In this combination book review and front office editorial, I am going to critique both Steve Kettmann’s recent book about Sandy Alderson and the Sandman himself (disclaimer: he is not called Sandman in the book, but do not let that influence your purchasing decision). Alderson has had a long and varied career. He has graduated both Dartmouth and Harvard, been a Marine officer, Vietnam veteran, corporate lawyer, world championship general manager in Oakland, MLB chief executive of baseball operations, the CEO who brought in the fences in San Diego, MLB Latin American coordinator, and finally, off what had to be some kind of a bender, he decided to come to New York to take over the Mets in the fall of 2010.

I was doing the Mets Annual at the time and there was so much said about how wonderful a move it was going to be and the Mets were going to build the right way, from the ground up. Some of his trades of veterans for prospects have gone from highly-criticized to brilliant maneuvers in short order—his R.A. Dickey to Toronto for Travis d’Arnaud and Noah Syndergaard is up there with the fleecing of the Blue Jays of John Olerud in the 1996 offseason. But what the Mets really need right now is a Johnny O. They need a game changer in the middle of the lineup, not just for this year but for however long this window of opportunity is open for the Mets—or will be allowed to remain open by ownership. The money part is not his fault—the Wilpons never even uttered the name “Madoff” in their interview with him in 2010. There are plenty of other things that are Alderson’s fault.

Just look at Friday night’s game against the Dodgers, at which I was, unfortunately, in attendance. The wives of both of Friday night’s starting pitchers, Jon Niese and Zack Grienke, had babies that night. Grienke was in California for the birth. Niese was in the bowels of Citi Field watching it on FaceTime after being rocked by the Dodgers. L.A.’s emergency starter, Ian Thomas, who looks a lot like Clayton Kershaw facially and the way he handles the Mets, pitched great. The Mets emergency starter, Carlos Torres, pitched three superb innings—only they came in mop up after Niese missed both the chance for a win and to see the birth of his second child.

As GM this is what you do: You tell Niese congratulations and inform him he’ll pitch in the new Dad Sunday special against Grienke and then have a PR lackey escort him 10 minutes to the airport. You take the high road. You do the right thing and maybe you pull out as unlikely win as happened last Sunday when the Mets won Niese’s start 18 innings after it began. Apparently, Alderson was too involved scooping up the unwanted debris from the Braves bench (Juan Uribe and Kelly Johnson) to have taken a leadership position, and you can’t expect Terry Collins to make a decision that comes out right.

One of the revelations of former San Francisco Chronicle beat writer Steve Kettmann’s well-researched book on Alderson, is that the “Baseball Maverick” himself actually thought about firing Terry Collins last summer. He did not. It leads to me to a quote about Alderson from the author that is both impressive and frightening: “A Marine never retreats.” You’d think that facing overwhelming odds and after slowing the enemy, retreat would be possible if the other option was complete annihilation. And not to mix my war and baseball metaphors, but the Mets are on the verge of being completely overrun. Their skeleton crew cannot hold off a superior force, which is pretty much any team with a pulse, and Colonel Collins needs to be relieved of command if they plan to keep this hill of contention.

If Alderson and the Mets aren’t careful, a season that has featured some of the best Mets pitching I have seen since the mid-1980s will be washed away amid the increasing number of shutouts—not by the Mets’ overpowering staff, but by the opposition throwing up zeroes on this creampuff lineup. The Mets have been blanked 11 times in their first 96 games, and that doesn’t even count Niese’s start against in St. Louis where his team was held scoreless for the first 13 innings before they somehow scraped together a win in 18.

I will bypass the author—whom, I will add, did not write this book with Alderson, other than talking to him dozens of times—and I will speak to the GM directly. Sandy Alderson, you have built up an impressive résumé getting to this point, but it won’t mean diddley in terms of New Yorkers or anyone else if the Mets go down in flames and continue to be the worst offensive team with the best pitching. (Baseball-reference’s simple rating system lists the Mets as the 22nd best team in baseball. However that is derived, it can’t be good.)

If the Mets continue to languish, or make excuses about playing the tougher teams (imagine who they’d play if God took pity on us, and Sandy, and randomly tossed the Mets into October), or if the team does not take advantage of the lousy division and the lousy way Washington has played, then it shouldn’t just be the roster or the manager’s office that needs shaking up.

