Remembering Mets History: (1976) Seaver Opens Up the Bi-Centennial Year With A Win

-
April 9th 1976: In 1976 the National League was celebrating it's Centennial season & America was all wrapped up in the excitement of it's bicentennial.

At the end of March 1976, the New York Mets & Los Angeles Dodgers had worked out a potential deal that would have sent Mets star pitcher & franchise player, Tom Seaver to Los Angeles in exchange for their star pitcher, Don Sutton.

When the word leaked out, there was public outrage in New York & the deal was immediately squashed. The Mets soon agreed to give Seaver a three year deal worth $225,000 annually.

By 1976 the popular Rusty Staub & manager Yogi Berra were both gone. Staub had been traded to the Detroit  Tigers in one of the worst deals the club ever made. 

The Mets received veteran Tigers' pitcher Mickey Lolich, Once a great pitcher, the 35 tear old's best days were way behind him. Outfielder Billy Baldwin also came along in the deal, but he never quite made it at the big league level. 

The new Mets manager, was former AAA Tidewater skipper; Joe Frazier. Frazier had led the Tides to the International League Championship in 1975.

On Opening Day 1976, a crowd of 17,013 fans came to Shea Stadium, to see their Mets host Karl Kuehl's, Montreal Expos. Montreal Expo ace pitcher, Steve Rogers went up against Tom Seaver.

Starting Lineups



In the 1st inning, Tom Seaver started the year out by striking out Pepe Mangual & Larry Bitner,
both looking. He allowed a double to former Met, Mike Jorgensen, but then struck out Larry Parrish. 

In the 2nd inning, the Mets Del Unser tripled & scored on catcher Jerry Grote's single giving the Mets the early 1-0 lead.

In the Expo's 3rd, Pepe Mangual
doubled. Then former Met, Mike Jorgensen collected his second hit in as many at bats against Seaver, to drive in Mangual to tie it 1-1.

In the home 4th inning, Del Unser reached on a throwing error by third baseman, Larry Parrish. Unser then stole second. Jerry Grote then walked to put two on for Bud Harrelson. He came through with a double to left field brining in both Unser & Grote, as the Mets went on to a 3-1 lead.

Seaver would leave after seven innings of work, he struck out eight, allowing the one run on  five hits. 

Skip Lockwood came on in relief, serving up three straight singled, including an RBI hit from Parrish. It was now a 3-2 game. 

But Lockwood would shut the door in the 9th inning, striking out former Met Tim Foli, then getting Jose Morales to fly out. He ended the game striking out Pepe Mangual looking. 

Trivia: Lockwood collected the first of his 19 saves on the season. His 19 saves were second to the Reds, Rawly Eastwick (26) in saves for 1976.

Tom Seaver earned the win & would go 14-11 on the year He would strike out a league leading 235 strike outs & record 200 plus or more Ks for a record, ninth straight season. 

In 1976 he would come in third in the league in ERA (2.59) innings (271) & shut outs (5).
Sadly, it was his last full season in New York until 1983.
The Mets would finish in third place in 1976 going 86-76. It would be their last winning season for the next seven years.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Remembering Bobby Ojeda's Tragic Boating Accident (1993)

-
Image
Steve Olin, Tim Crews & Bob Ojeda March 22 nd 1993: was an off day from Spring Training, for three Cleveland Indians pitchers; Former Mets 1986 World Champion pitcher; Bobby Ojeda, Tim Crews & Steve Olin. The three friends, took out an 18-foot open-air bass boat & went out fishing & gator hunting in the darkness of the evening on Lake Nellie in Clermont, Florida. Tragedy struck, when the boat rammed into a private dock that jutted out some 250 feet into the still waters. Two other Cleveland Indians personnel had arrived to meet the fishing party just as the horror took place. They heard Bob Ojeda saying they needed help. The two men jumped into the water and called out for someone to call 911. 27 year old pitcher; Steve Olin was killed instantly. 31 year old pitcher; Tim Crews was alive but was struggling to breathe suffering from massive head wounds. Bobby Ojeda was in & out of shock, he was suffering from head lace...
Read more

