Put down the phone, put on the Bobby V.-style Groucho glasses, and open this book while we wait for the Mets to figure out what they want the story of 2020 to be.

Matthew Callan’s Yells for Ourselves: A Story of New York City and the New York Mets at the Dawn of the Millennium brings back the most dramatic Mets period since 1986—and with the Mets, we’re talking about a lot of drama options—and puts you right in it. The day-to-day exploits of Mike Piazza and Robin Ventura, the managerial machinations of Bobby Valentine, the bewildering motivations of the villain who would derail them all: Bobby Bonilla, the pouty superstar speedster: Rickey Henderson, and the Mets version of John Entwhistle: John Olerud—if The Quiet Guy in The Who reached base at a .427 clip, knocked in 96 runs, and scored 107 times despite being one of the slowest runners this side of Rusty Staub. But was Olerud the quietest or best member on the right side of the infield? Edgardo Alfonzo hit .313 during 1999-2000, knocked in 202 runs, scored 232, walked 180 times (with just 150 whiffs), had arguably the best day ever by a Mets hitter (6 for 6 on 8/30/99 at the Astrodome with three homers—plus, with a chance for his fourth homer, lashed a long RBI double in the ninth of a blowout and came around to score his sixth run), and made just 15 errors in those two years in 1,400 chances at second base.

One thing Callan does that I found interesting is that the source of this take is an encapsulation of the New York papers’ coverage of the team. Back when you had to watch an interminable hour of ESPN’s SportsCenter to get a few fleeting Mets highlights, the papers were how you followed the team, how you lived and breathed the ’99 Mets, who were actually more interesting than the team that followed in 2000, though that team went further—and broke even more hearts by losing to the Yankees in the Subway Series everyone wished for but Mets fans wished had never happened after Luis Sojo’s 100-hop grounder in the ninth inning of Game Five. Callan also flips the papers over to the front page, where we see how the city was run by Rudy Giuliani—and this does make you feel old, because he is very credible as New York’s mayor.

Yells for Ourselves is a great read and a must for Mets fans who want to relive those two tremendous and thrilling seasons, when people watched what was happening on the field instead of their phones, when fans crammed into less-than-perfect Shea, where they could buy a decent ticket (instead of a down payment on a decent-sized beer) for under $10. And it is also a superb read for people who do not remember those days, or a world where the Mets were a couple of wins—and a couple of shut-down ninth innings—away from knocking off the Yankees for back-page (and front-page) supremacy of New York.

(Note: This review is also listed on the Yells for Ourselves Amazon page for this book. Whether you like Amazon or not—not a big fan here—it is the way publishers and many book buyers judge whether they should proceed with a work by an author. Even a one-word review means something. Try it for all your favorite authors. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink.)

Houston, January 13, 2020: Major League Baseball handed down its penalties from the investigation over electronic sign stealing during 2017. The results are shocking: The team forfeited its first two picks in 2020 and 2021, was fined the maximum amount ($5 million), and both manager A.J. Hinch and GM Jeff Luhnow received suspensions for the entire season. Astros owner Jim Crane then held a press conference, plainly stating that both men were fired. I spied the list of punishments on a muted MLB TV screen while in the midst of a house cleaning mission, not realizing that the Astros had been far more thorough.

I have followed baseball avidly since the 1970s and I can think of nothing to compares with this in terms of punishment for an organization. I think the revelations of the steroid scandal are more damaging to the game, but there is a huge difference: No players are involved. These were members of management and the owner has the right to dismiss them wholesale and not worry about grievances through the MLB Players’ Association. The MLBPA’s involvement made the steroid situation far more difficult to police and as a result there were a lot of slaps on the wrist when I thought chopping off hands would have been more in line with issues concerning the integrity of the game.

