Mets Fans of Tomorrow
There’s an old episode of The Simpsons you may have seen where Bart and Milhouse are squaring off against each other on the diamond when Bart says, “Look at me! I’m Tomokazu Ohka of the Montreal Expos!” and Milhouse retorts with “Well, I’m Esteban Yan of The Tampa Bay Devil Rays!” It’s as funny now as it was when it first aired, given the unlikelihood of kids finding attributes worth emulating in obscure sub-superstars at the pro level. As we lurch toward another post-season we’ll have no part of, you have to wonder how we keep the children interested. Didn’t Whitney Houston tell us she believed they are our future? Sweeping a double-header from the Fish is all well and good, but if you’re staring up at a fourteen-plus game lead for the wild card heading into September you need some heroes on the team, that is, if you’re going to get anybody with 2.5 kids at home filling out the seats in the Promenade Reserved section.
With all the various setbacks this year we’ve still been lucky enough to see Reyes’ batting average stay stellar while he leads the league in triples, but do the little sluggers get as caught up in the numbers as their supposedly adult counterparts rearranging their fantasy teams? Are these individual accomplishments what young fans find particularly heroic? Maybe he’ll win the National League batting title. That would be something.
Otherwise, who else can these kids look up to? Duda? This year’s only other Met all-star plays for another team. And Wright, the other face of the franchise, leads the team in homers with eleven; that lists him as #122 in the majors in the category. That’s not enough pop to make elementary schoolers beg for a t-shirt, is it? Maybe Nick Evans can keep it going until season’s end and inspire a Little Leaguer or two. I don’t think most organized youth teams have Triple-A affiliates, though. Not yet anyway.
Granted, I don’t have kids and usually feel a whole heck of a lot better when they’re not around, so maybe I shouldn’t worry that by 2025 I’ll be part of a dwindling group of graybeards who actually care what the starting lineup is in Queens. By then, people like my fifth-grade nephew will be in their twenties; he lives in Florida and is a rabid Mets-hating Marlins fan who, considering his team affiliation of choice, may have bigger problems later in his life, too. Then again, he’ll have that fancy new stadium to sit in with all the air conditioning his nostrils can take.
But family aside, I’m concerned with Mets children. Beyond feeling pity for their weeping parents or the chance to knock a Baltimore chop on Mr. Met’s Kiddie Field, the team’s been offering them little incentive to keep them interested these days.
I suppose I managed to stay a Mets fan through a childhood punctuated with consecutive losing records and a disinterested father who regularly took us to Shea with a thousand-page hardcover spy novel from the library. At least I had Rusty Staub.
That McFadden’s Gameday Ticket Package with the unlimited hour of drinks sounds pretty good right about now. Since it’s illegal for kids to have alcohol, it won’t help them out, though. Laws. Not only that, school starts in a few days. Forget about hot classrooms and homework, they’ll have to eat lunch with Yankees, Red Sox, and maybe Phillies fans who have reasons outside of Halloween to look forward to October. I don’t envy these kids one bit.
I don’t think the Met’s have an issue with young fans. I’m a diehard Met fan. However, when I was 6 years old, I was a Yankee fan. The biggest reason was Roy White and Thurmann Munson. I went trick or treating in 1976 and Roy White lived in Wayne NJ. He answered the door and gave me a signed calendar and candy. As a 6 year old, I thought that was the greatest thing. I became a Yankee fan. I also liked TM because he was an awesome catcher. I was a fan until 1979-80. TM died and RW retired. I had nothing to follow when those guys were gone. During that time, it was so hard to get Yankee tickets since they were WS Champions. My Uncle worked for the NY Times and could get tickets to games. He always got Mets tickets because nobody wanted them. My dad used to take my brother and I to the games during the time I was a Yankee Fan. After 1980, I only saw the NY Mets in person, so I became a Mets fan for life. I don’t remember any of the players I watched during that time for the Mets but could name the starting lineup for the Yankees. However, I’m a Mets fan not a Yankee fan. Mets tickets are easy to get now and the Mets front office are running deals that allow kids to come see a game for free. The kids won’t remember that Angel Pagan was our center fielder but will remember that they saw the Mets team play in person. The Yankees have been good since 1996 but have old players under major contracts. So, they may become the Yanks of the 80’s soon. I just hope the Mets turn it around and become the Mets of 1986 so we keep those kids who come now. Like they did with me.
As mentioned, I do remember Grote and Stearns for their hard nosed play, and I remember enjoying watching Tom Seaver, Jon Matlack, Skip Lockwood, and Jerry Koosman pitch, and Dave Kingman’s bombs. Willie Montanez was AWESOME to watch — he was such a hot dog! And I will never forget Felix Millan choking up on the bat. But I also remember Richie Hebner being a jerk, and the Mets sending away Seaver and Kong for who knows why, and the team sinking into an abyss. It’s kind of like now, where they are on the verge of turning completely awful. If they let Reyes go it will compare to Seaver leaving. I imagine they’re smart enough to hold on to Wright, because if both Reyes and Wright leave, forget it — the youngins’ will start rooting for the Bronx Bombers.
I guess it’s all about perspective. But Wright and Reyes are the only ones who truly, in my mind, separate today’s Mets from that dark era between Seaver and Straw.
The pitcher you’re thinking of Corey was John Pacella
Yeah Turner has a somewhat better OPS — it’s in the .680s right now, which is not great, and who cares what he did in the minors? — but Flynn brought a glove to the field that was superior to just about everyone else in the NL. Flynn’s outstanding glove plus his weak bat is about equal to Turner’s weak bat and weak glove. Mind you, I am a HUGE Turner fan and have been so since last spring. But I’m also able to remain objective.
If you truly think that the pitching is as dominant today as it was in the 70s then we can’t even have a conversation, because my memory recalls nearly every team having people like Rod Gilbreath and Roger Metzger playing regularly.
I used Turner’s minors stats because this is his first year regularly hitting MLB ball so there’s a larger sample-size that gives a fairly decent idea of what to expect from him in the bigs as opposed to a few hundred AB’s this year. I agree Flynn was a whiz at 2B. I’m not sure what teams starting weak hitting middle infielders during the late-70s have do with dominant pitching during that era, could you explain the correlation?
@SiddFinch – Good, good point.
@JoeJ – Is it just historical distance, or do the names Joel Youngblood and Elliott Maddox just *sound* like historically awesome players? Then again, my wife thinks Angel Pagan is the best baseball player name ever.
@Timo and JoeJ – I think it was hard not to have a weak spot for the Yankees in the late 70s in NY when you knew: A.) The Mets would never play them for any reason that mattered and B.) Reggie had a stinkin’ candy bar named after him.
Was Skip Lockwood the pitcher who’s hat always fell off when he pitched or am I thinking of someone else?
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