Mr. Met....He's Just Like You!

...He rides the elevator!

Took this picture during my first game-day visit to the new stadium last night, at which I ate a Shake Shack burger, downed a beer, shivered a bit, enjoyed exploring a bit more, and, let's see, what else? Oh yes, saw them lose. Again. Meaning my in-person record since Game 7 of the 2006 NLCS has got to be somewhere around 2-12. Literally. For a team that consistently finishes well over .500, that's extraordinary. Please, keep me the hell away from Citi Field, no matter how much I beg and plead.

By the way, the story behind the above picture is amusing. We saw Mr. Met wandering around the centerfield concourse near "Catch of the Day," when he suddenly ducked into an elevator. As I saw him standing there with his "handlers," waiting patiently for the doors to close like some stockbroker on his way to work on a Monday morning, I thought it would make a hilarious picture. So I scrambled to get the shot, but the doors started closing. I snapped it anyway, and was sure that all I got was a picture of a closed elevator door, and cursed myself for missing the opportunity. Of course, when I looked at my camera, I saw the picture you see above. I don't know, I find it hilarious for some reason.

Now, on to Citi Field. As you know, the big complaints lately have been the lack of "Met-ness" in the joint. "You can't even tell the Mets play here," the people are screaming. And looking around last night, these complainers have a point. Nope, I didn't see any indication that the Mets play here. None. Absolutely none. None at all. None whatsoever. How pathetic.

Moving on, we had some ridiculous seats last night, as you can see from this shot. I used to sit in the RF field level seats a lot at Shea, but here it basically felt like we were actually ON the field. (In fact, if this had been Shea, that where these seats would have been - on the field). Definitely got a great view of the whole place, save the far, far RF corner. But I'll take it. Oh, and we were a mere two rows - TWO! - from "Chad" the ballboy, who got roundly abused by the fans near us all game long. Poor bastard.

I must also profess my love for the center field concourse - not just for Shake Shack and Blue Smoke, both of which are great (had my first Shack Burger last night - drool....), but the whole atmosphere out there is really nice. I especially like the back of the scoreboard, which you can see here. I'm looking forward to spending more time out here when it's warmer. Oh, and as an added treat, we bumped into Danny Meyer himself, whom I never would have recognized had it not been for my dad, a true foodie. In fact, no one else seemed to recognize him either, which allowed us to chat him up for a few minutes in front of the Taqueria. Nice fella. Even let me take a pic of him with Toasty, Sr., which you can see here.

Ahh, and as for the game itself? In what has become a running theme this season, my answer is this: "Meh." On the plus side, the bullpen was outstanding, and you can live with getting shut down (save for the first inning) by one of the best pitchers in baseball. On the down side, Maine completely fell apart, and getting dominated by Heath Bell is no kind of fun at all. But hey, even if the Mets aren't playing well, at least you can enjoy a good Shake Shack burger. I know it's true because Danny Meyer told me so. (seriously, he did).