The Thrill of Victory, The Agony of the Mets: Joan Whitney Payson

All things considered, I've had a pretty fortunate run as a Mets fan.  Shortly after signing up to bleed Met blue at a very young age, they won a championship shortly into my run as a fan and were a very celebrated team.  An organization comprised of very colorful individuals (Mex, Kid, to name a few) and budding superstars (Straw, Doc, to complement the veterans) helped cement me as a Mets fan for life.

Thanks, Dad.

Being a student of history and literature as well, I was always fascinated by the Mets' overall past and how they came to be.  Little did I know, at age 10, that 1962 was just a mere 25 seasons prior in 1986.  As someone who celebrated her Tom Seaver birthday recently, 25 years is a drop in the hat.

Then by watching the video An Amazin' Era, I realized how the Mets were born.  It was hard for me to imagine at age 10, and even later in my 20s and 30s by reading books like Bums, Amazin', and Boys of Summer, what it might be like to see one of my teams (or my teams' rivals) leave town and go straight cross the country.  Because without the loss of the Brooklyn Dodgers (now of Los Angeles) and New York (baseball) Giants (now San Francisco), the Mets may not exist.  I'm sure I'd still love baseball.  But the idea of no Mets is disconcerting to me, despite how much they like to mess with my feelings.                                                                                                                                             

In the 2007 HBO documentary, The Ghosts of Flatbush, an older fan who was quite young when the Dodgers left town in 1957 said that "Los Angeles may have been Siberia, it was so far away."  So from 1958 through 1961, there was no New York National League baseball team.  And according to many amateur baseball historians (like my father, who I have to blame for being in this mess), New York always was and always will be a National League city.  Despite what those pinstripe dummies in the Bronx try to tell you.

Meanwhile, in that same documentary, not to mention countless books written about those bums of Kings County, a few lines were devoted to "that other" National League ball club that shared success in the same municipality but rival boroughs, and their fans shared a heated passion that was reminiscent of the Hatfields and the McCoys.  You'd never know, given the ink and video devoted to reminding us about the Brooklyn Dodgers, that the other team that inspired the Mets' color orange played at the Polo Grounds, the Mets' first home.  The other team that won a championship as late as 1954 in New York.  And had storied players like Willie Mays, who made the infamous "Catch" in that same World Series. (And Mays is why I believe I'd have been a Polo Grounds inhabitant).

And the other team, that according to the many books written on the era, made majority owner Horace Stoneham out to be a "patsy" who was cajoled by Dodger owner Walter O'Malley to provide a natural rival to the Dodgers on the west coast, who had one proverbial foot out the door to L.A. 

Stoneham's team was his primary source of income.  It was an eat or be eaten situation for him to move the team to make it more profitable.  While he originally thought "midwest," to go further west wasn't much of a stretch for him.

Yet, a Giants' minority shareholder was very vocal about the team not leaving town.  In fact, hers was the only dissenting vote to move the team to San Francisco.  Several years later, that voter got her own wish: to bring National League baseball back to the Big Apple in a big way.

(Photo courtesy of National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum)

Joan Whitney Payson was not only a philanthropist, coming from a very well-known and well-to-do socialite family, but she was a huge baseball fan as well.  She was a known art collector, but she mostly wanted to collect ticket stubs to baseball games.  (I also believe her to be my spirit animal).

Yet for how revered Mrs. Payson (as she is still referred to this day by several prominent former Mets like Tom Seaver and Ed Kranepool) was and is in Mets lore, she presided over some of the most disastrous Mets teams.  While no one would ever question her Mets love and baseball fandom, her baseball legacy was tarnished by her family who inherited the team after she passed.  A family who didn't give a hoot about baseball or running a team, and allowed the team franchise player to be traded on their watch, a move that ultimately led to several years of hardship in Queens.

We know how the current front office ownership is viewed by most fans today.  But would Mrs. Payson been given the benefit of the doubt had she owned the team today?  I mean, would Joan Payson have been essentially "Frederica" Wilpon, someone who loved baseball so much that they just wanted to own a team, and thought fans were a means to an end to obtain that goal?

That may be a bit of an unfair judgment, but let's take a look at how the team operated in the Payson years.  (This also accounts for the de Roulet ownership after her death, since they inherited the team.)

It goes without saying that in 1962, the Mets were historically bad.  Monumentally bad.  Horrific.  Yet, fans were so hard up for National League baseball in the Big Apple, that they went and root root rooted for the Metsies (and went home not too happy 120 times in '62, but that's okay).  Though by 1968, they didn't have another 100+ loss season.  So that's a plus, I guess. 

Year	W	L	W-L%	Finish
1962	40	120	0.250	10th of 10
1963	51	111	0.315	10th of 10
1964	53	109	0.327	10th of 10
1965	50	112	0.309	10th of 10
1966	66	95	0.410	9th of 10
1967	61	101	0.377	10th of 10
1968	73	89	0.451	9th of 10
1969	100	62	0.617	1st of 6
1970	83	79	0.512	3rd of 6
1971	83	79	0.512	3rd of 6
1972	83	73	0.532	3rd of 6
1973	82	79	0.509	1st of 6
1974	71	91	0.438	5th of 6
1975	82	80	0.506	3rd of 6
1976	86	76	0.531	3rd of 6
1977	64	98	0.395	6th of 6
1978	66	96	0.407	6th of 6
1979	63	99	0.389	6th of 6

And yet the two standout seasons, 1969 and 1973, almost happened by accident.  The Mets were hardly world beaters during Payson's ownership, but they did have success that ultimately made the struggles worth it.  Some high highs, and low lows, if you will. 

On the back end of the operation, though, Payson seemed to be a shrewd investor, but establishing her own level of cronyism that impacted the team well after her death.  According to Amazin' by Peter Golenbock, Mrs. Payson was approached to be an investor in the "Continental League" team that would be based in New York.  Initially, she declined, until she was given a piece of information that this was a ploy to get the National League to expand in New York.  She later bought out the original minority shareholders, ultimately acquiring 80% of the team (A percentage, related in her obituary, that she wasn't even sure of, and responded with child-like glee, "Oh I think I own somewhere around 80-85%!").

The remaining 20% was held by a relative of the political Bush family, Herbert Walker...and M. Donald Grant, her personal stockbroker.

Oh.

Yet, from a business standpoint, the Mets probably would not exist had she not been eager to bring baseball back to New York.  But she did not seem interested in fielding a winning team, or at the very least, not willing to invest much in the team.  Also according to Amazin', when Branch Rickey was approached to run the new team, he insisted on a $5 million budget.  (In today's dollars, it would be in the neighborhood of $41 million...which is chump change for today's baseball, but back then probably astronomical, pre-free agency era).

They declined Rickey's demands...and named Grant team president.  On the general manager front, they hired George Weiss to run the team who had a reputation of being, shall we say, "frugal."  Weiss was tasked with finding "retreads" (i.e. ex-Giants and Dodgers who were beloved by the fans who stayed behind).  These players were also tasked to bring fans back to the Polo Grounds.  Basically, every Mets game early on was a Old Timers' Day parade featuring old Dodgers or Giants.

Until 1967, though, when a young upstart pitcher named Tom Seaver joined the team, the Mets had a nondescript team fielding some flashy but mostly nondescript players. 

If you think about it, the team got lucky when they got Seaver.  THEY WON A FREAKING LOTTERY DRAWING, FOR PETE'S SAKE.

Sporting News/Getty Images)

Yet the drafting of Seaver, not to mention the breakout of 1968 rookie pitcher Jerry Koosman (who finished in second to future Hall of Famer Johnny Bench in the ROY awards that year...I just like throwing that out there), the addition of former Brooklyn Dodger great Gil Hodges as team manager, plus some trades that got the likes of Tommie Agee, along with Mets old schoolers Cleon Jones and Ed Kranepool got them to a 100-win season in 1969...AND a World Championship. 

