These cards arrived from an old college buddy in Brooklyn who stumbled onto this blog. Andrew is a diehard Mets fan and being about my age, he is very familiar with Wallach's career, as Wallach had a lot of big games in Shea over the course of his career. I don't think he knew I was still actively collecting Wallach cards while we were in school (class '03) but he knew I was a Wallach fan.
There were a handful of guys that I would go to games with a couple of times a season. They all happened to be Mets fans, so I ended up going to Shea a lot. Typically we sat in the upper deck along the right field line. Shea is one of the steeper stadiums I've ever been to, and tumbling down 14 flights of cement steps and right over the railing always felt like a very real possibility. I didn't take the picture below but it's not atypical of where we usually sat, though we were always on the other side of the foul pole.
I'm no huge Mets fan by any means, and Shea was undeniably a dump. The cement concourses that always seemed to have a bit of standing water were nothing to celebrate. But none the less, I was sad to see it go. It was a fitting home for the Mets and their fans, I do not mean that in any sort of disparaging way.
New Totals:
As a Mets fan, I completely agree. Shea was and is the only home park that will ever really fit the Mets franchise and the Mets fan. Citi Field....bleh. It feels like the Mets are just stadium-sitting, or perhaps just renting the place out til Shea is done getting fumigated.
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