Monday I decided to come home after work to catch up on my blog since I was falling too far behind.
I was so tempted to head back to Staten Island after work where I could have indulged in an all you can eat deal while watching the SI Yankees play. I wisely thought better of it.
For a more in-depth analysis of the Staten Island Yankee experience please feel free in the near future to check out the following website,
http://www.stadiumjourney.com/ where I just did a review for my buddy Paul Swaney, their President and general partner who resides in Chicago, Illinois.
In addition, his site has tremendous reviews to give sports travelers like myself everything you need to know about getting places and they offer different opinions and views from all kinds of fans as well.
Please feel free to take a look in your spare time.
Be careful you'll get hooked.
Unlike Doc & Darryl, that's a good thing.
Tuesday night I went to Citi Field to see the Mets play the St. Louis Cardinals.
With their ace, Adam Wainwright on the mound following a dreadful 2-9 west Coast trip I thought the Mets were in for a long night.
Thankfully they proved me wrong on this particular night.
The Mets decked the Cards, 8-2!
The Mets rediscovered how to hit the ball within the friendly confines of Citi Field.
Believe me, I really wish I was in Wrigley Field.
Speaking of Wrigley Field, Andrew Van Cleve, who happens to live up the block from there put me in contact with Paul Swaney.
Andrew is another road tripper who I met back in May.
His mantra is Have game? Will travel!
Here's the link to his website site and blog which can also be found on my blog roll:
http://www.anygame-anywhere.com/
Wednesday night I was back at Citi Field which started out looking like a long night then the game started speeding up in the middle innings.
The Mets with Johan Santana pitching fell behind 6-0 before they even swung the bat.
They proceeded to get 2 runs back in the bottom half of the first inning.
The Cardinals added a run in the sixth and the Mets matched them with one of their own.
Going to the bottom of the eighth inning the Mets trailed by 4, 7-3. They managed to tie the score at 7.
The game wound up going 13 innings before they lost this one, 8-7.
My friend Don Steiger and his son Donnie who I saw in St. Louis a few weeks ago were relieved since they requested that I deliver them a token win.
Royalty came through again.
If you want to read up on these special people please go to my previous post called "The Gateway to the West".
Thursday night thankfully after making it through another day of work. I came home to rest and recharge the batteries.
Friday night it was back to Citi Field and a visit to Donovan's Pub afterwards.
The Arizona Diamondbacks were in town to face the Mets.
The Mets wound up losing to one of the worst teams in baseball partially thanks to their genius manager Jerry Manuel.
But like the King said he did what all 29 other mnagers would have done.
He brought a lefty pitcher in to face a lefty batter with two outs in the top of the sixth ining.
Mind you the lefty lefty overmanaging nonsense blew up in his face.
Raul Valdes in relief of Mike "shaky" Pelfrey faced 4 batters and gave up 4 hits including two home runs to put this game out of reach.
The Mets added a run but they still lost, 9-6.
It wasn't a total loss for Royalty.
As you can tell in a post I did about a few guys who had bought tickets for the Friday games from a season ticket holder.
Saturday night it back to you know where by now.
Let it be known the Mets came into this game 0-4 against the Diamondbacks this season.
The question was will tonight be the night?
The answer was yes!
The Mets found a way to finally rattle those snakes, 5-4 when Carlos Beltran hit a game winning sacrifice fly in the 9th inning.
It was a fun night throughout as I noted in a separate post when Royalty got to see some new found company.
We attract fans of all ages.
Sunday we were back.
At least this time we were treated to a pregame ceremony which I did a special post about.
Please check it out for further details.
In addition, a fellow roadtripper named Sean Rowland stopped by to meet and greet the King and I.
I did a post on him as well.
He also has a website. Here's his link:
http://www.stadiumandarenavisits.com/ which can also be found on my blog.
As for the game, if you call it that. The Mets looked like punching bags.
In reality, it was more like target practice.
The Diamondbacks behind Daniel Hudson who was making his major league debut looked like Dr. K in his hey day.
Hudson pitched 8 dominant innings and he picked his first major league hit too that drove in 2 runs.
The Diamondbacks hit 4 home runs.
Adam LaRoche hit two of them including a 415 foot double which was hit further than either of his two 3 run homers.
Stephen Drew hit one and catcher John Hester followed with a bomb of his own that even left the King in awe. What a shot that was.
The Mets went on to get destroyed 14-1!
On a positive note, there was an Oliver Perez sighting. He pitched 2 innings and he give up 5 hits and 4 runs.
What a week it was.
Stay tuned for the week ahead.
Thank you for reading.
I hope you got educated and amused at the same time.
That's the life of royalty.
Yours truly,
Gary Herman
