Dollar Hot Dog Night: The Return.

       As I pointed out in this very popular post from last month, I got my brother the same thing this year for his birthday as I did last year.  Oh, I usually get him tickets to a baseball game but this year I got him tickets to the same stadium with the same teams and the exact same promotion.  And oh what a promotion it is: dollar hot dog night!  But mother nature did her best to keep us from enjoying this glorious evening...

It rained on and off all day.  When we drove to the stadium, it started to pour.  As you can see, when we got there, the tarp was on the field.  There was hope though because there was a "window" - a small break where there was about two and a half hours of lighter rain and since it was supposed to pour all day Wednesday, it seems they were going to get this game in come hell or, um, high water.

At 8pm, around an hour after the game was supposed to start, they stated to take the tarp off the field.  This was by far the loudest cheer of the evening from the home crowd. 

You will notice in the upper left hand corner that they were showing the Flyers/Rangers game on the big screen.  This was the other highlight of the evening for the Philly fans as the Flyers would win the game (but alas, not the series).  Since I hate both of these teams, I was rooting for the meteor all series - but not this night since the Flyers play right next to Citizens Bank Park. 

How alike are my brother and I?  It took this deluge of rain for us to notice that we independently own matching raincoats.  Kinda sad but not the least bit surprising.  We also once bought the exact same pair of prescription sunglasses.  You'd think we came from the same gene pool or something and grew up in the same house.

An hour and an half rain delay meant that there were plenty of good seats available at game time.  The announced crowd was 28,000.  My guess is that maybe 5,000 were there at first pitch.  And I hold no grudge against any of them.  Anyone willing to sit out in this kind of rain and the 45 degree weather (oh, did I mention it was 45 fucking degrees out too? At the end of April?!?) is a hardcore baseball fan.  This made our seatmates, even though they were all Phillies fans, quite enjoyable.  No smack talk or jackasses at this game.  We were all in this together.

As for the game itself, Jonathon Niese obviously likes it cold and rainy because he pitched a wonderful game.  Seven innings of three hit ball, his only mistake a fastball to Marlon Byrd that was bone straight that went about 10 rows back in left field.

Niese's mound opponent did not take to the cold and wet as well.  Cole Hamels is a California boy and he looked it all night.  He was very uncomfortable and couldn't get a grip on the ball.  He walked the 8th and 9th hitters at one point to force in a run and I realized "hey, maybe this game could work out well for us..."

And in the end, it did.   By the seventh inning, we were the very last people in the third deck of the stadium (they had closed the upper deck early in the game) and the ushers asked us ever so politely to go to the field level so they could go home.  My brother and I obliged them and from there we watched the end of the game.   It was a real slog through the last few innings as the Mets bullpen decided to go 3-2 on what seemed like every batter.  Somehow, though, they did not give up anymore runs and the Mets won the game 6-1.  This was the first game my brother and I could recall in a very long time that the Mets won while we were in attendance.  My best guess at the last time they won one?  This game in Camden Yards in 2010.  By the end of the game, there were about 500 fans left in the stadium, half of them Mets fans.  Heck, there was more security people than fans by the end.  It was a nice, quick, happy ride home in the driving rain.  This might also be the first baseball game I have ever attended when I drank more hot cocoa than beer.

Oh, and what about the most important score of the night...who had more hot dogs?  Well...

This one was kind of over before it started.  My brother decided to go on Weight Watchers right after we decided to go to this game back in February, thus he only had three.  I, on the other hand, had seven just to break my mark of six from last year.  So yeah, I beat my brother handily in this department.  But I am also quite proud of his will power and of the 30 pound he has lost in that time.  Of course, when he complained about how cold it was at one point, I told him he would be a lot warmer with 30 more pounds of blubber on him.  Sometimes you can't win, huh?

Story Time.

       Today is my brother's birthday and I got him the exact same thing this year as I did last year (don't say I am not consistent).  I did get him a book as well to break up the monotony because nothing says excitement like a big thick encyclopedia full of statistics - this is not sarcasm, we are nerds after all.  But I also got him one of those odd piece-of-mind type gifts that might be a physical item for me but it is a grand affirmation for him and that is where our story begins. 

       Let's jump into the WABAC machine to 1987.  The Mets were reigning World Series champs and a man we call The Franchise had just retired.  I was 12 years old and deep into my obsession with collecting baseball cards and my brother had just gotten his drivers license.  It was a good time to alive in the suburbs of New Jersey.  If you know anything about Jersey, North Jersey especially, you know that kids hang out in the mall because there are like 7000 of them.  One of the late great stores of that era was called The Wiz  (and that little article told me that it still exists online, oh the power of the internets). Now, The Wiz was one of those all in one electronics stores, it sold video games, small appliances, stereo equipment, records, the works.  It was quirky as hell (though not even the quirkiest of local stores) and those not from around here might know it from Seinfeld (and Mets cards) and hell, fucking Joe Namath was their spokesman for a while.

