Going going, back back to Port St. Lucie Port St. Lucie

So on Monday I take off for Florida again. I’ll catch the last couple of days of Spring Training in Port St. Lucie, be there for the travel day on Thursday (not sure if the Mets have media availability that day or what), then head to Miami for the Mets’ opening series against the Marlins.

Last time I was down there, it was still in the early phase of camp — before any roster cuts, just as games were starting up. I am interested to see how things are different with the team nearly set and the season looming.

But more importantly, what are you interested in seeing? I’m flying solo on this one so there won’t be much in the way of video besides the occasional Skype chat. What do you want to read about on this site? Did you enjoy the content from my last trip to Port St. Lucie? What could I have done better?

All suggestions and feedback are welcome. You can comment below, or use this handy suggestion box if you prefer privacy:

Go back

Your message has been sent

Warning
Warning
Warning
Warning

Warning.

Journalism means getting high and eating Jamaican food

Two experiential pieces in today’s Daily News. Irving Dejohn smokes salvia and reports an “underwhelming” experience — though it looks from the video like he had a pretty good time — and Simone Weichselbaum eats Jamaican food on the subway.

Man, people wonder why the newspaper industry is in trouble. You needed two separate reporters to get high and eat Jamaican food? Doesn’t it seem like maybe the natural order of business would be to have Dejohn first smoke the salvia and then eat Jamaican food on the subway?

Anyway, the real story here as far as I’m concerned is the curried fried shark that Weichselbaum enjoys. I lived in a Brooklyn neighborhood with a huge West Indian population for four years and enjoyed a ton of Jamaican food*, and I’m not sure I ever saw fried shark available. Has anyone had it? The fried part sounds pretty delicious.

*- If you’re ever in Prospect Heights, go to The Islands on Washington Avenue. It’s outstanding. Also: Eat-in and dine upstairs. It’s a bizarre Being John Malcovich experience. Not the portal to Malcovich’s brain part, the half-floor part.

Boycott Fort Wayne, Indiana

Please follow my lead in continuing to avoid the city of Fort Wayne, Indiana. The mayor announced that the new government center will not be named for longtime area politician Harry Baals despite overwhelming support from the Internet. Instead, it will be called “Citizens Square,” which, without the possessive, seems to imply that Fort Wayne citizens are themselves square. They probably are, because they’re not cool enough to storm the mayor’s office and demand he pay tribute to the legacy of Harry Baals and the whims of the Internet. Hat tip to Terry for the link.

Mount up

Nate Dogg died last night. If you read this site regularly you know I don’t often get caught up in the rampant (and understandable) sentimentality that usually comes with a celebrity’s death, but the loss of hip-hop’s preeminent vocalist made me legitimately sad. Nate Dogg was a frequent topic of conversation among my friends in both high school and college, all of whom wondered how he managed to so sharply cut out his niche as the guy who sings the hook in just about every West Coast rap song.

“Regulate,” predictably I suppose, helped me start appreciating hip-hop — and for that matter, maybe funk music too — as much as any other track not on Doggystyle. It is a testament to Nate Dogg’s smooth style that the man could make a lyrical depiction of a dice game-come-crime scene accessible to a bunch of suburban middle schoolers on the other side of the country. Now on to the great East Side Motel in the sky.

Polls: Not a good way to determine anything

Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter was voted the greatest New York athlete ever, with Babe Ruth coming in a close second, according to a poll released Tuesday.

Jeter — a five-time World Series champion — earned 14 percent of the vote, while 11 percent tipped their hats to Ruth, according to the poll conducted by the Siena College Research Institute.

Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle and former Jets quarterback Joe Namath rounded out the top five.

Clemente Lisi, N.Y. Post.

This might be a fun topic for debate if Babe Ruth didn’t do the bulk of his damage in New York. Ruth is the best baseball player ever. His stats are so sexy, his baseball-reference page is blocked by SNY’s web filter. He played in seven World Series with the Yankees and won four of them. Even though he converted to being a full-time position player before coming to New York, he randomly pitched in five games in his Yankee career and got the win in all of them.

The more interesting argument is over the second-best New York athlete of all time. Here the case for Jeter could be made, I suppose, since he plays a premium position, is the Yankees’ all-time hit leader, and has the five rings and all. But I think it’s tough to even call him the second-best Yankee; that distinction should probably go to Mickey Mantle.

Who else, though? I’d love to put a Met in the discussion but, as good as Tom Seaver was, he probably didn’t contribute as much to the Mets all told as Mantle did to the Yankees. Lawrence Taylor? I could make that case. Patrick Ewing? Mike Tyson before 1990?