This is a different level of integrity. Let’s be clear, the Astros are the first team to be so punished and we could see other teams—and individuals—similarly disciplined in the weeks, months, and years to come. Astros owner Jim Crane brought up a good point: What major advantage was expected to gain for the ultimate penalty of putting their team and their own careers in peril? Did it make a huge difference? The 2017 Astros won their division by 21 games. They are also accused of using these systems during the postseason that year, when the Astros beat the Red Sox in four games to take the Division Series and needed seven games to dispatch both the Yankees in the ALCS and the Dodgers in the World Series. It was the first world championship in franchise history.

I believe in strict punishment for cheating the game, whether it’s betting by players or gambling with the game’s integrity. This is not a lifetime ban, but this is not throwing games or putting yourself and your team in a vulnerable position—as Pete Rose did. But this is the kind of suspension I think is deserved. Did new Mets manager Carlos Beltran have knowledge of this scheme as an Astros bench player? As a veteran with a lot of time to sit in the clubhouse and dispense wisdom, you’d have to think he knew something about it. I’m sure he will be asked, but in this instance it seems like players may evade punishment. Who knows? This was a shock. Who knows what other surprises may be in store?

Sponsored by Shea Stadium Remembered

The Jets play their final game at Shea Stadium. It also winds up being the final game for Steelers quarterback Terry Bradshaw, whose elbow gives out after a touchdown pass and he never plays again. The Steelers win, 34-7, and the fans tear down the goalposts and everything else they can get their hands on as the Jets exit for New Jersey. (The NFL Network put together an awesome segment about the last Shea game.)

The Jets finish their 20 seasons at Shea with a 70-67-3 mark, plus a 1-2 record in the postseason (that one win clinched an AFL championship in 1968). They drew 7.7 million fans to Shea. The opening of the stadium in 1964 made the Jets—previously known as the doleful Titans—the most popular team in the AFL. Even before they signed Joe Willie Namath. Their Shea tenure was often turbulent, battling Mets ownership about perpetually opening the season on the road and not playing at home on October. The situation eventually took the Jets to court. And eventually to New Jersey. Like the planes flying over Shea, these Jets were heading out of air space. As one fan’s sign said that last day at Shea: “Good luck in the swamp.”

Shea Stadium Remembered Presents

Shea Stadium Remembered Presents This Day at Shea, 12/9/1979: Once upon a time a Jets-Patriots game was quite a competitive matchup. Led by Richard Todd, who ran for a touchdown and threw for another, the Jets were up by 8 late, when Steve Grogan found Stanley Morgan for a Patriots TD. But the 2-point conversion was years away from adoption in the NFL, so the Pats kicked the extra point and the final was 27-26.

And if you or your loved ones loved Shea, here is something for under the tree. Message me if you want an inscription and bookmark.

John Delcos died the other day. The Mets reporter for the Journal News in Westchester for many years, he had his own site, and recently had contributed to Forbes.com. We came together just after the downfall of the Mets preseason annual in 2011. I have always regretted that I didn’t get in touch with him during the publication’s four-year run. And that the extent of our collaborations was a few pieces on each other for our respective websites, the most interesting was an article he interviewed me in 2015 about Yogi Berra and the 1973 World Series that came out shortly after Berra’s death and shortly before Terry Collins made his own World Series misstep. But John was always good at staying in touch. When we last spoke almost a year ago, John was looking to do a book. We mostly talked on the phone and conversed through emails. I was always happy to hear from him.

The one time that I went to the Citi Field press box was at his insistence. It was during the fleeting Happy Harvey Day phenomenon of 2013, when New York columnists actually broke off writing about the Yankees for a minute to look at this kid throwing bullets and showing swagger—more swagger than bullets, as it turned out. Generally, I’d rather sit in the stands and not have to justify myself to the public relations staff as to my worthiness to occupy the chair left empty by the New York newspapers that no longer send reporters to Mets games. I am glad he got me out of my comfort zone so I could witness the Mets creating buzz and the media hive decimating it. The Mets won and so did I.