Mrs. Payson, from most reports though, preferred to stay in the shadows, and was more than happy to just funnel the funds and be a matronly figure for her boys.  Yet, by anointing Grant (not a baseball guy) with decision-making powers, well, she may have had more of a Nelson Doubleday attitude towards being an owner (minus getting the correct baseball guys making the baseball decisions).  Grant himself certainly operated from a Wilpon very-hands-on perspective.

While the Mets finished in third place in each of the 1970-72 seasons, the only time Mrs. Payson "intervened," for lack of a better term, in baseball operations was to bring Willie Mays back to New York.  As legend had it, Mays was her favorite former New York Giant, and wanted him so badly on the Mets that, as Golenbock reported in Amazin', she offered to buy him from the San Francisco team for $1 million years before the actual trade went down.  Horace Stoneham ultimately acquiesced in 1972, and she brought Mays back to the city where he started defining his legacy as one of the all-time greats.

1973 was Mays' last year in baseball, but he managed to be part of a wild run for the "Ya Gotta Believe" team that won the NL East, went on to win the National League Championship, but lost to the Oakland A's in a seven-game World Series. 

By 1975, the Mets had finished two seasons, finishing in fifth and third place, respectively, after their YGB run.  Yet, the biggest loss of all that was a catalyst for sending the team into relative obscurity in the late '70s was the loss of Mrs. Payson herself, who passed away in September of '75.   Unfortunately, her love for baseball wasn't inherited by her family, who were now in charge of the Mets.  The de Roulet family entrusted M. Donald Grant with more baseball powers, preferring to follow his lead.

Generally, the landscape of baseball as we know it today also changed after the 1975 season with the advent of free agency.  With Mrs. Payson gone, and her family knowing little about baseball and caring less, M. Donald Grant had more reign over the team's payroll than ever before.

Under her family's watch, the team lost Tom Seaver in the "Steve Henderson" trade (Joe Torre once referred to the deal as such, and it always made me laugh).  Grant got rid of basically anyone who contributed to the Mets' successful years, because Grant had unquestioned power, and therefore, wanted to keep the payroll as low as possible.  The new baseball team owners didn't know squat about running a baseball team.

I have to wonder, actually, if that Midnight Massacre trade that has defined so many Mets fans' identities, would have taken place if Mrs. Payson was still alive. Here's my genuine curiosity: if free agency existed on the level when Mrs. Payson was still alive, would she have encouraged Grant to write out the blank checks?  I have to believe she would have personally intervened with Seaver and not allowed that infamous hatchet job by Dick Young to happen.  Even she knew how important Tom Terrific was to the Mets' name.

Evidence points to the fact that while the team loved her and thought she was a good owner who didn't meddle, it's possible that she, too, might have listened to Grant's suggestions to keep payroll low.  The alternative is that she would have done what she needed to do to keep her players happy - namely Seaver, Koosman and Dave Kingman - and would've made sure they were paid to market standards.

Joan Whitney Payson, original Mets owner.  Source: Pinterest

There aren't many quotes attributed to Joan Payson, mostly because she let her front office do the talking for her.  Her talking was to sign the checks and go to the games.  Unfortunately, it wasn't enough.

But with the passing of Mrs. Payson, and the Mets being sold to the Doubleday/Wilpon consortium in 1980, it was the end of an era.  That era being a throwback to how baseball used to operate under a "gentlemen's agreement" where owners called the shots and were nice enough to give jobs to scrappy baseball players.

But one woman broke that glass ceiling, and it's a shame we never knew how the team would have operated had she not put cronies at the top who didn't keep her best interests and wishes for a successful team at heart. 

So to recap, Joan Whitney Payson was a wealthy woman who loved baseball so much, she owned her own team.  Preferring to stay in the background, she let people loyal to her do the baseball work for her.  Yet, under her ownership, the team had two very successful years culminating in a World Championship and a National League Championship.  For those "highest of highs," the team suffered some abominable lows, like their 120-loss inaugural season to the trade of the team's "Franchise player" after her death, whose loss took years to overcome, even after the team was sold by the surviving de Roulet family.

Since 1962, the Mets have had four major ownership changes: Mrs. Payson, the de Roulets (her surviving family), Nelson Doubleday/Fred Wilpon, then the Wilpon/Katz Sterling Equities consortium.  There's been some overlap, yet no owner was quite as beloved as Mrs. Payson, who was the old grande dame of the organization and of baseball.

As Terence Mann spoke in Field of Dreams, the one constant through the years has been baseball.  It has been erased, rebuilt and erased again.  Mrs. Payson's ownership brings us back to a simpler time of baseball, and clearly could adapt to changes that sadly the people she put in the charge were not able to do.  There are signs of Mrs. Payson around Citi Field today, especially in the Mets Hall of Fame, where she was enshrined as a member in 1981.

Yes, under Joan Payson, the Mets had the thrill of some victorious years, but there was plenty of agony to go around.


Editor's note:  In case you hadn't noticed, this piece was written by Taryn "The Coop" Cooper", because she knows a thing or two about being a woman who loves baseball.


Note: The Thrill of Victory, The Agony of the Mets is a thirteen-part weekly series spotlighting those Mets players and personnel who experienced the best of times and the worst of times with the team.  For previous installments, please click on the names below:

January 2, 2017: Tom Seaver
January 9, 2017: Mike Piazza
January 16, 2017: Wally Backman
January 23, 2017: Daniel Murphy
January 30, 2017: Frank Cashen
February 6, 2017: Ed Kranepool
February 13, 2017: Doug Sisk

 

The Thrill of Victory, The Agony of the Mets: Ed Kranepool

In the film "Forrest Gump", the titular character ran across the country from one ocean to the other just because he "felt like runnin' ".  His travels took him across flat land, up the highest mountain, back down again, and even through a pile of dog ... ahem ... poo.  After spending three years, two months, 14 days and 16 hours on the roads of America, Gump decided to stop running because he was tired.  There was no fanfare as his run came to an end.  He just quit and went home.

Gump's spirited jog commenced around October 1, 1979, as a news broadcast that was airing at the beginning of his cross-country trek was reporting that President Jimmy Carter had collapsed that day while attempting to complete a six-mile race.  Just one day before Gump began his long run in the fictional town of Greenbow, AL, another long run was coming to an end in the very real city of St. Louis, MO.  And when this run of 18 seasons with a single major league franchise came to an end, it also had no fanfare.  It just marked the quiet close to the career of the last man who played for the original Mets.

He was steady.  He was Eddie.  But as a teenager, was he ready?  (Bettmann/Getty Images)

Edward Emil Kranepool was barely out of his James Monroe High School cap and gown when the Mets signed the amateur free agent to an $85,000 contract in June 1962.  The new expansion team was enamored with the young man who broke Hall of Famer Hank Greenberg's home run records at Monroe, promoting him to the big club before its inaugural season was over.  At age 17 and just three months out of high school, the Bronx-bred Kranepool collected his first major league hit at Manhattan's Polo Grounds - an opposite field double off Cubs reliever Don Elston.

In 1963, Kranepool split his time between AAA-Buffalo and the Mets, producing an impressive .310 batting average and .507 slugging percentage in 53 minor league games, while being overmatched at the major league level, batting .209 and slugging .289 in 86 games.  The following year, his last as a teenager and his first at the newly opened Shea Stadium, Kranepool became just the 13th player to appear in 100 or more games in a single season prior to blowing out 20 candles on his birthday cake.  The first baseman improved greatly during that 1964 campaign, batting .257 and finishing among the team leaders in hits (108), doubles (19) and home runs (10).

Although Kranepool was blossoming into an offensive talent, the Mets continued to bring up the rear in the National League standings.   After losing 111 and 109 games in 1963 and 1964, respectively, the Mets found a way to regress in 1965, finishing the year with a 50-112 record.  The team could actually have been a lot worse had it not been for Kranepool's performance in the first half of the season.

