Only our beloved Mets could have a better off-season then regular season and give fans hope for the future without actually DOING anything yet!! My own excitement has been fanned by seeing the amazing film, "The Last Play at Shea" last week, along with 2 other major events - first, the possibility of the Mets hiring a great new General Manager (either Sandy Alderson or Josh Byrnes), and second, the losses of the Yankees & Philthies in the play-offs!
"The Last Play at Shea" - 4 days later, and I STILL haven't gotten over seeing this film!!!
I began life in Woodhaven, Queens, then moved to Long Island at the tender age of 6 (almost 7), and finished my time in New York by living in Manhattan for 7 years, until moving to Southern California. During my time in NY, I LIVED through everything in this movie- seeing the many ups and downs of the Mets first-hand, attending my first game in 1968 with my grandfather and dad...thrilled at the excitement of New York in 1969 after the unlikely World Series win...taking my love of the Mets with me to Long Island when I had to make new friends, happy to have Seaver, Koosman and Grote along for the ride...attending games down the stretch during the Mets second amazing run in 1973...playing hooky from college while attending my first Play-Off and World Series games in 1986, while learning that a few very lucky breaks might mean more then having the most talent in the battle...and growing from teenager into manhood while listening to the amazing music of one Billy Joel, to the tune of seeing the "Piano Man" 41 times live in concert! My cousin Michael (whom I attended the movie with) said it best, to Billy himself - "Billy, you wrote the soundtrack to my life!"
I'm exactly the same age as Shea Stadium (although I hope to live a LOT longer then our former home) and the Mets and Billy have remained 2 of my biggest loves, and sources of frustration, for the better part of my existence. The Mets frustration isn't hard to figure out; my frustration with Billy is mostly due to the fact that he's released no new material in 17 years. As one of my best friends said, it was Billy Joel, NOT Bruce Springsteen, who should have been the one to release an album like "The Rising" as BILLY was/is the quintessential New York musician. (No hate from Springsteen lovers- I am ONE of YOU, having seen Bruce over 30 times as well as remaining in love with "The Rising.") Watching this movie, you just KNEW that one of the producers or writers had to be a Mets fan - and sure enough, after the movie finished, a panel followed (at the ArcLight Theater) including the writer, director, and 2 producers, one of whom- of course- is an avowed Met fanatic!! Only a true Mets fan would be fascinated by head groundskeeper, Pete Flynn, and the producers told a great story about how Pete had driven the Beatles to the stage in 1965, and had to be "cajoled" to stay around to drive a late-arriving Paul McCartney to the stage on the 2nd and final night of Joel's concert.
It's the small details that make this movie so personal, from interviews with Mets legends Tom Seaver & Mike Piazza to candid comments from Paul McCartney and Joel himself, and these are the things that make this movie so appealing to both Mets' fans and Billy Joel fans alike. So much of my own life was represented in this film, and I'm sure that many of you can lay claim to the same. I can't wait until this movie is released on DVD in February, and due to featuring 4 of the most beloved components of my life so far- Billy Joel, The Beatles, The Mets and New York- in the same movie, (as well as being an amazing film in it's own right) this film automatically gets
The Yankees & Philthies LOSE!!!Sometimes a win is THE most fulfilling thing in the world...but in this case, two losses can be just as fulfilling, especially when it's the hated Yankees and Phillies that are doing the losing! Yes, you can say "at least they got there" but after years of falling short and failing at the end of the season ('06, '07, '08) it's nice to see the same thing happen to the two most-hated teams by Mets fans alike!! Throw in the Braves' first round exit, and the play-offs got more fulfilling by the round!! Furthermore, it's great for baseball that 2 teams that have never won a World Series in their current cities will be able to cut that down to 1 team...whichever way it goes, it'll be an exciting series for baseball fans, and both teams have strong ties to the Mets- the Rangers are run by a Met fan (Jon Daniels) and a former Met World Series hero (Nolan Ryan), and the Giants move to San Francisco created the need for the Mets in the first place, not to mention the fact that we borrowed the orange and the NY symbol from their uniforms. Here's hoping for an exciting, 7-game season and may the best team win!!!
The GM Field Narrowed Down to Two
Although it was surprising that early favorite, Chicago's Rick Hahn, didn't make it to the final cut, it ends up making sense that the 2 finalists, Sandy Alderson and Josh Byrnes, have the most GM experience (forget Allard Baird- GM-ing in Kansas City during those years hardly counts as professional work- LOL) and have basically built/rebuilt organizations. It would seem that Alderson is the easy, and correct, pick to make, but there's always the chance that the Mets might go for the younger/cheaper route and select Byrnes, in light of the fact that the Diamondbacks are on the hook for 5 more years of salary to Byrnes which would cost the Mets far less then hiring Alderson would. Here's guessing that in this case, the monetary "easy way out" will NOT be the one that the Wilpons select, and Commissioner Bud Selig will make an exception and allow the Mets to announce that they are hiring Alderson some time late this week in spite of the news embargo during the World Series. Alderson is capable of rebuilding the entire Mets organization, and quickly, and brings with him the same cache' that previous GM Frank Cashen did almost 30 years ago.
In sum, a challenging and disappointing season is so far giving way towards a much more fulfilling off-season...let's hope the "magic" continues!!
Moral of the Story: Sometimes it's the "story" AFTER the "story" that matters most...
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