And the jingle, oh my god the jingle.  Frozen in time in 1987 but still so damn catchy that I will hum it at the weirdest times and basically at the mere mention of the word Wiz.  I am going to embed the video to share the earworm.

So now you have the background of how my brother, The Wiz, Tom Seaver, and my Mets all come together.  I don't remember where I heard it, but sometime in the summer of 1987, Tom Seaver was going to sign free autographs at the Garden State Plaza in Paramus.  This was a big deal.  The word was all over the place and I wanted to go.  Oh dear god did I want to go.  My memory is a little fuzzy as to why, but my mother would not take me.  I am going to go out on a limb and guess I was grounded for something (I was a tad rebellious at the age of 12).  I was crestfallen, crushed.  But there was hope - hope in the shape of my brother and his drivers license.  He could get me my Tom Seaver autograph.  Remember, this was before the internet and 1000 insert cards and before every kind of player went to card shows to sign; Seaver being recently retired meant he was not part of the old timers brigade like Mickey Mantle that dominated the shows of the time.  In my mind, this was my only chance to ever get a Tom Seaver autograph ever.  So I turned to my brother...now, he was 17 and could go anywhere and do anything he wanted with his new found freedom, so doing a favor for his pain in the ass little brother that did not involve girls and/or beer was not high on his list of priorities.  I begged, pleaded, cajoled, and several other synonyms of nagged my poor brother until I wore him down.   He did not collect sports memorabilia with the fervor that I did but he was a huge Mets fan and I think in the end the notion of getting to meet Tom Seaver, if ever so briefly, changed his mind.  So he went to The Wiz in Paramus on a Sunday afternoon and it was an absolute mob scene.  Apparently every little Mets fan around had somehow convinced his mother to go.  My brother parked liked a million miles away and waited on line for over two hours and his interaction with Tom Seaver was a nanosecond of recognition and hardly a glance.  But he got me my autograph.  He got it on a 1987 Topps Tom Seaver card that I had just gotten.  An odd choice, yes, but I was a kid and really, all I wanted was Seaver's autograph on something, anything.  I remember every square inch of that card.  The day game shadows on Tom's Boston away uniform.  The blue sharpie that kind of tilted ever so slightly on the signature.  It was a great autograph.  And my brother got it for me.  And believe me, he didn't let me forget it.  I had that card very prominently displayed among my things and for weeks and months afterward, my brother would guilt me about going through the throngs of barbarian hoards to get me my Tom Seaver autograph.  And I was grateful. Really, I was.  So damned grateful that a year later I traded it to my friend Jared.

Wait, WHAT?!?!??

Let's tilt the lever of the WABAC ahead a smidgen to a year later.  I was hanging out with my friend Jared at his apartment and I had brought my baseball binder full of all my favorite cards.  Now, Jared was a bigger Mets fan than I was.  Hell, Jared might be the biggest Mets fan of all time.  When he turned 13, he didn't have a bar mitzvah, he had a bar Metsvah, that should tell you all you need to know.  When Jared heard that I had Tom Seaver autograph, he wanted it.  I told him I would never trade it.  I spent the entire day in his house that day and we just talked about baseball cards and how much he wanted that card.  Eventually, he wore me down. 

He laid out all his cards and let me pick out whichever ones I wanted.  He talked up all his cards.  He talked down the Seaver autograph - heck it wasn't even on a Mets card, why would I want it?  He was a master manipulator; he knew what he wanted.  And eventually he got it.  And sadly, I don't remember most of the cards I traded for it.  I do remember a 1975 Harmon Killebrew being involved because that is an awesome card.  I remember maybe some Pete Rose cards involved and some Mets doubles he had.  The point was, I just traded a dollar for 10 nickles.  I was weak or perhaps Jared was just strong.  He was a smart kid and I somehow imagine him a high profile lawyer or something now.  We lost touch not long after this trade and I wouldn't blame the trade, per se, but I had moved away from the town he lived in and that's just how friendship works when you are 13.  Out of sight, out of mind.

What was not out of mind was the fact that I had just traded away what was the cornerstone of my collection.  I regretted the decision immediately.  Oh, and my brother.  My brother has NEVER let me forget it.   You did what??!?!??!?  He was mad then and he is still pretty miffed now if the subject comes up.  What was probably the nicest thing my brother had done for me up to that point and I had just given that away.  And what's worse, I gave it away for stuff I cannot even remember.