Through games of June 3, Kranepool batted a hefty .344 and produced a .922 OPS, while racking up 21 extra-base hits and 29 RBI.  As a result, Kranepool was chosen to be the Mets' sole representative in the All-Star Game, his first and only selection for the Midsummer Classic.  Kranepool didn't get to play in the game, as N.L. manager Gene Mauch chose to play Ernie Banks at first base during the entire contest, but the Mets' first baseman did become the youngest player at that position to become an All-Star - a distinction Kranepool still holds to this day.

Kranepool ran out of gas in the second half of the 1965 campaign, as evidenced by his .216/.268/.292 post-All-Star Game slash line.  He also had to deal with the unexpected retirement of the only manager he had ever played for in the big leagues, Casey Stengel, who broke his hip in a fall in late July and called it a career a month later.

When the Mets signed Kranepool in 1962, they were hoping to get the player who broke all of Hank Greenberg's high school records.  Instead, they got a mediocre player who seemed to be living out a real life "Groundhog Day" situation, doomed to repeat the same campaign year after year.  From 1964 to 1967, an average season for Steady Eddie saw him put up a .258/.312/.383 slash line with 19 doubles, 12 homers and 52 RBI.  Kranepool never hit below .253 or above .269 in any of those four seasons.  He also hit exactly ten home runs in three of the four years (he flexed his muscles in 1966 when he bashed a career-high 16 homers) and produced between 45 and 57 RBI during the quadrennium.  Kranepool was also playing almost every day, averaging over 500 plate appearances per season.  That all changed in 1968, when a new manager came aboard and ended up extending Kranepool's career by playing him less.

Prior to 1968, the Mets had lost 100 or more games in five of their first six seasons.  They had also established a permanent residency in the National League cellar, coming out for a sniff of ninth place just once in 1966.  But after six seasons of playing like a first-year expansion team, the arrival of skipper Gil Hodges shifted the mindset of the team.

"Spring Training, Gil Hodges wanted you to lead by example," Kranepool said about his former teammate and current manager.  "He built the ballclub around leadership."

Kranepool made his debut as a defensive replacement for Hodges, then played under him.  (Herb Scharfman/Getty Images)

The Mets won 73 games in '68, fueled by the pitching of rookie Jerry Koosman and sophomore starter Tom Seaver.  Unfortunately, Kranepool had his worst season since 1963, batting .231 with only three homers and 20 RBI despite getting the majority of the starts at first base.  Kranepool continued to get the bulk of the playing time at first base during the early part of the 1969 season as the team got off to an 18-23 start.  But after a club-record 11-game winning streak in late May and early June suddenly thrust the Mets into second place, the team felt the need to upgrade its offense, especially after being held to three runs or fewer in 34 of their first 56 games.  The team addressed the problem by trading for veteran slugger Donn Clendenon.

At the time of the trade, Kranepool was back to his typical pre-1968 self, which meant he was batting .256 with six homers and 26 RBI while getting most of the starts at his customary position. The lefty-swinging Kranepool and the right-handed batting Clendenon were then platooned at first base by Hodges, which maximized power production at the corner infield spot.

From June 15 until season's end, Kranepool and Clendenon combined to produce 17 homers and 60 RBI in 441 plate appearances.  Kranepool also produced some huge hits along the way.  His walk-off RBI single off future Hall of Famer Ferguson Jenkins on July 8 capped a three-run, ninth-inning rally and gave the Mets a thrilling victory over the rival Cubs, just one day before Seaver shut down Chicago with his Imperfect Game.  Five days after his hit against Jenkins, Kranepool delivered another game-winner, this time a tie-breaking RBI double in the eighth inning against Montreal that gave New York a 4-3 victory.  The Expos were once again victimized by Kranepool on September 18, when the veteran homered and drove in both runs in the Mets' 2-0 victory.  Six days later, the Mets wrapped up their first N.L. East division title.

"We kept applying the pressure, and the Cubs knew they were in a pennant race," Kranepool said.  "Every time we played a big series, we won it.  We beat the Cubs head to head in every series after that.  We got some breaks - but look, a winning team makes its breaks."

Buoyed by their late-season push for the playoffs, the Mets miraculously won it all in 1969, sweeping the Atlanta Braves in the inaugural National League Championship Series and needing just five games to upset the heavily favored Baltimore Orioles in the World Series.  Kranepool started four of the Mets' eight postseason games, collecting a hit in each contest.  In the Mets' first-ever playoff game, Kranepool scored two runs and delivered the fielder's choice that plated the go-ahead run in the eighth inning.  The following day, Kranepool got the Mets on the board first with an RBI single in the first inning.  Kranepool played in just one World Series game because the Orioles started left-handed pitchers in four of the five games, but he made the most out of his sole appearance, clubbing a home run in the Mets' Game Three victory - the first Fall Classic game ever played in Flushing.

The look of a champion.  (Focus On Sport)

Although he was only 24 at the time, Kranepool had become the longest tenured Met.  He was also a world champion and one of the leaders in the tight-knit clubhouse.  Third baseman Ed Charles, the poet laureate of the Mets, said it best when he discussed the team's camaraderie during their championship season.

"We felt like a family," Charles said.  "It started with Mrs. Joan Payson, the owner, who had a habit of making people feel at home.  It included the leadership of Gil Hodges.  And there was the chemistry of the team.  We were all close.  I went to barbecues at the home of Kranepool, (Art) Shamsky, (Ron) Swoboda.  We went out together on the road.  I never saw a team with so much closeness."

As close as Kranepool was to his teammates in 1969, he ended up playing far away from them for most of the 1970 campaign.  Kranepool batted just .222 in April, then went 0-for-May, failing to collect a hit in the 12 games he appeared in during the month.  After not collecting a hit in five June games, which dropped his batting average to a pitcher-like .118, Kranepool was unceremoniously demoted to AAA-Tidewater, spending the next two months there trying to regain his hitting stroke.  Kranepool batted .310 in 47 games with the Tides and was called back up to the Mets in mid-August, where he was used exclusively as a pinch-hitter.  His final major league stats for the year: .170 batting average, eight hits, no homers and three RBI in 43 games.

While Kranepool was in the minors in 1970, his bat wasn't missed in the starting lineup, as Clendenon batted .288 with 22 homers and a then-franchise record 97 RBI.  But Clendenon saw a significant drop-off across the board in 1971 (.247, 11 HR, 37 RBI in 88 games), which allowed Kranepool to re-establish himself in the big leagues.  Kranepool's renaissance season ended with a .280 batting average, 14 homers and a career-high 58 RBI.

At the conclusion of the 1971 campaign, Clendenon was released by the Mets, allowing Kranepool to take over first base on a full-time basis for the first time since before Clendenon's arrival.  But the sudden death of Gil Hodges prior to the start of the 1972 season changed the direction of the club, with Yogi Berra tabbed to replace the beloved Hodges.  The passing of his manager and mentor also affected the play of Kranepool, who batted just .204 with four homers and 14 RBI through the team's first 87 games.  Kranepool eventually recovered after a three-month mourning period, batting .326 with 15 extra-base hits and 20 RBI over his final 195 plate appearances.

As good as Kranepool was during the second half of the 1972 season, he was surely going to lose playing time the following season to John Milner, who finished third in the National League Rookie of the Year vote in '72.  Milner played mostly in left field during his stellar rookie season, but was more suited to play first base.  In 1973, Milner and Kranepool switched positions, with Milner getting most of his starts at first base and Kranepool splitting time between first and left.  Kranepool did not respond well to the switch, batting .239 in 1973 with just one homer and 35 RBI.  He was also mostly a spectator during the Mets' run to their second division title in five seasons, appearing solely as a pinch-hitter during the last two weeks of the regular season.  But even in limited action, Kranepool was instrumental in getting the Mets back to the World Series.

