On this page, you will find a list of all the events that the KHH bloggers have gone to and written recaps for. To give our readers a sample, there is a short quote from each recap.
After we saw R.A. Dickey lose at home to the Rockies, Astros, and Giants, he was able to win on the road at Yankee Stadium. Do you get what I mean by unpredictable?
The Angels had two errors tonight, and they were both on Jason Bay ground balls in the infield. In fact, they were both overthrows of first base that went into the crowd.
Tonight, the Red Bulls defeated the New England Revolution 2-1 at RedBull Arena to pull in to first place in the Eastern Conference. The win was the first for the Red Bulls in their last 7 games, going 0-1-5 before the victory tonight. However, it was almost another tie for New York when the Revolution appeared to score a goal in the 86th minute, but the player was ruled offside. It would have been a terrible tie for the Red Bulls had the goal counted. The scoring in this game almost started in the early minutes, but the Red Bulls goalie, Greg Sutton made a great save on a penalty kick to keep the game scoreless. The scoreless drought actually did end when the Revolution had an own goal in the 37th minute to make the score 1-0 Red Bulls. We did not get a good look at it because we were on the other side of the field in the supporters section, but it must have been disgusting, as any own goal is. The next goal came in the 50th minute when Thierry Henry made some beautiful moves and scored. He probably had the ball for maybe 10 seconds in the penalty box just destroying any defender in his way and making a perfect shot. Soon after, in the 55th minute, New England cut the lead to 2-1. After this goal, the game was full of missed opportunities from both teams. I think that the final score really should have been 6-4 Red Bulls. For example, Thierry had two beautiful passes, one to Corey Hertzog, who just gave up and stopped running, and one to Medhi Ballouchy, where he just flat out missed. He had a wide open net and just completely missed the goal. For New England, there were many shots on goal and a couple of shots just wide or over the top of the net. They could have easily had at least 3 goals. Greg Sutton played very well in goal for the Red Bulls to preserve the 2-1 victory. After this victory, the Red Bulls will now embark on a 4 game road trip and they will not return home until July 6th when they host Toronto FC.
Red Bulls Goalie Greg Sutton
Now on to the jokes from the game:
As I mentioned in my preview article, Sam, Raphi, and I all wore Jets jerseys (Chad Pennington, Dustin Keller, and Jonathan Vilma, respectively) in honor of the Red Bulls playing New England. I think we got mostly positive reviews from the Red Bulls supporters section. Maybe we were on TV. Did anyone watch the game on MSG+?
As we were on our subway to Park Place, there was a kid making high pitched screams. I guess you had to be there. It was pretty funny.
We only had two tickets entering this game (both first row of supporters section), so Sam had to scalp one. He bought one for $20 from this pretty creepy lady. They were probably the worst seats in RedBull Arena, but he had no problems moving into the first row with us because everyone stands in the supporters section.
There were multiple cancer smoke bombs in this game. There was one as usual just before the game started to make the field very smoky. After the Red Bulls first goal, though, surprisingly there was no smoke bomb. It was very pleasant. But after their second goal, there was, of course, a smoke bomb. I probably have lung cancer from it. It was disgusting. Here’s a video of the bomb. There are also some pictures. It was worse than it looks:
Revolution Goalie Through the Smoke Bomb Smoke
Revolution Goalie Through the Smoke Bomb Smoke
During the first half, some fans decided to put up a huge soccer shirt in the upper deck. It is actually huge. I don’t know what the point of it is or even what team it’s for, but it was pretty cool. Here’s a picture:
The T-Shirt in the Upper Deck
As I mentioned earlier, there was a beautiful saved penalty kick by Greg Sutton. Here’s a great video of it:
After the Red Bulls had won the game, the supporters leaders tried to make everyone take their shirts off for the win. As you can guess, we did not participate. It was just a bunch of random, gross drunk people without shirts on. We tried to get out of their as quickly as possible. Luckily, I do not have any pictures.
There are maybe 4 or 5 different Red Bulls supporters leaders. The head leader is a guy who has probably been with the team since it started at Giants Stadium. I believe he was also the first one to take his shirt off and tell everyone else to do so. Sam did not approve of him but I thought he was good. He is classic Red Bulls. Then there is the young somewhat Hispanic guy who was there for much of the first half and part of the second. I liked him. Then there is the white guy who had a bad throat and was not able to yell into the loudspeaker for too long. Last, but certainly not least is the guy who never stood on the stool, but yelled from his microphone from below. I enjoyed his hat. Here are some pictures of Red Bulls supporters leaders:
The Young Hispanic Guy
Supporters Leaders
Our Favorite Supporter Leader
There were more random Red Bulls bench players warming up right next to us this game. Here are some pictures and a video:
Red Bulls Bench Player Stretching
Red Bulls Bench Warming Up
Bench Players Warming Up
Did you know that Taco Truck is the official taco of the New York Red Bulls? Well now you know. I’m sure DJ Mbenga already knew that (I know you check this blog constantly, DJ). Here is a picture of Taco Truck:
The Taco Truck Sign
The Newark Bears trumpeteer made an appearance tonight at RedBull Arena. He was blowing away at his trumpet all game, but this time there were actually other fans so it was hard to hear him. Here is a picture of the trumpet (you might need to look closely to see it):
The Newark Trumpeteer
I have a special announcement to make: Thierry Henry has officially moved past Johan Petro in the joke player category. He made some wonderful plays tonight, both shots, and especially passes and he is a high quality soccer player. Even though he often acts like Petro, he will no longer be compared to him in this blog. Congratulations, Thierry!
