QuesTek For Your Baseball Library: Ballpark E-Guide--Citifield

 
 Do you like planning things?  It may be the dead of winter, but if you get home tonight from celebrating the Mets' acquisition of D.J. Carrasco with the burning desire to plan out your next trip to Citi Field where you will be able to enjoy "lower" ticket prices next season, I may have just the thing for you.

If you don't go to a ton of games during the season, or if you have children, a car, or are a normal person with other things going on in your life, getting to the park to see your beloved team underperform can be a hassle. And for the thrifty, the Mets website doesn't have an interest in helping you do anything but empty your wallet into the Wilpon investment fund.

Here is where Kurt Smith's guide can help. It is a primer that mainly covers ticketing, parking, and concessions with some tips for cheapskates thrown in.  Smith helpfully runs down the price schedule for tickets in Citi's various sections which range from "inexpensive" to "OK now this is just ridiculous." Anxious ticket buying newbies will find the section on obstructed seating helpful, as Smith points out the seats to avoid--worth the price of the guide all by itself for many of us! Other concerns, such as where you could potentially park for free, where to find the "fancy beer," what you can smuggle bring into the park (peanuts and a little water or soda), and where you can get cheap hotdogs for your little brats, are addressed throughout the well-written 25 page guide.

Smith had me (and I suspect many Mets fans) on the first page where he breezes through a litany of complaints about the Mets' new stadium--the stain of Citi corporation, the unrequited Dodgers-love, the pricing, the obstructed views. But it turns out you can still have a swell old time in the house that TARP built, particularly if you can see the game, can be relatively sure you haven't paid too much for your tickets, and can rest assured that your car will probably be there when you go looking for it after the game.

Now for the ultimate IMFM QuesTek question: would I buy this if it wasn't given to me for free to review? Yeah, I think I would, because it is cheap and functions something like a friend who knows the Citi ropes for those of us who have no friends.  For five bucks,  you won't be breaking the bank to get some inside info and I think there is a nugget of detail in here for every fan, no matter how many miles their foam finger has logged. But you could also think of it as five dollars the Wilpons won't get out of you. The guide can be purchased here, and there are links to other possibly relevant guides for Mets fans, to Bronx and Philly parks where a little intelligence gathering can perhaps help them avoid being vomited on or attacked.