The Mets played a dozen games during the 1973 postseason; Kranepool started one of them.  That lone start occurred in the first do-or-die playoff game in franchise history and only happened because right fielder Rusty Staub injured his shoulder in Game Four of the NLCS while making a spectacular catch against the outfield wall.  With the Mets and Cincinnati Reds having split the first four games of the best-of-five series, Kranepool got the nod from Berra to start Game Five in left field, with Cleon Jones moving to right in lieu of the injured Staub.  Kranepool rewarded his manager immediately, driving in the first two runs of the game with a bases-loaded single.  The Mets never trailed in the game and advanced to their second World Series, which they lost in seven games to the Oakland A's with the underhand-throwing Staub returning to right field and the healthy Kranepool returning to the bench.

The bench became a familiar place for Kranepool for the rest of his career.  From 1974 to 1978, Kranepool started just 317 games over the five-year period, making more than 82 starts in just one of the five seasons (1976).  Although he performed well as a part-time starter, batting .286 with a .399 slugging percentage, Kranepool was lethal as a pinch-hitter.  When he came off the bench from 1974 to 1978, Kranepool batted an eye-popping .396 (57-for-144) and slugged .590.  Included in the torrid stretch was a .486 batting average as a pinch-hitter in 1974 - the first of four consecutive seasons in which Kranepool batted .400 or higher as a sub - and a .300 pinch-hitting average in 1978, which doesn't seem as impressive until you consider that he hit .065 (2-for-31) during the season when he batted in other roles.

In the mid-to-late '70s, Kranepool was the team's top pinch-hitter and top mustache-grower.  (Michael Zagaris/Getty Images)

By the time 1979 rolled around, the team was in shambles.  Gone were Seaver and Koosman, with The Franchise being traded to Cincinnati as part of the Midnight Massacre in 1977 and Kooz being dealt to the Minnesota Twins following the 1978 campaign.  Not a single player from the '73 pennant-winning team remained at the start of the 1979 season.  Except for Kranepool.  And his days as a Met were also about to come to an end.

Following the death of team owner Joan Payson in 1975, control of the club went to her husband, Charles, and daughter, Lorinda de Roulet, neither of whom shared the same passion for the game that Mrs. Payson had.  Baseball operations fell into the hands of team chairman M. Donald Grant, who had no intention of spending much money to better the team.  Instead, he pared the roster of veteran players who were asking to be paid like their counterparts in other cities.  The camaraderie that existed between the players when the Mets won the World Series in 1969 was completely gone a decade later, and so was Grant, who was removed as the team's chairman by the club's board of directors prior to the 1979 season.

Kranepool, who was never one to mince his words, had some harsh feelings about the questionable transactions made by the team during the ill-fated M. Donald Grant era.

"Look at some of the deals they made," Kranepool said.  "They were horrendous.  They unloaded everybody and didn't make a good deal."

And although most of the negativity surrounding the team following the death of Payson fell on Grant, Kranepool always dished out more vitriol towards general manager Joe McDonald.

"I didn't have a good relationship with Joe McDonald," Kranepool said matter-of-factly.  "I didn't respect him.  I didn't like him; he didn't know anything about baseball.  There were termites who ate away at the organization, and he was part of the termites.  Donald Grant got blamed for it, but Joe McDonald was the one who made the trades."

Because of his testy relationship with McDonald, Kranepool knew that when his contract expired at the end of the 1979 season, he would no longer be a Met, regardless of how he performed.  In what would be the final year of his long career, Kranepool batted .232 and managed just two homers and 17 RBI in 174 plate appearances.  To add insult to injury, the Mets closed out their season at Shea Stadium on September 23 by honoring Lou Brock of the Cardinals, who set a major league record when he stole the 938th base of his career in his final appearance at Shea.  Kranepool, the only man to play for the Mets in each of the franchise's first 18 seasons, didn't even get to play in the game and received no ovation from the home crowd.

Following the season, Kranepool was not tendered a contract and became a free agent.  Although he was only 34 at the conclusion of the 1979 campaign, Kranepool never played another game in the majors.  He finished his career as the Mets' all-time leader in nearly offensive category, even though a good chunk of his career was spent riding the pine.

Ed Kranepool wasn't just a hometown kid living out his dream on the baseball diamond.  He was also a stockbroker and a restaurateur.   He appeared in commercials, movies and TV shows, doing everything from plugging shaving cream to being accused of stealing Chico Escuela's soap in a classic Saturday Night Live sketch.  And on multiple occasions, he used his business savvy to try to purchase the team he once played for.

Krane.  (Paul Hawthorne/Getty Images)

Following the 1979 campaign, the newly-retired Kranepool joined forces with a small group of investors in a failed attempt to buy the Mets from the Payson/de Roulet family.  The Mets were eventually sold to the team of publisher Nelson Doubleday and real estate investor Fred Wilpon.  Three decades later, when Wilpon encountered financial difficulties due to his connections with Ponzi scheme swindler Bernard Madoff, he attempted to sell a small percentage of the team to increase his cash flow.  Once again, Kranepool stepped up to the plate, this time with a group of investors that included Martin Luther King III, but no purchase was ever made.

When Doubleday and Wilpon bought the Mets in 1980, Kranepool officially ended his career in baseball.  His retirement as a player ensured that he couldn't affect the Mets on the field, and his inability to purchase a part of the team meant that he couldn't have a say off it.  But despite his numerous failures - not being able to buy a part of the team, not developing into a perennial All-Star and not even being an everyday player for the majority of his career - Kranepool remains beloved by Mets fans to this day.

His career began as a 17-year-old when the expansion Mets called the Polo Grounds home.  He developed into a serviceable player as the team moved into their new home in Queens.  He owned a World Series ring before he turned 25.  He thrived as a pinch-hitter during the latter part of his career.  And he was inducted into the Mets Hall of Fame after his playing days were over.

Forrest Gump got to experience and influence many key moments in American history just by being there.  Ed Kranepool's longevity did the same for him, as he witnessed and participated in many of the Mets' seminal moments.  Kranepool was there for the highs of two pennants and one World Series championship.  He was also present for the decline and dismantling of a once-proud team.  And when his run as the longest tenured Met was done, the native New Yorker just went home.

Kranepool will always have a home when it comes to the Mets.



Note: The Thrill of Victory, The Agony of the Mets is a thirteen-part weekly series spotlighting those Mets players and personnel who experienced the best of times and the worst of times with the team.  For previous installments, please click on the names below:

January 2, 2017: Tom Seaver
January 9, 2017: Mike Piazza
January 16, 2017: Wally Backman
January 23, 2017: Daniel Murphy
January 30, 2017: Frank Cashen

Quick Starts Don't Always Guarantee Happy Endings

For Mets fans, Charlie Culberson is proof that Bichette happens quite often at Coors Field.  (AP Photo by David Zalubowski)

In 2006, the Mets rolled to a division title.  The turning point of the season came in early June, during a three-city, ten-game road trip.  The Mets had opened up a seven-game bulge in the NL East by late April, but their lead in the division had been halved to a more tenuous 3½-game lead by early June.

New York split the first two games of their long road trip in 2006, but then won each of the remaining eight games, scoring in the first inning of all eight contests.  By the time the Mets returned to Shea Stadium, they had increased their lead to 9½ games and had lost sight of every division rival in their rear view mirror.  By racing out to quick starts in each game, the Mets increased their chances to win ballgames, and they took advantage of the early leads throughout the road trip and for the rest of the season.

The 2006 Mets scored in the first inning in 61 of their 162 games.  They had the lead after one inning 44 times.  They won 33 of those 44 games, for a .750 winning percentage.  It's not uncommon for a team to win a ballgame when it gets out to a fast start.  Even the 1962 Mets, who finished the year with a 40-120 record, went 16-21 in games in which they held the lead after one inning.  Their .432 winning percentage in those games was significantly higher than their overall .250 winning percentage.