I think my brother has reason to be kinda pissed.  Though that Killer is pretty sweet.

Let's fast forward to a couple weeks ago.  I was searching Listia aimlessly and I stumbled upon this listing.  To end the suspense, it was this:

It couldn't possibly be.  I emailed the seller as to how he obtained this card.  I asked him about 100 other questions about it.  He didn't have a lot of answers.  He did have many other signed raw cards online.  I compared this card to a few other Seaver autographs.  It's not perfect, but then again, when Seaver was scribbling a bazillion autographs at The Wiz in 1987, his autograph wasn't perfect then either.  The odds that this is the same card are practically nil as I still imagine Jared somewhere clutching and loving that card more than his family.  I didn't care.  I decided it was fate, I must have it.  And I won it.  And earlier in the week, I opened an envelope and there it was, after 26 years in the desert.  Now, like I said, I am quite certain that this is not the same card my brother got me but to me, it is a symbol.  A representation of a small but very specific kind of redemption and affirmation.  I have had it sitting on top of a pile of cards that I see every day when I wake up and seeing it never doesn't make me smile.  I hope my brother can forgive me my impetuous nature at the age of 13.  I hope my brother knows how much I appreciate not only the fact that he got this card for me, but about a million other things he has done in time as my big brother that have gone above and beyond the call of duty.  I hope somewhere Jared is happy with his card, but for me, this card is much better...I re-earned a piece of my soul by obtaining this card.  Happy Birthday, bro

Father's Day.

       Father's Day is not my favorite greeting card holiday.  Last year, I was feeling sort of morose and gave the five cent version of why and then was pretty negative to the cards I featured.  Well, this year, I have decided to accentuate the positive.  It is quite an exciting time in my family because my brother and his wife are expecting their first child in about six weeks.  Not only will this be the start of the next generation, it will be the first time someone will be happily referred to as "Dad" in this family in decades.  Needless to say, I am very excited for my brother and he is, well, he is scared shitless.  In honor of his impending paternal status, I have decided to highlight my player collection of his favorite player, Keith Hernandez. 

Let's start off with the nine pocket pages:

These are the faux vintage reprint cards.  For such a popular player, it sure seems like there is not a ton of these out there like some other players of similar stature. 

There in the middle you see some great before and after shots of Keith's mustache.  It was quite a big deal last year when he shaved it off.  In fact, his upper lip is still naked and it still looks weird.

See what I mean about not a lot of the new stuff featuring him?  I have a rare empty spot.

Let's get to the section with his playing days.  First off, a page of him on the Indians, a stage of his career that he and all of us would like to pretend never happened. 

The less said about him in a Cleveland uniform, the better.

Here we go, he's in the blue and orange of the boys from Flushing, much better.

The second 1989 Topps card here is a box bottom card, which is baby blue and alas, did not scan well.  Those cards really looked sharp.

The 1959 style card on this next page is from Baseball Cards magazine.  He looks pretty panicked that they picked pink for the border, I think he has a point.  

If it seems Keith has a lot of cards showing him fielding, you're right...and he should. He won 11 straight gold gloves and it is one of the rare cases where a player deserved every single one of them.  He was an artist at first base who practically redefined the way the position is played.

Keith was named the first team captain of the Mets back in 1987. If you look closely, you will notice that on the 1988 Score card he has a 'C' on his jersey.  While I have seen it a few times since, I hadn't seen that in baseball before. 

Hey look! A decent scan of a Sportflix card, you can almost see an actual picture there.

If you check out this picture, you'll see his 1986 Topps All Star card in the background along with former Mets teammate and fellow Met broadcaster Bobby Ojeda.  I know if I had a baseball card, I would keep them around like that too.

It kind of makes sense to have Keith Hernandez featured on Father's Day for me.  My father was a dude with a mustache who could kind of be a dick and Keith is, well...he's had his moments.  My mom liked dudes with mustaches and intimated to me when I was a kid that she also liked Keith's butt.  That would theoretically make that 1984 Topps card a favorite of hers.

Keith was traded from the Cardinals to the Mets in 1983 for two stiffs because of his love of the nose candy.  It was one of the rare cases cocaine did something good for the Mets. 

I have no idea where I got that 1981 OPC card, but I am glad I own it. You can see on the 1978 Topps card there that he is not 100% sold on the mustache.

