…two out of three ain't bad.

Once upon a time you could count

on A.J. Burnett to beat himself, but some wise man has taught him that

strikeouts are fascist and he oughta throw ground balls, seeing how

they're more democratic. Funny, he never struck me as the listening

sort in years past.

Anyway, between his still hitting 97 in the

ninth and Glavine being determined to spit the bit, it was all too

apparent our recent 4 o'clock lightning wasn't going to materialize. So

it goes; complaining about getting muzzled

after a six-game winning streak would be so Steinbrenneresque. (I loved

Big Stein's poor publicist having to issue a transcript of Pissy

Tantrum #9,312 after the Yanks got swept by the Orioles. This one was

good even for Steinbrenner: He noted that his team has the highest

payroll in the game and accused them of not playing “like true

Yankees,” both of which would be tailor-made to make me gag under

less-happy circumstances. How's that Kevin Brown trade looking, George?)

Still,

the Yankees are about to get one thing we really need, and I'm not

referring to another old, surly veteran. They're near a deal for a new

park, with the Daily News offering the details.

Much as it pains me to write it, they've behaved astonishingly well for

a modern sports franchise: The Yankees are paying for the park and

assuming all maintenance and operations costs, with the city chipping

in the land and some transportation infrastructure. The city even keeps

all the parking revenue.

So where does that leave us?

According to unnamed city officials, the Wilpons are focusing on the

new network and improving Shea.

Improving Shea?

Um, Earth to Planet Wilpon: Shea can only be improved by repeated,

enthusiastic application of the wrecking ball. Rehabilitating Shea is

like rehabilitating Mo Vaughn, and we all know how that turned out. If

the Yankees' deal goes through, what the Mets will have to do to get a

new park will be crystal-clear, and waiting will only make things cost

more. And frankly, we've waited long enough. TV is great and all (I

particularly appreciate it now that the Mets are weekend-only

programming for me), but when I get up for a Dr Pepper — strangely, it

never occurs to me to get a soggy pretzel or a soda without a cap —

Fred and Jeff don't make any money. C'mon, fellas. The New Mets deserve

a New Park.

Some miscellaneous items of note:

* Heath

Bell has retired the first 20 batters he's faced at Norfolk. Meanwhile,

we have three lefties in the bullpen, one of whom is Felix Heredia.

Felix hasn't been seen in some time; stadium employees whisper that

he's living somewhere in the darkness beneath the stands, attended by

his retinue of feral cats. Curiously, Willie Randolph refuses to let

anybody go look for him.

* Fans of the Holy Books

(currently there are two of us) may be interested to know that the New

Mets certainly live up to their name in terms of turnover: The

season-opening slate of 25 includes no less than 13 Met newcomers.

(Fourteen if you count the mysterious arrival of Aaron Heilman 2.0.)

That's

already more than or as many new Mets as we got to meet, meet, step

right up and greet in 16 previous campaigns. Sanity indicates we're

unlikely to rack up 35 new arrivals, as we did in 1967 — a figure of

dubious distinction approached in 2002 and again last year, when there

were 29 new Mets.* (The low is just four new Mets, back in 1988.)

Ah, hell with it. Here's the whole shebang.

1962-69: 45, 22, 19, 20, 17, 35, 8, 9
1970-79: 10, 8, 13, 13, 9, 17, 9, 14, 16, 14
1980-89: 13, 15, 13, 12, 15, 12, 10, 13, 4, 14
1990-99: 20, 13, 24, 20, 19, 25, 19, 24, 26, 20

2000-05: 22, 17, 29, 21, 29, 13 and counting

Oh, and bring on those Phillies.

* Not 28 in 2004, as originally written. E: Jason (9th, counting)

As befits a game won in the eighth and

then again in the ninth, the portion of the sold-out crowd that was ambling happily down the

ramps leading to Gate D was giddy as all get out Saturday. Given that

it was the sixth consecutive win for its team, there was bound to be

more than just an extra bounce to its step.

First, there was a generally joyful noise that contained no discernible words. Then several hearty rounds of “LET'S GO METS!” Then a brief digression into “YANKEES SUCK!” Then more “LET'S GO METS!”

I'd been caught up in post-win chants before. They rule. As I left a game in July '84 after Keith Hernandez beat Neil Allen in the tenth and increased the Mets' lead on the second-place Cubs, there was no containing the mass glee. “WE'RE NUMBER ONE!” alternated with “STEINBRENNER SUCKS!” back

then. I had just returned to New York from a summer semester in

college, desperately following the Mets' rise through box scores and

Sports Phone calls. If anything told me that what I'd imagined from

afar was happening for real, it was the chanting that continued that

night long after the winning run was scored.