You need to do something substantial that does not gut your future but assures it. You need to put your signature on a prospects for veterans deal like you have the veterans for prospects deals that have been your forte in New York. You need to do something before this season gets away. A baseball maverick would.

In this, my 40th year following the Mets, I have seen a team that reminds me a lot of that first team I ardently watched in 1975: great pitching, abysmal hitting, though the ’75 crew at least had Dave Kingman slugging home runs and Yogi Berra managing. Never a huge fan of Yogi, but even my fourth grade self would concur that he had a lot less reason to be fired than Terry Collins. I’ll save my summation of Collins for the end. But while it’s hanging there let me say this: If you are going to play all these 2-1 and 1-0 games, you need a manager who can occasionally steal such games by making good decisions. Yanking Jacob deGrom at 99 pitches after retiring 15 in a row and then letting Noah Syndergaard throw 116 pitches in the next game makes absolutely no sense. So much for not saying much here about T.C.

The Mets enter the All-Star break on a 7-2 surge, but they entered the break with an 8-2 push last year and it did not end in glory. If they score four runs they win. And they average 3.48 per game, second worst in baseball, and only two runs behind the Phillies for that distinction. Imagine if the Mets played in the DH league? They’d have no offense since their pitchers are some of their most consistent batters. They must find more hitters. And they must find who they can afford to get rid of. Squandering this pitching would be worse than squandering being 10 games over .500 just 16 games into the year, as this team already did. They must play better on the road. They ended the first half one game out of the second wild card. One game behind the Cubs, a team they inexplicably went 0-7 against. They are just 8-15 vs. the Central, but are tied with Washington for most wins in the NL East (23-15) and trail the Nationals by two games. Enough! To the grading.

To be included, players must accrue 50 at bats or 15 innings pitched. This prevents Stephen Matz, Logan Verrett, Bobby Parnell, Jack Leatherstich, Rafael Montero, Buddy Carlyle, Jerry Blevins, Akeel Morris, Jenrry Mejia, Johnny Monell, and Danny Muno from getting grades. Hopefully all the pitchers will qualify for a writeup at year’s end. And the hitters get replaced by people who can hit. David Wright deserves a writeup because the end may be near. But right now the only end is the first half.

First-half 2014 Report Card

Jacob deGrom     A       Not the best stuff on staff, but deGrom performs, perseveres, and adjusts. Good job, All-Star.

Jeurys Familia      A       Should be All-Star and first half MVP. Stepped up for Mejia. He’s reason they have winning record.

Noah Syndergaard   A-       As good as advertised. If only Mets could score for him or bat him cleanup. Best. Shrug. Ever.

Matt Harvey        B+      Harvey could learn a lot from kids. Like how to shut up and pitch. Harvey has the mojo, though.

Bartolo Colon       B+     Said it last year, I’ll say it again: Bartolo is entertaining and effective. Good role model, batting star.

Jonathon Niese     B       I love how Matz has higher WAR in just 2 starts than Niese in a whole season. Jonny Trade Bait.

Sean Gilmartin      B       Has great numbers, but I don’t trust him. Maybe I’ve only seen his bad games. Good Rule V guy.

Wilmer Flores       B       An offensive guy on the list. Finally. But if Wilmer he does not play shortstop, he is not as valuable.

Daniel Murphy      B-      I don’t believe Murph will be here after 2015, but with Wright, who knows? They need any hitter.

Travis d’Arnaud     C+    He is getting a reputation as constantly hurt player. Mets need him to catch or they’ll go nowhere.

Curtis Granderson     C+     A .119 average vs. LHP; .163 BA in July. Walks and hits solo HRs. Can’t believe 2 1/2 more years.

Eric Goeddell         C+     Thought former UCLA stud was out of the system and here he is excelling at Citi, when not hurt.

Lucas Duda          C       Stop swinging at pitches in the dirt! Let them walk you. Not your fault Cuddyer bats behind you.

Michael Cuddyer    C       Must be good clubhouse because he’s bad middle of order. Poor use of limited resources, Sandy.

Juan Lagares        C       Has taken a step back on defense and offense. Hope it’s just the elbow; hope it will one day heal.