That brings us to the curious case of the 2014 Mets.  This year's squad has gotten out to a better-than-expected 15-14 record.  However, they have lost three straight following Saturday night's heartbreaking loss to the Rockies.  The Mets scored three runs in the first inning, extended that lead to 6-0 two innings later, then watched the Rockies take the lead in the fifth.  New York came back to take a one-run lead in the ninth only to watch Charlie Culberson (who had never homered at Coors Field in 80 career plate appearances) blast a game-winning two-run homer to straightaway center field off Mets "closer" Kyle Farnsworth.

When the Mets scored three runs in the first inning, it marked the 12th time in 29 games they had crossed the plate in an opening frame.  But once Charlie Culberson touched home in the ninth inning, the Mets' record dropped to 3-9 in those dozen affairs.  That's a .250 winning percentage.  In other words, the 2014 Mets have had as much of a chance of winning when they score in the first inning as the 1962 Mets had of winning any game.  But even the original Mets were able to play better when they scored in the first than this year's squad.

It's still early in the season, and the Mets' awful record when they score first could easily turn around.  But it's become an alarming trend that starting pitchers are having trouble holding early leads and relievers also are experiencing technical difficulties protecting those precious leads.

The 2014 Mets have won 12 of 17 games when they haven't scored in the first inning.  Their luck changes dramatically when they do score in the opening frame.  It doesn't make any sense why this should be true.  But it needs to be corrected or else Sandy Alderson's prediction of 90 wins will prove false.
 

The Best On The Worst: Jim Hickman

Ed Kranepool is always referred to the last member of the 1962 Mets to play for the team.  While that statement is correct, it's also true that Kranepool was still playing for James Monroe High School in the Bronx when the Mets were taking the field for the first time in St. Louis.  Kranepool did not make his debut during the Mets' inaugural season until September 22, just in time to suit up for the fledgling team's 116th loss.

Although Kranepool played in each of the club's first 18 seasons, by the time he participated in his first major league game, there had already been 44 players who had taken the field for the Mets, with more than half of them appearing on the team's Opening Day roster.  But almost all of the players who were in the Mets dugout during the team's inaugural game on April 11, 1962 were former Mets by the time the team began its fifth season in 1966.  Almost.  One still remained, and by the time he had played his final game as a Met on October 2, 1966, he had already made quite a name for himself in Mets lore.

Jim Hickman - an original Met who was one of the few reasons to feel good about those early teams.

James Lucius Hickman was originally signed by the St. Louis Cardinals as an amateur free agent in 1956.  Although Hickman showed good pop in the minors, he had trouble collecting hits that stayed in the ballpark.  From 1956 to 1959, Hickman managed to hit 86 home runs at various minor league levels, but only hit .266 during his first four professional seasons.  Hickman's first .300 season earned him a promotion to Triple-A in late 1960, but a regression to a sub-.250 batting average in 1961 kept him from advancing to the majors.  After six seasons bouncing around in the Cardinals organization, Hickman was left unprotected in the 1961 Expansion Draft.  He became a former Cards' farmhand on October 10, 1961, when the New York Mets selected him with their 18th pick.

A move to an expansion team practically guaranteed playing time at the major league level for Hickman, even though he was the fifth outfielder selected by the Mets in the expansion draft.  Starting for the Mets would be a different story, especially after the team acquired future Hall of Fame outfielder Richie Ashburn two months after the draft.  Certainly, if Hickman could endure six years in the minors as a patient gentleman, he could also do the same on the bench for the Mets.  But he wouldn't need to, especially once manager Casey Stengel gave him his first chance to play all nine innings of a game.

Jim Hickman made his major league debut in the Mets' third-ever game on April 14, 1962, appearing as a pinch-hitter for Al Jackson.  Hickman popped out in his first at-bat, then went 0-for-2 in his first start three days later before being removed for a pinch-hitter in the seventh inning.  Hickman didn't play a full nine innings until the Mets' ninth game.  The Mets lost to Pittsburgh to fall to 0-9, but Hickman was the team's hitting star, going 3-for-4 with two RBI.  New York finally won its first game the following day, but Hickman went 0-for-4 and was back on the bench for a week.  Hickman was used solely as a pinch-hitter until late April, when one big swing in front of the home crowd put him in the starting lineup for good.

On April 28, the Mets erased a five-run deficit against the Phillies by scoring six runs in the sixth inning.  Although the Mets had taken a 7-6 lead, Philadelphia put two men on base in the seventh and another in the eighth without scoring.  Needing an insurance run, Jim Hickman gave the Mets exactly what they needed, clubbing a pinch-hit home run off Ed Keegan in the bottom of the eighth.  Hickman's first big league blast gave the Mets the extra cushion they needed, as they held on for an 8-6 victory to earn their second win in franchise history and first at home.  The next day, Hickman got the start in center field for the Mets.  He rarely saw the bench again.

Beginning May 1, Hickman went on a hitting tear, which coincided with the Mets' first (and only) hot streak in 1962.  Hickman hit .364 during the first half of May and finished the month with five doubles, five homers, 11 RBI and 17 runs scored in 24 games (22 starts).  The Mets won nine of 12 games from May 6 through May 20, but lost that winning feeling as June approached.  Hickman, however, continued to be one of the more productive Mets at the plate.

Although his final numbers for the year (.245, 18 doubles, 13 HR, 46 RBI) weren't spectacular, they were still among the best on the team.  Despite collecting only 96 hits, Hickman was second on the team in doubles and third in home runs.  Hickman was also one of just three regulars on the original Mets to post a slugging percentage above .400.

Hickman's second season in New York saw him lead the team in various categories and also produced one of a number of "firsts".  On August 7, 1963, Hickman became the first player in team history to hit for the cycle, accomplishing his feat against the team that originally drafted him.  Serving as the Mets' leadoff hitter against St. Louis, Hickman singled in the first, doubled in the second and tripled in the fourth.  The home run, which helped Hickman earn a starting position a year earlier, was all Hickman needed to make baseball history.  But after hitting 13 homers in his rookie season and five more in the Mets' first 31 games in 1963, Hickman had experienced a power outage, hitting just four homers in 260 plate appearances from May 13 through his third at-bat on August 7.  Facing Barney Schultz in the sixth inning, Hickman made it five homers in 261 plate appearances, as he completed the cycle with a blast off the journeyman reliever. 

The first cycle in franchise history helped Hickman get back on the home run track, as he swatted eight homers over the next six weeks.  The cycle was also one of eight multi-hit games for Hickman in August after he produced just seven such games in June and July combined.

Two days after hitting for the cycle, Hickman produced another memorable moment, hitting a walk-off grand slam against the Chicago Cubs.  The two-out, ninth-inning blast off reliever Lindy McDaniel turned a potential extra-inning affair into a 7-3 Mets victory, which gave starting pitcher Roger Craig his first victory after 18 consecutive losses - a National League record at the time.  Ironically, McDaniel had intentionally walked pinch-hitter Tim Harkness to load the bases for Hickman - the same Tim Harkness who just six weeks earlier had also victimized the Cubs for a walk-off grand slam, the first such blast in team history.

"Oh, what a month.  Late in the season back in '63.  What a very special time for Jim..."

Despite Hickman's strong August, his extended mid-season slump kept his final batting average low (.229), but that didn't prevent him from being one of the team's most productive offensive players in 1963.  Hickman finished second on the team in hits (113), doubles (21), RBI (51), runs scored (53) and slugging percentage (.399).  He also led the Mets in homers (17) and triples (6) while playing in a team-leading 146 games.