I remember buying this 1987 Star set from a kiosk in the Paramus Park mall when I was 12 years old.  Why do I remember that so vividly yet I cannot recall important events of my life?  Or even where 90% of the other cards in this collection came from...sigh. 

So those are the pages, but since I am on a roll, let's go into the shoe boxes to see what other goodies I have.

Right off the bat, I have his rookie and the mini.  That mini is really well centered, considering I have seen that card in all sorts of alignment disarray. 

I also have a nice big bat piece and a very handsome autograph.  Not only is it on card, but it looks splendid; you can make out every letter in his name.  That is a quality signature.

Wow, I have a lot of bat cards but no jersey cards.  I should pick one up eventually so I can fill out the quad.

That Team Tribute card with Gary Carter and Lenny Dykstra is all sorts of shiny.  Sadly, the scan does not do it justice.  The quote they used for the Bazooka card is very amusing.  Keith is, of course, famous for his love of the night life to the point where he dated Elaine on Seinfeld.  I hope I don't have to explain that to you.  If I do, you might be reading the wrong blog.  

Some nice low numbered shiny here:

Those Pristine cards look fantastic, too bad Topps felt the need to hide them in gigantic sealed special holders.  I usually bust those out; I have no idea why I left this in its uncirculated prison. 

A couple of inserts of him on the wrong team again:

That is his 1983 Topps Traded card, which was featured in the pages, so I guess I have two of them.  Anyone want to trade for that one?

Finally, a few more nice inserts:

Those Topps Super Teams refractors are pretty much the ultimate in shiny cards ever.  Damn, I adore that set.  The Dynasty Card there has Gary Carter and Dwight Gooden on the front.  I remember having endless arguments in my youth with Yankees fans over who was the better first baseman, Keith Hernandez or Don Mattingly and who would make it into the hall of fame first.  Sadly, the unfortunate answer to that particular question is: neither. 

That's my Keith Hernandez player collection. There are some cards I'd like to add to it, but I think it is pretty comprehensive.  I now leave you with the immortal words of Ralph Kiner - "It's Father's Day today at Shea, so to all you fathers out there, Happy Birthday."

Laborious.

       It's funny, sometimes I sit down at the keyboard to do a post and the words flow like endless rain into a paper cup (to steal a line).  For example, I did the walk off one from the other day in no time - I had a "moment" watching baseball highlights on TV, and I sat down and wrote about it.  Also, the other night I had one idea, switched gears midway, and it all came out no problem...this post has been sadly underread, go look at it, I'll wait... Did I mention it's a drunk post? (I cannot become one of those people who can only write when he drinks).  Even some of the longer, more specific and involved posts that took a week or more to write came pretty easy.  But right now, I have been sitting here for half an hour looking at a blank screen and you know what?  I got nothing.  I understand that no one really wants to read about the writing process and even fewer want to indulge an author trying to work through writer's block by writing about it, so I am gonna shut the hell up about it and just grab a few random scans out of the 'unused' folder.  Maybe the muses will conspire for me better tomorrow.

This is a very recent scan.  I promised to show this page when I wrote a trade post after my near month long hiatus.   I simply adore the 1994 Fleer design, so simple, so effective.  And like most simple, effective designs, it works both horizontally and vertically.  I can't decide which I like more.  In fact, I might have to make two pages of these, one for each.  Looks like I gotta update the wantlist again.

I am not sure why I scanned this page, but damn is it cool.  Upper Deck loved their multi-exposure photos in the early 90's.  The Canseco and Valenzuela work best, I think, but the Griffey is probably the most famous one, that or the 1989 Nolan Ryan (not shown on this page).  The other thing that this page reminds me of is the recent State Farm commercial with Kerry Wood.  If you have seen it, you should know what I am talking about; if you haven't, go watch it, it's damn amusing. 

I also could not for the life of me tell you why I scanned this page of John Olerud cards.  I have two pages of Olerud in my retired stars book and I only scanned this one for some reason.  Very odd.  I recently got into a big argument with my brother about John Olerud.  It would help you to know that my brother's favorite baseball player of all time is Keith Hernandez and he will rant to whomever will listen how Hernandez belongs in the Hall of Fame.  My argument was that Olerud was a superior player to Hernandez and no one of sound mind can make a strong, legitimate case that he belongs in Cooperstown, so how could Hernandez belong?  Now, I am not even sure I believe this, but the argument really drove my brother crazy.  My instincts as the younger brother to constantly tweak and antagonize my older brother have not dulled with age. 