Kevin Plawicki        C       I like a kid who is from Purdue, is a hard worker, and plays through vertigo. But he needs to hit.

Carlos Torres        C       Lucky his arm ddn’t fall off in 2014 from TC abuse. Manager runs CT out there despite results.

Alex Torres           C      Like Carlos, you don’t know which Torres will come out of pen. Hard to trust, but good when on.

Ruben Tejada       C-     If Tejada is your regular SS, you are not playoff team. Even front office hates him, yet he stays.

Dilson Herrera       D+    Got in a slump, but gets on base and can play defense. Problems would be solved if he played SS.

Kirk Nieuwenhuis    D+     A year ago he had B- at ASG. I thought he should play LF. This year he had F till 3 HR Sunday.

Darrel Ceciliani        D+    Not a fan. It’s nice to have speed, but I’d rather have Nieuwy, with the K’s and sudden power.

Anthony Recker     D      Another guy stuck in Vegas. Can’t hit, but which Met can? Brings chance of power every 4 days.

Hansel Robles        D      You know Mets are getting better when their bad relievers look like him. Familia started slow, too.

John Mayberry      D-     Won a game with extra-inning hit and his dad was a KC stud. Other than that he’s been worthless.

Eric Campbell         D-     Can you believe EC was hitting .340 at 2014 ASG? Looked great during April run, abysmal since.

Dillon Gee              F      I’ve always liked Gee, but on a team with these young studs, Mets can’t carry his 5.90 ERA.

David Wright          Inc    Will he ever play again/be any good again? That may sound alarmist some day, but not now.

Manager/GM

Terry Collins          C-        Players like him, but he’s outlived his usefulness here. It is time to win and he’s not the man.

Sandy Alderson      C+       Gets an A+ for the pitching and an F for the offense. As if moving in the fences would solve it.

It has been hard getting things up on the site because I started two new jobs recently and have been trying to finish editing

my upcoming book on the 1986 Mets, which I know you will love. But the day after Steven Matz debuted I got this great

note that I just have to share. I have not been getting much else site related mail of late—so see if you can help with that.

Short as this piece is, time has been even shorter and it was a race to get it up on the site before Matz pitched again. And

who knows how many more times he will pitch before we get a follow up post. Maybe the Mets will even give us something

to write about that is positive in terms of solid all around play.

As it stands, I quote the first coach of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers John McVay, when it comes to the Mets lineup’s

execution—I think it’s a good idea.

Let’s Go Matz

Dear Met,

May have to change the name of your site to matzsilverman.com!

Jim Humiston,

Queenbury, NY

Jim,

I like the way you think, friend.

Another good young pitcher isn’t news for the Mets, a guy who can drive in four runs--in a month--is news. He roped that

first ball farther than any Met with runners on base has in an eternity. Terry Collins had just been whining lamenting that

he had put on seven hit-and-runs and none had worked, and Matz did it the first time.

The third hit he got that drove in two runs--the four RBI were the most by a pitcher in his debut in a century, and it

almost killed his grandpa he was so verklempt in the suite. Nice for a boy from Long Island to make good with the

hometown team. Now they can bat him cleanup when he’s not pitching so they can protect Lucas Duda.

With a name like Matz he was born to be a Met. And he missed being the 1,000th Met in history by one. But I think he

got the fanfare like the balloons and shopping spree for the 1,000th shopper at a local super market. The Little Debbie

Crumb Cakes are on me—actually they’re on Michael Cuddyer, whose father delivered them.

I would feel more confident with Matz in left field.

You know, I hadn’t been to a game besides Opening Day, but I went to see Toronto, something I have done their other three times to New York. Since the Mets haven’t lost to them in Flushing, I hadn’t seen them lose in 1997, 1999, and 2001. (So much for a regulated interleague schedule, MLB.)

Because there was rain on the way down and rain in the forecast, my friends decided not to go when I was halfway down, so I met them for dinner on the Connecticut border, figuring I’d go by myself once the rain delay ended. Only there was no rain delay. It went off as scheduled and then after watching rapid-fire marksman Mark Buehrle be perfect game through three innings on TV, I took off for Flushing. Noah Syndergaard wasn’t perfect, but he was close. I feel sorry for ump Marty Foster, who got clocked by a foul ball, but the extended delay helped me get to my seat by the time Lucas Duda doubled for the first hit of the game in the fifth inning. It would not be his last double.

