innings before finally allowing them to push across a run. It was a sad, sad day.

We fell apart in our second game that day, against my church’s other team, after our pitcher got hurt and I had to take the hill.

Alas we turned it on again for the last game, allowing us to claim third place in the consolation round. Our other church team claimed second place.

Usually such a finish will get you only a flier telling when next season’s league fees are due, so I was pretty happy when the umpire came over with a sweet plaque. Someday I’ll hand it over to the church. Someday.

5) Not sure how this happened. Not even sure it’s a good thing. But I’ll take it.

Silly Phillies fans shouldn't be allowed to buy jerseys

Wow, this Phillies fan has all sorts of issues.

Paul Lukas’ Uniwatch blog is required reading for a jersey fanatic like me.

On Thursday he posted a photo showing the folly of Phillies fans.

The intended target of the shot, I suppose, is the goofball wearing the jersey with "Mets Suck" where the player name and number is supposed to be.

So let’s start with him.

First, he’s wrong. The Mets don’t suck. They’re winning about as many games as they lose, so that makes them merely mediocre. The Nationals suck.

And if there is any fan who should know about sucking, it would be a Phillies fan, considering the franchise as recorded more losses than any other in baseball history. Yes, they’ve lost more than the Cubs.

So our Phillie fan is either incapable of reading the standings, can’t spell mediocre or was trying to save on lettering by using the shorter word.

Second, he’s spending a fair amount of money to be incorrect. That’s a replica jersey — you can tell by the lack of the MLB logo on the collar. A personalized replica goes for $89.99 on the MLB Web site. An authentic would cost him about $200.

Either way, that’s a lot of cash to drop on a taunt that loses its effectiveness once you step off an elementary school playground.

But why stop with the jersey? It appears our Phillies fan with more cash than smarts is carrying two water bottles into the stadium, one of which is nearly empty.

I’ve been to Cit-Bank Park, and I know for a fact there are water fountains and sinks that freely dispense water. Everyone knows that you can bring one water bottle inside, and refill it over and over rather than carrying two bottles. Dude, it’s all tap water.

And it’s not like he’s carrying a bottle for a friend. Because if you’re wearing a jersey like that, you have no friends.

There are actually all kinds of jersey horrors in there, which you would expect from Phillies fans. Take the women walking next to our hydrated fan.

She’s wearing a Chase Utley jersey. It’s a cheesy replica, which is bad enough. But it’s got the wrong style lettering and numbers. The Phillies have a distinctive font, and that’s not it.

If you’re going to spend that much money, why not get it right?

I know these things are expensive. But you can find bargains if you look and are patient. I got an authentic Johan Santana home alt with proper lettering and even the Shea Farewell patch for about $25 on eBay.

See the guy walking ahead of the goofball in the Ryan Howard jersey? Same sin, but with the alternative retro jersey. Only he’s stepped into a whole new area of shame by wearing the wrong cap. People, is it so hard to be coordinated?

Right next to him is a Red Sox fan — the Phils were playing Boston when this was taken — and he’s got issues, too.

The green cap is bad enough. I can’t see the number, but I know it’s a Red Sox jersey because of the red piping along the collar.

Drop down from there, and what do we see? As Suzyn Waldman would shriek. "OH MY GOODNESS GRACIOUS!" That’s a player name. The Red Sox are famous for not having the players names on their home jerseys.

Normally this is a sin associated with Yankee fans who feel the need to plant Derek F. Jeter’s name on the back of their jerseys where it is not supposed to exist. Don’t get me started on the ones who put RUTH back there.

But I expect that from Yankees fans. Red Sox Nation knows better, even teen-agers.

Before we call for a shunning of all Phillies fans, look at the guy on the left. Authentic alt retro jersey, properly lettered and numbered with the correct cap. You just know this guy keeps score and doesn’t yell "balk!" whenever the pitcher fakes the pick-off to third.

He should be allowed into the park. But no one else.