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Gammons on the '86 Team

Elster88 Oct 14 2005 10:57 AM

I'm still looking for the article. He only very briefly mentioned the '86 Mets when saying how a couple of the dominant teams in the 1980's did not have traditionally high powered offenses. This smelled fishy to me, and Simmons confirmed that it wasn't true: ]The Mets led the league in runs scored, scoring 15% more runs than the league average and 44 more runs than the next closest team. They led the league in batting, slugging and OBP (the latter by 13 points). They led the league in walks. They were 3d in the league in home runs and 4th in doubles. And they did this while playing in Shea Stadium, one of the league's best pitcher's parks (they scored 4.68 runs/game at home, 4.99 on the road). Their team OPS+ was 116, compared to 111 for the 1999 Indians and 114 for the 2004 Red Sox. It was 116 again in 1987. It was 117 in 1988. On the days when Howard Johnson or Kevin Mitchell played shortstop, the 1986 team could field a whole lineup (except pitchers) where the lowest OPS+ was 114, that being Wally Backman with a .320 average and a .376 OBP. The Mets, within the context they played in, beat the crap out of people."" Not sure what Gammons meant. Maybe they didn't have an unusually high number of homers as per 1990+ standards? Carter and Straw had what, 60 between them?

Edgy DC Oct 14 2005 11:14 AM

Ah, perception vs. reality. The Mets had a stealth offense that wasn't fully appreciated because They had an All-Star-quality pitcher going Every. Damn. Night. A lot of their offense came from well above-average-at-their-position sources, but at no postion were they clearly the best, except maybe catcher. (This distinguishes them from the All-Star-at-each-postiion Indians of the late 1990s, where some of those All-Stars were over-rated enigmae like Sandy Alomar.) Third base came from a strong year (net, anyhow, with long streaks of goodness and badness) from Ray Knight. But who went around saying, "We got Knight at third! Woo-hoo!"? Leftfield was productive, but it was jerry-rigged. A great May from George Foster was followed by an ugly summer and a release, only to be replaced by Kevin Mitchell and Mookie Wilson. Centerfield was very productive. To a lesser, extent --- but still signficant relative to the postition --- so was second. But teams and fans never feel fully set at a postiion with a platoon. The Mets offense had a way of lying dormant for six or seven innings and then exploding. One may go home feeling, "Well, that was looking feeble, but we got the big hit when we needed it." We may not have appreciated that those late explosions were happening every night and were adding up. Darryl Strawberry could have some great years and stil make peeps feel they're not getting something Carter and Hernandez weren't quite what they were in their best pre-Met seasons.

ScarletKnight41 Oct 14 2005 11:33 AM

]The Mets offense had a way of lying dormant for six or seven innings and then exploding. One may go home feeling, "Well, that was looking feeble, but we got the big hit when we needed it." We may not have appreciated that those late explosions were happening every night and were adding up. D-Dad and I definitely appreciated the '86 team's propensity for coming from behind. We'd call that the Type B type of win (as opposed to the Type A, where they just took an early lead).