Dipping Into The Archives Vol. 5

1975

Was it a bad omen that in 1975 the price of the Mets yearbook jumped all the way up to $1? The cover celebrated Tom Seaver’s achievement of becoming the first pitcher in National League history to amass more than 200 strikeouts in 7 consecutive seasons. Surely the Mets would take all steps to ensure that such a generational talent, whose nickname was The Franchise after all, would remain with the club for his entire career. Right? Right?

The team rebounded slightly from the disappointing 1974 season, finishing in third place with a record slightly above .500. Sadly, Yogi Berra would be fired midseason; it’s easy to forget but combining his brief cameo as a player along with his time as both a coach and manager he actually wore the orange and blue for more than a decade.

More shedding of the 1969 team took place over the offseason. Both Ken Boswell and Duffy Dyer were traded, but a more significant loss loomed larger. The Mets traded Tug McGraw to Philadelphia. He’s more closely associated with 1973 than he was with 1969, but he was the emotional leader of the club; he popularized the “Ya Gotta Believe!” slogan. To be fair, John Stearns was one of the players acquired in that deal. Stearns was one of the team’s key players for the rest of the decade. He made 4 All-Star games, and he was one of the toughest MFers to ever wear the uniform.

The departure that really hit me hard would come during the season, as the Mets released Cleon Jones in July. Jones was my favorite player as a kid; his game was in rapid decline, so it was a justifiable release, but a 9 year old kid wouldn’t care about that. (There was a lot of ugliness surrounding the end of his Mets tenure which I would rather not get into. Google it if you wish, I’ll simply say that the team unnecessarily humiliated the guy) By the end of the 1975 season there would only be 6 remaining players from the 1969 club.

There were 2 other fairly significant acquisitions. The Mets traded for Joe Torre; he was only 4 years removed from his MVP season, but the club continued its tradition of trading for an aging third baseman at the exact moment of his decline. On the other hand, unlike many of the other trades they had made for a third baseman they didn’t give up anyone particularly significant. Torre would soon start his managerial career at Shea, but his most notable “achievement” as a player in New York came when he set the record for grounding into 4 double plays in the same game. And 1975 was the year in which Dave Kingman came to town. There’s a lot to unwrap with that guy; I’ll save my Kingman thoughts for 1976.

A significant off-field event took place with Ralph Kiner’s election into the Hall of Fame. At the time it was a pretty controversial selection; many were up in arms over the fact that he only played for 10 seasons. Eventually, people came around and especially with more advanced metrics he came to be seen as a worthy choice.

1975 was the second of the two seasons that the Mets shared Shea Stadium with the Yankees while Yankee Stadium was undergoing renovations. 1975 was actually the one time I got to see Henry Aaron play in person; it was while he was DHing with the Brewers. You have to love the exuberance displayed in this photo caption, the Yankees had a similar third place, barely above .500 season that the Mets had. I wonder what the atmosphere would have been like had there actually been a Mets v. Yankees World Series that year with all games taking place at Shea.

Once again, the lackluster Future Stars page hinted how barren the farm system was becoming. The most noteworthy Mets rookie of 1975 didn’t even make it into the yearbook. Mike Vail had a 23 game hitting streak, which tied both the NL rookie record, but Cleon Jones’s team record as well. He was an offseason trade acquisition so it’s somewhat understandable that the yearbook editors overlooked him. He wasn’t part of the organization long enough to have warranted inclusion.

Finally it’s worth noting that the franchise suffered two significant losses in 1975. Before the year ended both Joan Payson and Casey Stengel would pass away. Payson was an ideal example of the concept of fan as owner; who knows how she would have handled running the club in the free agency era, but what we do know is that her successors badly mismanaged the team. There’s a reason why the Mets spent almost a full decade in either 5th or 6th place. And Stengel’s role as vice president was largely ceremonial, but he was always an entertaining presence on Old Timers’ Day. Payson and Stengel would go on to be the initial inductees in the Mets Hall Of Fame in 1981.

SNL Season 6 Recap

As I’ve mentioned multiple times during my run through SNL season 6, Peacock does not stream the full episodes, editing out the musical performances among other elements of each episode. The stream of episode #9 only runs 34 minutes long, roughly half of its actual length. So, unless musical guest Jimmy Cliff sang for a half hour, which is unlikely, a lot of material was edited out this week. As a result, host Sally Kellerman is barely seen. In addition to the monologue, which itself lasted only a couple of minutes, she appears in a grand total of one sketch and even in that case she only shows up at around the halfway point. Or to put it another way; Jim Fowler from Mutual Of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom made a cameo appearance in one sketch, yet he had almost as many lines as Kellerman did in the portion of the show that has been preserved. I have to imagine that she was featured in the majority of the pieces that were cut out.

About her selection as host - by 1981 she was far from a big enough star to warrant a hosting slot. In the monologue she listed some of her classic roles from movies such as M*A*S*H and Brewster McCloud. Yes, at the time these were already a decade old. She would have been a solid choice to host if SNL had existed in 1971; in 1981 not so much.