There were many different cheers from the supporters section tonight. My personal favorite was “I Believe That We Will Win”, which you can see in a video that I took below. However, Sam’s favorite was “Da le me”. I believe it is in Spanish. It sounds like jibberish to me. I was unable to find a youtube video of this, but let me know if you see one.
Here are some more pictures from the game:
A New England Corner Kick
A New England Corner Kick
A New England Corner Kick
Revolution Goalie
Our next KHH event will be on Sunday night as we have a viewing party of Keeping Up With The Kardashians. All are invited and we hope you join us. After that, there is a possibility that we go to Yankees-Indians on Monday night if the prices are not crazy. Hopefully our favorite Cavaliers, Alonzo Gee, Ryan Hollins, and Joey Graham will make appearances if we go. We will be sure to get their autographs.
Tonight, the Red Bulls will be taking on the New England Revolution at RedBull Arena, and the KHH bloggers will be attending this great rivalry. I don’t actually know if these teams are even rivals, but because of the humungous Jets-Patriots rivalry, I assume that this should be a rivalry as well. In honor of Jets-Pats, Raphi and I (and possibly Sam) will be wearing Jets jerseys. I will also be wearing my newly purchased Red Bulls scarf. We will be sitting in the first row of the supporters section, so we will be in clear view. Hopefully we will be on TV, and hopefully there aren’t any more smoke bombs, but there probably will be. For those of you who don’t know, the last time we were sitting first row of supporters, every time the Red Bulls scored (twice, and also at the beginning of the game), the supporters leaders set off smoke bombs that probably legitimately gave everyone in the area lung cancer. It was actually disgusting, and it is not something that I am looking forward to tonight. Moving on to the actual game, out of the 4 soccer games that we have been to this year, we have seen 3 ties (in our last 3 games) and one loss. This will most likely be our last soccer event of the season, so we need to end it on a winning note. C’mon Red Bulls! Let’s get a win tonight! A win should not be too difficult as the Red Bulls sit in second place in the east with a 4-2-7 (ew, 7 ties) record while the Revolution are in 6th place with a 3-6-4 record. In my opinion, and because this game is at home, it is a must win for the Red Bulls. Also of note is that the Red Bulls have disgustingly tied their last 4 games. They gotta win this one tonight! Expect a game recap after the game.
Tonight, I will be joining Raphi to watch Game 5 of the NBA finals and it will be another KHH viewing party. All are welcome to this event free of charge (only 25 cents less than a typical Nets game!). The series between the Mavericks and Heat is currently tied 2-2 with the winner tonight likely to be the NBA champion. I think that it is a much more important game for the Mavs because this will be their last home game of the series. The last two games will be in Miami, and there is no way that Miami will lose 2 in a row at home after taking 2/3 in Dallas. I would say that if the Mavericks lose, the series is over, and that is why I am picking the Mavs, 89-85. There has been a lot of talk (mostly coming from ESPN idiots) that Lebron James is terrible now that he had 8 points in the last game. This is 100% b.s. In the last series, he did all the scoring and D-Wade did none of it. The team opposing the Heat chooses to guard one of them tightly, but it is impossible to guard both. The Mavs are choosing to guard Lebron, so Dwyane is getting tons of open looks. Everyone seriously needs to shut up about Lebron sucking in this series. He is still probably the best player in the world. At the KHH event, we will all be rooting for the Mavs and we hope that you will join us to celebrate. Our next KHH event will be Red Bulls-Revolution on Friday, followed by a viewing party of the season premiere of Keeping Up with the Humphries’s on Sunday.
This game was everything we expected it to be and much more. The final score was 1-1, with Greece scoring in the first half and Ecuador tying the game in the second. It was the third straight tie that we have attended in a soccer game (the previous two being Red Bulls-Rapids and Red Bulls-Crew). This was a pretty well played game with good defense, good goalkeeping, and timely offense. Greece’s goal in the first half was pretty beautiful. It was a header off of a nice pass. Ecuador’s goal was not quite as nice, but it fired up the bright yellow-clad Ecuadorian fans in attendance. This was the first game that we have went to at Citi Field where there has been a sellout. Actually, it is the first game of any kind that we have went to that was a sellout. We usually choose to go to the cheapest games possible, but for this game we actually had to spend $30. It was 100% worth it, as it was a lot of fun. I wish there would be more international soccer games at Citi.
The Sun Sets Over Citi Field
Now on to the jokes of the game:
Right as we arrived to the stadium, we noticed the immense presence of bright yellow shirts. This is Ecuador’s color, and they had a lot more fans than the Greeks, who’s colors are blue and white. The stadium seemed to be glowing like a firefly for the whole game. See bright yellow pictures below:
Bright Yellow Outside Citi Field
More Yellow Outside
Sign in Greek. Also notice the yellow sellout.
This whole game, from the soccer itself, to the music that was played, to the fans that attended, was so Cristina. For those of you who don’t know, Cristina is a Spanish teacher at our school, Heschel. She is annoying and loud, Spanish, and doesn’t really understand English at all. That is what this game felt like. And I think the playlist from this game came right out of Cristina’s iPod.
