Today is that most glorious day of the baseball season: Opening Day for the Mets. In honor of this great occasion, let's take a look back at illustrious moments that occured on this date in Mets history.

1948: Future Mets owner Fred Wilpon meets Bernard Madoff: a new stickball teammate of his. Fred accidentally breaks Charles Ponzi Jr.'s window. Neither realizes how cruel karma is. 

1963: Met infielder Rod Kanehl celebrates his 29th birthday. His teammates look at his cake and spend 45 minutes laughing about the fact that his name is "Rod". 

1964: The Mets have their name legally changed to the "New York Rods" for one day. Kanehl is still not amused.

1971: Dave Marshall hits 6 home runs. Everyone assumes it's a prank.

1975: Rusty Staub's 31st birthday. Staub was glad his teammates didn't do anything too crazy. At least he wasn't this guy.

1981: Future Mets batboy Rick Blevins Dick Stevens Nick Evans Who W. Ho is born, maybe.

1985: "Irish Hammer" Daniel Murphy is born. Toddler Leonard Davis attempts a rough slide into Mrs. Murphy's womb. 

1994: 1963 Met Roger Craig calls Rod Kanehl to wish him a happy 60th birthday, calls him "Little Rod". Kanehl hangs up. 

1999: A letter from a young Sam Page convinces the formerly beardless RA Dickey to grow his now trademark beard. 

2001: The Norfolk Tides hold "Rusty Rod Day" to honor the birthdays of Staub and Kanehl. No one takes it the wrong way and nothing questionable happens. 

2010: Jerry Manuel puts out an April Fools Day prank lineup and forgets to change it before Opening Day. 

2011: A young Mike Massaroli stays up past midnight to write a probably mildly humorous FanPost for April Fools Day.  

2034: Nick Evans hits his 1200th career home run, including 13 that evening. He is optioned to AAA Venus after the game. 

Edit: Damn strikethrough feature is so glitchy. 

I encourage you all to sit down before you read this offseason plan, because otherwise you risk falling over in awe.

via i487.photobucket.com

1) Scott Stapp is designated as the official anthem singer at all Mets home games. Also, during the 7th inning stretch he will sing his popular  beloved song "Marlins Mets Will Soar". It'll be quite a spectacle. 

2) Terry gets free reign over his coaching staff, but we make one decision for him: Warthen out, Rick Peterson back in.

3) Release Oliver Perez. It's time for him to leave now. Buck up and eat the rest of his contract.

4) Resign Pedro Feliciano. 2 years/8 mil. We need a lefty in the bullpen, why not pick the most familiar one?

5) Trade Fernando Martinez to San Francisco for Chris Ray and cash. F-Mart is looking like more of a bust with each passing day. Ray is a respectable reliever (especially compared to some of our other options), who isn't particularly highly valued by San Fran (he wasn't on their postseason roster). The cash should give us a tad bit more payroll flexibility too.

6) Sign Josh Bard to a 1 yr/2 mil deal with a team option for a second year at the same price. Bard's a catcher. He's a free agent. He's cheap. He's probably better than Mike Nickeas.

7) Sign Ryan Langerhans to a 2 yr/3 mil deal. Langerhans is a good defensive outfielder who gets on base at a respectable clip. He's a better option than Chris Carter, who is neither of the above.

8) Sign Chris Young (pitcher) to a 2 yr, 10 mil incentive-heavy deal. Tread carefully, as we don't want another Kelvim Escobar. And speaking of the devil...

9) Sign Kelvim Escobar to a minor league contract with an invitation to Spring Training. The man has to take what he can get at this point, and the pickings are slim since he's thrown 5 total innings in the majors since 2007. Give him a shot, but with less on the line.

10) Sign Pedro Martinez to a 1 yr, 5 mil deal. Once again, reclamation projects are really the name of the game here. Pedro didn't pitch in 2010 so he may not have the leverage to ask for a contract much bigger than this. 

Many of these ideas really boil down to taking marginal risks and hoping for big rewards. If all goes right, we could contend next season. If all goes wrong, these contracts are short, cheap, and therefore easy to wipe our hands of.

Here's what I'd imagine the team would look like

C Josh Thole

1B Ike Davis

2B Daniel Murphy

SS Jose Reyes

3B David Wright

LF Jason Bay

CF Carlos Beltran

RF Angel Pagan

B Josh Bard

B Ryan Langerhans

B Justin Turner

B Luis Castillo

B Lucas Duda

(SP Johan Santana)

SP RA Dickey

SP Mike Pelfrey

SP Jon Niese

SP Chris Young

SP Pedro Martinez

CL Francisco Rodriguez

RP Pedro Feliciano

RP Chris Ray

RP Kelvim Escobar

RP Bobby Parnell

RP Ryota Igarashi

RP Manny Acosta

2010 Payroll (estimated): $136 mil

2011 Payroll (estimated): $136.5 mil ($148.5 mil if one includes the salary of Oliver Perez that must be paid off)