Chase's First Mets Game: In Words

One of the biggest responsibilities of fatherhood is teaching your son about baseball. Baseball is very important to me and I want it to be important to my son (now sons). I think every young boy cherishes the memories of his first game, and I wanted it to be special for Chase as well. I decided I would wait until he was 5 years old to take him. Many people questioned my methods, and every time I saw a picture of another youngster at his or her first game I even doubted myself. But I wanted his first game to come when he could really appreciate it. When he could sit and watch without going to the bathroom or begging for ice cream every 5 minutes. I wanted him to be able to understand the game a little. I wanted him to be able to stay the whole game. And I wanted him to be old enough so that the things he saw that day would stay with him forever.
I made the right decision.
We got there early because I wanted to have plenty of time to walk around and to allow for traffic. We arrived at about 11:30. We walked into the Jackie Robinson Rotunda, the Mets Museum and the team store. At this point, slightly after noon, Chase decided he wanted to go to our seats. I wanted to take him to the Shea Bridge, but didn’t want to force him, because it was a lot of walking from where our seats were.
We sat down with 43 minutes to go until game time. I thought this was a recipe for disaster, but two things kept his attention: the planes and the groundskeepers. Every time a plane went by, he nudged me said “another plane, it’s kind of insane.” This wore off by about the 5th inning, after the 80th plane.
He loved the grounds crew. They were chalking lines, then loading the equipment onto a flatbed pulled by a little cart, which was driven around the warning track then through a gate in the outfield fence. Chase decided when he grows up he doesn’t want to be a player, “who bat and pitch,” he wants to be on the grounds crew, but “at Chase Field, because that’s my name.”
Before the game the home run apple is out of its hat and I explained that it would go down when the game starts and only come back up if a Met hits a home run. Right around the time he insisted the apple would never come back up, Ike Davis hit his first home run.
Luckily it was a very fast game, he wasn’t constantly begging for food. We got hot dogs in the 2nd (I brought a juicebox from home), and we missed the top of the 6th while we went to the concourse to pee and get ice cream (we got a cheap dippin dots imitation, which he loved). He really enjoyed the 7th inning stretch and singing “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.”
The game was just about 2 hours old when the Mets took a 1-0 lead into the top of the 9th. Of course they blew the game thanks to some typically horrible defense by Lucas Duda. But he redeemed himself by throwing a runner out at the plate to preserve the tie. I had to explain how you can throw a runner out. Then I had to explain what the Mets would have to do to get a run and win the game (I really thought we’d been over all this stuff).
It was around this time that Chase was starting to get antsy, with two pitching changes and a run scored the top of the 9th took quite a while. Chase was fidgeting with his hat, and his sunglasses, he climbed into the row behind us, then down into the row in front of us. He was actually in the row in front of me when Davis homered again to give the Mets the win. I scooped him up and gave him the biggest hug ever. Then we watched as Davis jumped into the crowd of his teammates at home plate. The entire section of excited Mets fans gave Chase high-fives, he loved it.
Now it was time for the Mr. Met Dash. The thing Chase was looking forward to most, the thing that likely prevented him from requesting an early departure. So we made our way down to the bullpen area, exited the ballpark and lined up by the chop shops on 126th Street.

The line wrapped all the way around the parking lot, under the subway tracks. I overheard a security person say it would take about an hour, then we walked another half a block. I was determined to stay and so was Chase. An industrious vendor with a cooler on wheels had Italian ices, only $2, since we were now outside the stadium area. That kept Chase busy for a while, and thankfully the line moved fairly quickly. Once you go to the stadium you entered by the bullpen, then snaked through hallways under the field. You come out in right field and walk down the warning track. The runners enter the field at first base and run the bases from there, stopping to high-five Mr. Met (or doing it in full stride like Chase).

Then they round third and head for home where they meet up with their parents and walk through some more corridors revealing nothing more exciting than the loading docks. I’m pretty sure I saw a chalkboard sign saying “8 days without an accident.” What kind of accident did they have 9 days ago?
By this time it was a little more than an hour after the game had ended and there was no parking lot traffic. Which was nice, but I would recommend any other two-parent families wishing to do the Mr. Met Dash send an emissary outside in the 8th.
But I am glad we didn’t do that, I’m glad we stayed until the bottom of the 9th to see a walk-off home run (and the apple again), I’m glad the Mets won, I’m glad Chase got to run the bases. And I’m glad I waited 5 years for this very special event, because it made it even more special.