So Saturday's refusal to stop cheering just because the game was over

and we were no longer looking at a field wasn't unprecedented. But this

was: As we streamed out of Gate D, a 7 train rolled by, heading west.

Unprompted but all at once, the mass of fans that emerged into the

sunshine shrieked and waved every pair of arms it had toward the

elevated tracks.

For anybody who figured they'd beat the crowd and jump on that first 7 out of Dodge, we had a message:

HEY TRAIN!

WE WON AGAIN!

WE BEAT THE MARLINS!

WHAT A GAME!

WE CAME FROM BEHIND!

WE DIDN'T LOSE TO LEITER!

AL PITCHED GREAT!

BUT PEDRO PITCHED AWESOME!

WE WERE LOSING ALL DAY!

BUT WE DIDN'T LOSE!

WOODY PLAYED LEFT!

HE'S AN INFIELDER!

HE MADE A LEAPING, LUNGING CATCH!

ROBBING CASTILLO!

THEN HE DOUBLED PIERRE OFF FIRST!

IN THE EIGHTH!

WE CAME BACK!

IN THE BOTTOM OF THE INNING!

BELTRAN TIED IT ON HIS THIRD HIT!

MIKE SMOKED A GROUND-RULE DOUBLE!

THAT PUT US AHEAD!

BRADEN NEARLY BLEW IT!

BUT WE WERE SAVED BY A CALL AT HOME!

WE NEVER GET A CALL ANYWHERE!

BUT TODAY WE DID!

VICTOR DIAZ CAME UP IN THE NINTH!

AND VICTOR DOUBLED!

VICTOR ALWAYS DOES SOMETHING!

RAMON CASTRO WAS UP NEXT!

WILLIE HAD DOUBLE-SWITCHED HIM IN!

WILLIE'S A GENIUS!

RAMON SINGLED VICTOR HOME!

WITH THE RUNNING RUN!

AGAINST GUILLERMO MOTA!

TAKE THAT MOTA!

TAKE THAT MARLINS!

WE WON!

SIXTH IN A ROW!

WE'RE OVER .500!

NEXT STOP, FIRST PLACE!

AND 111TH STREET!

The train, thus informed, rumbled onward and we all went our separate

ways to spread the word in relatively quieter, somewhat less

gesticulative fashion.

As Steve Martin told Garrett Morris when he was proven wrong about the sex appeal of the Festrunk Brothers, it’s okay, Cliff. Many American girls enjoy you, too. They enjoy your protruding buttocks all the time!

So you’re an idiot. Sometimes idiots win world championships.

While I was a little less fatalistic about mild and hazy Aaron Heilman’s chances than you were, I wasn’t exactly betting the next mortgage payment on the Mets dispatching the Beastmaster of 2003. It was said earlier in the week that Pedro hasn’t quite gotten that New York baseball fans didn’t hold him in utter contempt, just Yankees fans (who will never be rightly accused of knowing baseball anyway). In that vein, Josh Beckett knows there’s a difference between New York’s baseball teams. That other one he stifled. This one sullied him good.

But why are we talking about him, let alone them? Let’s talk about that tall drink of water who nobody wanted to sip from. Heilman. No. 1 draft choice. Struggled in the Majors. Stagnated in the minors. Unrequited trade bait. Got the call to fill in, one suspects, for the same reason Greg Brady was picked to be Johnny Bravo: because the costume fit.

Turns out the most reviled Mets starter since Kaztor Ishbrano just needed time — approximately six days — to develop, just as the Mets needed time — same amount — to turn the tide of this season from a wave of despair to a torrent of jubilation.

Time and tide.
Nothing and no one can stop us now.
For better, for worse, this time I’m sure it’s gonna last.

Remember the demi-hit “Tide and Tide” by Basia? Did you know that before going solo, Basia was in a trio called Matt Bianco, which doesn’t quite rhyme with Matt Franco? Did you know they recently got back together after more than fifteen years apart and released a new CD? Did you know they were scheduled to play Westbury on a Sunday night in early March but were postponed because of, à la Alay Soler, visa problems? Did you know they got their visas and rescheduled their Westbury date for Friday night, April 15? Did you know my wife is a huge Matt Bianco and Basia fan?

Well, ya do now.

