Mets say good riddance to Marlins' park

MIAMI -- The Mets' final day at Sun Life Stadium began like so many others at the building formerly known as Joe Robbie, Pro Player, Dolphin and Land Shark.

Though the name of the place frequently changed, everything else, unfortunately, stayed the same throughout its 18 years of being a temperamental host to Major League Baseball.

After another soaking rain Wednesday lessened to a drizzle, Terry Collins and assistant general manager John Ricco ventured outside to inspect the field, which was covered by the tarp, a daily occurrence here.

"Where do the goal posts go?" Ricco asked.

Collins then used his foot to trace a fading white line, left over from last week's Dolphins-Cowboys NFL preseason game, to show Ricco the back boundary of the end zone. Only a few feet from the Mets' dugout, there was a circular grass cutout, about the size of a large pancake.

"Right there," Collins said.

This never was a ballpark. Just a football stadium masquerading as one, and for the Mets, that charade came to an end Wednesday with their 1-0 victory over Marlins. R.A. Dickey (8-11) pitched seven scoreless innings for his ninth straight quality start. He allowed four hits, struck out three and walked three in lowering his ERA to 3.47 while making sure the Mets closed out their Sun Life chapter with a winning record (74-72).

"I wish that was significant," said Dickey, who improved to 3-0 against the Marlins this season and did not allow an earned run in 20 innings.

The only run was scored by the game's first batter, Jose Reyes, who singled and hustled home from first base on Lucas Duda's RBI double with one out. Reyes went 1-for-2 with a pair of walks to raise his NL-leading average to .335.

Josh Stinson pitched a scoreless eighth -- he has not allowed a run in 52/3 innings since his call-up from Buffalo. With Bobby Parnell getting the day off, Manny Acosta took care of the ninth to earn his second save with the Mets.

Next season, the Marlins move into a new retractable-roof facility in the Little Havana section of Miami, built on the site of the demolished Orange Bowl. "There's no question it's time for an upgrade," David Wright said. "This is a football stadium. During the football season, the field gets all chopped up. The lights aren't made for baseball and the facilities are obviously more suited for football. I'm not going to miss this place too much.

Wright's 73 hits are the most of any Met at the multiple-named stadium and he finished second in RBIs (41) to Carlos Beltran. Al Leiter had the most wins in a Mets uniform with five, but he's better known for throwing Florida's first no-hitter, also in the same building.

The frustrating part about playing baseball in South Florida, however, was always the weather. The start of Tuesday's game was delayed 74 minutes by rain and the Mets had to stay cooped up inside Wednesday because of afternoon storms.

"At this time of year, it's tough to play here," Collins said. "The weather beats you down."

In recent years, the whole experience has been just as depressing for the Marlins as it has for visiting clubs. The empty seats create a sea of orange and the lack of crowd noise allows individual fans to be heard on the field. "When there's 100 people, and you got the two guys that didn't get the beer cut off, and they're the only two guys sitting above your dugout, it gets a little ridiculous," Collins said.

That, in a word, pretty much sums up the experience in the last days of baseball at Sun Life Stadium.