Amazingly, despite all the great power hitters and speedsters who have donned a Mets uniform through the 2013 season, Hickman remains the only player in club history to lead the team outright in both triples and homers in the same season.  The only other players to lead the team in the two categories - but not outright - were Cleon Jones in 1971 and Howard Johnson in 1989.  Jones hit 14 homers to tie Ed Kranepool and Tommie Agee for the club lead in 1971.  He also matched Bud Harrelson with a team-leading six triples.  Eighteen years later, Johnson led the Mets with 36 homers, but his three triples made him the team's co-leader in that department with Kevin McReynolds and Dave Magadan.

Hickman's power was mostly a product of his home ballpark in 1962 and 1963, as he hit 21 of his 30 homers at the Polo Grounds during his first two seasons in the big leagues.  But the Mets were moving into state-of-the-art Shea Stadium in 1964, leaving some to believe that Hickman's power wouldn't translate well in the Mets' new home.  Those fears were quickly allayed, as it took just 13 at-bats in his new home park for Hickman to hit his first home run, and he couldn't have picked a better time to hit it.

The Mets began the 1964 season by playing just 13 of their first 42 games at home, leaving Hickman little time to become acclimated to Shea's dimensions.  To make matters worse, Hickman only started three of those 13 home games.  But when the Mets returned to New York after a lengthy 15-game road trip on May 29, Hickman was in the team's starting lineup against the San Francisco Giants.  Hickman was 0-for-2 in the game when he came to bat in the bottom of the seventh inning.  The Mets, who began the frame trailing by two runs, were able to tie the game on run-scoring hits by Frank Thomas and Joe Christopher.  Up stepped Jim Hickman, trying to give the Mets the lead for the first time in the game.  After Christopher stole second to put himself in scoring position, Hickman took Giants starter Jack Sanford deep with his first Shea Stadium home run - a tie-breaking clout that gave the Mets a 4-2 lead, which would become the final score two innings later.

Although Hickman failed to play in 140 games for the first time as a Met in 1964, he still managed to post career highs in batting average (.257) and RBI (57).  He also slugged 11 home runs in just over 400 at-bats (six of them were hit at Shea Stadium), allowing him to reach double digits in homers for the third consecutive season.

The 1965 campaign was a season of transition for Hickman and the Mets.  After spending most of their first three seasons using well-known, but past-their-prime, players to attract fans to the Polo Grounds and Shea Stadium, the Mets started to call up more of their minor league talent.  Two rookie outfielders - Cleon Jones and Ron Swoboda - combined to play in 165 games in '65.  Along with Joe Christopher, whose breakout performance the previous year (.300, 16 HR, 76 RBI) made it impossible for the manager to sit him on the bench, that left few starting opportunities for Hickman.  It took a sad day in Mets history to give Hickman the second chance he needed to turn his lost season around.

Through late July, Hickman was having a terrible season.  The outfielder was in the starting lineup in only 48 of the team's first 96 games and was batting an even .200 with eight homers and 20 RBI.  But when Casey Stengel broke his hip as a result of a fall, Wes Westrum took over as the team's skipper, giving Hickman more starts in the outfield, as well as spot starts at first base.  Hickman responded well, batting .276 with seven homers and 20 RBI over the last third of the season.  One particular game in early September showed that Hickman was all the way back from his early season doldrums.

On September 3, 1965, Hickman was once again facing the team that originally drafted him, the St. Louis Cardinals.  Two years after achieving the first cycle in Mets history in a game against St. Louis, Hickman would be the author of another "first" versus the Cards.  In the second inning, Hickman got the Mets on the board first with a home run off Ray Sadecki.  Two innings later, Hickman struck again, giving the Mets a 3-0 lead with another blast off Sadecki.  By the sixth inning, St. Louis had cut the Mets' lead back to a single run, and still had Sadecki on the mound when Hickman stepped up to the plate for his third at-bat.  Had Sadecki learned anything from Hickman's first two at-bats against him?  Let's just say it was third verse, same as the first (and second), as Hickman launched his third homer of the game to give the Mets a 5-2 lead.  The Mets went on the win the game, 6-3, as Hickman became the first player in club history to record a three-homer game.  Hickman had a chance to become the eighth major leaguer to sock four home runs in one game, but settled for a measly single in his fourth at-bat.

Despite finishing the year with a career-low 369 at-bats, Hickman still managed to hit 15 homers - four behind team leader Ron Swoboda.  Hickman also added 18 doubles, which contributed to his .407 slugging percentage - second on the team to Swoboda.  A post-Stengel resurgence boded well for Hickman in his quest to return to everyday action in 1966.  But an unfortunate injury shattered those dreams, as well as his future with the Mets.

From 1962 to 1965, Jim Hickman started 338 games in the outfield, with 240 of them coming in center field.  As the 1966 season opened, Hickman had become the longest tenured player on the team - the only player from the original Mets roster to make it to the team's fifth season.  Hickman was back to being a regular outfielder in 1966, starting 16 of the team's first 21 games.  But a wrist injury kept him out of action for nearly three months, giving Cleon Jones the opportunity to take over the center field position on a full-time basis.  Upon his return on August 9, Hickman started just 26 of the team's final 51 games, finishing the year with just four homers and 16 RBI in 174 at-bats.

Hickman's injury-shortened season, along with the emergence of Cleon Jones, led the Mets to trade him and Ron Hunt to the Dodgers for outfielder Tommy Davis in November.  Hickman played one year in Los Angeles - just as Tommy Davis played a single season in New York - before being traded to the Cubs after a horrendous 1967 season in which he batted .163 with no homers in 65 games.  Hickman split time between the majors and minors in 1968, then finally ended three years of injuries and inadequate play in 1969, batting .237 with 21 homers and 54 RBI for the surprising North Siders.  A year later, in 1970, Hickman had a season that no one could have seen coming.

Prior to 1970, Hickman was the owner of a .236 lifetime batting average and had never scored or driven in 60 runs in a single season.  But the new decade brought about a new Jim Hickman, as the slugger set career highs across the board.  Hickman batted .315 with 33 doubles, 32 homers, 115 RBI and 102 runs scored for the Cubs in 1970, earning his only All-Star nod and finishing eighth in the National League MVP vote.

Hickman's success was short-lived, as he was never able to replicate his monster season.  From 1971 to 1973, Hickman averaged 13 homers and 48 RBI, while batting .259.  He closed out his career in 1974, after playing one season with the St. Louis Cardinals - the team he tried to make during his first six professional seasons, but never quite made it.

When Jim Hickman played his final game for the Mets in 1966, he ranked either first or second in virtually every offensive category.  Hickman led the team in games played (624), doubles (78 - tied with Ron Hunt), home runs (60), RBI (210) and walks (167).  He also ranked second in runs scored (202) and hits (439), with Hunt leading both categories.  Hickman surpassed ten homers in four consecutive seasons (1962-65).  The only other player in the Mets' first 20 seasons to accomplish that feat was Tommie Agee, who hit over ten homers in each season from 1969 to 1972.

Jim Hickman was known as Gentleman Jim during his 13-year career in the big leagues, not just for his sincere politeness, but because of his humility on and off the field.  As detailed by author William J. Ryczek in his book, "The Amazin' Mets, 1962-1969", the Tennessee-bred Hickman always thought he lacked the tools to be the best player he could be, and not all of the tools were physical.

"I was 25 when I came to the Mets, and these kids out of the cities were 18 going on 30.  It was a hard place to adjust to.  I think if I had been a little tougher mentally, I might have been a better player."

During the first five seasons of their existence, Jim Hickman was the Mets' most consistent power hitter.  He was also one of the team's most dependable run producers, driving in crucial runs for Mets teams that struggled to win.