I will now talk about some of our purchases and giveaways from this game. At the top of the Citi Field escalator, a random guy handed us out a pamphlet in Spanish and Thundersticks with Spanish advertisements on them. I immediately threw the pamphlet out and blew up the thundersticks but I got bored of them after a while. Once we were inside, we bought peanuts, as is Shea custom. I don’t know if we should have, because this game wasn’t even close to being as much of a joke as Mets games are. Anyway, we ate the peanuts at halftime, and I would call them, in a word, delicious. They were actually good. The more games we go to, the better the Citi Field peanuts have been. Also, before the game started, Raphi decided that he wanted to buy something. He might have been tempted by my buying of a Red Bulls scarf on Saturday (which I also wore to this game), but Raphi decided to buy a Vuvuzela. I would call this a mistake because it is worth a dollar and he paid $9 for it. But he had some fun with it and he will be able to cherish it forever. As we were heading back to our seats in section 401 (we sat right on the side of the section. I was the seat closest to falling off the edge. It was exhilerating.), Raphi decided to take some pickles from the condiments stand. He put them in a napkin and we ate them in our seats. We are so cheap, really. But they were actually good. See pictures of our acquisitions tonight below:
Some Goodies
Raphi and His Vuvuzela
Thundersticks with Spanish Ads
Thundersticks and Vuvuzela
The Trifecta
Right before the game started, the national anthems of Greece and Ecuador were sung. They were jokes to say the least. Check out the videos of both anthems below:
For this game, the Mets had to cover part of the baseball diamond with grass and it kind of looked ridiculous and stupid. Also, some seats weren’t really facing the field, but luckily we did not run into this problem. Check out pictures of Soccer at Citi below. Also check out pictures from our seats in Section 401 (we arrived at this game very early, so that is why the seats look so empty):
Pepsi Porch from Section 401
Random Area View from Section 401
Pepsi Sign
The Field Below Us
A Soccer Pitch on the Diamond
A Soccer Pitch on the Diamond
Soccer in the Outfield
Advertisements on the Field
Home Plate Was Covered With a Tarp
Do you know the Mets apple in Citi Field that comes up whenever the Mets hit a home run (which is once every 10 games nowadays)? Well, today, whenever a goal was scored, the apple came up. It still said Mets on it. They should have put a sign over the Mets sign that says either Greece or Ecuador depending on who scores. The Mets sign makes it worse. But it was still good. I’d like to say that before this game started, I called that this will happen. It might not be the most improbable thing in the world, but still. See picture of the Mets apple below:
The Mets Apple (which will appear later in the game)
Mets Home Run/Soccer Goal Apple
In the first half, the Greece defense was very good. Ecuador had many more opportunities to score than Greece, but the Greeks capitalized on their opportunities and Ecuador missed some shots and got blocked quite a few times. In the second half, Ecuador was pretty desperate to score until they had their goal and then they were just happy to settle for the tie. Going into the game, Greece was ranked much higher than Ecuador, and they were very happy with a tie in this game. Because they were not trying as hard to score, the end of this game could have been more exciting.
When Ecuador actually did score their goal, Citi Field was absolutely nuts. Everyone was going crazy. It was the loudest I have ever heard the Citi and it wasn’t even for a Mets game. That’s pretty sad. See this video that was taken shortly after the Ecuador goal was scored:
The biggest joke from this game was definitely the yellow cards handed out. There were 6 handed out in all, and each one more of a joke than the last. Raphi commented that the game was pretty chippy, but 6 yellow cards is just too many. I wish we saw a red card. I also commented in the game that there should be blue cards to complete Ecuador’s uniform, because their shirts are yellow, their shorts are blue, and their socks are red. They actually look kind of ridiculous. They should have gotten a blue card. See pictures of Citi Field yellow cards below (there were too many so I didn’t take a picture of each one):
Yellow Card on Citi Field Scoreboard
Yellow Card on Citi Field Scoreboard
Overall, this was a very successful game for Citi Field and the Mets, and they probably made a ton of money, maybe twice as much as they would for the average Mets game. Even though it won’t happen before I leave for camp, and probably not even this year, there will definitely be more soccer being played at Citi Field in the future. I will be the first one to get a ticket when it happens, and I think that all of our readers should too.
Check out these pictures from the game:
Game Action
Game Action
Game Action
Game Action
Game Action
Check out these videos from the game:
Tomorrow morning (or should I say today because it’s past midnight), we will be heading out to Newark to see the Bears in action. We have third row seats and it should be great. Expect a game preview tomorrow morning.
Tonight, the Greek national soccer team will take on Ecuador’s best in Queens at Citi Field. We have been to Citi many times this year, and we have seen many soccer games this year, but we have not done both at the same time, so this should be very exciting. The Mets groundscrew has put grass-looking stuff over the part of the infield that will have soccer played on it, which makes it a little less of a joke, but it should still be a pretty big joke. We are sure to get peanuts. Maybe even two bags because this is even more of a joke than Mets games, and peanuts signify jokes. The reason that Shea has chosen to host these two teams is because of the huge population of each nationality in Queens. There are over 100,000 people from each nationality in Queens alone, making the borough home to the most Greeks and Ecuadorians except for Greece and Ecuador themselves. Already, over 30,000 tickets have been sold because of this and we might even see a Citi Sellout. Ecuador is currently ranked #56 in the world and is coming off of a run to the round of 16 in the 2006 World Cup. Greece is ranked #12 in the world and was eliminated in the first round of the 2010 World Cup. I predict that this game will be slightly more competitive than your typical Red Bulls game. In other soccer news, the Wilpons have expressed interest in owning an MLS team and the MLS commissioner has said that he wants his next expansion team to be located in Queens. I would love to see this happen. We would be able to see Citi Soccer very often and there would be a rivalry between the Red Bulls and the new Queens expansion team. Who would we root for? Probably both. I wonder which team would be more popular, because the Red Bulls play in New Jersey. I think many fans would just want to go see the new team in Queens instead. This will be a story for a future day. For this game, we will be sitting in section 401, the section as far away as possible for a baseball game, but actually not terrible for a soccer match. It will still be a joke. I hope we are in the Ecuadorian cheering section. I also hope that it is not a 0-0 or 1-0 game.
