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Riding The Tricycle

Ok, so on Friday's SNY broadcast, Gary Cohen told you of Harry Danning, the last player nailed trying for an inside-the-park home run with a cycle at stake...What they didn't tell you, besides Danning's status as the greatest Jewish catcher of all-time (so says his Baseball-Reference.com page), was...

* That Jose Reyes became the first player in Mets history with a single, a double, and two triples in a game.

While that had never been done by the Mets, it had been done against them. I could give you 800 guesses at the former Met who put forth that kind of game and you wouldn't get the name. Only 829 players have played for the Mets (so says Ultimate Mets Database), but I bet it would take until guess 801 to come up with this guy...

Junior Noboa.

Two great notes from that game of June 5, 1990
1) Mets broadcaster Ron Darling allowed the double, and the second triple to Noboa.
2) Despite Noboa's unbelievable effort, his team didn't win. The Mets did...in walk-off fashion when Tom O'Malley homered off Expos reliever Dale Mohorcic in the bottom of the 11th inning.

* Also of great significance in Friday's win: The Mets had a pair of tri-cycles (or maybe it's try-cycles), one from Jose Reyes and one from David Wright. A tri-cycle (or try-cycle) is when a player misses getting the cycle by one hit.

For his part, it was the 4th time in Jose Reyes' career that he was a home run shy of the cycle. This is an all-time Mets record!

Most Times Missing The Cycle By A Home Run
Mets History

Jose Reyes 4<<>> Set record in Mets win over Diamondbacks Friday
>> Total occurences: 72

For David Wright, his single, double and home run meant that it was the 9th time in his career that he was a triple shy of the cycle. He's now second all-time in Mets history in that department.

Most Times Missing The Cycle By a Triple
Mets History

Mike Piazza 12
David Wright 9
Robin Ventura 8
Darryl Strawberry 8
Ed Kranepool 8
Carlos Beltran 8
Howard Johnson 7
>> Total occurences: 250

* For the record, let's get the other two variants out there. They are a pair of very odd lists.

Most Times Missing The Cycle By A Double
Mets History

Darryl Strawberry 3
Frank Thomas 2
22 others 1
>> Total occurrences: 27

Most Times Missing The Cycle By A Single
Mets History

Gregg Jefferies 3
Ron Swoboda 1
Darryl Strawberry 1
Joe Christopher 1
>> Total occurrences: 6

There's no easy way to check my source (the great Baseball-Reference PI) for the 355 tri-cycles (or try-cycles) in Mets history to see if more than one took place in the same game, as happened Friday. Perhaps some other time.

Comments

You just made up try-cycle, didn't you?
Stormy said…
Very cool info!!

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