The History of Yogi Berra & the Yoo-Hoo Chocolate Drink

-
Image
Yogi Berra & Yoo-Hoo's  history go back to the 1950's. Yogi had met the Oliveri Family, the owners of the Yoo-Hoo company at a Country Club function near his home in New Jersey. Natale Olivieri started bottling the chocolate drink in 1928 in Garfield, w Jersey. By the late 1950's he Yoo-Hoo product wasn't selling all that well. Mr. Olivieri asked for Yogi's opinion at the new Jersey function. Berra said he actually liked the soft drink & started promoting it along with his teammates. Soon Yogi put Yoo-Hoo on the map, appearing in commercials, advertisements and supermarkets promotions.  Berra would show up at the factory in Carlstadt, New Jersey & became a hero to the factory workers. He soon became a Vice President of the company owning a large amount of Yoo-Hoo stock. In his auto biography Yogi wrote "One time I was in the office and the phone rang, I always answer a ringing phone, the woman on the other end asked if Yoo-Hoo was hyphenate...
Read more

Remembering Vixen Founder / Guitarist; Jan Kuehnemund (1961-2013)

-
Image
centerfieldmaz was shocked to learn of the sudden passing of Jan Kuehnemund, the founding member of the all female metal band Vixen. Jan was a fantastic guitarist, song writer & women pioneer in Heavy Metal. I am a huge fan of hard rock all girl bands & Vixen were one my long time favorites. Janice Lynn Kuehnemund was born November 18th, 1961 in St. Paul Minnesota. The female guitarist formed one of the first all female Metal bands in Minnesota with singer Janet Gardner while in high school in 1980. By 1985 they moved the band to Los Angles California, to be part of the Heavy Metal scene. In 1987 the classic Vixen line up of Jan Kuehnemund (lead guitar) Janet Gardner (vocals/ guitar) Share Pederson (bass) & Roxy Petrucci (drums) formed & released their debut album the following year. Vixen 1988 In a world of all male Heavy Metal bands during its heyday, Vixen were groundbreaking in being an all female metal band. The Runaways, with Joan Jett & Lita Ford...
Read more

Remembering Mets History (1979) SNL's Chico Escuela Visits Mets Spring Training & Attempts a Career Comeback

-
Image
Bill Murray interviews (Garrett Morris) Chico Escuela In March 1979, original Saturday Night Live cast member; Garrett Morris joined the Mets at Miller Huggins Field for Spring Training. At the time the Mets were still holding Spring Training in St. Petersburg Florida.  Garrett Morris was posing as  the fictional Mets player, Chico Escuela who wore uniform #5 (cinque).  Escuela was doing his famous spoof of the Latin players of the time, posing as a popular infielder from the Dominican Republic that didn't speak much English. His legendary catch phrase was "baseball been berry- berry good to me". "baseball been berry-berry good... to me" The Chico Escuela character appeared nine times during on SNL's fourth & fifth seasons. He debuted on December 9th, 1978, in a Knight of Columbus sketch as a guest speaker. He then became the Weekend Update Sports reporter, where after being introduced by Jane Curtain, he would reply "tank you Hane". Chico woul...
Read more

Remembering Batgirl: Yvonne Craig (1937-2015)

-
Image
centerfieldmaz interrupts baseball with a sad note on one of his favorite actresses. Being a huge Batman (TV series) fan Yvonne Craig has been someone I adored since I was a child.  As a boy I always hoped the Batgirl cycle would wiz by on the opening credits, meaning it would be a Batgirl episode. I didn't realize why until I got older & liked girls. For myself & millions of young boys of the 60's / 70's Batgirl was one of our first crushes. But her character also she added so much more than that to the final season of Batman. She was special in so many ways ... rest in peace Batgirl! Yvonne Joyce Craig was born May 16th 1937 in Taylorville, Illinois. As a young girl she was a talented ballet dancer, getting accepted to the prestigious Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo. She eventually moved to Los Angeles & began an acting career. She landed a part in Gidget (1959) as one of Gidget's beach...
Read more