Looking ahead, we have some great events coming up at KHH. After tonight, we will be waking up early to see the Newark Bears take on the New Jersey Jackals at 11 AM tomorrow. This sort of came out of the blue, but this will finally be our chance to use our Newark Train Tickets!!! This is a cause for celebration, and you can bet we will be celebrating tomorrow. Oh yeah, and we bought third row tickets behind home plate for 10 bucks each. Typical Newark Bears. I can’t wait to see all of these great players. Then, on Friday we will hopefully see some more soccer at RedBull Arena as the Red Bulls take on the New England Revolution. Raphi will most likely be wearing his Jets jersey. A game recap of Greece-Ecuador will be coming later tonight.
This might have been the most disappointing finish to any event that we have went to this whole year. The Red Bulls’ goal, scored by Mehdi Ballouchy in the 9th minute, held up for the next 81 minutes of the game until Rich Balchan scored for the Crew in the last minute of stoppage time. Fans had already left RedBull Arena when the goal was scored and every fan in attendance was unhappy with the result. If the Red Bulls had won this game, they would have moved ahead of Philadelphia for 1st place in the Eastern Conference, but instead they now remain in second place. This game was a tale of two halves. The first half was dominated by the Red Bulls. They could have been up by 2 or 3 at halftime if not for missed opportunities and good defensive plays by Columbus. In the second half, however, Columbus came out attacking. The Red Bulls were in defensive mode for much of the half and did not have many scoring opportunities and it came back to hurt them in the end. The Red Bulls goal came on a beautiful pass from our favorite Red Bull (along with Thierry Henry), Luke Rodgers. It was very pretty. Columbus’s goal was not especially pretty. It was more out of desperation and they were willing to do anything to get the ball in the goal. Of note in this game (we did not know this until now), the Red Bulls were missing 4 key players in this game, Juan Agudelo, Tim Ream, Rafa Marquez, and Dwayne De Rosario due to playing on various national teams. If the Red Bulls had a full squad, maybe they would have won this game. (Note: All pictures in this article were taken from websites, not my camera because I forgot it at home.)
Mehdi Ballouchy Scoring His Goal For the Red Bulls
Now on to the jokes from the game:
We did not buy tickets on stubhub or Red Bulls Ticket Exchange before this game, so we knew that we would either have to buy at the box office or scalp. Scalping seemed like the better choice. Luckily, we found a guy with 7th row seats behind the goal. I was able to get them for $50 total, a pretty good deal. I have never purchased fake tickets before from a scalper, so I was not especially worried about these. However, while waiting on line to scan my ticket, I turned my ticket over and looked at the back. Immediately I got very, very nervous. On the back, printed multiple times in small boxes read words like “Kan’t Kopy”, “Hidden Pantograph”, “Artificial Watermark”, “Anti-Copy”, “Security”, “Microprint”, and various other spooky words. I thought that the tickets would not work and we would be kicked out or arrested. Luckily, the tickets worked and I have no idea what was ever on the back of them.
First of all, I want to talk about the Columbus Crew name and logo. The Crew must be the strangest name in professional sports. They couldn’t think of anything better than that? And their logo is extremely strange as well. Check it out below:
Columbus Crew Logo
In the section directly above us, for the entire game, was the Columbus Crew “Supporters” section. I guess they came all the way from Ohio to cheer on their Crew. And they brought some friends along with them. Their most annoying friend was a drum that was beating non-stop for the entire game. It was extremely annoying. People in our section were yelling at them to shut up. It was very rude. After the Crew scored their goal, the Crew supporters were going crazy and beating the drum even louder.
Thierry Henry is officially Johan Petro, if he wasn’t already. He just does every single thing that the Pet would do if he played soccer. It’s hard to describe what he does, but he’s just so Petro. Henry pictures from the game below:
Thierry Being Petro
Thierry Still Being Petro
Luke Rodgers plays with a lot of heart. He always runs down balls and tries to steal passes at any opportunity. He is the kind of player that coaches want to have, even though he is about 5’5. Rodgers pictures from the game below:
Luke Rodgers
There were a ton of injuries in this game, most of them probably being fake. Players were moving around like zombies. One time they brought a stretcher out onto the field and then the player just stood up and walked off the field. It was kind of a joke.
At halftime of this game, I bought a Red Bulls scarf. It’s pretty nice. I did a lot of shopping downtown earlier today, so why not add to it now. It was $30, but if I ever buy a $30 scarf, it was tonight. Here is a picture of it (I took this picture):
My Red Bulls Scarf
We have decided that RedBull Arena is too nice for peanuts. It is too clean and holy. We should not soil it with our peanut mess/disaster (however, there was Chex Mix, pretzel, and hot dog sightings tonight).