One thing I enjoy about being there is seeing the positioning, which you don’t get when watching on TV with all the closeups and fan shots. My friends could not make it, but they bought good seats, in the same area where the announcers are stationed, so you could really see how everything set up on the field. The way positioning is done in the game today, being able to see the field is more important than ever. I am older and do not go to the 20-plus games I went to with these same buddies in the 1980s and 1990s, but I still feel like I miss something watching at home instead of being in the park. It ain’t football. Thank God.

Monday’s game had everything, including my usual fit about the over-managing of Terry Collins. Another four-out save? Really? The only day the guy hasn’t pitched in the last four was his first day as a father. No surprise that ex-Mets farmhand Jose Bautista (remember how the Mets just had to get Kris Benson in 2004?) went deep twice. Or that Toronto was poised to set a franchise record with its 12th straight win, but Duda beat the shift with a ball that would have been an easy pop up if the outfield was aligned normally and then Wilmer Flores banged the winning single up the middle. The untold story, though, is Ruben Tejada. Yes, he broke the tie in the sixth with a double, but with the Mets trailing in the 11th he drew a walk. On a(nother) lousy at bat by Michael Cuddyer, Tejada stopped between first and second—the first savvy baseball play I’ve seen him make in two years—which slowed down Toronto just enough so they couldn’t turn a game-ending double play. His play was forgotten—as was the bad managing—and the praises sung were for Mrs. Flintstone.

I feel I can speak to this here because, well, it’s my site, and the Mets infiltrated the office of Sterling Cooper with Draper and Pryce becoming unexpected Mets fans in the days before the Mets were even remotely close to pennant contention. And I would like to think that in one of the many Matt Weiner endgame scenarios, stretched out another decade, there is one where Don Draper comes up with “The Magic Is Back,” while freelancing for Jerry Della Femina. Or maybe that could be the pilot for the After M*A*S*H spinoff featuring Harry, Stan, and Peggy.

The first time I saw Mad Men was during the 2007 playoffs. I was watching the Cubs get swept by the Diamondbacks in the Division Series, saying, “God, how I wish this was the Mets getting smoked.” But of course they’d blown a big lead and lost on the last day. Bored, I turned the channel and I saw that JFK was about to be elected president and everyone in this New York office found the idea repugnant. And then two Dons were in Korea. I kind of like the contrary opinion, and that’s what Mad Men was. Though I was never a Nixon man, or even boy.

Mad Men also served as a glimpse into my lost subconscious. These were the years I missed, although I was there. I was born about the same time as baby Gene: no grandparents, out of touch with what my older siblings were up to, and just wanting to be included—and failing that, to watch television. Black and white was fine, the color TV in my parents’ room was for special occasions, like Tiny Tim’s wedding. I still don’t get it.

But I got Mad Men. It was like it was written for me, at least the set up. The blonde model mother and the commuting father wearing those Alpine fedoras, American cars, beer in a can, brown liquor, everyone smoking, and kids dismissed with the wave of a hand. I had great parents. My mother was beautiful but, unlike Betty Draper, she did have a heart. My dad commuted but—and I’m pretty sure about this—he was not a serial philanderer. We lived in a suburb where I would feel uncomfortable living today but I still visit in my dreams.

I could visit that place every week, when Mad Men was on, which was never enough. The Sopranos, another Matt Weiner effort, was great for a few years and then became a chore that I watched out of obligation. Boardwalk Empire, written by another Sopranos alum, was good, but it reached its peak too early and there was a whole season of filler that made me glad when they wrapped the show up. In The Sopranos, and a little bit in Boardwalk Empire, every time a new character was introduced, I’d think, “Gee, I wonder how this guy gets killed.” With Mad Men every episode, every character had something to say. And it was like life, people came and went. And when it too left the building the last time Sunday night, I was content and a little sad.

