Opening Day

After an absence that spanned from June 2010 until April 2013, I made my first trip to Citi Field for the Mets home opener on Monday afternoon. My friend Danny invited me and I happily accepted his kind offer and found myself quite excited to hit up a home Mets game. I grew up going to Shea Stadium 4 or 5 times a season, and in my late 20's and early 30's went to anywhere from 25-85 games a year, including some classic playoff games. Even after I moved to Cambridge, MA I drove down frequently to attend big games in the 2007 and 2008 seasons.

Things started changing in 2009. Instead of being eliminated on the last day of the regular season as they had been in 2007 and 2008, the 2009 season was one without much drama. Additionally, my family had fewer tickets at the much hyped Citi Field because of a major spike in the prices. And three, the seats we had at Shea were much better than the ones we had at Citi Field. I went to about 3 games at Citi in 2009, the previously mentioned one in 2010 and sat out all of 2011 and 2012. This was clearly the longest drought between home games for me since I was 5 years old or so.

Citi Field is a tough place for me. Shea Stadium felt like home. Citi Field feels like a stadium named after a bank. To afford a game you need to be willing to invest a large sum of money. The amount of advertising at the place is hard to stomach, and from a baseball perspective, the sightlines are awful.

We sat in the left field Promenade (Upper Deck) on Monday about half way up. At no point, could we see the left fielder when he was positioned defensively for an upcoming pitch. A key moment in the game, a grand slam to left field by newcomer Colin Cowgill was made more (less?) interesting and exciting to us, when the screaming line drive he hit disappeared and we watched him slide into 3rd base with an apparent triple. A few seconds later the umpire signaled it was a home run. The replay, shown in hi def on "Citi Vision", which Citi Field goers have come to rely on to make up for the bad sightlines, cut off the replay just a moment before the ball cleared the wall, adding a sense of irony and humor to the blind spots we all deal with.

I don't mean to come off as a complainer in this post. In fact, I had a great time on Monday. I was with 4 people very dear to me, the sun was out most of the game, and the Mets got a win. The company I shared was the true measuring stick of the day and I left the stadium in a great mood.

Someday perhaps, I will feel at home at Citi Field. Maybe what  it needs to shake the current feel of commercial sterility is to be the venue for a spectacular Mets run to the World Series. Or perhaps, I will never get used to it and will watch the Mets on TV and listen to the radio more than I ever have. If that's the case, my retirement will probably be much more well funded, but a big part of the first 40 years of my life will take a back seat in the second half of my life.

Whatever happens, I will keep you updated.