THE 1969 MIRACLE METS: THE IMPROBABLE STORY OF THE WORLD’S GREATEST UNDERDOG TEAM (72 page)

When Weis singled, Seaver tried to bunt him
over but his normally good technique failed him. He bunted the
third strike foul and was out. In the fourth, Seaver retired the
side one-two-three, but on the third out, covering first on
Hendrick’s grounder to Clendenon, the Orioles’ catcher spiked him.
Seaver required a little medical care from trainer Gus Mauch but
was okay.

From the fourth to the eighth, Seaver and
Cuellar matched each other. Only Paul Blair reached base, on a walk
in the sixth. After throwing two balls to Frank Robinson, Grote
came to the mound. Seaver felt he got away with a hanging slider
that F. Robby popped to Harrelson. He fell behind Powell, 3-and-0,
but threw strikes to make the count full. With Blair running,
Powell fouled a couple off before flying to center.

Johnson almost got him, blooping one to left
that Jones ran in for, making the catch. With Cuellar on, Seaver
figured this was a typical 1-0 Mets game. He and the staff were
used to them. The strong New York pitching, in a complete reversal
from the Atlanta play-off series, had dominated since the fourth
inning of game one. In 30 innings the Orioles had scored once! They
had been put into a severe slump by Mets arms.

Seaver felt “nervous, apprehensive and
eager” as he took the mound in the ninth. The crowd was on edge. It
was not a game of spectacular hits and catches, like the previous
day. It was a typical Roger Angell-type of pitcher’s duel; the
slow, building tension of a 1-0 contest reaching a crescendo. The
Mets were
so close
. Seaver could taste it, a 1-0 complete
game victory in the World Series. It was almost too good to be
true. He began thinking of his near-perfect game on July 9. On that
date Tom said he felt just as tense entering the ninth. Today even
though he did not have a Don Larsen-style perfect game, the concept
of winning 1-0, with his whole family in the stands, to give his
club a near-insurmountable 3-1 Series lead with Koosman pitching at
home the next day; well, this could be
The Perfect Game
.

But an actual perfect game was “almost a
selfish goal.” He wanted this Series win for his teammates. He also
wanted to prove himself the team leader everybody said he was. The
previous year, Denny McLain was the unquestioned star of the
Detroit Tigers, but it was Mickey Lolich and his three Series
victories who was the hero against St. Louis. Seaver had no trouble
with Koosman being a hero, too, but he certainly wanted to atone
for his game one loss, and for two mediocre post-season
performances prior to this.

Seaver glanced out at right field. He was
surprised to see Swoboda still in there instead of his usual
late-inning defensive replacement, Ron, er,
Rod
Gaspar.
Apparently, Hodges was not going to “bring on Ron Gaspar” or “Rod
Stupid.”

“If Gil made a move, it was going to turn
out right; if Gil didn’t make a move, that was going to turn out
right, too,” Seaver assessed. “If, as some people said, God was a
Mets fan, Gil was His prophet.”

Blair led off. Pitching carefully, Seaver
induced a fly to Swoboda, the first action he saw in right field
all day. Frank Robinson worked a two-two count, then fouled two
outside fast balls. Seaver began to press a little. He was
beginning to tire, but his adrenaline was pumping. Seaver decided
to go with what had gotten him here: high, inside heat, attempting
to overpower the slugger
mano o mano
, the style he made
famous in numerous battles with National League sluggers over the
years: Bench, Clemente, Stargell, McCovey, Aaron, and so many
others. It was good old country hardball, but with nine innings
behind him that extra mile or two per hour he needed to get it past
the cat-quick F. Robby was missing. He roped a single to left.
Seaver immediately second-guessed himself, but was thankful
Robinson missed it by a fraction of an inch. Otherwise the game
would have been tied.

Powell came to the plate. Seaver decided on
breaking stuff and jam pitches. He got what he wanted, a
double-play grounder, but it had eyes: right field, base hit,
Robinson racing to third. First and third, one out, grim tension
gripping Shea.

With Ron Taylor and Tug McGraw warming up,
Hodges came to the mound. In today’s era, Seaver would have been
gone; he probably would not even have started the ninth. Hodges
trusted Seaver when he asked him how he felt. “All right,” he said.
“A little tired but nothing serious.” Maybe he was, just this once,
fudging a little, but Hodges had a hunch and stuck with him. He
almost made his first serious managerial error in this year of
infallibility.