This was the fourth time that a Met pitcher has flirted with The Great Unmentionable while Stephanie and I have been off doing something classy. Seeing as how we don’t do very much at all, that’s pretty remarkable. We’ve been at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Tanana against the Giants), Sweet Smell of Success (Astacio against the Brewers), Bombay Dreams (Glavine against the Rockies) and, lately, immersed in the pop/jazz/neo-Brazilian stylings of Basia featuring Matt Bianco while Aaron Heilman played the corners of the strike zone like a virtuoso.

We should really get out more often.

Fortunately, we weren’t completely in the dark while history was being brushed up against. The concert didn’t start ’til eight, so we heard Aaron’s early brilliance in the car. Then there was a helpful, lengthy intermission between the dreadful opening act and the brilliant headliners, during which the tiny radio (don’t leave home without it) said it was 4-0. I deduced only one hit had been surrendered. Gary said it was an infield single, but I didn’t know just how infield it was and how (as I saw on the news) it could’ve been gloved by the pitcher and…ah, forget it. As Tom said to Nancy, more or less, why are you crying? We won.

I’m sure I would’ve enjoyed watching it from the couch, but Steph and I sharing the long headphones during intermission ­ and the two of us pumping fists simultaneously when Heilman got Lo Duca looking to close the seventh — was the signature moment of the young season. Basia then came in firing bullets, so it was a win-win for both of us.

We couldn’t have seen Aaron Heilman giving us this night just as we couldn’t have seen .500 was a mere five games away after last Saturday.

It is just .500 but this is so much better than if 5-5 had been accumulated in more random fashion. Two wins, a loss, a win, two losses would be maddeningly inconsistent. This way it’s poetry.

Actually, it’s better than poetry. It’s Aaron to Basia to Pedro.

Nothing and no one can stop us now.*

* Except possibly Leiter and Delgado and those gnats at the top of the Marlin order and whoever else they got. Sorry to step on your beautiful sentiment, Basia, but a fan on a streak has to respect the streak, which in my case means fretting over its imminent demise every few waking moments.

“Something tells me it's going to take a bit more than this to beat Florida, particularly with Heilman vs. Beckett looming as the biggest mismatch since Bambi and Godzilla squared off. (If young Aaron cares to make me look like an idiot, I'm all for that.)”

Hi, my name is Jason, and I'm an idiot.

Those first five dispiriting losses didn't count, right? Just glorified exhibitions, right? The season started when Pedro outlasted Smoltz, right?

At this point, 4-5 doesn't feel too bad. Yeah, Houston appeared dysfunctional and this series was the essence of catching them at the right time (the same thing happened last August: we took two of three from them just before they took off), but that's the way she bounces sometimes. You may have noticed that the Reds benefited from Mets malaise a week or so ago.

Not that I'm terribly concerned with them now that they've packed their old kitbags, but for all the misfiring the erstwhile Colt 45s did, they were in nailbiters for three consecutive dates. Why didn't they win any of them? Maybe because Phil Garner kept Brad Lidge caged in the bullpen the whole series? As inane as it is for a manager to automatically go to a closer because it's the ninth and he has a lead, it's about as stupid to not use your most effective weapon when he can do you some good in the eighth. Instead, he managed to tap John Franco three straight games. How well did that work?

I blame Clemens. Just out of habit.

On the happy side of the field, how about that bench? Anderson, Cairo, Castro and Woodward have been nothing but good news for us, especially in the face of the aches and pains facing Willie's best laid plans. I can't think of much that any of them has done wrong. Though none of them is an obvious home run threat off the bench (that was supposed to be Diaz, but he can go straight to being a star), they are a finely honed unit of sharpshooters that needs a nickname. Rando's Commandoes? Willie's Whipsaws? Desperation Dynamos? We're taking nominations.

And how about that Zambrano? If the score hadn't been mentioned from time to time, I would've assumed he put us in an 8-1 hole. But either his middle name is Houdini or the Astros are royal putzes. Really loved it when he threw the wild pitch that tempted Lane to score from second only to set a trap and tag him out at home (and nearly injure his elbow again but never mind that).

Don't lose hope over Heilman despite all evidence that indicates you should. I mean for tonight. I went to a game last September when Heilman faced off against another 2003 post-season hero, Mark Prior. It seemed hopeless, and it was for almost nine innings, but it stayed close thanks to Aaron's gumption (and the Cubs' simmering case of the vapors). That was — I can't believe I've found yet another excuse to reference this — the afternoon Victor Diaz and Craig Brazell made everything beautiful.