#22 on the Red Bulls, Stephen Keel, is basically Anderson Varejao of the Cavaliers. Just look at the hair. That’s all you need to know. See pictures below:
Anderson Varejao and Stephen Keel
There is a player on the Crew named Josh Gardner (Sam’s cousin perhaps?). We thought he was Jewish from his name, but the internet does not say that he is. Pretty disappointing. See picture below:
Josh Gardner of the Crew
Of note from this game is that both goals scored were scored on our side of the field, which is very lucky. If we had been sitting in the Supporters section, we would not have seen a goal up close tonight.
Do you remember 2 or 3 weeks ago after Red Bulls-Rapids, they gave out a new copy of ESPN Deportes with a picture of a Red Bulls player on the cover? Well, they gave out the exact same copy of ESPN Deportes tonight after the game. It was extremely cheap of them. I immediately tore mine up and threw it in the trash. Raphi did the same thing shortly afterwards.
Unfortunately, we will not be attending Mets-Braves tomorrow night, but we will be returning to the Citi on Tuesday to see Greece-Ecuador in a much anticipated matchup. For the Red Bulls, they continue their homestand next Friday and we will likely be in attendance, unless Raphi has to be Jewish.
This was the most impressive game that we have seen the Mets play all season. I think that they really responded to Terry Collins’s rant last night, but this response may only last one game. The game was played in two parts. The first part of the game was the first 2.5 innings and the second part was the last 6.5 innings of the game. The first part of the game completely belonged to the Pirates. In the top of the first inning, the Pirates had some lucky hits, but ultimately killed Pelfrey. They had two steals before the Mets recorded an out and 3 steals in the game. There was a meeting on the mound in the first inning as well. The big blows in the inning were singles by Andrew McCutchen and Matt Diaz. The Pirates scored 3 runs in the inning. After a 1-2-3 bottom of the 1st, the Pirates were at it again. Andrew McCutchen hit another RBI single and then Neil Walker hit an absolute bomb to right-center. It went over the 415 sign, the deepest part of the park, and continued on to hit the Dunkin’ Donuts sign. It probably traveled close to 440 feet and it scored 2 runs. The Pirates were leading 6-0, and then tacked on one more run in the third. It was 7-0 Pirates. To make things worse, Paul Maholm who came into the game batting .050 went 2-3 in the game. This was very typical Mets and every single person at Shea thought the game was over. We were in for our second Mets blowout loss in 2 games.
Paul Maholm at bat. He is about to get a single.
Now on to the second part of the game. This part belonged to the Mets. In the bottom of the third inning and down 7-0, Carlos Beltran hit a ball off of the facing of the left field middle deck and cut the score to 7-3. It was the first ball that I had ever seen hit past the lower deck in left field at Citi Field. This was nice, but so what. Nobody thought that the Mets would come back and win. But the Mets were not done. After a couple of boring innings, the Mets put together a great two-out rally in the 6th inning. With the bases loaded and two outs, Ruben Tejada hit a single to right to cut the Pirate lead to 7-5. Then, a pinch hitting Daniel Murphy singled as well to make it a one run deficit. In typical Mets-Pirates fashion, Ruben Tejada scored to tie the game on a passed ball by Pirates catcher Dusty Brown (who?). This was on the first pitch be Pirates reliever Chris Resop. Both pitcher and catcher were kind of a joke. At this point, Mets fans had a lot of confidence in their team. In the 8th inning, more disasters struck for the Pirates. First off, Jose Veras, the Pirates reliever was awful to say the least. In the 7 batters he pitched to, he got 2 out, gave up 1 hit, and walked 4 of them. After Ronny Paulino led off the inning with a single, he was pinch run for by Willie Harris. After this, Chris Capuano pinch hit for Jason Isringhausen. I was shocked when I saw Cappuccino pinch hitting, but he was only there to lay down a bunt. In typical Mets fashion, he was unable to get the bunt down, though Willie Harris did force a Veras balk and got to second. When Capuano had two strikes on him, something I never saw happened. Terry Collins pinch hit Josh Thole for Capuano in the middle of the at bat. Thole walked and then Ruben Tejada hit a sacrifice fly and Willie scored from third. Later in the inning, Veras gave up a bases loaded walk to Beltran to make the score 9-7 Mets. But the game was not over because K-Rod always makes games interesting. He gave up a leadoff triple to Xavier Paul, but Pittsburgh only scored once in the inning to give the Mets an impressive 9-8 victory. One thing to note about the final score is that Raphi, half-jokingly, predicted this score in the first inning. The first correct score prediction of the year goes to Raphi in a very strange game.
Jose Reyes Warming Up
To talk about the pitching briefly, Paul Maholm was fine except for the 3 run homer to Beltran and the 6th inning. Other than that, he was very impressive, but those things really hurt him. Pelfrey was pretty disgusting in this game giving up 7 runs in 5 innings, but luckily the Mets bailed him out and he avoided the loss. For the first time in a long time, the Mets bullpen did not blow the game. They were actually quite good. Congrats Tim Byrdak, Bobby Parnell, and Izzy. This was a big win for the Mets because if they lost this game, they would have lost 3/4 at home to the lowly Pirates. Even though it is not enough, at least they got 2 wins. This was the Mets biggest comeback in a game since June 30, 2000 when they came back from down 8-1 to the Braves. After Terry Collins’s rant last night, I expected the Mets to win this game, but not in this crazy fashion. I expect Collins’s rant to last one game and the Mets will return to their bad ways tomorrow night when they host the Braves. Terry was very happy about the win, almost too happy. He might have taken it as more than it actually was. I’m sorry, but all you did was beat the Pirates at home.
