Remembering Tom Seaver, Two Years After His Death
In this issue, we look at the remarkable baseball life of Hall of Fame pitcher Tom Seaver on the two-year anniversary of when he passed away.
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Pregame Pepper
Did you know…
. . . Tom Seaver is not only the greatest player in Mets history, but he is undoubtedly one of the greatest pitchers in MLB history. Here are a few stats that jump off the page when examining Seaver’s career numbers, particularly his strikeout numbers.
Seaver has the sixth-most strikeouts of any pitcher in Major League history, with 3,640 K’s over 20 seasons.
He led the National League in strikeouts five times in his career, which only 13 other pitchers have ever done for either the American or National League.
Seaver racked up 10 200-plus strikeout seasons in the National League, more than any other pitcher in NL history.
Only two pitchers in MLB history won 300-plus games, struck out 3,000-plus batters, and had a sub-3.00 career ERA: Tom Seaver and Walter Johnson.
Leading Off
Now and Forever, The Franchise: Remembering Tom Seaver
By Bill Pruden
In a year in which the New York Mets give every indication of wanting to make history, they have also embraced their own history in unprecedented fashion. The Baseball Hall of Fame nudged that effort along when it finally inducted Gil Hodges, who led the team to its improbable 1969 World Series win. The Mets followed up by retiring the number of arguably their finest and most important position player, Keith Hernandez. Too, they scheduled an August Old-Timers game, inviting back dozens of former Mets to celebrate the team’s distinctive, if sometimes star-crossed history.
In the midst of all this, as the season moves into its final stretch, it seems only fitting to pay tribute to “The Franchise,” Tom Seaver, the finest player to ever wear a Mets uniform, and a man whose death two years ago today was one of too many that have befallen Hall of Fame members in the 2020s.
Fittingly, given how new owner Steve Cohen has embraced Mets history, this season began with the unveiling of a larger-than-life-sized statue of Seaver. The statue, actually commissioned by former owner Fred Wilpon, was long overdue. But coming on April 15, before the Mets' 10-3 victory improved their record to 6-2, it was a fitting tribute to the right-hander who carried the team on his back in 1969 and was the symbol of both the good and the bad -- his trade and then the later failure to re-sign him -- that has been Mets baseball since the team first started playing in the Polo Grounds in 1962.
Seaver’s road to the Mets was an interesting and convoluted one that at one point pitted the NCAA against Major League Baseball. In the spring of 1966, with threats of lawsuits looming, Commissioner William Eckert voided a contract Seaver had signed with the Atlanta Braves, and instead held a lottery among the Mets, the Philadelphia Phillies, and the Cleveland Indians, all of whom had all expressed their willingness to match the voided contract. Out of this chaos, and by the grace of the baseball gods, Seaver became a Met.
After spending the 1966 season with the Mets’ Triple-A farm team, the Jacksonville Suns, the strong right-hander earned a spot on the 1967 Mets roster. He not only made the All-Star team, but pitched a scoreless 15th inning in the National League’s victory. While the Mets finished in last place, Seaver compiled a 16-13 record with 18 complete games, 170 strikeouts, and a 2.76 ERA. The performance earned him the 1967 NL Rookie of the Year Award.
The following year, the Mets were little better, finishing in ninth place. Seaver, who started for the team on Opening Day, again won 16. In addition, he struck out more than 200 batters for the first of nine consecutive seasons. But for all he accomplished in 1967 and 1968, it was in 1969 that the legend of Seaver, “Tom Terrific,” was established.
The young ace of the staff became the ace of the pitching-rich National League. He won a league-leading 25 games, finished the year with eight straight complete games including three shutouts, and earned his first NL Cy Young Award. He was the runner-up to Willie McCovey of the San Francisco Giants in the voting for the Most Valuable Player Award.
But while that may have been the writers’ view, to the denizens of New York, especially Queens, in 1969, Seaver was the city’s eternal MVP, as he led the Mets on a miracle rise from the depths of the NL standings. First to the top of the Eastern Division in MLB’s newly constructed divisional alignment, then to a victory over the Braves in the inaugural League Championship Series, and finally to a World Series victory in five games over the heavily favored Baltimore Orioles, one of the most monumental upsets in baseball history.
Seaver’s 10-inning complete game, a 2–1 win in Game 4, sealed the victory that put the team on the cusp of immortality and embodied all that he had meant to the team and its achievement. Indeed, in winning the World Series, the Mets became the first expansion team to win a division title, a pennant, and the World Series, and they did it in their eighth year of existence, a time frame that was then the record.
Meanwhile, Seaver was awarded the Hickok Belt as the top professional athlete of the year, while Sports Illustrated named him its "Sportsman of the Year."
That year was the peak of Seaver’s years with the Mets. While he led them to another National League pennant in 1973, things soon soured. In 1977, in the midst of contentious contract negotiations with Mets Chairman M. Donald Grant, a story by longtime Seaver antagonist and New York Daily News columnist Dick Young blaming Seaver’s wife Nancy for the pitcher’s "greedy" demands blew up negotiations. It led to Seaver being traded to the Cincinnati Reds on June 15 as part of the "the Midnight Massacre." It was the end of an era -- but the love for Seaver never died.
Indeed, Seaver would have another act, pitching for almost another decade. First for the Reds, then briefly for the Mets again before heading to the American League where he did stints with the Chicago White Sox and the Boston Red Sox, before finally retiring in the aftermath of an injury plagued 1986 season. His final numbers were historic. He finished with a career record of 311-205 and a 2.86 ERA and was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1992 in his first year of eligibility, named on a then-record 98.8 percent of the ballots.
And yet for all of that, he was forever a Met. Certainly, his best years were with the Mets where he compiled a record of 198-124 with a 2.57 ERA and 171 complete games -- 44 of them shutouts. And all three of his Cy Young Awards came while in New York.
Even with all those accolades and awards -- and his was one of the most decorated careers in baseball -- there was more to Seaver than all of that. He was by any measure a great pitcher -- but there have been many great pitchers in the game's history. But Seaver was something more. There was an aura about the big right-hander.
Identified back in 1966 by Dodgers scout Tommy Lasorda as a prospect with “plenty of desire to pitch and wants to beat you," Seaver infused a young franchise with that feeling, leading them to the previously unimagined promised land. What he meant to the Mets transcended numbers and awards. Indeed, over the history of the game, few have cast a greater shadow over a team's very existence than Seaver.
As Cohen said at the unveiling of the statue, “When I was in high school and college, getting to watch Tom Seaver pitch was one of the greatest thrills you could have at a Mets game.” Indeed, like many of the Mets fans who regretted that Seaver’s career in New York had featured five near misses but never the no-hitter he finally achieved only after the infamous trade to the Reds, Cohen added, “To this day, I still want Qualls to ground out instead of lofting one to left-center to ruin Seaver’s perfect game. The fans gave him a standing ovation. He deserved it and still deserves it. The game was imperfect, but the man was the perfect Met, Tom Terrific.” As Cohen concluded, "Tom Seaver transformed the Mets, transfixed New York and won the hearts of Mets fans."
Seaver was “The Franchise.” Few nicknames have ever been so fitting.
Bill Pruden is a high school history and government teacher who has been a baseball fan for six decades. He has been writing about baseball--primarily through SABR sponsored platforms, but also in some historical works--for about a decade. His email address is: courtwatchernc@aol.com.