Not that I'd bet against Beckett, mind you.

From around the Majors: ENOUGH ALREADY with the Skanks and the Sox. Both of them. They're tiresome. The whole bit. Yes, we love the Red Sox. Yes, they thrilled us last October. Yes, we continue to thank them for their slaying of the beast in the most satisfying manner of all-time. But go away, both of you. You're sucking up too much oxygen. As for the guy in the stands who may or may not have slapped at Sheffield, watch the replay again. The dude was three sheets or more to the wind. That whole front row had beers lined up on the top of the fence. And baseball wonders why these things happen.

I had hoped for a glimpse of the Natspos' home opener on the telly. I know ESPN was sending Skanks-Sox out to most of the country (which has to be just as bored with it by now), but the Northeast would get an alternate feed. It would have to be the return of the American national sport to the American national capital, right? Even that bloviating sack Chris Matthews taped Hardball from RFK.

So what did ESPN go with? The White Sox at the Indians. All due respect to displaced South Siders and Clevelanders, but where exactly is the constituency in Skanks-Sox blackout territory for that game? How the did two relatively anonymous Midwestern teams in the second week of the season trump Washington's first baseball game in 34 years? Who makes these decisions — the DiamondVision guy?

Which reminds me: On Opening Day, one of those between-innings pop culture quizzes asked some poor sap what year “Another Day In Paradise” by Phil Collins was a hit. The three choices on the board were 1985, 1989 and 1990. Honestly, I couldn't hear the answer he gave, but the PA blasted, “Sorry, the answer is 1990.” Well, not really. It came out in late '89 and was in fact the final song to hit No. 1 on Billboard's Hot 100 in the 1980s. It then lingered on the chart into early 1990. Who constructs a quiz like this? Who makes two of the three prospective answers for an allegedly fun time-filler more or less right but then declares only one of them correct? Why on earth even use this dismal downer of a song on what's supposed an annual day of renewal? And since the contestant wins the worthless prize whether he says 1989, 1990 or the year 2525, can't they just let us sit there in peace and wait for the batter's eye to break down again?

Having found (despite a four-game winning streak) yet another thing to bug me about Shea, I'll be back there tomorrow for Pedro and Al. I plan to greet each of them warmly, one more warmly than the other.

So Willie let the music play. The Astros let another one get away.

Don't get me wrong: I'm thrilled by our grit, vim 'n' vigor, moxie, or

whatever you want to call it. Speed never goes into a slump (though it

often does pop a hammy — did anyone else cringe when Reyes took off

for second in 45-degree weather?) even if David Wright and Mike Piazza

do, and sometimes a little luck is the best weapon of all.

All good things, but I couldn't help noticing that the Astros seemed

incapable of getting out of their own way. Witness the fatal (for them)

eighth inning: Leadoff walk and a double, but they still had a 3-1

lead. Marlon Anderson grounds out (3-2), then Reyes squibs a little

worm killer that John Franco has no play on (3-3). Then, just to quiet

a bunch of Houston bloggers crying (with good reason) about bad luck,

Cairo smacks a grounder to Mike Lamb. Ahh…the name is Bootsy, baby! Mets lead.

Sure, scoring three runs on 200 feet worth of grounders can be a sign

of your team's never-say-die attitude, or that the Fates are smiling

down on you. But it can also mean you're playing a yet-to-gel team

that's commenced to play lousy. Something tells me it's going to take a

bit more than this to beat Florida, particularly with Heilman vs.

Beckett looming as the biggest mismatch since Bambi and Godzilla

squared off. (If young Aaron cares to make me look like an idiot, I'm

all for that.)

As for the return of Senator Al, I confess to some remorse over my recent hard-heartedness. Rich Chere of the Star-Ledger had a nice piece

yesterday morning about Al, who let the reporter rummage around in his

tortured psyche. His suggestion that he rejected the idea of the

Yankees because of how much Met fans would have hated that softened me

up a little, but what really got me was Al talking about how much it

would have meant to him to have trailed only Seaver, Gooden and Koosman

in franchise wins. How many current Met pitchers do you think even know

who Jerry Koosman is?

Who knows — maybe there's a videotape of Al surreptitiously flipping

through the media guide before his tip of the cap to Kooz. And he

flubbed when Tom Glavine joined the team. Regardless, I feel a bit bad

now.