After John wound up in a wheelchair, we made plans to go to spring training together. In the end, he was just not up to the journey. It was not the same without him and I have not been back to spring training since. He had plenty of press box friends who were better connected than I, but he always made me feel that we were all on even par.

What really sticks with me was his Mets Report site. He included whatever inside information he had and his posts were always insightful. He did it because he cared and still felt the need to share that knowledge with a fan base that he fully understood. Once Adam Rubin—another good guy with great communication skills— exited the Mets beat, the John Delcos Mets Report was the best thing I read on a regular basis about the Mets. John’s last entry was this past Opening Day, but it was filled with analysis and observations such as: seven days into the season, Seth Lugo was already overused. “Callaway has been erratic in this young season as to how he’s used his bullpen.” Neither of us was a fan of Mickey.

I am sad I won’t get to talk to him about Carlos Beltran taking on one of the toughest jobs in sports: Pleasing the Wilpons and Mets fans. Who knows what it takes to please Mets ownership. Pleasing Mets fans? That’s what he did best, through good old fashioned reporting.

For nigh on about 30 years I have almost annually selected a Met who showed grit and usually the ability to hit, yet got no love from the manager. Past winners have included the likes of Todd Pratt, Mackey Sasser, Nick Evans (the only two-time winner), Heath Bell, and even—after an exile to the minors and a seat on the bench in Flushing in 2016—Michael Conforto.

Dom Smith would have been a candidate, but he plays the same position as the best rookie hitter in Mets history. Even when Smith did play first base, I yelled at the no-longer Mets manager, “Why isn’t Pete Alonso playing? He’s only 24! He doesn’t need a rest!!” And when Dom played left field, I’d bark at the TV, “Why isn’t J.D. Davis playing left?” Dom got his 200 plate appearances, including a .286 pinch-hit average and the season-concluding walkoff homer after not missing two months because of injury. So he’s got too much going for him to be FNP Met.

Adainy Hechavarria had a shot, before he became a one-man Mets wrecking crew, seeking vengeance for the Mets cutting him on the eve of a $1 million roster bonus. You know, I’d be pissed, too. But he’s a Brave now, so he’s not even eligible to be the FNP. Chop this!

Joe Panik nearly snagged it. The Mets picked up the Hopewell Junction local off waivers to be the regular second baseman after Robinson Cano was injured. But Cano came back sooner—and better—than expected, so Joe rode the pine. In about two months as a Met he batted 103 times and hit .277. I live somewhat close to him in the Hudson Valley and his daily commute is noteworthy, but he didn’t take an Uber from two states away to get to Citi Field.

Rajai Davis was getting ready for batting practice in Lehigh Valley, PA, for the Mets’ AAA team in May when he found out he was going back to the majors. The dude is 38 and playing in the minors despite having clubbed a game-tying home run in the eighth inning of Game Seven of the 2016 World Series for Cleveland. Rajai was not waiting a second longer to start back to the bigs. He pulled out his phone and dispatched an Uber driver to take him to Citi Field. A couple of hours and $243 later, the gregarious outfielder had a friend for life in Jason his driver and Darryl Strawberry’s old number. Number 18 got to Flushing mid-game, pinch-hit in the eighth, and smacked a three-run blast in a 6-1 win over the eventual world champions.

The former 38th-round pick out of UConn-Avery Point—I lived in Connecticut for several years and I’m not even familiar with that branch—was sent back to Syracuse while Aaron Altherr stayed in Flushing. Despite a homer in his first at bat as a Met, Altherr possessed neither the stick nor the flash to match Rajai. Altherr and his .129 batting average appeared in 26 games in New York while Davis, though injured for part of that time, languished in the minors. Finally sense was restored to the universe and Altherr, who had gone 2-for-August, was jettisoned and Davis was recalled.

Rajai’s next big moment came in—you guessed it—the eighth inning against the Dodgers on September 14. Rajai broke up a scoreless duel with a three-run, pinch-hit double. He only batted 25 times as a Met, not even enough to qualify for a grade on my report card! But Uber and the big moments puts him at the top of the class and cemented the FNP for him. He’s never won a World Series ring, but he has the plate display in his front parlor, complete with Gil Hodges’s image. Hold it high, Rajai, you earned it.