There is one bone I have to pick with the show: the Drapers’s dog. Listen, Mr. Weiner, we had dogs in the 1960s, too, and you either had one or you didn’t. The Draper dog was around for a couple of episodes—I don’t know if it had a name but it might as well have been Tiger because it was handled even less smoothly than a show actually made during that era: The Brady Bunch, which had a couple of episodes featuring the dog and then it was gone without a word. (In reality, Tiger died between seasons and they brought in another dog that only freaked out the kids, so they cut out Tiger.) But the Drapers had a dog early on and then there were tons of episodes when it wasn’t in the house and then it appeared wagging its tail as Don wandered the house one night. Even in the 1960s the dogs ruled the house, or at least we walked around the poop in the middle of the living room because out of four kids, no one took Topper out. Or maybe Betty shot their dog in the back yard one afternoon when the Valium ran out. Weiner did use dogs to unforgettable effect in one episode. Duck Phillips was a sumbitch ad executive and a recovered alcoholic, which happened in a world where people drank all day and called it work. When he goes around the bend and the dog cries for him to stop drinking, Duck abandons his beloved Irish Setter onto the street on Madison Avenue so he can go up to his office to drink his face off. That stays with you, as did so much in Mad Men. But like Mad Men I should go now, I need to take the dogs out.

In Judy Lynn (née Van Sickle) Johnson’s memoir on growing up with baseball, I expected a lot of baseball, but as in life, there is more. A lot more. The tale of a preacher’s daughter coming of age in the 1960s—and an affiliation with a very Dutch background—surprised me. A lot of things surprised me about this book, and that’s a good thing. If you read a book that is exactly the way you expect it to be, well, that doesn’t teach you anything, or take you outside your comfort zone.

Judy, raised a New Jersey girl, is an English professor, graduate of Mount Holyoke College with a PhD in English literature from Brown, who formerly taught at several boarding schools. I came upon her work during the Hofstra Mets Conference, the father of the now annual Queens Baseball Conference. The New Yorker took notice, too.

Watching the Game: Meditations from a Woman’s Heart is a fine book by someone who knows how to write, who sees the poetry between spaces of words like the poetry between pitches, when the game is moving like it should and the air is filled with anticipation. She ties the act of sitting in the stands with something deeper, because we all know it is. Johnson is a dedicated fan, no, student of the game, dedicated enough to get broadsided by a car on the way back from a Cape Cod League game and still think about getting back there as soon as possible. This book will make you leave the phone in the car (or at least buried in your pocket or purse, where it belongs) and appreciate where you are. You never know when you’ll run into someone who is at their first game, or their last. Make every pitch count. Watch the game!

This Mother’s Day—or if Mom isn’t quite into baseball to this degree, this Father’s Day—Watching the Game makes a great gift. It’s like the gift of baseball, only you can read it during a long rain delay.

We interrupt this—as Channel 11 used to say in promos when a team no one expected anything from was playing well—“surprising” New York Mets start to bring you the announcement of the winners for the third annual Greg Spira Award. Well, actually the announcement is here.

Congratulations to Lewis Pollis ($1,000 first place for his piece on paying front office talent), Cee Angi ($200 second place for her profile on the great Vin Scully), and Rob Arthur ($100 third place on the sounds that the bat makes and what it means). Given the state of freelancer remuneration today, all recipients were especially happy to hear the news. You can read the winners on the link, and if this sounds good to you, and you are under 30 years of age, just have a baseball piece published or presented containing original analysis or research. The piece must be published (online or paper) between January 16 of this year and January 15, 2016.

Greg Spira was a solid colleague, a good friend, and a great Mets fan. He hated games in poor weather, but he might have even ventured to an April game to see this Mets start in person. He died from kidney disease in 2011. He would have been 48 today.

Who would have thought we’d be here? The 2015 Mets put together an 11-game win streak! It’s the fifth time the Mets have reached 11 straight victories. And each time has been a surprise. I think even the 1927 Yankees might have been surprised by an 11-game win streak, especially since their longest win streak during their 110-win, 60-HR, 4-game sweep season was 9. But 11 has come at interesting times for the Mets in the past, and almost all of them came early in the years 1969, 1972, 1986, and 1990. Some transformed the season, some merely helped prop them into contention.