But only a bit. If Leiter's approaching 100 pitches in the top of the

fourth on Saturday, I guarantee my remorse will be in check.

Speaking of which, was that vintage John Franco, or what?  When he

got two strikes on Reyes, I said, “Uh-oh, Reyes is exactly the kind of

young, overeager hitter Franco carves up by throwing  junk off the

plate.” But then I realized I'd been using that line for 15 years, and

it stopped being true sometime in the late 1990s. More times than I

care to recall, I watched Johnny throw balls that those young,

overeager hitters ignored, leading either to walks or some kind of

slow-motion John Franco debacle. And indeed, after Reyes got his bat on

one of those not-quite-junky-enough pitches, screw-ups ensued. The

outcome wasn't obviously Franco's fault, but it did happen with him on the mound, so….

Nothing personal, Johnny (honestly), but I'm glad it's Houston's problem.

P.S. Joe Grzenda,

one of 16,583 men to play for the 1967 New York Mets, handed President

Bush the ball for the ceremonial first pitch at the Nationals' home

opener. (Naturally the Met angle will be criminally underplayed by

those philistines in D.C.) The ball was the same one Grzenda threw for

the last pitch in Senators' history. Now that's cool. It would have

been cooler if Livan Hernandez had thrown that same ball for the first

pitch to Craig Counsell, but of course that wasn't going to happen.

(What if Counsell had fouled it off?) Anyway, shucks.

Why do I love 7:10 starts? Because my team can play an 11-inning grinder and it's not the middle of the night.

Great game — I kept expecting Harvey Haddix to walk out of a

cornfield, or Bambi Castillo to emerge from the dugout and win it.

(Remember that? The 80-degree day in March?) Was that really our team?

Ishii only walked three, Wright struck out three times, and the bullpen

was great. Oh wait, Jose Reyes swung at ball four — that was

our team. (And thank God he did.) I think my favorite part was the

crowd getting behind Looper: All is forgiven, Braden, at least until

tomorrow. (Hey, it's New York. That's as forgiving as it gets around

here.)

This was one of those games you keep expecting to take on the template

of “significant early-season game,” which means some time-honored

ending that you gnaw your fingernails trying to predict. First I

assumed Vizcaino would be the death of us, because he a) was

pinch-hitting for the Antichrist and b) is Jose Vizcaino. (My new

theory: Jose has held a grudge since Steve Avery nailed him in the knee

and Bobby Jones didn't retaliate. Which means if Bobby Jones isn't such

a wuss, we win the 2000 World Series. It's all so clear. Damn Bobby

Jones.)

That didn't happen, so I had to look for another template. Piazza

beating Chad Qualls seemed unlikely — anyone named Qualls has us over

a barrel, after all. Then I was sure Luke Scott would beat us, probably

with a two-run single between Matsui and Diaz, because those

who-the-hell-are-you guys are always the ones who kill you. As for John

Franco collapsing, it seemed a bit too easy and was.

I'll freely admit I didn't think to diagram Reyes refusing to be walked

and punching a little nubber up the middle, Manny Acta waving Diaz

around third, and poor Chris Burke's throw home barely clearing the

mound. No classic ending, just a head-shaking mess. Good by me.

Confession time: I couldn't get hyped up about the Antichrist beyond

reflexive bristling. You know what? It's starting to be a long time ago.

When I was a kid, I liked chocolate ice cream. Because I liked chocolate ice cream, I was, as a matter of principle, against vanilla ice cream. Oh, vanilla ice cream was good, but giving it any credit would somehow take away from chocolate's status. As time went by, I found myself increasingly preferring vanilla over chocolate but if you asked me which I liked better, I would've said chocolate. It wasn't until my late thirties that I came to grips with the notion that if I liked vanilla more than chocolate, I should readily admit it.

I like vanilla ice cream more than chocolate ice cream.

It's that sense of loyalty to a flavor or an affiliation or a cause that is at the core of why it has taken me this long to tumble out of the Mezzanine closet and reveal myself as a Shea-basher. In my mind, I was already there. But to admit it out loud was to take a whole other escalator to a whole other level of admission. As someone who has spent his entire life idealizing Shea, mythologizing Shea, dreaming of Shea and going to Shea, how could I turn around and declare for the whole blogging world to read that I don't think kindly of Shea anymore?

Like this: I don't think kindly of Shea anymore.

I guess I already said that yesterday. But I'm sticking to it.