Sponsored by Shea Stadium Remembered
Well, I got some grief yesterday for posting about a pennant the Mets clinched at Shea in 2000 before losing to the Yankees. So today let’s remember the Grand Slam Single of 1999. I was also there, and I had a new job and tons of work to do and here I am at the game and it’s going on forever and I have to be 100 miles north tomorrow morning and they’ll probably lose anyway and… wait a minute, this is one of the best games I’ve ever seen. It didn’t matter that we were drenched, that the game was more than five hours old, that the Mets hadn’t scored since the first inning, or that Atlanta owns us. Live in the moment, Mets fans! Even if the moment is 20 years old!! Stop comparing yourself to Yankees fans!!! That’s what I told myself that afternoon at Shea and was rewarded with a moment I will never forget it. Neither should you!

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Back when there were no Nationals, just the scruffy, cuddly Expos, whose parents were cruelly cheap but they did speak French, the Mets took the Wild Card and then took the pennant in a dominant display over the Cardinals. Mike Hampton was brilliant, pitching AN ACTUAL COMPLETE GAME SHUTOUT IN A POSTSEASON GAME (the second in as many series by a Met that fall). Shea Stadium shook like I’d never experienced before, as Todd Zeile cleared the bases with a double and you knew that Game Five was going to be the clincher and you were going to see it happen. It was wonderful, beautiful for about 24 hours. And then some pushy guys from the Bronx clinched the other pennant and you came to realize that the next two weeks would either be the best of your baseball life, or it was going to feel like putting a beloved pet to sleep. Goodbye, Hampton.

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The 1973 Mets went from last to first in a month’s time to take an NL East division no one seemed interested in winning. Beating the Big Red Machine in the best-of-five NLCS was another matter. The rules of the day had home-field assigned on a rotating basis with the same team hosting Games Three, Four, and Five. The Mets took full advantage  of this scheduling. Pete Rose may have won the fight, but the Mets won the war. The riot at Shea Stadium that followed the pennant clinching was a whole different matter.

I look at the significance of the game, the day, and the year against a tense political backdrop in Swinging ’73 and in a piece I wrote today for Rising Apple.

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This is a challenge to summarize all that happened during the Rose-Harrelson brawl. I spent at least a month crafting this part of Swinging ’73 and talked to as many Mets as I could find, from Jerry Koosman, who was the mound and remembered little of it, to Rusty Staub, who was running in from right field and saw the commotion out of the corner of his eye, to Ron Hodges leading the bullpen charge, to Jon Matlack, who was in the bathroom and came out wondering what the hell was going on! I got some input from George Theodore, Wayne Garrett, and Buzz Capra, who were in the middle of the action—Theodore, still recovering from a broken hip, was just trying to break it up and not break something else.

Somehow, no players were ejected. Fans pelted the field with debris when Rose came out to left field for the next inning. WFAN’s Bob Heussler was a college freshman in the front row in the loge: “When you saw the whiskey bottle come flying onto the field, you knew this was pretty much out of control.” Sparky Anderson pulled the Reds off the field. A contingent of Mets—manager Yogi Berra, Willie Mays, Tom Seaver, Cleon Jones, and Staub—came out to left field to calm the fans and avoid a possible forfeit. And a full scale riot.

I went out to the Long Island Ducks ballpark to talk to part-owner Bud Harrelson in 2012. What a gentleman! We talked in between him pitching batting practice to the Ducks and he provided the back-story of the bad blood that ensued after Matlack limited the Reds to two hits in Game Two in Cincinnati. Like Mookie Wilson and Bill Buckner years later, the autograph circuit actually brought Rose and Harrelson closer together as time wore on. Not friends—like Mook and Billy Buck became—but accomplices in a long ago time.