The 1969 Mets had never had a winning season, and believe it or not, had only once even been over .500—a lofty 2-1 in the first week of 1966. Early in the ’69 season it looked like 2-1 was the closest the Mets would get to a winning mark, but in mid-May they touched .500, and when queried about the greatness of the moment, Tom Seaver shot back, “What’s .500?” As the beat writers shook their heads at the arrogance of this kid who didn’t know where his team came from, it seemed the baseball gods agreed as the Mets dropped their next five, including their first ever game with the expansion San Diego Padres. Then the baseball gods revealed what they had in store for the 1969 Mets. The Mets won the next 11 in a row, all of them against the West Coast teams that had long filled Shea and stuck the Mets with loss after loss. Of the 11, only the last win—a 9-4 win over the Giants, was by more than three runs. Two of the wins were 1-0 games decided in extra innings. Even after the winning streak ended and the Mets dropped two straight, they won 9 of 12. Though the Cubs had a big lead, the Mets had more magic up their sleeve, ending with a stream of ticker tape down Lower Broadway that October.

Gil Hodges, who had guided that Mets team to its unlikely 1969 world championship, died suddenly in spring training 1972. Yogi Berra was installed as manager, the front office heartlessly calling a press conference the afternoon of the funeral to announce Berra as manager and Rusty Staub as right fielder, a deal Hodges had pushed for. The Mets players were sad and also angry at the callous way the team handled the situation, so of course they went out and had what stood as the best start in the team’s first 24 seasons of existence. The Mets were already 14-7 and in first place when Jerry Grote singled home Cleon Jones in the bottom of the ninth for a 2-1 victory over the Giants on May 12, the same week the Mets acquired Willie Mays. The next thing you knew the Mets had an 11-game win streak and a six-game lead. That’s where the good times ended. On June 1 the Mets were 30-11 and five games in front. From that point on they went 53-62 as everybody got hurt and the team regressed to the mean. Though there would be magic in 1973, the ’72 season turned out to be a dead end.

The 1986 Mets started the year 2-3 and didn’t look good doing it, the exact same point where the 2015 edition came in. Unlike the 2015 team, however, the ’86 Mets wsere expected to contend for a title. A week and a half into the season, the ’86 Mets had more rainouts than wins when they took on the Phillies on Friday, April 18. They won that game and then swept the series. On Monday the Mets rallied for two in the ninth against the Pirates and they swept the series. The Mets went into St. Louis, where their dreams of a division title had been crushed the previous fall, and were down by two runs in the ninth when Howard Johnson crushed a game-tying home run off Todd Worrell. When the Mets won the next inning, it was the first game—regular-season game, mind you—the Cardinals had lost when leading in the ninth since 1984. The Mets swept the four-game series. They won the first two games in Atlanta before the Braves ended the streak at 11. The Mets had a five-game lead after 16 games. They would fulfill the prophesy of Davey Johnson: Dominate.

I didn’t have much in the way of recall for the 1990 streak until I looked it up. It turned out to be the only one of these streaks prior to 2015 where I saw any of it in person. And even that is open to interpretation. It was in June and I was at the sixth game in the streak, though it looked enough like a loss where my buddies ands I left early to see the end of the Buick Classic golf tournament in Rye. It was a horrendous decision because the Mets won while we were stuck in the Shea parking lot getting out, and the finish of the Buick Classic was about as exciting as a pro making a two-foot putt. I wasn’t living in the area and was visiting, yet I was still plenty angry they’d fired Davey Johnson on top of trading all the guys who had made 1986 a year to remember (and not just because of an April win streak). The 1990 winning streak helped keep the Mets in the divisional race until the final week, when the Pirates finally finished them off. The streak was the high point of the Bud Harrelson regime.

So here we are at 11. In baseball these things change frequently, so I am getting this up on the site. If the streak keeps going, I’ll keep writing. If the Mets crash through the ceiling and into the land of dozen, stay tuned. If not, then look back on this when things might not be going as well. It is a long season.  Even the ’86 Mets had a losing road trip, that is “a” as in one. In the meantime, try comedian Jim Breuer for pertinent Mets updates. Besides the streak, that’s the best thing I’ve seen all season.

