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.)