Mets Walk-Offs And Minutiae

(Reprinted from a posting on November 1, with two new ones added, with appropriate links at the bottom...) The Mets And The Yankees A 9-inning Haiku Dave Mlicki won It wasn't even that close Six to nothing Mets When Brian McRae went wandering off first base I was beyond pissed http://metswalkoffs.blogspot.com/2005/06/bring-in-yoshii.html Matt Franco was up The Yanks had Satan pitching Two-run single. Yay! Clemens beaned our guy What a piece of expletive And what a grand slam! Carlos Almanzar? You have got to be kidding Piazza crushed it Estes missed his spot But the home run sure was nice Winning is revenge http://metswalkoffs.blogspot.com/2006/06/pitching-in.html One shining moment A home run off David Wells Mo should have quit then Shane Spencer dribbler A perfectly placed baseball Sturtze threw home wildly All hail Mister Koo! First a double off Johnson Then that slide...he's safe! EXTRA INNINGS (new ones) David Wright's a smash Randy Johnson: pathetic Call it a Charmed

Perhaps you saw the highlights of last week's Marlins victory over the Orioles and were astounded when Miguel Cabrera got the game-winning hit on Todd Williams' attempted intentional walk gone awry. I was more intrigued by the manner in which the Marlins tied that game, on back-to-back pinch-hit home runs in the 9th inning. The Mets have done that, as recently as May 4, 1991 against the Giants. In fact, they were the last squad to even a contest at that juncture in such a manner. The story of that game is one of the Giants squandering two two-run leads and the Mets bullpen combo of Wally Whitehurst, Alejandro Pena, John Franco and Pete Schoureck, working a little magic for a couple hours to bail out Ron Darling. The Giants took a 2-0 lead but the Mets evened it in the 4th inning on an RBI single by Howard Johnson and a sacrifice fly by Kevin Elster. The Giants snatched the lead right back in the 5th on Will Clark's two-run home run and Darling's night was done after 5

* From a story in the October 28, 1986 edition of the Boston Globe , the day after the World Series concluded...really! It came from a notes column co-written by Dan Shaughnessy, Jackie MacMullan and Larry Whiteside. "Trade talks at the World Series are at best preliminary, but one source says the Red Sox have now added backup first baseman Danny Heep to the deal in which outfielder Mookie Wilson would come to Boston...The Mets want a middle reliever in return and have their sights on Bob Stanley."

Answers to the trivia quiz posted on June 28, 2007 http://metswalkoffs.blogspot.com/2007/06/our-special-bonds-cardinals-haters.html 1) Those of you who have been regular readers for a long time should know that I wasn't going to let this quiz go by without making a reference somewhere to Neil Allen and his 3 walk-off defeats for the Cardinals against the Mets. 2) Had a lot of fun stumping people with this one. The big-city guy is Daryl Boston . The small-state dude is Del Unser . Both hit the Cardinals very well in their Mets careers. 3) If you can't beat 'em, join em. That was the case for Pete Falcone and it should have been a sign that he wasn't very good if he couldn't beat the Mets teams he faced in that era. 4) Rick Reed couldn't beat the Cardinals in the playoffs, but was 5-0 as a Met against them in the regular season. 5) Considering the era in which he played, this isn't as tough as you'd think. The lefty is Sid Fernandez . The righty is David

In their esteemed history, the New York Mets have had three players do what this Big Papi fellow on the Red Sox has done, get walk-off hits in back-to-back games. The first to do it was Jerry Buchek, and I've written about his feats here. http://metswalkoffs.blogspot.com/2005/07/baseballs-been-jerry-jerry-good-to-me.html The last to do it was Mike Cameron, and I wrote about that accomplishment here http://metswalkoffs.blogspot.com/2005/11/cameron-yards.html The middle man in this trivia trove is John Milner and I suppose it's time I wrote about him. On August 21 and 22, 1973 Milner got the decisive hit in walk-off wins over the Dodgers. I'm only going to write about the first one today and due to various constraints, I'm going to be rather brief about it. I shall summarize in 118 words, one for every minute it took for that particular game to be played. The quickest walk-off win in regulation time, in Mets history was one in a series of comebacks during the run to the 1

From what I read these last few days, Jose Reyes is the hottest Met going since Derek Bell. Yes, that's right, I'm referencing Bell's great run, right at the beginning of his Mets career, which spanned the 2000 season. That success began with back-to-back 3-hit games against the Phillies. It continued for a span of nearly two weeks. Over a 13-game stretch, the Mets rightfielder went 29-for-57 (.509 batting average) with 14 runs scored and 11 RBI. His acquisition looked like the steal of the century. Bell's good fortune continued throughout the month of April, in which he hit .385 (and was not named NL Player of the Month) and into May when he had another good run, marked by an 11-game hit streak. On May 21, the Mets and Diamondbacks met on a rainy Sunday afternoon, with Randy Johnson opposing the Flushing 9. It took two baters for the Mets to get the run back that Reed allowed in the top of the 1st. Bell followed a Joe McEwing double with one of his own. This was one of