Now presenting the best thing ever

I have friends in the promos department:

For what it’s worth, Gil, the fellow with the dog there, is SNY’s one-man IT army and, in truth, a good guy who’s very good at his job. But I have been tweaking him on Twitter for months trying to convince him to find room in the IT budget to get me a company iPad for… I don’t know. If I had one, I’d know all the important work-related things I could be doing on it.

Also, the way Mets fans Blame Beltran for everything that goes wrong, SNY employees — by which I mean me, primarily — blame Gil. As far as I’m concerned, basically everything that plugs in around here is his responsibility, so if my cable box is wonky or the little red voicemail indicator on my phone isn’t working or light bulbs burn out, that’s because of something Gil did. So obviously my troubling lack of an iPad2 falls directly on his shoulders.

Twitter Q&A-style product

I’m very tired. Here’s something:

Good question. You mean where is it right now, or where is it available from? I’ve been in the mood for a good grilled cheese since Ted Burke sent me that text from Bradenton. But to me the best grilled cheeses come from my kitchen, and I like ’em old-school, the way my dad used to make them when I’d come home for lunch in elementary school: American cheese on white bread, grilled golden brown on a ton of butter. If you want to throw bacon on there, I mean, obviously that’s cool, but it’s not even necessary.

I’m open to eateries with good grilled cheeses, though. Anyone know of any?

My take: He’s still Luis Castillo. I don’t want to sound mean to be fatalistic about this, but it’s the same dude who has been downright brutal for three years. I get that he’s in good shape and he lost weight and maybe that’s worth something, but how much? Is he suddenly going to be a rangy fielder for the first time since 2007? Is he, at 35, likely to do anything more than tread water?

I’m guessing no. And even if he is a better fielder than Daniel Murphy, Brad Emaus and Justin Turner, I find it hard to believe he’s so much better that it will mitigate the difference in offense. I mean, hell — even if Murphy’s downright terrible there and you take him out of the competition, Emaus and Turner have both played full seasons at second in the Minors. Turner has played shortstop! You’re telling me neither of these guys can provide the Mets more than Castillo can at this point? I’m sorry, I find that hard to believe. And no three Grapefruit League games are going to change my mind.

Actually, the more I think about it, the more I wonder what it is I’m missing about Turner. Look at his stats: He has been good in every Minor League stop. Old for most levels, yes, but always solid on-base percentages with some pop. In fact, using the Minor League Equivalency calculator, Turner’s 2010 comes out much better than Emaus’, since Emaus’ numbers were inflated by the Pacific Coast League. Turner’s line in Buffalo translates to .280/.329/.420, while Emaus’ Las Vegas rates equate to .229/.311/.369.

So much. I know it’s bad form to complain about work stuff in these trying economic times, and really, I’m in no position to whine about any aspect of a job that occasionally pays me to watch baseball games. But pants are total b.s.

Seriously, I have to wear pants to edit a website? Really? And no jeans; that’s the rule. Every so often we’re allowed to wear jeans because it’s snowing or it’s Christmas Eve or a swarm of locusts has descended upon Manhattan, and even though that day should be massively inconvenient, it’s not so bad because I’m so much more comfortable. Confident too. I look better in jeans.

It was the Media Noche. A couple people asked me about my Spring Training sandwich picks so let Nate’s Tweet stand in for all of them. The Port St. Lucie sandwich scene is bleak. It is almost entirely fast food and chain restaurants. I tried the Angus Three Cheese and Bacon sandwich at Arby’s. It’s gross, I’m sorry to say. I ate a surprisingly decent buffalo chicken sandwich at Ruby Tuesday.

I did have a pretty delicious Jamaican beef patty at a place called Jerk City out on U.S. 1. I would consider a beef patty a sandwich, because I use a very liberal definition of the term “sandwich.” I understand that others would not call this a sandwich.

I’m going back to Florida for the last couple of Spring Training games and then the opening series in Miami. I understand I will have way more exciting culinary options in Miami than I did in Port St. Lucie. I look forward to it.

Am I spamming the crap out of you right now?

If you’re getting annoying emails from me, let me know. When I first started this site, I briefly had a subscription service set-up wherein users got notified whenever I posted anything. Problem was, we actually couldn’t figure out how to add an unsubscribe option to the emails, and when I started posting more often they got extremely annoying. Eventually I couldn’t take it anymore and I shut ’em down.

Last night, I needed to fire the thing back up for administrative purposes. I tried to get all the real, human users unsubscribed from the notifications but if I missed you, send me an email at tberg@sny.tv (or just reply to the spam) and I’ll make sure you’re removed from the list.