That said twice, I'll be at Shea Stadium at least a dozen more times this season because, as with chocolate ice cream, it's better than nothing. Actually, like chocolate ice cream, it's better than lots of things. It's better than Yankee Stadium no matter what surrounds either one of them. It's better than Madison Square Garden or Lincoln Center or any theater I can think of because they don't play baseball games in those places. It's better than every retro jewel in Baltimore, Pittsburgh or San Francisco because I'm not in Baltimore, Pittsburgh or San Francisco. It's better than any building or arena or stadium that doesn't have Mets games as their main attraction.

Which gets back to the problem. They've got us and they know it. We are each other's enablers. They know we're always gonna fall for the Mets angle. They've especially got Mets fans of a certain vintage who “grew up” in Shea Stadium and don't wanna let go. They've got us by the sentimental short hairs and they show no compunction about pulling hard. They've got the one thing we can't get anywhere else in the world.

They've got the Mets.

Damn them, damn them, damn them.

What they don't have for us is trust. As I continue to deconstruct the matter, that's what gets me about the Shea dystopia.

Are there other things that have turned me into a Shea-shooer? Sure, but they're not fatal. Does it bother me…

* That it's old and leaky? Yes, but so am I.
* That it's got a staff that as a rule would sooner kick you square in the nuts than sincerely wish you a good game? That's not OK, but this is New York. Courtesy would be appreciated but we don't have to get Disneyfied about it.
* That its curdling infrastructure works to raise the vile-behavior quotient up another notch? Really, I can't prove that even though I do sense it. In the prettiest Flushing Field of Dreams of imagination, you're gonna have at least a few drunken idiots as long as you sell too much beer, and they're not gonna stop selling beer. (And however many drunken idiots there are, they're always gonna be sitting in my section.)
* That they've never done Thing One about easing congestion out of the parking lot or toward the subway entrances? This pisses me off greatly and it's inexcusable, but it's only an issue when there's a big crowd and when there's a big crowd, it means we're doing well and if we're doing well, I'm a little more easily bought off. It's still absolutely disgusting that they pretend access issues don't exist.
* That a two-bit city like (almost everywhere in the National League) has a new ballpark and we don't? I do covet my neighbors' brighter, wider, nicer homes, but it's not about new versus old. The White Sox never should have torn down Comiskey Park. I wish Tiger Stadium was still open for business. Wrigley Field and Fenway Park speak for themselves. Needless to say, Shea isn't Comiskey Park, Tiger Stadium, Wrigley Field or Fenway Park. It never had to be. It could have aged gracefully. It hasn't. But that alone is not the problem.

The problem is the distrust factor. You walk in to that place and you're immediately suspect. No, I take it back. You're immediately suspect just walking toward that place. I understand security and the need for it, but as with everything else, they make you feel like a criminal just for carrying a bag.

I open mine, I unzip my jacket, I do whatever they want me to do before they tell me to do it. I'm not who they have to worry about, but they act as if they do. Me and everybody else. There's something about the way they go through this necessary step that makes me feel like I'm about to join a lineup. My favorite was the guard at Gate E who once took out the book I was carrying, a political one, and opened it. Then he glared at me. What was he hoping to find? Subversive literature? Proof of non-citizenship? The stolen sign for the hit-and-run?

For all that is charged for a bottled beverage, alcohol or otherwise, they should trust you enough to let you carry it back to your seat with its cap on. As I mentioned, I've been to lots of ballparks. Nowhere else do they take the cap away from you. I've asked about this. I've been told two stories. One is, oh, we need the caps to track how many bottles we've sold. I think they have cash registers for that. The other is we don't want people throwing full bottles on the field. Ah, distrust. They think I and most of us just spent four bucks for twenty ounces of water so we can take dead aim at Bobby Abreu from 300 feet and hit him on the fly. Come on. Even the drunkards in my row on Opening Day weren't going to waste pricey Bud (save for what they spilled on Laurie) trying to take out an Astro.

While they don't trust us to act like adults, they do trust us to think like children. A few years back, I was at a game with a friend from work. She noticed these very nice-looking Hot Wings buckets with the Mets logo on them. Neither of us wanted an $18 order of Hot Wings, but it didn't seem unreasonable to try to track down a bucket. We went into the deli/bar where they were sold and asked if we could get an empty bucket. We'll even pay for it, I said (because I automatically assume you can't get something for nothing, let alone virtually nothing for nothing). We were told that if we wanted the empty bucket, it would cost the same $18 as if it came with Hot Wings. We passed on the bucket.