Although Hickman struggled to stay in the starting lineup at times, he still managed to find himself in the right place at the right time for many "firsts".  He was the first Met to hit for the cycle and the first Met to hit three homers in one game.  (Jose Reyes is the only other player to accomplish both during his time with the Mets.)  Hickman is also the only Met to lead the team outright in triples and homers in the same season.  And had Tim Harkness not beaten him to the punch, Hickman would have provided the first walk-off grand slam in team history.  Hickman was known for a "last" as well, as he was the last member standing from the original Mets who took the field in April 1962.

Jim Hickman was more than just a player who was known for several memorable individual games.  He was one of the few dependable players the Mets had during their formative years.  Before Tom Seaver joined the team in 1967, Jim Hickman and Mets losses were about the only sure things you were going to get as a Mets fan during the team's first half-decade.


Note:  The Best On The Worst is a thirteen-part weekly series spotlighting the greatest Mets players who just happened to play on some not-so-great Mets teams.  For previous installments, please click on the players' names below:

January 6, 2014: Todd Hundley 
January 13, 2014: Al Jackson
January 20, 2014: Lee Mazzilli
January 27, 2014: Steve Trachsel
February 3, 2014: Rico Brogna
February 10, 2014: Skip Lockwood 
February 17, 2014: Ron Hunt
February 24, 2014: Craig Swan 
March 3, 2014: Hubie Brooks 
March 10, 2014: Joel Youngblood 

The Best On The Worst: Al Jackson

In 1962, the New York Mets and Houston Colt .45s entered the National League as expansion franchises.  The previous October, a special draft was held so that the two teams could stock their rosters with major league talent.  Houston decided to draft younger players who had bright futures.  The Mets, on the other hand, felt like the best way to go was with veteran players, including several who had ties to New York.  That's just a nice way of saying the Mets drafted older players who had bright pasts.

Roger Craig, Gil Hodges and Don Zimmer - all former members of the Brooklyn Dodgers - were drafted by the Mets in the expansion draft.  By the end of the 1963 season, they were all former Mets.  The Mets also drafted just three pitchers with their first ten selections, so when it came time for the team to announce its 11th pick, the Mets set their sights on a 26-year-old southpaw who had pitched beautifully in the Pittsburgh Pirates' minor league system for half a decade, but had never been afforded much more than a cup of coffee at the major league level.

From 1958 to 1961, he posted a 55-34 record in the minors with a brilliant 2.58 ERA.  But despite his success, he only took the mound for the Pirates 11 times over those four years, making just five starts and six relief appearances.  Needing a left-handed starting pitcher after drafting three right-handers in their first ten picks, the Mets took a chance on the talented, but inexperienced pitcher.  A few years later, he became the team's first ace, or what passed for an ace on a last-place team.

Al Jackson was the best he could be for a team that was the worst anyone did see.

Alvin Neill Jackson wasn't a very tall pitcher.  Listed at 5'10", Jackson was never going to be an intimidating presence on the mound.  But he knew how to pitch, and he gave the fledgling Mets their best chance to pick up a rare victory during their seminal seasons.

Jackson's career as a Met didn't start out very well.  But then again, neither did the Met careers of most of his teammates.  Jackson started the third game for the Mets in 1962, allowing six runs in his first outing for New York, a loss against the team that gave up on him just six months earlier.  He followed that up by allowing another half-dozen tallies in a 9-4 loss to the St. Louis Cardinals.  But after two scoreless relief appearances, Jackson was tapped by manager Casey Stengel to start the first game of a doubleheader against the Philadelphia Phillies on April 29.  Jackson responded by tossing the first shutout in Mets history, scattering eight hits in the team's 8-0 victory.

Despite ending April on a high note, the month of May was not very kind to Jackson.  By the end of the month, Jackson had a 2-6 record and an ERA approaching 6.00.  But his fortunes turned once the calendar turned to June.  From June 6 through August 28, Jackson made 18 starts, allowing two runs or less in ten of them.  Jackson actually won five of those ten games, which was quite an accomplishment on a team that went 28-101 after starting the season with a 12-19 record.  Three of the five victories were shutouts, including the first one-hitter in franchise history on June 22, but one of his better performances came in a game he actually lost.

On August 14, 1962, the Mets hosted the Phillies at the Polo Grounds.  Jackson was dominant in the game, allowing one run on two hits through nine innings.  But Phillies starter (and future Mets manager) Dallas Green was just as stingy, holding the Mets to just one run through the first nine frames.  Green was lifted from the game in the 11th, but Jackson soldiered on, scattering two hits in five scoreless innings from the 10th through the 14th.  Incredibly, Jackson had gotten the Phillies to ground out a whopping 25 times in the first 14 innings.  He appeared to have his 26th ground ball out when Tony Gonzalez led off the 15th inning by hitting a roller to Mets third baseman Sammy Drake, who had entered the game as a pinch-runner for regular third sacker Felix Mantilla six innings earlier.  But Drake's throw was mishandled by first baseman Marv Throneberry, allowing Gonzalez to reach second base.  Jackson then allowed two singles wrapped around an intentional walk, giving the Phillies a 3-1 lead.  Jackson stayed in the game to complete the 15th inning, but the Mets failed to rally for him in the bottom of the inning.  Jackson's final line: 15 innings, three runs (two earned), six hits, five walks, six strikeouts, another loss.  It was as typical as the 1962 Mets got.

For the season, Jackson went 8-20 with a 4.40 ERA.  But those numbers don't accurately represent how good Jackson was for a team that wasn't good at all.  From June 1 through September 10, Jackson posted a 3.38 ERA and was credited with six victories.  The Mets won seven of Jackson's 20 starts during that three-month time period.  They were a woeful 16-66 in the 82 games not started by Jackson from the beginning of June through the middle of September.  Jackson led the 1962 Mets in ERA and tied for the team lead with 118 strikeouts.  He also pitched the only four complete-game shutouts the Mets recorded in their inaugural season.  Considering the team of misfits he played for, Jackson pitched very well in 1962.  The Mets took a small step forward in 1963, but it was Jackson who made the greatest strides in the team's sophomore season.

In Jackson's second season with the Mets, he posted a 13-17 record with a 3.96 ERA and a team-leading 142 strikeouts.  His 13 wins represented 25.5% of the team's 51 victories in 1963.  To this day, Jackson remains one of only five Mets pitchers who were credited with victories in more than one-quarter of the team's wins in a single season.  The other four are Tom Seaver (1967, 1972, 1975), Jerry Koosman (1968), Bret Saberhagen (1994) and R.A. Dickey (2012).  Jackson was particularly strong over the final two months of the season, going 7-3 with a 2.49 ERA over his last 11 appearances (10 starts).  Unfortunately, the team went 9-29 in games Jackson did not appear in over that same stretch.

The Mets combined to win just 91 games in 1962 and 1963, but Jackson won 21 of them, more than any other pitcher on the team.  When the team moved from the Polo Grounds to Shea Stadium in 1964, Jackson found the new digs much to his liking.  Although Jackson's final record (11-16, 4.26 ERA) wasn't overwhelming, he pitched his best games that year at Shea.  Included among them was the first shutout (as the well as the first victory) in Shea Stadium's short history, a 6-0 victory over the Pittsburgh Pirates on April 19.  Overall, Jackson went 7-5 with a 3.68 ERA at the new park in 1964.  But he didn't save all his best games for the home fans.

On October 2, Jackson won a 1-0 pitcher's duel over future Hall of Famer Bob Gibson in St. Louis.  It was the second time Jackson had defeated Gibson by that score in three seasons, having previously accomplished the feat on July 27, 1962, also in St. Louis.  Those twin shutout victories by Jackson over Gibson were the only two times the Mets defeated the Cardinal legend from 1962 to 1966, as Gibson went 15-2 against New York in the years prior to the debut of their own Hall of Famer, Tom Seaver.  But by the time Seaver came aboard, Al Jackson was already gone.

