The Mets' Metness

While all teams have a history, good, bad, great or pathetic, they also have some qualities about them that make them stand out from the others. At one end of the spectrum you have franchises like the Cardinals and Yankees with a long line of championships and Hall-of-Famers. The other end has the Tampa Bay Rays. Some have legendary announcers, a crazy mascot or a quirky moment in history that is all their own. Rooting for a team is more than just hoping they win (and let's face it, if your team wins all the time or is expected to win, it's just not as fun). It's listening to a familiar voice on the TV or radio every day. It's naming your dog Mookie. It's everybody thinking you're crazy because instead of having a photo of your wife and kids on your desk at work you have a picture of Ken Boswell. It's insisting that your friends and family call you Edgardo Alfonzo. The Mets fall somewhere in the middle of the pack in terms of past success or great moments, but they have a certain spirit or uniqueness that makes them special. In other words, the Mets have a Metness about them. Here is a list that makes the Mets what they are, and what no other team can claim. (This is part one, with part two coming tomorrow.) 1962 Mets: The ultimate expansion team debut, the '62 Mets were the most horrible collection of players yet were loved and popular. No other team's opening year has gone down in the annals of baseball history the way this team has. Does anybody look back on the '61 Angels or '69 Padres this way? With Casey Stengel's wit and wisdom deflecting the horrid performance of the team (40?120), the Amazin's (a combo platter of washed-up vets?Gil Hodges, Richie Ashburn?and zany characters?Marv Throneberry, Choo Choo Coleman, Don Zimmer) answered the manager's question of "Can't anybody here play this game?" with a resounding no. 1969 Mets: The '62 Mets set everything up for the '69 squad. But it wasn't just the expansion-year team that stunk?it was the '63, '64, '65, '66, '67 and '68 versions, too. And that just made '69 all the more sweeter. The Miracle Mets were arguably the biggest underdog winners in baseball history. Finishing in fifth place in their division would have been a success, but beating the 109-win, powerhouse Orioles? As was the saying of the time, "If we can send a man to the moon, the Mets can win the World Series." But it wasn't just luck, as they won 100 games during the season, surging ahead of the Cubs to win the division by eight games. And they had great pitching (Seaver, Koosman, Gentry, et al.), clutch hitting (with Cleon Jones batting .340) and, of course, stellar fielding, as Tommie Agee's and Ron Swoboda's catches in the Series proved. But most importantly, they had Gil Hodges. 'Meet the Mets': The Mets theme song, written by Ruth Roberts and Bill Katz, is without a doubt the best team song in baseball history. Sure, other teams have one (even the Yankees), but did George Costanza sing part of it on "Seinfeld"? Did Raymond and Robert Barone sing the whole tune at the end of an "Everybody Loves Raymond" episode? I don't think so. Even Yo Lo Tengo recorded a version of it. The Sign Guy: Mets fans of the first 20 years of the team's existence surely remember The Sign Guy?Karl Ehrhardt. He would bring up to 60 impeccably made, relevant signs to every game (he was a professional sign-maker, after all). When Jose Cardenal would strike out, Ehrhardt would pull out his "Jose, Can You See?" sign. As an opposing pitcher would be taken out of a game, his "Enjoy Your Shower" sign would rev up the crowd. And after the Mets' won the 1969 World Series, his sign said it all?"There Are No Words." Unfortunately, Ehrhardt passed away this past February, but he'll always remain in Mets lore. (It seems like there's a new sign guy at Shea now, and he's always wearing an Ed Kranepool jersey.) Dwight Gooden's 1985 Season: There have been other standout seasons involving young phenoms, mania, attendance records and hoopla?Vida Blue in 1971, Mark "The Bird" Fidrych in '76 and Fernando Valenzuela in '81?but Gooden's '85 year tops them all when you combine age, performance and atmospehere. He was 20 years old?the same age as Valenzuela, but younger than Blue and Fidrych?and he put up a 24?4 record, a 1.53 ERA and led the league with 268 strikeouts. Every game he pitched at Shea wasn't a baseball game, it was a rock concert. And it wasn't Kajagoogoo. It was Guns n' Roses. And he went on to do it year after year until he strolled right into the Hall of Fame. Oops?I guess that's one more thing that makes the Mets the Mets.