 I do know why I scanned this page of J.R. Richard.  I have been kicking around the idea of doing a series of posts about players who were either complete failures, or players who didn't live up to their potential due to unfortunate circumstances, or some combination of the two.  James Rodney here would obviously fall into the latter category.  If you look at his statistics, if he didn't have that stroke, he probably would have had a career along the lines of Bob Gibson or Jim Palmer.  He was that good.

Whoa, I actually know why I scanned this page as well.  When I was writing my opening day post, I wanted to use the word "moments" so I scanned both pages of Milestones and Moments that I have and chose one and threw the other into the 'unused' folder hoping to find another use for it.  I am racking my brain here and I can't figure out any reason I would use this page unless I wrote a post about "crappy overpriced crappity crap crap."  Hey!  Maybe I should write that one down, it sounds like a good idea.

This page was also scanned for the aforementioned opening day post.  I scanned two pages of Play Ball and used the faux vintage one rather than this page of straight reprints.  I wouldn't have wanted anyone to get the idea that I was hoarding a page of near mint cards from 1941 and just casually using it in a post without paying it any mind.  A while back, I went through a brief (and expensive) infatuation with vintage Play Ball cards.  Looking back, like any lost love, it was worth it, even though almost all of those cards I had are now gone. 

Last but certainly not least is this page of 1999 SP Signature Edition autographs.  At the same time I went through my vintage Play Ball phase, I also became enamored of this set.  It was brand new at the time and, being an autograph-in-every-pack type product, it was very expensive.  I probably bought the equivalent of a case of this stuff.  I would sell the really good hits to fund my purchase of more packs and boxes; it was a vicious cycle.  And while I pulled a lot of the high end cards, I never did get my white whale.  I don't own a Mike Piazza autograph at all (they are quite rare) and I think this is the nicest one of the few that are out there.  Once every couple of months, I still get (and try to resist) the urge to blow $100-$150 on this Piazza.  Until I do finally give in, I have this page of lesser stars and rookies to keep me satisfied.  You will probably see this page again since I am sure I could easily do a whole post out of it, but for now, showing it here means my 'unused' folder is empty and I have no more "writer's block" crutches to fall back on.

Life, The Universe, and Everything.

       I was going to call this post "The Answer" but I didn't want you to think it was about Allen Iverson (an athlete I have a lot of opinions about, but that will be a whole different post).  If you are the nerd that I am, you already know the answer to life, the universe, and everything: 42.  I will let google field the queries for the uninformed on that one, but beyond its literary connotations, the number 42 has a very important meaning in baseball.

In 1997, baseball took the unprecedented step of retiring the #42 throughout Major League Baseball in honor of Jackie Robinson (something that subsequently hockey did to the #99 for Wayne Gretzky and football did for the #32 for OJ Simpson - wait, I might be wrong on that second one).  Now, I am all for the love and adoration that Jackie Robinson gets as a man.  If I have to tell you what he did and what he went through, I have to question your reading of a baseball blog.  What gets lost in all of his humanitarian accolades is the fact that he was one hell of a ball player.  In a beautiful imaginary world where Cap Anson didn't conspire to ban Fleetwood Walker and blacks always played in MLB, Jackie Robinson would be remembered as one of the great smooth roughhouse ballplayers of all time.  From everything I have read and seen, he was a thing to behold.  He ran without fear, hit the ball hard to all fields, and fielded his position like a dancer.  Just remember during all the hullabaloo this weekend that Jackie Robinson was not only a great human being, he was one of the all time greats between the lines.

       After baseball retired the #42, any player wearing it was "grandfathered" in and allowed to wear it until they retired.  As players wearing it slowly disappeared, only Mariano Rivera was left.  Then a few years ago, some players started wearing it on Jackie Robinson Day as a tribute.  Then, baseball let all of the players wear it.  While some have bemoaned the recent fetishism of all the players wearing #42 on Jackie Robinson Day, this year, it has personally worked to my advantage.  My brother's birthday is at the end of March and my usual birthday present to him is to get him tickets to a baseball game.  These tickets almost always involve our team, the Mets...and we don't only go to Mets games in Queens, we have been up and down the eastern seaboard.  When I lived in Boston, we went to Fenway.  We went to the Bronx and saw the second Mets/Yanks game ever.  We went to Baltimore and Camden Yards - twice! - and last year we went to Washington.  This year, we will go to Philly and see their ballpark and those (now very hated) Phillies.  Also this year, I specifically chose Jackie Robinson Day.  First off, because I have never been to Jackie Robinson Day.  But secondly and far more importantly, this year my brother turned 42.  That's right, this year, my gift to my brother is not only seats to a Major League Baseball game, but I "arranged" it so all the players would wear his age on his back.  Happy Birthday Bro!