If you’re bothering to read a site called Mets Police you are probably hip to the Mets defensive woes this season.
I don’t think piling on Jerry Manuel is fair. Someone has to play first base and we all agree Murphy has to play somewhere, and with third base being his best position you kind of have a problem.
I think the Mets should consider bringing in baseball’s first defensive coordinator and it should be Davey Johnson.
Now it’s time for another episode of How I Met The Mets.
Kids…let me tell you about the time Davey played a big fat guy at shortstop and won the world series. If you are under 30 why don’t you go google a picture of Kevin Mitchell (I’m mobile, I can’t he’ll you). I’ll wait ’til you get back….
…Yeah that guy. Big roly-poly guy. Davey figured out which of his pitchers were fly ball pitchers and on the days that he didn’t expect too many grounders he’d stick the fat guy at short to get his bat in the lineup. He got away with it every time. I can’t think of a single “bad error” by Mitchell although I bet the Mets Walkoffs blog guy is about to email me some.
Kids…let me tell you about the big fight in Cincinnati. One night the Mets and Reds didn’t get along. Several players got ejected. Davey, master of half-ass defense, stuck Gary Carter at third base. He got away with it, and I even remember Gary making a great play late in the game, maybe even extra innings (Walkoffs I need you…)
Davey even platooned pitchers. Jesse Orosco and Roger McDowell took turns hiding in the outfield and pitching. It was a whole new level of lefty-righty. Davey got away with it.
Kids….my mind is foggy about this one now that I’m old but I think it was also Davey who shuttled Rusty Staub between left field and right field one sunny afternoon (cough, Walkoffs help…).
Rusty was another large fellow and whatever the hell happened, he spent the afternoon shuttling between left and right depending on what type of batter was up It took about half an hour for Rusty (mainly a pinch hitter at the end of his career) to switch positions.
So we need Davey. Let Davey sit next to Jerry and call time out after every play. He can put Tatis where he thinks the ball will be hit, Reed in the likely outfield position and he can hide Murphy batter by batter. Plus we’d have an 86 Met around, it will tick off the opposition, and it will be wildly entertaining.
Jerry if you don’t believe me, ask your hitting coach. Kids, let me tell you about the time Howard Johnson became the Mets starting center fielder. Now that was a disaster….
Rusty game was 4/28/85 and Jesse/Roger was 7/22/86. Remember those both well. Loved Davey
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYN/NYN198504280.shtml
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CIN/CIN198607220.shtml
The Rusty gamne was actually a rainy afternoon. The game lasted 18 innings and also featured Strawberry’s first career grand slam. I was there – first game I ever took pictures at. I have a great shot of Rusty standing on third – probably the last time in his career he was literally standing on third (considering he was pinch run for almost 100% of the time)
Were the ’86 Mets the last team to win the World Series without having a single go-to guy as the closer? My recollection of ’86 was that Johnson would decide on whether to use McDowell or Orosco for the 9th based on which batters were due up. (Sometimes the other would pitch the 8th, making for a potent 1-2 punch.)
The big advantage of this is that you didn’t have the same guy automatically pitching the 8th or 9th inning of a close game. If you have a team that might flirt with 100 wins in a season, you can’t expect any one pitcher to appear in almost every game you win. Davey Johnson and Mel Stottlemyre understood that in a way that no manager in the majors seems to these days.