The other night I was wearing a Mets jersey with the Kid 8 patch. My youngest asked why it said that.
Junior stepped in and explained the Mets had a really good catcher and he died.
Then they asked if the Mets will retire 8. No.
Do they have other retired numbers? A quick lesson about Casey, longer about Gil, and they know all about Seaver.
Will the Mets retire David’s number? I guessed yes but not for many years.
What about Jose? Well, he might be in the Marlins for 12 years. I don’t think they ever will.
Great conversation. It reminded me of the early days of New Ebbetts Field when the Mets forgot to decorate and I would harp on the franchise for not breeding a new generation of fans. I’ve done my part.
When my son was 2 1/2, not only could he name every player in the Mets yearbook, but he could sing “Meet the Mets” – both stanzas! Not many kids today know what the butcher, the baker and the people on the street do. By the time he was 3 he had committed to memory my 1986 highlight video. Soimetimes I forget that he didn’t see it in person, he remembers some of it better than I do!
both stanzas! Great job.
I was my son’s age the year they won it all against 100-1 odds. My parents were not New York natives, so I didn’t know that the manager who wore #14 was a huge hero in 1950s Brooklyn, nor the first base coach who wore #8 was the greatest hitting catcher ever to play in the Bronx. My own son was born after Piazza’s 2001 home run, but he knows what Keith and Ron used to do; he knows that the Cubs and the Cardinals used to be the enemy before there was an NL Central–back when two divisions was still new and probably considered heresy. He saw Endy’s catch for the first time last night during a Yankees telecast, and I had the chance to educate him on another piece of Mets history.