They discussed the base to throw to on a
double-play ball back to the mound. Brooks Robinson was quick, but
not a fast runner. Hard stuff, in. They decided to pitch him. He
had an .067 Series average, but was clutch.

Then it happened. If it was possible that a
better catch than Agee’s two from the previous day could be made;
better than Mays in 1954, maybe the greatest catch in Series
history, or some say in
all of baseball history
, it was
about to happen. If Agee’s catches defined the Series and the
season, this would out-do them.

The crowd chanted
“DE-fense,
DE-dense,”
as if the Jets’ were making a goal-line stand, or
the Knicks were trying to hold off “Earl the Pearl” Monroe with a
minute left protecting a one-point lead.

Seaver jammed Robinson high, but he
tomahawked a nasty, hard-sinking line drive towards right fight
field. Swoboda raced towards it. He had no angle, no real place to
turn his glove or his body to make a catch. He was like a matador
trying to tackle a bull. This hit had all the earmarks of skidding
past him, scoring Powell from first, putting B. Robby on third with
a triple, making the score 2-1 Orioles. The third run would be 90
feet away with two outs. Seaver would trudge into the dugout with
his second loss of the Series. Baltimore would suddenly be very
much alive, full of momentum after tying the Series at two games
apiece, knowing they were going home no matter what. Seaver
suddenly turned into a fan.

“I watched, fascinated by the race between
Ron and the ball,” was how he described it. His “fielding
instincts, everything Rod Dedeaux had drummed into me, weren’t
working.” Not sure what to do, whether the ball would go to the
wall or be trapped, he did not know what base to back up, so went
to none of them.

After delivering the pitch, he threw up his
glove self-protectively when he saw Robinson’s violent contact, in
case he hit a shot back at him. From the mound he watched the ball
start to sink, “and Ron left his feet and dove and jabbed out his
glove back-handed. The ball hit the glove. It stuck.”

Then, “even more remarkable than the catch,
which was pretty remarkable,” Swoboda rolled, displayed the glove
to the umpire who made the out call, and in one motion came up
throwing home to try to nab Frank Robinson, who had the wherewithal
to tag up just in case. Robinson scored to tie the game. Powell –
stunned – held at first. There were two outs.

Even though Baltimore had just tied the
game, Shea went ballistic cheering for Swoboda. People asked
themselves if they had seen what they just thought they saw. In the
dugout, Gaspar just cheered, knowing that he may have been a better
fielder, but never would have made that play. Swoboda, despite his
hard work, was
not
a good outfielder. He had bumbled around,
letting Buford’s fly land for a homer, Jose Canseco-style, in
Baltimore. But Gil – hunch, intuition? – had done it again, to
para-phrase from the Nicene Creed, “by what he had done and what he
left undone.”

Seaver was drained, mentally and physically.
Realistically, he had no business staying in the game. His style,
the opposite of the seeming effortless grace of Jim Palmer, was one
total exertion after another. There was a reason he worked so hard,
ran so many wind sprints. He needed to in order to maintain the
kind of physical condition necessary to sustain his “drop and
drive” motion. In his head, he was disappointed; the shutout lost,
victory now nebulous, momentum taken away.

But momentum was not with Baltimore, either.
They had to be scratching their heads; first Agee, now
this
guy
. What did they have to do to catch a break here? Hendricks
took two balls. Seaver was losing it rapidly, feeding him an easy
one that Hendricks hit for a two-run homer to put Baltimore ahead,
3-1; that is, except for the fact that it barely curved foul.

God is a Mets fan.

Seaver gathered everything he had and
delivered some heat to get Hendricks to fly out. Now the Mets would
need to score in the bottom of the ninth for Seaver to get the win.
The faulty memory of millions of New Yorkers is that they did just
that. However, just as California tied the game
after
Dave
Henderson’s homer for Boston in the 1986 Championship Series, which
they won in extra innings, the Mets did not win game four in the
ninth.

In the bottom of the inning, Jones singled
with one out. Swoboda, who had on 10 occasions driven in the tying
run, mostly down the stretch, stepped to the plate amid thunderous
cheers. He had suddenly, inexplicably, risen to the heights of New
York hero worship, his visage and announcement of his name drawing
cheers previously reserved for Mickey Mantle or Frank Gifford.

“Ron, who looked to me like a small Paul
Bunyan, started creating myths of success about himself instead of
myths of failure,” wrote Seaver, who added that with work he could
be “one of the best hitters in baseball.”

