endy chavez bobblehead

Here is the Endy Chavez bobblehead doll. Yes it's 2 (now 8.40) in the morning and yes it's time to be tucked away and sleeping well and planning how to clean up and back the apartment. And yes the dog is seemingly weirded out by the schedule changes, rambunctious and carrying everything toy-sized in his mouth, including toilet paper roll and paper towel roll.

But the tale is like this. Dor and I got tix for a Mets vs Reds game, the last game before we leave the city. Dor's girls picked this week to be in the Adirondacks, and it's a chance she couldn't pass up for a game. I went with Raycroft, and tonight's game is coincidentally Endy Chavez bobblehead night.

Let me backtrack to game 7 of the National League Championship Series. Long after Steve Trachsel dropped a heap of crap in game 4 as his performance, and in the cold NYC night, the Mets are holding on to a tied game, trying to beat a pesky St Louis team with gems from unsung guys like John Maine and Oliver Perez. I forget who's pitching, but someone leaves a ball out over the plate and the ball is hit. Hard. The damn thing is leaving the park. Defensive backup Endy Chavez is manning the left-field wall, tracks the ball, and it's going over the fence. No matter. He leaps up over the wall, brings it back; anyone can see that the ball is only half in the glove. A matter of inches and that ball is a home run.

I almost cried. It will last as one of my favorite Met moments, even though the Mets lost to the likes of So Taguchi and Adam Wainwright in the later innings.

I love Endy. And I wanted a bobblehead. But I arrived a little late and only the first 25,000 through the gate got the majesty of the bobblehead. It has his hand up! Making the catch! And me with no Endy! I resigned myself to going bobblehead free. But after my 2 beers, I looked at the lovely AIG sponsored boxes in blue and orange. The box design mutes the details of Endy and the catch for the classic look, and I considered how much I would pay on E Bay for one.

The game was a dog-- John Maine walked people over and over again and gave up a grand slam in the first. As usual Paul LoDuca was fairly useless in run-producing spots. Ruben Gotay's reactions were... questionable at second base (I see now that he was charged with two errors). And the kid in front of us kept whacking his dad or uncle with a Thunder Stick, which is a really annoying sound throughout a baseball game. But at the end, I was waiting to see if anyone was going to leave their bobblehead. The one I targeted, sitting alone behind some people, was offered to the crew behind us with two others. I piped up and asked if they were getting rid of one and they gave it to me instead.

Made my day. I told the couple next to us how Dor and I freaked out when he made the catch, how we knew the Mets were gonna win, though they didn't. And on the subway, a guy told a Brooklyn-bound hip crew that when he gets pissed at work, he'll look at the Endy bobblehead and everything will be all right.