The show may have finally hit rock bottom with the weekly Rocket Report segment. This week’s show took place a few days after a ticker tape parade was held in honor of the returning Iranian hostages. Charles Rocket tried to interact with the parade honorees, and his attempt to joke with them fell flat. It was painful to watch.

As promised the previous week, Eddie Murphy is now an official cast member. He was still finding his voice, but it was striking to see that even at the age of 19 he already had supreme self confidence and could at least make something out of subpar material. That skill really stands out when he appears on Update. Rocket and Gail Matthius both stumble through bad jokes and awkwardly await audience laughs that do not come. The energy in Update rises dramatically whenever Murphy sits at the desk for his segment.

Rather than choose a best sketch of the night, which does not exist, how about the episode’s low point. This time it involved a premise in which pre-adolescent son Gilbert Gottfried walks in on his parents Joe Piscopo and Ann Risley in the midst of some BDSM play. The bit was as uncomfortable as it sounds.

Next week is episode #10, hosted by Debbie Harry. Color me intrigued for this one. In 1981 Harry was a top level superstar. My only concern is that with her as host the episode could be more music central than normal. There could very well be a LOT of material edited out of this one.

Mookie & Pino

One of the most powerful scenes in movie history is so important because it continues to resonate to this day. It’s the scene from Do the Right Thing in which Mookie confronts Pino over the fact that his favorite actors, athletes, and singers are all black, yet as Mookie points out he’s always n***** this and n***** that. Pino awkwardly attempts to explain how those celebrities whose work he admires are different.

Change the wording of the scene slightly and it just as applicable to the toxic homophobia that has been increasing so exponentially. This isn’t the old days when gay public figures had to remain closeted if they wanted their careers to continue. Entertainers are much more comfortable to share who they are with the public. How can a homophobe reconcile their belief that LGBTQ don’t have a right to exist, let alone live their true selves publicly, yet still be a fan of, say, Neil Patrick Harris?

More Manfred

Which leads me back to our good friend Rob Manfred. He received a boatload of deserved criticism for his comments last week concerning the Oakland A’s pending move to Las Vegas and his snide remarks about Oakland fans. He shouldn’t be let off the hook for what he said in that same press gathering about Pride Nights.

We have told teams, in terms of actual uniforms, hats, bases that we don’t think putting logos on them is a good idea just because of the desire to protect players.

Protect players from what? Protect them from any backlash that may come from making bigoted statements? And why is this the sole issue over which the league feels the need to “protect” players? What if a player decides he doesn’t wish to wear a camouflage uniform on a Military Appreciation Night? Or if he pushes back against any specific theme night which celebrates an ethnic group? I can’t imagine the league would bend over backwards to indulge a player’s feelings in cases such as those. It sends the message that the league condones homophobia, or at the very least appeases those who feel that way.

There are 162 games in a season. If a guy can’t put aside his prejudices for only 1 of those games and wear a cap with a rainbow on it, he deserves pushback. The LGBTQ community is marginalized enough as it is. For the league to essentially tell approximately 8% of the population that it wants their fandom, but not badly enough to make the extra effort to make them feel welcome is a terrible look.

Huggie Bear Redux

It didn’t take long for the “one strike and you’re out” warning given to Bob Huggins at West Virginia to kick in. His tenure with the Mountaineers and his coaching career for that matter have come to an ignominious end, as he submitted his resignation Saturday evening. He is lucky that the end of his career merely came with personal embarrassment and reputational damage.

According to the police report on Friday night he was found on a Pittsburgh street blocking traffic due to a blown tire on his SUV. His breathalyzer test registered at .210. .210! That’s almost 3 times the legal limit. It seems unimaginable that a 69 year old man could consume that much alcohol to produce that high of a blood alcohol level. He is so goddamn lucky that he didn’t injure or kill someone when he got behind the wheel.

It’s a sad ending to his career. As I had mentioned when he had first gotten himself into hot water for repeating using the f** slur on a radio show, over the course of his long career he had managed to successfully change his public perception. He had previously been known as a winning coach, albeit one with an inappropriately explosive temper and some of the worst graduation rates seen from any college program. It’s worth noting that he also had a DUI on his record back when he was coaching at Cincinnati. But due to having lasted so long he almost became a lovable figure. Cue John Huston’s quote from Chinatown about getting respectable if you last long enough. He had become an affectionate curmudgeon, well known for wearing casual quarter-zips on the sideline years before coaches began to dress down. That’s all gone; the first thing people will think of when his name comes up is the way his career ended. That .210 breathalyzer reading suggests he has a serious problem; one can only hope that he addresses the issue before he causes a tragedy.

The End Of The Page

Hey all, if you’ve been enjoying what you have been reading, why not pay it forward and recommend it to a friend or two, or twelve? You’ll be glad you did. Thanks for reading, and see you on Wednesday.