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An thanks to Gelf Magazine and Le Poisson Rouge for having me to Varsity Letters. It was pretty fun dashing for the train with the Mets game blasting the radio call over my phone. Still saw a lot of Yankees garb in the big city, including some worn by the family of Ed Lucas, who was the nightcap on our doubleheader—or more accurately, I was opening up for him. Great man, great stories, and a great-sounding book, Seeing Home. I plan on experiencing it in the audio version. And Ed—and his son Chris—have turned me around on my attitude about the late Phil Rizzuto, who was instrumental in helping him forge a career in baseball despite not being able to see. “Holy cow, Messer, you’re making me sound like a hero!” God bless you, Scooter. And Ed Lucas.

A new year and a new age. Welcome to the eighth year of metsilverman.com. You could call us a jinx, if you like, though 2008 was the year I swore off luck (my first April Fool’s post) and it was the last year the Mets had a .500 season, or played at Shea Stadium, or had a September game that mattered—it was all too much. But I am still here, a survivor—and so are you. Even if you weren’t even a Mets fan then, you are a survivor of the lineage—just as you are a celebrant of 1969 and 1973 and 1986 and 2000, even if you never saw a pitch.

Each year I tie in a Mets player uniform number with my age. That’s how the site began during a happily sleepless night as I planned out the first year of the site. And why stop now? Even if I am the big 5-0 now. And what bigger 5-0 could there be than Sid Fernandez, unless it was Benny Agbayani. This year for 50, and having been fortunate enough to spend a couple of days in the Aloha state for the first time, I have fused a two-headed Hawaiian hydra out of this pair: the right-side being all Benny and the lefts-side being Fernandez.

El Sid was a latter day Jon Matlack, though not as consistent or as adept as Matlack as finishing what he started. Sid had his greatest contribution as a Met in Game Seven of a World Series, Matlack his worst—further proof that one game can decide championships and careers (and another reason why the one-game play-in in the postseason runs contrary to baseball, where everything—even the previously precious one-game playoff to get into the postseason—should have a back story).

But when we talk about Sid Fernandez you should know three things: he was from Hawaii (why he was the first Mets player to wear 50, for the 50th state), he is fourth all-time in major league history with just 6.85 hits allowed per nine innings (behind only Nolan Ryan, Clayton Kershaw, and Sandy Koufax), and when the Mets were on the ropes in Game Seven of the 1986 World Series, El Sid stepped out of the bullpen and shut down the Red Sox. If he’d bombed that game, well, just think what the last 29 years would have felt like without that championship. He was quiet yet colorful, heavy on the hill but light on his feet, stolen from Los Angeles and underrated in New York, a great pitcher though plagued with not getting enough wins, the measuring stick of his day. He was the NBC Miller Lite Player of Game Seven of the World Series, the only Game Seven the Mets have ever won.

Benny Agbayani also came through at crucial moments for the Mets. Steve Phillips might have kept him perpetually in the minors, possibly because Benny was a Bobby Valentine creation, and not a traditional prospect he could trade for a broken-down reliever. Benny hit his way to the majors, needing to outperform the entire outfield to get to stay in New York. He came up in 1998 and didn’t impress anyone with his .133 average in 16 at bats. He got another chance during the 1999 season and hit 10 home runs in his first 73 at bats to become a Mets folk legend. He may have faced more minor league purgatory the following spring, but his grand slam in Japan earned the Mets a split of the first major league games played there, and he also earned himself a spot of the Mets roster. He was the most interesting member of a nondescript outfield and his home run in the 13th inning to win Game Three of the Division Series and—combined with the next afternoon’s Bobby Jones NLDS clincher against the Giants—logged in as number five of my favorite Shea Stadium moments seen in person. (A first-year feature on the blog in the last year at Shea.) The glass slipper only fit for so long, but Benny was a hero when it counted. If he hadn’t hit a tiebreaking double in the eighth inning of Game Three of the 2000 World Series, maybe the Yankees would have the three-peat sweep instead of the simply humiliating loss in five games. Benny may have been too free on the Howard Stern show in predicting the Mets to win in five, but in his two best years he combined for 29 homers and 102 RBI in 626 plate appearances. And Benny thrived when the games mean the most.

Now if you have been playing close attention, since that first year there has been a recurring theme in posts throughout a given year, whether it’s my favorite games at Shea (2008) or a critique and accounting for every doubleheader in Mets history (2014). I’ve tried just about everything, so this year the theme will be: no theme. I have a book I am trying to finish—on the 1986 Mets—and I need to put my investigative talents into that. But there will be posts, just nothing as thematic as in the past. Maybe next year there’ll be something different.

