Good morning Mets fans,
For newer readers, Saturday is usual more casual around these parts. I always make a run to an Unnamed Donuts Chain (they should sponsor the site so I can have a huge advertising budget like Mets Blog! Anyone seen the banner ads?! I just saw one on the Post’s site!)
You can also pretty much bank on a Lee Mazzilli mention every Saturday, although the current trend in Mazzilli news is disturbing. Whereas a few months ago I could daydream of #16 sitting in the Mets dugout, it is clearler and clearer that Lee has become Mr. Yankee..
There’s no hiding this. That’s a lot of pinstripe. Lee talks about how proud he is of “this stadium.” This hurts. I would share the video with you but MLB could potentially go out of business if they allowed embedding technology, so click here.
As typed this post the new dog completely sharked a donut from my youngest. Cue Jaws theme…..out of nowhere donut gone.
In case you’re under 40: In 1979, Mazzilli led the Mets with 181 hits, and 79 runs batted in, and was their sole representative at the All-Star Game in Seattle. Mazzilli hit a game-tying solo home run in the eighth inning of that All-Star Game, and drew a bases-loaded walk in the ninth inning to bring in the winning run of the National League‘s 7–6 victory. The following year, he had his best statistical season, leading the Mets with 162 hits, 31 doubles, 16 home runs, 76 RBIs, 82 runs, and 41 stolen bases. (via wikipedia)
You need to understand what it was like. We had NOTHING. Exciting things for Mets fans were that our guy hit a home run in the All Star Game and that Craig Swan was on the same baseball card as Ron Guidry which proved that Swan was just as good. Oh yeah, you guys probably don’t know how great Guidry was for a while. You can imagine a 25-3 with a 1.74 season right? Swanny made the card with a 9-6 record but hot damn he led the league in ERA!
I’m aware that Mazzilli was the lone bright spot in the late 70s, but I only remember him as a washed up bench player.
It bothers me a lot more to see Dwight Gooden, Darryl Strawberry & David Cone at Yankee events.
Chief, whatever Mazilli did or did not do in his one year at SNY clearly has put him in the Ebbets’ Field Flannels Dog House (just trying for a another Mets’ Police Sponsorship, I thought that it was a natural tie-in). As for Gooden, Cone, Strawberry and the like, I think after the original stadium design and the whole painting over the Gooden wall, I would have thought that it was painfully clear what the team thinks of its history. Hell, aren’t you the one championing (since they won’t) bringing back Old Timer’s Day & Banner Day?
Paul, even as a washed up bench player, he got a bunch of big hits for the Mets as they won in ’86.
Lee was the pin up guy, not only for girls, or for Mets fans, but as a guy in Bay Ridge Brooklyn, he represented the hood.
But all that was prologue to his timely hits for the Mets in 86.
Eliott Gabelman loved that mazzili kid…