Pelfery on the Mound
Now on to the jokes from the game.
Today’s Mets promotion was a Dunkin’ Donuts gift card. It is worth $2 at any Dunkin’ Donuts if you buy something there. It was a pretty meager reward for sitting through Mets-Pirates. Raphi was so disgusted with it that he gave his card to me. I am doubtful that I will use either card. Here is a picture of the card:
The Mets Dunkin' Donuts Give Away Card
We wanted to go to Mets-Pirates batting practice today, but Raphi was 40 minutes late so we missed it. Fortunately though, we did get to the game in time for a softball home run derby. Even though they used metal bats, these guys were really able to smack the ball. I was actually surprised at how good they were. They hit many home runs. There were kids in the outfield trying to catch the balls and they all failed. See pictures and video below:
Kids in the outfield during the softball home run derby.
The Home Run Derby
People actually sat in the upper deck of left field today! I was very surprised because this should have been the least attended game of the season. It was a Mets-Pirates day game. But people were out at the ballgame today. There were also a lot of schools that came out to Shea. Each school wore a different colored shirt and they all sat in a huge group so they were easily spotted. See pictures of upper deck left field and schools at the ballpark below:
Upper Deck Left Field
Upper Deck Left Field. People actually sat under the scoreboard!
Yellow Shirt School. Worst possible seats ever.
Some More Schools
Purple School in the Pepsi Porch
After the home run derby and before the game started, there was really nothing going on. The Mets groundscrew was randomly watering the infield and the Mets were playing the radio in the background. They were popular songs and very unlike the Mets. See pictures of the groundscrew below:
Great picture of groundscrew. This is my favorite of the day.
After the home run derby we decided to not leave our very good seats and go to our bad seats. Even though we got moved a few times, we never had to leave the area and we had very nice seats in the 10th row behind first base for the entire game.
The highlight of the game for us was the paper, napkins, and plastic bags that blew onto the field. They just made the game even more of a joke. It was a very windy day and because of this, the field was covered with these things throughout the game. And they always huddled together. Sometimes there was a huge clump of napkins in left field, sometimes the plastic bags surrounded Angel Pagan in center, or sometimes they attacked Pelfrey on the mound. They also sometimes chased baserunners around the basepaths. See pictures and video below (Raphi claims that he was crying from laughter during the filming of the video):
Paper and Plastic Everywhere
Groundscrew working to get the field free of paper and plastic in between the innings. Needless to say, they failed.
More Paper and Plastic
Because of all the wind, one of the security guards lost his light blue Mets hat and it blew onto the field. It was on the field for a good 5 minutes during game action. I wish it interfered with one of the plays. See picture below:
The Security Guard's Hat on the Field
In the 7th inning stretch, Raphi got a shirt. I maybe should have gotten one also, but I had already caught 3 this year (I gave the first one I caught to Raphi). I already have 3 Mets shirts and I don’t know if I can stand any more of them. The shirts are wrapped with one of those long balloons that clowns use (we call it Petro’s armband) and after the last pitch of the game, I “fired away” the balloon. This expression comes from Peggle when you have such a big lead that you can just fire away and you will still win. Speaking of Peggle, I had a great shot on the train ride home from last night’s game. See a video of it below. Also see how Raphi used his caught shirt:
Raphi's Mets t-shirt catch. He decided to use this shirt to protect his legs from getting sunburned. Typical usage of a Mets prize.
Here are a few more pictures from the game:
Jose Reyes Warming Up
Nick Evans Being Nick
Pelfrey Preparing for his Terrible Start
Matt Diaz, a Right Field Fan Favorite
Dusty Brown, Pirates Catcher. He had 4 at bats on the season coming into today and he has a great name.
Paul Maholm. He came into the game batting .050 and he still got 2 hits.
After the game ended, we went behind the Mets dugout to try to get something from one of the players. I was sort of expecting something because they won, but I got nothing. I was kind of disappointed, but that is because I am very spoiled. In the 10 or so games that we have went to, we have caught 4 throw away Pepsi Max Shirts, got two Chevrolet Mets black shirts, 4 free tickets (to Mets-Phillies and Mets-Pirates), got 3 balls, and Angel Pagan’s hat. That is an impressive list, if I do say so myself.
If the Mets lost this game, Terry Collins would have been so angry with them, but I guess the pressure will be off them for one more day. I can’t see them beating the Braves tomorrow night, though. Here at KHH, we have some exciting events coming up. On Saturday, we will likely attend Red Bulls-Columbus Crew, possibly with Sam. Then, on Sunday night, it is possible (but unlikely) that we will go to Mets-Braves. If we do not go to this game, our last chance to see the Mets will be the day before I leave to go to camp on Friday, June 17 when they play the Angels. Next Tuesday, we will be back at Citi for Greece Ecuador. I am really looking forward to this and it should be great.
Kevin Correia. He is batting .000 with an OBP of .040. That's disgusting. He should've had one of the Pirates infield singles.