No anecdote or symptom of Shea's and the Mets' distrust and disdain for its paying customers, however, resonates like what happened to Stephanie and me last August. It illustrates my single biggest complaint about how the organization views its fans and runs its venue. It shows how little they respect they have for us.

It was a Sunday afternoon. Some good friends of ours were treating us to the game because it was their son's first-ever appearance at Shea (Brian Buchanan's, too). Having arrived early, I took Stephanie to the Fifth Avenueish boutique the Mets had opened in April. She hadn't seen it yet and I had only been in there once. For other ballparks, a store like this is standard fare. At Shea Stadium, it was an event. The previous time I attempted to get inside, there was a line and a barrier like it was Studio Freaking 54.

We entered the ballpark through Gate C and were able to walk right into the store. We did some t-shirt shopping and such. Brought our items to the front counter. Handed a credit card to the cashier who rang us up and ran it through. Our purchase was completed.

I point this out to note that we were indeed paying customers, not just at the game (OK, you bought us the tickets, but they were paid for) but at their high-end tchotchke shop. We weren't vagrants or loiterers.

As we were leaving, a guard stopped us to look through our shopping bag and match the items to the receipt. This was a little offensive, but that's retail, I rationalized. This was Shea Stadium, not Tourneau Corner, but ya gotta do what ya gotta do. Either way, it only took a moment.

Now we're standing outside the store, having exited onto the Field Level. That's good, I'm thinking, because I want to take Stephanie to the International Food Court which has been relocated down the left-field line. We can buy our exotica and then take it up to our seats in Loge.

We are stopped at another barrier and asked for our tickets. I show them. I am told these are for Loge, you take the escalator up one level.

Yes, I say, I know. But we just want to go to the food court.

You have to go up to Loge first and then walk all the way down toward left field and come down that ramp to get to the food court.

What?

You have to go up to Loge first and then walk all the way down toward left field and come down that ramp to get to the food court.

But the food court is right over there, I point out. We just want to go buy our food and then we'll go to our seats.

You have to go up to Loge first and then walk all the way down toward left field and come down that ramp to get to the food court.

I blurt out some righteous indignation along the lines of let me get this straight: We have tickets for this game. We have just shopped in your store. We have spent good money in there. What we want to do next is spend more good money right over there, mere yards away. We are adults who have come here on our weekend to enjoy ourselves at what is supposed to be a leisure activity. And you don't trust us to walk over there, buy our food and go to our seats without trying to pull a fast one and sit down here instead of up there despite the fact that I can read my ticket and for what it's worth my wife and I prefer the Loge to the Field Level which you guard like it's a state secret?

You have to go up to Loge first and then walk all the way down toward left field and come down that ramp to get to the food court.

I was also told that this is policy.

Ohhhh…it's policy! I'm sorry, I didn't understand. Policy. That explains everything.

I was also told that if I wanted to register a complaint, I could go find a Fan Relations desk.

Even better! We're here on a Sunday. We came for a good time. And now because we want to go spend more of our hard-earned money on some of your less unpalatable foodstuffs but think it's completely insulting to be chased upstairs just so we can head right back downstairs practically to where we are standing as we speak because you don't trust us to then bring our food to the seats specified on our tickets, we're supposed to engage your grudging-if-we're-lucky bureaucracy to have Policy reiterated to us like we're hotheaded threats to The Way Things Are?

You have to go up to Loge first and then walk all the way down toward left field and come down that ramp to get to the food court.

I didn't have enough self-respect to cause more of a scene and I'm not enough of a consumer-rights nut to have followed through with indignant letters. But once I went upstairs, I never went back down to their food court.

I sure showed them.

Exactly one week later, Stephanie and I visited Citizens Bank Park for the first time. They, too, had a store on what would be their equivalent of the Field Level. Much bigger than Shea's. The selection veered to Phillies-themed items, but one would expect that. We bought another bunch of t-shirts and pens we probably didn't need, took it to the cashier and paid for it. After it was bagged, we walked to the exit.

I looked for the guard who was gonna shake us down. There was none.

I looked for the next guard who was gonna check our tickets to tell us to immediately find an escalator. There was none.

I looked for some authority figure to tell us we were doing something wrong. There was none.

