With the numerous audio and visual attacks we battle daily when reaching for our digital devices, it’s easy to get swamped with news happening at the moment. What was the result last night? What was said afterward? And most importantly, how this outcome will create opinions for this moment but has also established enough proof to project results for the rest of the season accurately.
We are all guilty of it and I hold back the anguish of back-to-back shutouts in Wisconsin, after which the New York Post’s Jon Heyman quickly reminded you that Milwaukee is the smallest market in Major League Baseball. The Post is one of my many digital morning stops to read about what I watched last night. Another is Tim Britton of The Athletic, who usually has an accompanying lyric among his weekly drops. So to mimic one of the best, how about…
“If you push too hard, even numbers got limits.
How did one straw break the camel’s back? Here’s the secret.
The million other straws underneath it. It’s all mathematics.
~ Mos Def
Yes, Milwaukee, Wisconsin is the MLB's smallest market with roughly 1.5 million people in their metropolitan area. For comparison, Camden, Vineland and Philadelphia, PA are considered the Delaware Valley metro region with a population of roughly 6.3 million. Milwaukee is the smallest metro with a baseball team behind Cincinnati and Denver.
But Forbes has the Brewers' average rating viewership in 2022 as slightly more than the Reds and Rockies combined and "last season's record revenue for Major League Baseball translates into all-time-high valuations for its teams." So billionaires not spending money on their marketing department or actual players on the team to generate interest in their respective areas doesn't gain my attention.
One of those billionaires mingling amongst the commoner does. Viewers of the Mets' season opener could easily see the blue-shirted 7 Line Army members in the outfield seats, helping to amass the less than 32,000 fans in a stadium that constantly had an additional 10,000 more noisy fans a few weeks earlier for the World Baseball Classic.
Heyman was in Miami last Thursday and reported how "Mets owner Steve Cohen sat way down the right-field line with several hundred working-class straphangers from the Mets-loving 7 Line community." That same community that has privately and publicly asked for this for decades, long ago when Met fans falling asleep to the game on the radio wouldn't change to WFAN in the morning.
The evolution of sports talk radio, allowing countless unnamed callers to expound about what they would do if they were the owner or the general manager, moved from audio to typing tweets and posting @ your favorite pundit with your opinion. The next step is where we are currently - that same fan from Great Neck, NY, is now the owner and attempting to appease those masses.
"Cohen played a true man of the people, separated from the masses only by the occasional serenades in tribute to him — "Un-cle Stee-eeve" — and of course about $20 billion in the bank account."
Steve Cohen, Uncle Stevie or whatever you want to call him, and the collection of talent wearing the Blue and Orange deserve one day of solace from expectations, if only because they are endless - Opening Day. Yes, it was officially opening day a few days ago, but the season is still less than a week old. Citi Field will be filled for the first time this year and the home opener has the most important word mixed among its opening letters - HOPE.
The beauty of baseball is its similarity to a freshly planted seed. Since I've never farmed a day in my life, my best comparisons are The Simpson: Tapped Out and Animal Crossing. At the start of the season, you put something in the ground, add subsistence and routinely check up on it. Depending on the item, it takes a few days or weeks before a true sense of its outcome can be determined. All of which serves as ample time to get silly on the one certainty from Thursday - hope.
I hope that the bulk of early injuries means the team will stay healthy down the stretch. I hope that Max Scherzer hasn't lost it over the off-season. I hope that the many hard-hit balls will find grass instead of leather. I hope that sending top prospect Brett Baty to Syracuse doesn't come back to bite them. I hope starters like David Peterson and Tylor Megill can go deeper into games, lessening the stress on an already overtaxed bullpen. I hope that Pete Alonso stays healthy.
I hope my relentless dedication to the jersey and those wearing it will be rewarded with an extended season, blooming in early fall and continuing into September. Let's hope that motivates all sports fans to tune in. Here's hoping the Mets make it worth our time and that's the truth.
Upcoming Series: Miami Marlins at New York Mets
Friday, April 7 - 1:10 pm
Edwardo Cabrera (0-0, 4.50 ERA) vs. Tylor Megill (1-0, 3.60 ERA)
Saturday, April 8 - 4:10 pm
Trevor Rodgers (0-1, 6.23 ERA) vs. Kodai Senga (1-0, 1.69 ERA)
Sunday, April 9 - 1:40 pm
TBD vs. Carlos Carrasco (0-1, 11.25 ERA)
- Mets 2024 Preview - Get Ready And Be Patient - March 28, 2024
- Edwin Diaz Shines In Spring Debut - March 11, 2024
- Mets notes From spring's first pitch in Florida - February 26, 2024