After two seasons in which he led the team in wins, Jackson lost 20 games for the second time in 1965.  Jackson's ERA also went up to 4.34, while his innings decreased to 205⅓ - his lowest total in four seasons as a Met.  Although his 8-20 record said otherwise, Jackson wasn't horrible in 1965.  He still tossed three complete-game shutouts and posted a career-best 1.354 WHIP.  It was the team around him that got worse, especially when Jackson was on the mound.  Jackson made 31 starts in 1965.  The Mets scored two runs or less in 15 of those starts, putting extra pressure on Jackson to be as flawless as possible.  Even in his three complete-game shutouts, the Mets only managed to score a total of five runs for him.  And all but one of Jackson's eight wins in 1965 came in complete-game efforts.

By the end of the 1965 season, the Mets realized they needed two things.  They needed to abandon their "let's go with the proven veterans" philosophy.  They also needed a third baseman, a need that continued to haunt them into the 1970s when they inexcusably traded away future All-Stars like Nolan Ryan and Amos Otis in order to get help at the hot corner.  Apparently, their need for a third baseman was greater than their need to get younger.

Just weeks after the 1965 campaign ended, the Mets traded Jackson and Charley Smith to the St. Louis Cardinals for Ken Boyer, an 11-year veteran who was the league's MVP just a year earlier.  But after winning the award following a 1964 season in which he hit .295 with 24 homers and a league-leading 119 RBI for the World Series-winning Cardinals, Boyer regressed in 1965, batting .260 with 13 homers and 75 RBI.  Still, that didn't stop the Mets from trading Smith and their 29-year-old left-handed starting pitcher, who was also the team's all-time leader in wins at the time.

Boyer performed miserably as a Met, batting .258 with 17 homers and 74 RBI in one-and-a-half seasons in New York.  Meanwhile, Jackson went on to post his best season in the majors with the Cardinals in 1966, going 13-15 with a career-best 2.51 ERA and 1.148 WHIP.  Jackson finished 6th in the league in ERA in 1966 and 10th in WHIP.  He followed up his 1966 campaign by going 9-4 in 1967, although the 31-year-old Jackson was used mostly in relief by the team.  The Cardinals returned to the World Series that season, but by then, Jackson had already fallen out of favor with the team.  One day after St. Louis won their second championship in four seasons, Al Jackson was traded back to the Mets.

By 1968, the Mets had a young and talented starting rotation, led by Tom Seaver and Jerry Koosman.  New manager Gil Hodges liked the youth in his starting rotation, which eventually also included 21-year-old Nolan Ryan and two 24-year-olds in Dick Selma and Jim McAndrew.  As a result, Al Jackson was only allowed to start nine games for the Mets in 1968.  He did not fare well as a starter in his second go-round with the Mets, going 2-6 with a 4.42 ERA.  But he did have great success coming out of the bullpen.  In 16 games as a reliever, Jackson posted a 2.52 ERA and 0.981 WHIP, holding opposing batters to a .257 on-base percentage.  Jackson had found a new home with a Mets team that was clearly better that they were when he left them after the 1965 season.  But his homecoming didn't last very long.

Jackson was brutal to start the 1969 season, recording a 10.64 ERA in nine relief appearances.  In five of those nine games, Jackson allowed two or more runs.  The final straw came on May 22, the day after the Mets had reached the .500 mark for the first time in team history in the month of May.  In that game, a 15-3 loss to the Braves, Jackson came into the game in the seventh inning with the Mets already trailing by ten runs.  By the time the inning was over, the Mets were down by two touchdowns, as Jackson allowed an inherited runner to score, plus three of his own runners.

Soon after his meltdown in Atlanta, the Mets rolled off a team-record 11-game winning streak, but Jackson did not pitch in any of those games.  With the team feeding off its young pitchers, Jackson was no longer needed, so he was sold to the Cincinnati Reds on June 13.  The Mets went on to win the World Series without him, and Jackson went on to finish his career as a Red, as Cincinnati released him on April 13, 1970.  A career that began in Pittsburgh in 1959 was now over, but Jackson's life in baseball, especially with the Mets, was not.

Since throwing his final pitch in the big leagues, Jackson has coached at many levels.  He managed the Kingsport Mets for a spell in 1981, then served as Davey Johnson's pitching coach before Johnson's eventual promotion to manage the Mets in 1984.  Jackson molded the young arms that became All-Stars for the Mets in the mid-to-late '80s, and eventually made it back to the big club himself, serving as the team's bullpen coach for the only Mets squads to earn back-to-back postseason berths in 1999 and 2000.  Jackson had just missed appearing in the World Series on two separate occasions, first with the Cardinals in 1967 and then with the Mets in 1969, but he finally got to experience one in 2000, nearly four decades after pitching in his first game for the Mets.  His career had come full circle, and as noted in David Ferry's book, "Total Mets: The Definitive Encyclopedia of the New York Mets' First Half-Century", Jackson still hasn't reached the end of his baseball journey.

"The years that I spent [with the Mets], as a player, coach, whatever, it was a great ride.  An outstanding ride.  And I really haven't finished yet."





Al Jackson was diminutive in stature, but he was quite large for the Mets when it came to giving the team its best chance to win during its formative years.  From 1962 to 1965, Jackson went 40-73 with a 4.24 ERA for a team that was a combined 194-452 over its first four seasons.  During those four years, Mets pitchers hurled 25 complete-game shutouts.  Jackson was responsible for ten of them.  (Jackson is one of only six pitchers to toss ten shutouts as a Met.  The others are Tom Seaver, Jerry Koosman, Dwight Gooden, David Cone and Ron Darling.)  Jackson also led or tied for the team lead in wins three times, strikeouts three times, and ERA once.  His highs of 13 wins and 142 strikeouts in 1963 remained single-season team records until they were broken by Seaver and Koosman - two pitchers who went on to set a lot of club records in their time with the Mets.

Just 38 days after Jackson played his last game with the Mets in 1969, Seaver broke the lefty's franchise record of 43 career wins.  But Jackson's 80 losses were not surpassed until May 27, 1974, when Seaver lost his 81st game as a Met.  By then, Seaver had amassed 137 wins, nearly 100 more than Jackson's total.  To this day, only four Mets pitchers have lost more than 80 games - Seaver, Koosman, Gooden and Jon Matlack.  All four of those pitchers are considered to be among the best in franchise history.  However, all four of them also pitched for more successful Mets teams.  Jackson had the unfortunate luck of being the best pitcher on the worst Mets teams.

Al Jackson could have played for a number of World Championship teams.  He played for the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1959 and 1961.  The Bucs won the World Series in 1960.  He was a member of the St. Louis Cardinals in 1967, but he didn't participate in their run to the World Series crown.  He also pitched for the 1969 Mets, though he was a member of the Cincinnati Reds when his former teammates celebrated their title on the Shea Stadium mound.

When Jackson was afforded the opportunity to pitch, it was usually for teams that did very little to help him earn a victory.  Jackson was the Mets' de facto ace from 1962 to 1965, although all that title got him was hard-luck loss after hard-luck loss, with a pinch of a one-hitter here and a couple of dashes over Bob Gibson there.  Jackson deserved better from his teammates, but that was like asking Marv Throneberry to play more alertly on the field.  You knew he would try his best, but in the end, he would just miss a base or two or drop a throw to cost his teammate a chance at a complete-game, 15-inning victory.

If anyone can define being the best on the worst, it's most definitely Al Jackson.  His final numbers as a Met certainly don't look pretty when compared to those posted by the likes of Seaver, Koosman and Gooden.  But his numbers were far better than the ones his teammates were putting up on the board.  Little Al Jackson may have been small in stature, but he was as big as they came in the early days of the New York Mets.

Photo by Herb Scharfman/Getty Images

Note:  The Best On The Worst is a thirteen-part weekly series spotlighting the greatest Mets players who just happened to play on some not-so-great Mets teams.  For previous installments, please click on the players' names below:

January 6, 2014: Todd Hundley