At Citizens Bank and at Minute Maid and at Great American and at every beautiful new ballpark I've been to (hell, even at — Gil forgive me — wretched Yankee Bleeping Stadium), they don't crotchblock you from buying stuff. They may not invite you into their private suites, but they don't put all the worthwhile merchandise on one level and then restrict access to that level. They don't cut off their distrustful noses to spite their Policy-hewing faces. They want you wandering around. They figure you'll spend your money where you wander. And even if you don't, they employ pretty basic business sense and figure you'll have a good enough time so that you'll buy a ticket to come back again and again whereas you might not ever come back if you don't have a good enough time.

Maybe it's the ushers' union that holds a death grip on Policy. Maybe if a fan was trusted to roam the Field Level concourse and one of them dared to use that access to casually wander into an empty orange seat, an usher would have to be nudged awake to angrily check that person's ticket. Maybe the Field Level and the concept of the box seat as province of the swells is so embedded in the New York baseball consciousness from the 1920s that it's beyond the realm to imagine that somebody wouldn't want to “sneak down” into one. Maybe they think the only people who attend Mets games are seven years old.

Maybe Shea Stadium is just a decrepit rathole run by an organization that holds its customers in complete contempt because it knows it can.

Play ball, indeed.

Greg, welcome to the other side. We were beginning to wonder if we’d ever see you in these parts, but we’re glad you’re here.

The description of Shea I offer curious baseball fans who’ve never been there is that it’s like a DMV with a ballgame somewhere inside it. A couple of years ago I had my pregame ritual down to a dismal science: Get upstairs somehow, dodge the credit-card hawkers, wait for one of the three squat, murderous-looking women who do nothing but man the DiGiorno pizza line (three?) to shift her gaze from outer space to us saps in line, trouble her to also get me an amazingly expensive soda, wait half an hour for her to shuffle back from this taxing mission, loudly identify which kind of bill I’m giving her because I’ve seen too many disputes over this after the fact, scamper for my seat before the victuals cool back into inedibility, and hope that my seat is a) not occupied by a drunk or a violent mental defective; and b) isn’t being dripped on by some combination of water, rust, beer, jet fuel, pigeon urine, and blood that’s been making its way through the cracks in the upper deck since 1964.

Once I achieved vague acceptance of this ritual, they had to go mess it up, replacing the dispiriting but edible DiGiorno’s mini-pizza with a lank, oddly colored slice of something. As for the bathrooms, I just pray that I won’t have to wade. And the staff? I once tried to get in to the bleachers on a Wednesday night, clutching the now-empty bottle of Pepsi I’d bought. The Human Fight and I were five people too late, prompting the lumpy cop manning the gate to say farewell to the rest of us: “That’s it, getouttaheah.”

Par for the course at Shea: If I ever heard an “enjoy the game” or even an “I’m sorry this entire level is out of condiments, sir — we’re rushing to get some more” I think I’d die of shock.

Plus they can’t do anything right at Shea. The stats are wrong, the pop-culture quizzes insipid, the cameramen inevitably take their crowd stills as some yahoo sticks a Yankee cap in front of the subject’s face, and “Around the Majors” delights in showing you groundouts from the first two innings of a Milwaukee-Colorado matinee even when you’re in a pennant race. And not only did they lose the leaf on the apple but it was missing for several years until someone found it in a storeroom.

And the surroundings? Yankee Stadium is a locus of Satanism and full of louts, but it is near actual stores, bars and other places inhabited by humans. (OK, by bipeds.) Shea has a highway, a Soviet park or two, and an area of the city that does not have paved roads.

The Vet contained a jail and was surrounded by a parking lot (bad) and then Philadelphia (worse). And it was better than Shea, at least until you got to the field.

The only thing that used to save Shea was that field, and the fact that it’s grass. (As in, “at least it’s grass.”) But now every NL stadium has grass — and few of them have a rusting, creaking concrete donut surrounding that grass and apparently doomed to be there forever.

This is not the way things have to be. It’s not even the way things have to be in Wilponland — Keyspan Park is bare-bones concrete, but it has nice touches, staffers who don’t always act like orange-vested prisoners on county work detail, and good food. Not good as in “I can choke this down if I think happy thoughts” but good as in, “Should I get three more dogs or just two?”

And the worst part is we’re stuck together, we and Shea. The city can only absorb one new park in a generation, and it’s not going to be ours. Ironically, this is the only reason I’m against the West Side Stadium: If it gets built, we get nothing. Even if it doesn’t, we probably get nothing. You know the Yankees will get their park, because they’re the Yankees. Us? We’ll be sitting there getting dripped on until the last member of the Pepsi Party Patrol fires the last Brian McRae T-shirt into the facade of the section above us, bringing it down on our heads.