Jul
21
2011

Interview with Former Met Frank Catalanotto

An article by Former Writers

I had the pleasure of welcoming former New York Met and the recently retired Frank Catalanotto to my show Mets Talk Live! Wright or Wrong?!? yesterday. For those of you who do not know, Frank is a class act, and it was a real pleasure and a treat to converse with the Smithtown, NY native.

Here are just a few of the topics I discussed in the interview with Frank:

- His playing days with the Mets

- His inspirational figure growing up

- The Frank Catalanotto foundation

Here are some highlights:

JS: To lead things off, given that your from Smithtown, New York just about an hour away from Queens, what was it like last year to come back home and play for the Mets in 2010?

FC: It was awesome, it was a dream come true. I always wanted to play for a New York team and to be able to live at home, sleep in my own bed, be with my family, and have my friends and family come to the ballpark and watch me play was just awesome. I wish is would have lasted a little bit longer, but I’m still happy I was able to have that opportunity to play for the Mets.

JS: Who was your first inspiration, or I guess you could say role model that first exposed you to baseball and really got you into the game?

FC: It was my dad, definitely my dad. From a young age when I was 2, 3, 4 years old he would take me out back and pitch to me and he’d roll me ground balls. He would also take me to Yankee Stadium all the time, about five times a year, we’d watch all the games on television, he really had a passion for the game and that’s where my passion grew from.

JS: I couldn’t help but notice your foundation and the Vascular Birthmarks Foundation on your website at fcatalanotto.org. I think it’s great to see everything you’re doing to raise awareness, but for our listeners could you explain the foundation a little more in-depth and how they could potentially help?

FC: Yes, certainly. My daughter was born with a Vascular Birthmark on her nose, she’s 12-years-old now, but when she was born there was this big red spot on her nose and it continued to grow bigger and bigger. We got in touch with this lady named Linda Shannon and she was the head of the Vascular Birthmarks Foundation and she told us that there were treatments that could be done to make these birthmarks go away. So we met with a couple of doctors and my daughter had a couple of laser surgeries to remove the birthmarks and today you can’t even notice it.

The Vascular Birthmark Foundation helped us out so much that my wife and I are co-chairpersons for the foundation and they’re just a real good foundation, we try to promote awareness about them and help raise funds so you can go to www.fcatalanotto.com and go to my foundations website which is linked to the Vascular Birthmark Foundation. We’re having a golf outing October 3rd, here in Long Island and if anyone wants to see any information on it they can go to my website and there is a link to that as well.

To hear this and what else Frank had to say on yesterday’s installment of Mets Talk Live! Wright or Wrong?!? just click on the link and you can skip up to when Frank calls in, which is about 19 minutes into the show.

About the Author: Former Writers

12 Comments + Add Comment

K Maxx July 21, 2011 at 3:24 pm

Does Catalanotto own stock in Metsmerized? This is like your 4th interview with him. His Mets career was 25 atbats, enough already.
- Dave [Retire 31] July 21, 2011 at 8:33 pm
  
  Couldn’t have said it better myself
  - Justin Silberman July 21, 2011 at 8:42 pm
    
    Unbelievable, I have nothing to say honestly. Everyone always gets on athletes for not interacting with fans, bloggers, media members, etc. and finally one of them is classy enough and nice enough to sit down for a personal interview and talk about a great cause and this is the reaction gets. Just absolutely absurd, I’m sorry but this a joke.
    - Dave [Retire 31] July 21, 2011 at 10:24 pm
      
      For having nothing to say, you said a lot.
      
      Two words: Justin Turner.
Justin Silberman July 21, 2011 at 3:34 pm

This was my first interview with him. Also, I’ve reached out to many former and current Mets players and have not gotten any responses. Frank was nice enough to respond and was more than willing to call in and talk with me and answer anything and everything. There is not more you can say about Frank especially in today’s world of athletes where they believe they are better than everyone and are not obligated to interact Frank. Well that’s not Frank at all, he’s the role model for fan interaction, he’s a true class act, and is an athlete that should be looked at that way.

If I had to put a number on it and being the sports junkie I am I would say only about 10% of athletes respond and interact with fans on a casual basis or something like this. More times than not as a mentioned earlier, many athletes won’t give many fans or non-credentialed media members, bloggers, w/e the case may be, the time of day, plain and simple. But as I stated that wasn’t the case with Frank
- USAmetsFans July 21, 2011 at 5:17 pm
  
  Thats because hes a nobody…
  - Even Flow July 21, 2011 at 9:11 pm
    
    I’m sorry….who are you again compared to Catalanotto?
    - Justin Silberman July 21, 2011 at 10:10 pm
      
      Thank you Evan.
      - USAmetsFans July 26, 2011 at 12:30 am
        
        Thank you Evan.
Justin Silberman July 21, 2011 at 5:34 pm

He’s a nobody then who put together a decade and a half career in the Major Leagues with a .291 career batting average, for all the thousands of players who have played the game and failed Frank put together a nice solid career to say the least. The average career in baseball is like 4 years so he exceeded that by almost 4 times that.
- Kay July 21, 2011 at 8:56 pm
  
  Being called a nobody by someone sitting behind a keyboard with a mock name. Need more be said?
  
  Congrats, all of my reading of FCat seems like a class guy, local guy that is doing a lot to give back to his community. We need more nobody’s like that in the world.
  - Justin Silberman July 21, 2011 at 10:12 pm
    
    Exactly my point, he’s a class act, and fighting for a great cause, a world class athlete using his status and name to do something meaningful. What more could you ask for than that? More athletes should be doing what Frank is doing.

NL East Standings

Team	W	L	Pct.	GB
Braves	42	28	.600	-
Nationals	34	35	.493	7.5
Phillies	34	37	.479	8.5
Mets	25	40	.385	14.5
Marlins	22	47	.319	19.5

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