This was such a classic Mets game. They blew their lead late in the game, as they usually do, and lost for the second night in a row at home to the Pittsburgh Pirates, 9-3. The first 6 innings of the game were as boring as watching the second quarter of Nets-Pistons, but the last 3 innings were as good as Nets-Spurs garbage time. The first scoring came in the game by a two out, two RBI single by Ruben Tejada in the fourth inning. No other team scored again until the top of the seventh, and boy, was the top of the 7th fun. The inning started off with an Andrew McCutchen infield single. Fine. But that was not all. The Pirates hit 4 infield singles in a row to start the inning, 6 hits to start the inning, and 5 infield singles total in the inning. Basically, they had 8 hits in the inning (they had 2 going into the inning) and 5 of them were infield hits and 2 of the outfield hits could have been caught. So the Pirates had one clean hit in the inning and ended up scoring 5 runs. Somehow, there were no errors in the inning, just plays that should have been made. It was very typical Mets. The Pirates added 4 more runs in the top of the 8th before a home run by Justin Turner in the bottom of the inning. Shockingly, (and this is really shocking) it was the Mets first home run in 11 games. Wow. Out of the Pirates 14 hits, 13 of them were singles and the other was a double, so they really just got pretty lucky. Or the Mets played very bad defense. Probably both.
Neil Walker swinging for the fences
The starting pitching in this game was actually pretty good. Kevin Correia got his major league leading 8th win of the season and his 7th win on the road. He left after 6 innings, so when he left he was not winning the game, but after the Pirates scored 5 runs in the 7th inning, he got the win. Even though Chris Cappuccino gave up 5 runs in 6 innings, they were not at all his fault. They all came on infield singles in the 7th inning and at least half of them should have been outs. I kind of feel sorry for him because he pitched very well and has nothing to show for it. The Mets bullpen tonight was very typical. Pedro Beato gave up 3 runs in 1 inning and Mike O’Connor gave up a run without recording an out. Dale Thayer pitched the last two innings without giving up a run. Congrats Dale! You were the best Mets pitcher of the night!
Dale Thayer making his appearance
Now on to the jokes of the game, and there were many of them.
Raphi was 40 minutes late today, so we arrived in the beginning of the second inning. We missed a great Andrew McCutchen diving play in the first inning, but we saw a replay of it. The Pirates had quite a few nice plays in the field today. I was impressed with their defense. Anyway, we decided to use our Mets-Pirates tickets from Monday to get into the lower level. I bought the cheapest tickets possible on Stubhub. We were very successful with our choice of seat because we were in the third row and did not get kicked out.
We were sitting in foul territory in right field, which is home to Matt Diaz of the Pirates. People were yelling things at him in our section for most of the game and told him to give them balls. They were most likely drunk. He was smiling for most of the time and not really focusing on the game. Typical Pirate. I think he also tried to talk back jokingly to the people yelling at him but I don’t know what he said. Here are some pictures:
Matt Diaz in Right Field
Matt Diaz Smiling
When Angel Pagan was up, he hit a ball down the first base line that was just foul. It wasn’t foul until he was almost at first base and he took his sweet time walking back home and picking up his bat (he is still officially my favorite Met because I got his hat on Monday). While he was walking back, Citi Field played a full round of R.A. Dickey’s alarm clock. For those of you who don’t know what this is, it is one of the cheers they play at baseball games. Once when R.A. Dickey was pitching, we decided that it is probably The Dick’s alarm clock. It is just very R.A. I enjoyed listening to it.
People were yelling at Anthony, the Mets ballboy (who we call Carmelo) the whole game to give them balls. He gave out more balls than usual tonight. Also, we noticed that he got a red-haired Mohawk. Interesting. See pictures below:
Carmelo
Because we were not sitting even close to our real seats and because Raphi forgot his Tote Bag to put peanuts in (bring it tomorrow), we did not start eating our peanuts until the 5th inning when we thought that nobody would kick us out. Surprisingly, these were the first good Shea peanuts we have had and there was not an infinite amount of them. We finished them in a record 1.5 innings. I was impressed.
In the 8th inning, Pedro Beato intentionally walked Chris Snyder, the catcher for Pittsburgh. As you would have guessed, this move did not work out well for Beato.
Mike O’Connor came in to pitch in the 8th inning. The reason the Mets brought him in was to pitch to Lyle Overbay, a lefty. O’Connor is the Mets’ lefty specialist (AKA defensive specialist, AKA The Cracker) and yet he still gave up a hit to Overbay. Following this, he walked Ronny Cedeno on 4 pitches and then gave up a hit to Xavier Paul. He did not record an out. Well done Mike.
During all the Mets pitching changes in the 8th inning, K-Rod was bored. He decided to stare at the game through the wire fence in the bullpen. He probably could not have been more bored and disgusted with his team. The funny pictures are below:
K-Rod bored out of his mind staring through the bullpen fence
K-Rod's still bored
After the Mets were down by 7 runs in the 9th inning, we decided to move up like usual. We went to our same seats as on Monday when I got Angel Pagan’s hat. When the game ended we went up to the Mets dugout again. Unfortunately, they did not win so they were not celebrating on the field and throwing things into the stands. However, I did receive a ball from a mysterious person in the Mets dugout. He just threw the ball over the top of it so I was not able to see who it was. It was a relatively easy catch seeing how difficult catching a ball usually is. Also, in the 7th inning stretch, I caught another orange Mets and Pepsi Max shirt. I will wear it tomorrow to the game. Below you will find a Mets 7th inning stretch video. Unfortunately I did not take it because I was trying to catch a shirt, but it is still ok. Also, you will see a high quality version of the Mets 7th inning stretch song. It is one of my favorites.
