Free Tickets To See Joey Votto

So far, there is one entry for the free tickets to see the Mets and Reds tomorrow afternoon. ONE. Based on the lack of entries, I’m going to guess:

1. You’re unable to go to Flushing on a Thursday afternoon due to previous commitment (i.e., you work during the day, you’re in a hospital bed, you have a mani-pedi scheduled, etc.).

2. You haven’t had time yet to take or find a photo expressing your Mets fandom.

3. You can’t figure out how to post a photo to the MetsToday Facebook page.

4. You simply aren’t interested in watching the Mets and Reds engage in Our National Pastime at New York’s largest open-air restaurant.

Or, maybe you’re in the process of snapping that photo and getting it uploaded to the MetsToday Facebook page. In which case, you have until 7:00 p.m. EST tonight to execute.

Do you want to see a Major League Baseball Game featuring Canada’s greatest hitter of all-time (apologies to Larry Walker and Terry Puhl), for FREE? Then quickly, get a photo posted to the MetsToday Facebook page for a chance to win the tickets. At the time of this posting, you have a decent chance, since there’s only one other entry. Good luck!

Joe Janish began MetsToday in 2005 to provide the unique perspective of a high-level player and coach -- he earned NCAA D-1 All-American honors as a catcher and coached several players who went on to play pro ball. As a result his posts often include mechanical evaluations, scout-like analysis, and opinions that go beyond the numbers. Follow Joe's baseball tips on Twitter at @onbaseball and at the On Baseball Google Plus page.
  1. JW May 16, 2012 at 9:12 am
    Long time reader, first time comment-er (I think). I am unable to go and I think that if only one person can go, then why not let him win the contest?

    This speaks volumes on the quality of your readership, that they are all such hard workers that they can’t show up to an afternoon game mid-week.

    • Joe Janish May 16, 2012 at 10:38 pm
      JW, thanks for your long-time loyalty, it’s greatly appreciated. Also thanks for finally commenting — I hope you make it a habit!

      If only one person won the tix that would be fine with me. And you may have something to that theory about the quality of the readership. Though I know there are many MetsToday readers who would really, really like to be working hard for someone right now yet can’t due to any of various reasons.

      Thanks again. Looking forward to your future comments.

  2. Colin May 16, 2012 at 9:32 am
    I think this is an indictment of your website. To think a Mets fan would sink to this pathetic level posting pictures for a $5 ticket. I thank all Mets fans for not falling for this charade.
    • Joe Janish May 16, 2012 at 10:40 pm
      “Indictment” sounds negative, like the site is a criminal or something; I hope people don’t think that I’m doing something wrong here. I can assure you that the Mets are providing tickets that cost more than five bucks.
  3. rts2346 May 16, 2012 at 9:37 am
    Would love to go – and going for free would be wonderful – but I can’t. Although I am retired, as is often the case I seem to have multiple things to do on the same day, which is really a good thing.

    Love the Mets, and faithfully read your posts, courtesy of the Google Reader (I really miss the old version, which made commenting and sharing very easy)

    Hope you make this offer again!

    Let’s go, Mets – I have really enjoyed following them this year, and even though I don’t think they can keep it up, “Hope springs eternal…”

    • Joe Janish May 16, 2012 at 10:41 pm
      Thanks very much for your loyal readership! This was kind of a last-minute thing, and hopefully if there’s a next time, it will be with more notice.

      Thanks again for reading, and hope to see more of your comments in the future.

  4. norme May 16, 2012 at 11:40 am
    Sorry, Joe. Even free tickets can’t induce me to Citifield.
    Of course living in SC doesn’t help, but I only go to Mets games on the road.
  5. Colin May 16, 2012 at 11:52 am
    Here’s a suggestion:

    Instead of making someone do a song and dance for a ticket how about giving them away to a reader of this blog without the whole “do this for me first”.

    • HobieLandrith May 16, 2012 at 4:57 pm
      The amount of time it took you to write that comment is about the amount of time it takes to post a picture on Facebook. Just sayin’
    • Joe Janish May 16, 2012 at 10:55 pm
      Colin, I’m sorry that you found the process to be complicated.

      I chose to do it this way as a means of what I thought would be simplicity on my end. As you know, I do not require registration to post on this site, so I needed some way to easily and positively identify entrants and confirm valid means of communication. I also needed what I thought was a fast and easy way to provide an entry of some sort. For me, the easiest way to do this was through Facebook.

      I suppose I could have just put up a post that stated, “hey, I have free tickets for Thursday’s game. Whoever wants them, send me an email.” But, to me that’s boring, and I wanted to create some kind of qualification for “winning” the tickets. What if I did just make a simple offer as you suggest, and a hundred people responded? How do I choose? The first one gets them? The 50th? And how do all the “losers” know that my decision process was on the up and up, and not a way to give the tickets to my cousin? How would the Mets know I didn’t just hand them to my neighbor?

      And I’m completely befuddled by your “do this for me first” comment. What the heck does that mean? I’m giving away free tickets to a MLB game, and asking for NOTHING in return. I didn’t even ask that people “like” the MetsToday page, because I don’t really care whether or not people like it — I just wanted to provide something extra to MetsToday readers.

      In fact, not only did this giveaway give me nothing, but it TOOK time away from my life that would have been spent doing something else. The idea was to provide a “thank you” to MetsToday readers and try to do something fun. Clearly, I failed miserably.

      I’m open to suggestions on how you would have executed this giveaway differently, as there may be a similar opportunity at some point in the future. Please let me know your thoughts, I’m all ears and eager to hear your feedback.

      • Mike B May 21, 2012 at 1:42 pm
        Joe,
        Dont pay any attention to the negative responses. I didnt think there was anything wrong with your contest.

        Whether you were trying to promote MetsToday or not, I think you should and there is nothing wrong with giving away free tickets to get the word to people.