In the meantime, enjoy the games, everything is starting anew. There is talk about the Mets finally turning it around. Well, I will believe that when it happens. I left my Ya Gotta Believe at the door in Swinging ’73.

But this will be the last time I name a year after Mets and their uniform numbers. At least until my Turk Wendel Year comes around at 99. It’s not a conceited after-50 thing in age but rather a complete lack of useful numbers to count the age past 50. Dave Murray, Mets Guy in Michigan, God bless him for including not one but two of my books in his Mostly Mets Reading Month in March. He is just old enough to be a year ahead and celebrating a Mel Rojas Year at 51. I’ve had enough crashing and burning myself to involve Mr. Rojas, but I’ll still be around. At least I hope so.

As for hope and the Mets, well, hope is dispensed with an eye dropper when it comes to the Mets around here. A lifetime of pessimism made it so I expected the worst in Game Six in the 1986 World Series, and I was utterly shocked when the best happened instead. And then Sid saved the day in Game Seven. I wonder if lightning will ever strike twice for me and my kind, but that’s why we watch and we wait for another Sid Fernandez or Benny Agbayani to come up big when we’re least expecting it.

Back when skipping school to watch a baseball game was still considered truancy, three buddies and I called in sick and went to see Tom Seaver’s first game back as a Met, against the Phillies in 1983. I didn’t like lying to my high school or to my parents, but I was not taking the risk that someone might tell me I could not go. Ironically, I skipped the next several openers due to school obligations (and I still likely would have blown those off had I gone to college within four hours of Shea). But I have missed only three openers since 1989: one as a personal protest to the strike, and the others because the family was on vacations that were more memorable than many of the openers I’ve seen.

You kind of get to the point where you go on Opening Day just because you usually go. I always have fun with the people I’m with, but last year’s debacle with the Mets blowing the lead to Washington and losing their closer for the year made me wonder aloud why he was out there in the first place since his elbow had been a problem in Florida. And I had to wonder what the hell I was doing there if the team had been a problem in Florida, and for most of the decade prior.

Monday, April 13, six years to the day—or night—that Citi Field opened, the Mets had their biggest crowd at the stadium for a game that counts. The only bigger crowd was for the All-Star Game in 2013, and my family in standing room pushed the number to 45,186. I was proud to be part of the 2015 opener’s 43,947. Maybe one day I can be part of the crowd that sets the mark in a game of significance late in the season. Or in whatever games are played after the also-rans are done. We’ll see. For now I was glad to be sitting in the far reaches of the left-field upper deck for an entire game. Previously I’d bought tickets there but left after a few innings, easily able to snag better seats. Not for this game.

The place was jammed. And even though the people who had the two seats next to us never showed up, pairs of people flitted down and sat there for innings at a time—like the Citi seagulls no doubt wondering, “What’s with the people, these teams can’t hit?” Mets bird of prey Jacob deGrom and three relievers blanked the Phillies, 2-0, and the Mets even introduced what I can only assume is a new old song for wins: “New York Groove.” The Mets have not exactly been taking care of business in recent years. I prefer BTO to K-I-S-S, but it’s been time for a change for a long time. In more ways than one.

Everyone is trying to get behind the team. (Well, maybe not everyone is doing it the same way.) I like the ballclub, but I think they need to trade for at least one middle infielder who is a major league fielder and can also hit. Their bench could use something, too. And given that Jenrry Mejia let us all down as one of four major league pitchers recently caught cheating,  maybe a setup reliever might help if Vic Black doesn’t come back the same and Carlos Torres’s arm doesn’t fall off from overuse. These kinds of players cost money and they’ll likely cost prospects—two things the current Mets management has been reluctant to part with. Maybe this is the year the Mets make a late-season move, if they stay in the race that long.

I’m just glad I was there to open the place up. And I’m glad my buddy Dave, a policeman, was there as well—not just for the game, but for the moving tribute to the NYPD. When people complain about security lines, they should think first about why those exist and how safe we feel going about our lives compared to people elsewhere. Inconvenience is a small price for vigilance. I don’t like speeding tickets or security lines, either, but you can’t have everything the way you want it. You’d think Mets fans at least would understand that by now.