This game was our first blowout Mets game of the season. Most of the other games have been close, but ironically, their first blowout win or loss comes in a loss to the worst team in baseball in the last 20 years. As I said earlier, the end of this game, especially the 9th inning, was equivalent to garbage time of Nets-Spurs. For those of you who don’t know, this year when the Spurs visited Newark, they terribly blew out the Nets. The entire 4th quarter featured Steve Novak, Chris Quinn, Ben Uzoh, and Quinton Ross. It was disgusting. A similarity between the two games was that people were just yelling at the players and there was no crowd noise because everyone had left, so the players are able to hear everything people say to them. One guy today was yelling at Lyle Overbay for the whole 9th inning. See Mets-Pirates garbage time pictures below:
Carlos Beltran
Mookie Wilson with Willie Harris
Willie
Lyle Overbay bored in the 9th inning
Your favorite KHH bloggers will be back at the Citi tomorrow for more Mets-Pirates action! It is an early start, 1 PM, but we hope to go for batting practice at 11:30. There is also a high possibility that we will go to Red Bulls-Crew on Saturday in Harrison. Sam may even join us! We are looking forward to it.
The Red Bulls came back twice again tonight against the Colorado Rapids, but it was only enough to earn a 2-2 tie. In our first Red Bulls game, the team came back twice but ended up losing in the end. The tie tonight propelled them into a tie for first place in the Eastern Conference with the Philadelphia Union. The most interesting note from this game is that (according to Yahoo), the 4 goals that were scored in this game was the fastest 4 goal period in MLS since 2008. The 4 goals were scored in a total of 6 minutes and no other goals were scored the entire game. The first goal was scored on a rebound off a penalty kick. The Red Bulls goalie made a nice save on the shot, but the Colorado player just tapped in the rebound and it was an easy goal. Then, two minutes later, Thierry Henry tied the score at 1 with a goal of his own from about 19 yards away. 3 minutes after that, the same Rapid, Jeff Larentowicz, scored to give Colorado the lead, and then Luke Rodgers (more on him later) scored a beautiful goal to tie the score at 2. Rodgers’ goal was perfectly shot from an angle just over the head of the Rapids’ goalie.
Jeff Larentowicz of the Rapids (he's the white guy)
Now for some interesting notes from the game:
RedBull Arena
As I announced in my preview article, we sat in the Red Bulls Supporters section in this game. These are the crazy fans that stand the entire game and are mostly drunk. We were in the first row so we probably didn’t have to deal with as much craziness as most people. We were also sitting right next to the leader of the “Vikings Army” as it is called. There were a few different people leading the group because nobody had a strong enough voice to do it the entire game. They each had megaphones and they knew all the cheers that the fans do. My favorite is the “I believe that we will win” cheer, which you can see on youtube if you search Utah State cheer. If we go to another game, we will probably sit in the Supporters section again.
The first joke of the game started at the beginning and happened every time the Red Bulls scored a goal. Whenever this happens, they unleash a smoke bomb thing that covers the entire section and part of the field with smoke. To make it worse, it was right next to us because we were in the first row. I’m pretty sure that I have lung cancer now after breathing it in at the beginning of the game and after the Red Bulls’ two very close together goals. It was disgusting and nobody likes it. I actually have no idea why they even bother to do it.
At halftime, the subs warmed up on the field before the starters came back onto it. Some of the subs are really terrible. They were taking practice shots that sailed over the net. Once it hit a guy holding a beer and he spilled it. He must have been quite upset. MLS subs are awful. One sub finally got in at the end of the game. He is only 18 years old and he is from Colombia. The fans liked that he got in the game but he didn’t actually end up doing anything. After the game was over, the Red Bulls gave out an ESPN Deportes magazine because the player, Juan Agudelo was on the cover of it. I guess he’s famous in Spanish speaking countries. Here are some pictures from the magazine. Look for a familiar face coming up:
Juan Agudelo
Oli Perez made it into the ESPN Deportes magazine!!! Shocking...
For much of the game, the subs were warming up during the game right in front of us. It was very unprofessional and kind of weird. Especially because only one of them actually got into the game. Here are some pictures:
Random Sub
Random Subs
Random Subs
My new favorite player, along with Thierry Henry (AKA Johan Petro) is Luke Rodgers. He’s basically Raphi except good. He is from England and he is a short, white, annoying guy. He scored a goal tonight and almost had another one. He had a bicycle kick that just missed that would have been a beauty of a goal. I wish it had went in. The fans also love him as they made up multiple cheers for him.
Luke Rodgers
As we went home from Harrison, we had to take the Newark train again. It was filled with Peggle and ESPN Deportes reading. I might have actually won the Peggle series from Raphi today for the first time ever. Here are some pictures from our journey on the PATH:
Yes, we are.
Oh Hi PATH
Here are some more pictures from the game:
Our next KHH event will be on Saturday night as the Mets host the Phillies. These are the tickets that I basically stole from the Mets after a rain out that I was unable to sell on stubhub, so we will probably end up going. On Monday, we will then see Mets-Pirates at Shea, which are tickets that we also got for free. Seeing how many free Mets games that we are going to in the upcoming week, I have a question. If you can go to any Mets game at Citi Field for free, who would you want to see the Mets play and who would you want to see pitch? Post your responses in the comments section.
Kim Had Humps 