Mets Walk-Offs And Minutiae

Couple random trivia questions for those as bored as I am...answers in the comments section 1- Brett Myers will hopefully be the last pitcher to do the following against the Mets at Shea Stadium... - throw 8+ shutout innings - strike out at least 10 The first pitcher to do so, more than four decades ago, was also a member of the Phillies. Name him. This isn't as hard as you'd think. 2- Jose Reyes enters Sunday tied for the Mets all-time stolen base lead with 281. One other player in MLB history has exactly 281 stolen bases. He's a former teammate of Reyes'. Name him. 3- Mike Schmidt faced this former Mets lefty 66 times in his career and never hit a home run against him. That's Schmidt's most appearances against any pitcher, without hitting a home run. 4- June 5, 1963 marks the first time that the Mets ever swept a HOME doubleheader from the Phillies. The losing pitcher for the Phillies in Game 1 is a "person of significance" for both the Mets and Phil...

The only thing you can contemplate writing about is Ricardo Rincon joining the ranks of Mets with 0.00 ERAs. For the record, he joins (listed with innings) 1-Jon Adkins 1- Desi Relaford 1-Kenny Greer 1-Manny Hernandez 1-Bob Gibson 1 2/3-Bob Johnson 2- Kevin Brown 2-Don Rose 2 2/3-Felix Heredia 5 2/3-Dan Schatzader 5 2/3 C.J. Nitkowski True Metzeros know... The highest ERA in Mets history belongs, not to Jonathon Niese (15.00), but to Todd Zeile (45.00).

Shea Stadium has been home to 335 Mets walk-off wins (so far). It just occurred to me that I've never written about the first one. The beginning began on May 8, 1964, a Mets-Cardinals game at Shea and who knew then that the Cardinals would go on to be World Series champs, and that the Mets would play such a significant role in their end-of-season race past the Phillies. You may have heard those stories before. There isn't as much to this tale, but it's still noteworthy nonetheless. Two of the primary participants for the Cardinals, starter Ernie Broglio and reliever Bobby Shantz weren't long for St. Louis, as they'd be traded a month later for someone named Lou Brock. The Mets started well off Broglio, scoring twice in the first, with the key hit being Jesse Gonder's RBI triple. They'd be up 4-1 by the eighth, with Jack Fisher sailing along, but alas with two on and two out in the eighth, pinch-hitter Carl Warwick hit a game-tying three-run home run. The las...

Newest Met Ricardo Rincon has a claim to fame that is very significant to this blog. On July 12, 1997, Rincon was the winning pitcher in a walk-off no-hitter. The Pirates haven't had many things go right since losing the 1992 NLCS on Francisco Cabrera's walk-off hit. They haven't had a winning season since. This would rank as one of their better days of recent vintage. Granted, Pirates starter Francisco Cordova, a good friend of Rincon's, did most of the dirty work for nine hitless innings against the Astros that day (part of a 23-inning, 3-hit stretch against them) and Billy Wagner's outing for Houston (1 1/3 innings, four strikeouts) was of a higher level of success, but we cannot ignore Rincon's contribution to history. Rincon's four-batter stint came in the top of the 10th inning. He faced two players with a Mets connection (Bill Spiers and Derek Bell) and two who are still active (Luis Gonzalez and Brad Ausmus) and his only blemish was Bell's walk....

* Tuesday's game was the 179th Mets road extra-inning win, their fourth this season (yes, we're charting those now too). * It's the Mets first road extra-inning win in Milwaukee in team history. * The last person to hit a game-winning sacrifice fly in a road extra-inning win for the Mets (before Endy Chavez) was in Miller Park on Tuesday. Mike Cameron had one for the Mets against the Pirates, September 18, 2004. * The Mets last 6-5 road extra-inning win prior to this one featured an unusual game-winning hit, a Rey Ordonez home run to beat the Marlins in the 10th inning, on May 31, 2002. * This was the 6th time this season that a Mets pitcher got a win, while pitching 1/3 of an inning. That is a franchise record, breaking the previous mark of five such regular season wins in 2000. *Lastly, Here are some minutiae bits on Daniel Murphy that came into play Tuesday (thanks BB-Reference). - He's 7-for-11 with three walks in plate appearances that came in a tie game. - He'...

Jonathon Niese was born on October 27, 1986. Expect this to be referenced often, because it's the date that the Mets won the World Series. But what happened on the baseball-season birthdays of other current Mets? Moises Alou, July 3, 1966 The Mets split a doubleheader with the Pirates, losing 8-7 and winning, 9-8, as seven Mets drove in runs in the nightcap. In a bizarre finish to Game 2, the Pirates ran out of players, and pitcher Bob Purkey (career .110 hitter) struck out as a pinch-hitter with two on base to end the game. Orlando Hernandez, October 11, 1969 The Mets lose Game 1 of the World Series, 4-1 as Mike Cuellar beats Tom Seaver. Don Buford starts things off with a leadoff home run and the Orioles never look back. Billy Wagner, July 25, 1971 Ron Taylor struck out Roger Metzger with runners on second and third and two outs in the ninth to preserve a 7-6 win. Cleon Jones led the Mets with three hits, including a home run. Carlos Delgado, June 25, 1972 The Mets got swept by t...

To read my other post today, please link to http://www.metswalkoffs.com/2008/09/its-your-nieses-birthday.html The wonderful Baseball-Reference allows me to generate such lists as this one. In their illustrious history, the Mets have had 9 previous occasions in which they've started a lefty who was making his major league debut. There's a reason this doesn't happen often. Lack of success might have something to do with it. The lineup includes 1995, Bill Pulsipher: 5 career Mets wins 1994, Jason Jacome: 4 career Mets wins 1988, David West: 1 career Met win 1985, Bill Latham: 1 career Met win 1972, Brent Strom: 0 career Mets wins 1971, Jon Matlack: 82 career Mets wins 1967, Les Rohr: 2 career Mets wins 1966, Dick Rusteck: 1 career Mets win 1965, Rob Gardner: 4 career Mets wins Perhaps it's a good omen that Tuesday's starter is named Jon.

It seems like today is a good day, given the events of Msr. Sabathia and his near no-no'ness on Sunday, to tell the story of September 7, 1984. The timing is particularly good because I recently purchased an audio cassette of the game, and recently got to hear the details of the pertinent parts. It's the story of a day on which the Mets came as close as close could be to throwing a no-hitter. Dwight Gooden was the pitcher. The Chicago Cubs were the opponent. The score was not an issue, as the Mets coasted, 10-0 behind home runs from George Foster and Darryl Strawberry. It was also a record-setting evening, as Gooden broke the NL record for strikeouts by a rookie pitcher, set when Grover Cleveland Alexander struck out 227 in 1911. The only blemish on Gooden's mark that evening, an infield single by Cubs third baseman Keith Moreland, in the fifth inning, somewhat akin to that of Marlins catcher Paul Hoover in the 161st game of the 2007 season. The hit was legit, a slowly top...