This “challenge” was the wurst.
Citi Field tried to glom onto the viral “999 Challenge,” in which baseball fans gobble down nine hot dogs and nine beers in nine innings — but my attempt to devour the Opening Day experience left me filled mostly with disappointment familiar to Mets fans — and not nearly enough beer.
I volunteered for the food-centric feat in the name of journalism, of course. But the laughably small 2.5-ounce beers and teeny weenies caused mostly a bloated, thirsty feeling — and I was barely able to catch a buzz.
At first, I thought the gut-busting undertaking would require Pepto Bismol on-hand and possibly a doctor on-call, so I rang the world’s number-three-ranked competitive eater Geoffrey Esper for advice.
He suggested skipping breakfast and changing up hot dog toppings to combat “flavor fatigue” in order to channel my inner Joey Chestnut.
But after I paid $60 for the “999 Challenge” tray of nine 3.5-inch hot dogs and a single 24-ounce can of Coors (I could have also chosen Heineken) I knew all that prep was for nothing.
The tall boy was meant to be divided into nine barely-there glasses and sipped at a snail’s pace of one 2.5-ounce cup per each of the game’s innings. That’s only about the size of a double shot glass.
Lame.
“Not full glizzies?!” one fellow disappointed fan moaned at the slider-sized franks, using the slang term for hot dog.
“Those hot dogs look so sad,” another said.
The first two mini hot dogs went down easy, and I knocked back my tiny beer in just a couple sips. The little glasses are plastic souvenirs decorated with the Mets logo, which explained the price of the tray.
As I ate wiener after wiener — each served on a cracked and stale bun — I was dying for more to drink.
The booze-to-hot-dog ratio was not a winner. I needed more beer.
But my “cold one” had heated up to the temperature of lukewarm tea by the end of the sunny, three-hour affair.
By the third inning, I’d kissed the possibility of a buzz goodbye.
I managed to get the ultra-dry dogs — which didn’t actually taste that bad — down with the help of ketchup and mustard. It only took three bites per dog — but I still got uncomfortably full by the fourth inning.
My stomach was protruding, and it got so hot, and my fingers started swelling. I was over it.
The giant tray set up on my lap also made it hard to stand up to cheer as the Mets dominated over the Pirates, ultimately winning 7 to 11.
In the end, I drank all 24 ounces of the beer and managed to choke down 6.5 of the dogs before growing wildly bloated and giving up.
I left feeling hot, tired and grumpy.
Now, I need a real drink.
— Additional reporting by Natalie O’Neill