For the third straight time, Swoboda singled
to right field. Frank Robinson, who by now was in half-belief
regarding this entire episode of
The Twi-Light Zone
he was
living in, nonchalanted the ball but scooped it up and threw it, so
Jones stopped at second. Hodges called on Shamsky to pinch-hit for
Ed Charles, but reliever Eddie Watt induced a grounder to
Johnson.

Seaver sat in the dugout, not sure of his
feelings. There was no logical way he should have been allowed to
pitch the 10
^th
. He was bushed. He knew it and half
wanted, expected, to be pulled. But Hodges had his hunches, and
this one said to stay with his ace. Seaver trudged out there,
determined to draw his last reservoirs of strength.

The atmosphere was now a frenzy of pleading,
begging and cajoling the home team to victory, hope against hope.
Seaver never looked at Hodges. He got up, took his jacket off, and
crossed the foul line, “and I was safe.” A whole city was with him,
the hero, Prince Valiant;
don’t lose, don’t be the goat, not
now, not after everything we’ve been through together.

Seaver told himself not to let himself, Gil,
the team or the city down. He had thrown 135 pitches, but this was
the
World Series
, for God’s sake. They were all going to
leave it out on the field, every piece of themselves, against the
109-win Baltimore Orioles. Things started out badly for Tom; a hard
Johnson grounder to third, the difficult chance failed by defensive
replacement Wayne Garrett. Belanger tried to bunt, but Seaver went
with two-seam fast balls, throwing rising heat to induce a pop-up
to Grote. Clay Dalrymple pinch-hit for Watt.

“He was no threat to anybody – except me,”
was Seaver’s assessment of him. The Phillies beat Seaver twice in
1968, chiefly on a homer and another hard hit by Dalrymple. He
singled, and there were runners on first and second. This was the
bottom of the order, but they touched the Mets’ ace. Now the top of
the order came up

Buford flied to Swoboda but Johnson tagged
and went to third. 57,367 sweated it out; it was hold ‘em Tom
Seaver time. Hodges stayed in the dugout. Blair came up. Seaver
knew he was the last man he would face, and put all he had into
getting him out. A hit would score a run and he would be lifted. An
out would mean Seaver would be pinch-hit for. This was it. Seaver
struck him out on two hard fast balls and a good curve. Relief,
ecstasy and hope mixed together.

Jerry Grote faced reliever Dick Hall, who
pitched like a guy with cerebral palsy who had just had a stroke.
He delivered the ball from somewhere in his chest cavity, his face
contorted like one of those astronauts sitting in a g-force machine
at top speed. Grote hit an easy pop to Buford, but God decided to
guide the ball directly into the setting sun. Neither Buford nor
Belanger could get it. The ball fell in for a “double.” Shea was a
wall of sound.

Gaspar went in to run for Grote. Seaver
surmised that somehow Gil knew he would need Gaspar to pinch-run
for Grote, which was why he did not use him to replace Swoboda,
which was why Swoboda made the great catch, which was why the
faster runner was now on second, which was . . .

Billy Hunter, managing in Weaver’s place,
ordered Al “Babe” Weis intentionally walked. Weis batted .215 with
23 runs batted in that year! That was an improvement over his .155
numbers from 1966, at least. J.C. Martin pinch-hit for Seaver.
Kranepool was a better bunter than Martin, if that was the plan,
but Hodges went with Martin. More mystery.

Southpaw Pete Richert, a two-time All-Star
with the lowest ERA on the Baltimore staff, replaced Hall. Hodges
stayed with Martin instead of right-hander Duffy Dyer against the
lefty. On the first pitch, Martin laid down a perfect bunt about 10
feet in front of home plate. Richert picked it up and fired to
first base. Martin was running
about a foot inside the fair side
of the base line!
The ball struck him on the wrist, and rolled
down the outfield foul line beyond anybody’s reach. Martin should
have been called out for interference, as replays showed, but the
umpires missed it. Gaspar was waved around third and headed home
with the winning run.

Seaver: “I couldn’t see his face. I could
only see his legs. I saw them pounding up and down, kicking up
dirt, and then, as Rod Gaspar’s front foot stretched out and
touched home plate, in the fraction of a second before I leaped out
of the dugout to welcome him, my whole baseball life flashed in
front of me, the perfect game I’d pitched when I was 12 years old,
the grand slam home run I’d hit for the Alaska Goldpanners, the
first game I’d won as a member of the New York Mets, the imperfect
game I’d pitched against the Chicago Cubs, one after another, ever
minor miracle building toward that one magic day.