This is weird.  I have ZERO recollection of ever seeing this cover before.  I probably have even blogged about it in the past but as I did this post it was new to me.

Are we really gonna hype this guy from The Cardinals? He doesn’t even want to be here.

Once again let me point out the blue on the cap is the current blue not the electric blue of our faulty memories.  Did we all hallucinate that it was a little lighter back when?

Congrats Jeremy Hefner, you have benefitted from wearing a coach’s number. Hefner was 8-15 in his Mets career.

I almost went with Rogers Hornsby.  I saw his name and was like “oh I didn’t realize he was on the 62 Mets…makes sense, they signed a lot of old timers and….” GOOD THING I CHECKED.   He stopped playing ball in 1937 lol.  He was a coach.  I am trying to stick with players here.

 

 

Mickey Mantle could do it all.  He could hit for power (536 lifetime HRs).  He could hit for average (10 seasons of .300+ batting average, including 2 over .350). He had speed (6 times he had 10+ SBs). And he could play defense, patrolling the deep centerfield at the original Yankee Stadium better than anyone.

How good was the Mick?  He won the MVP 3 times, and finished in the top 5 in voting 6 other times.

What is astounding is that in his first 6 full seasons, when he won 2 MVPs, he wasn’t even the best CF in New York (hello Willie Mays).  But he was the best in the American League by far.

There is no doubt that Mickey Mantle is an Immortal.

For some background on what this is, check out the introduction post here.

Interesting choices here.  As the ’82 Mets won 65 games I think I would have been all in on..

TOM SEAVER IS BACK

…but I guess the Mets wanted us to look at the whole team.  Some decent players on that cover.  Anyway it’s great that Tom is back and he should be part of the organization for years to come.

..

We are starting to get into less common numbers so the list should start to get a little wacky, but this one is a no-doubter.  The man carried the Mets into October, then Murph took over for three weeks and then the clock struck midnight.  But for those two months, have you ever seen a player carry a team like that?