15
2012
A Date Which Will Live In (Mets) Infamy: June 15, 1977
An article by Tie Dyed
There are certain dates in our nation’s history when Americans remember exactly where they were and what they were doing. One day that stands out for Mets fans is June 15, 1977. That is a day in our history which will live in infamy.
Tom Seaver, the face of the franchise, the heart and soul of the franchise, The Franchise, was traded away–no, was discarded–by the team he loved.
No player in the history of the Mets had single-handedly left such a void upon his departure. When Tom Terrific was traded, the short term effect was felt immediately. The long lasting effects would continue nearly a decade. For the 8 year period from 1969-1976, the Mets averaged 84 wins per year. In the 6 years that followed (leaving out the strike shortened season of 81), the Mets averaged just 65 wins. From 69-76, the Mets finished 1st twice, 3rd five times and 5th only once. After the trade, we finished last 5 times and 5th once. The average attendance at Shea from 69-76 was 25,002. The average attendance at what came to be known as Grant’s Tomb dropped to 13,401. Or to put it another way, there were roughly 42,000 empty seats every game at Shea. (the current seating capacity of Citi Field).
There is no need to go over Seaver’s stats. We all know of his 3 Cy Young Awards, his Rookie of the Year award, his 9 All-Star Games while wearing the blue and orange, his 9 straight years of recording 200 K’s or more. And so on…There have been close to 900 players who’ve donned the Mets uniform and only one has been deemed worthy of having his number retired.
Seaver meant more to the Mets than just wins and strikeouts. Prior to his arrival, the Mets were a laughing stock, the proverbial doormat for the National League. With the arrival of #41, the Mets gained credibility. At least every 5th day, we had a pretty good chance to win. He was the Mets first superstar. Long before David Wright was ‘the face of the Mets,’ that honor belonged to ‘Tom Terrific.’ After opposing Seaver in the 73 World Series, Reggie Jackson said, “Blind people come to the park just to listen to him pitch.” He was not just the best Mets pitcher. He was arguably the top pitcher in baseball in the latter half of the 20th century.
Whenever Seaver strolled to the mound, the game took on a different feel. You just knew you were witnessing greatness. You were experiencing something unique, something you could tell your grandchildren about.
In addition to the impressive stats, Seaver was a class act. An all-around good guy. As impressive as he was on the mound, he displayed elegance and distinction off the mound. Teammate Cleon Jones said of Seaver, “Tom does everything well. He’s the kind of man you want your kids to grow up to be like. He’s a studious player, a loyal cat, trustworthy.”
On June 15, 1977, Mets fans were devastated when Tom was traded to the Cincinnati Reds. Heartbroken. Grown men cried. It was the loss of innocence for many and served as a stark reminder that when all was said and done, Baseball was a business. Not a game. There was no ESPN at the time. There was no 24 hour news. America had to learn what was going on in the world in a 30 minute nightly newscast by Walter Cronkite or David Brinkley. But yet, the news of Seaver being traded was worthy of news coverage on the three national networks. It came to be known as ‘The Midnight Massacre.’
Baseball was very different in 1977. A controversial new concept called “Free Agency” was in its infancy. The Mets original owner, Joan Payson, had recently died and the club fell under the control of GM M. Donald Grant. A businessman and strict disciplinarian, Grant was more concerned with Wall Street than Baseball. Slowly, the core of the Mets, players like Cleon Jones, Tug McGraw and Rusty Staub, were being sent away. It was on this day in June when the foundation crumbled and the unimaginable happened.
Seaver was perturbed by management’s reluctance to enter the free agent market and their lack of willingness to improve the team. He also wanted to renegotiate his own contract. Although he was the top pitcher in the game, he was paid less than many of his colleagues with less talent. Some favored his request but others, old school Baseball people, scoffed at the way a player would have the nerve to ask for a higher salary. Grant refused to budge, accusing Seaver of ‘being motivated by money.’ Seaver refused to budge. The clock was ticking.
Dick Young was a well known and extremely controversial sportswriter for The Daily News. During the 1961 season, it was Young who first proposed the idea of an asterisk next to Roger Maris’ name. In the summer of 77, on almost a daily basis, Young lambasted Seaver in the press.
On June 14th, however, Grant and Seaver reached an agreement. Tom Terrific would remain a Met. However, Young wrote a scathing column the following day. He compared Seaver to the hated Walter O’Malley, the man responsible for moving the Dodgers from Brooklyn to Los Angeles. Young wrote, “Tom Seaver is like Walter O’Malley. Both are very deceptive in what they say. Both are very greedy.”
Later in the same column, Young fabricated a story. He concocted a feud between Tom Seaver and friend and former teammate, Nolan Ryan. Young also claimed that Seaver’s wife, Nancy, had gotten in an argument with Ruth Ryan, Nolan’s wife, about the fact that Nolan was earning more. This was totally unsubstantiated and false. Upon reading the article, Seaver contacted the Mets, told them the deal was off and demanded on being traded. Later that day, Seaver was sent to the Reds. In 2007, Seaver said, “That Young column was the straw that broke the back. Bringing family into it is not right. I had to go.”
Shea was aptly nicknamed Grant’s Tomb after Seaver was sent away. The same evening The Franchise was sent to Cincinnati, the Mets also traded their only legitimate Home Run threat, Dave Kingman. Later that year, Grant also got rid of Buddy Harrelson and Seaver’s batterymate, Jerry Grote. The following year saw Jerry Koosman leave for Minnesota.
But it was Seaver’s dismissal that sent the Mets into the abyss of the National League basement. Before Seaver arrived, the Mets were the doormat for the NL. After he left, they once again were reduced to that same position. The Mets would occupy last place for 5 of the next 6 years and watch as the torch of New York Baseball was passed to The Bronx. In the 6 years that followed, as the Mets played to an empty stadium every night, the Yankees went on win 3 World Championships and 5 pennants. While Seaver pitched elsewhere, he recorded his 300th win and 3000th strikeout. After all those years with the Mets in which he pitched 5 1-hitters and had 3 no-hitters broken up in the 9th, Seaver recorded the one and only no hitter of his career. It came against the Cardinals, exactly one year and one day after he was traded. Reds skipper Sparky Anderson once said of Seaver, “My idea of managing is giving the ball to Seaver and sitting down and watching him pitch.”
The Midnight Massacre was a turning point in Mets history. One that will never be forgotten by Mets fans.
About the Author: Rob Silverman
It was 1973 when my dad introduced this 7 year old kid to Baseball and the Mets. It's been a love and passion that has lasted for 40 years, much longer than my first marriage. Since I was little, there've been 2 things I've always dreamed of: 1) Being a successful author and 2) playing right field for the Mets after Rusty Staub retired. Although 4 decades have passed and based on the current condition of the Mets, I have not given up on either dream
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Just a great article, which captures the essence and depth of the Midnight Massacre. From that era, I recall the Mets had a mascot – “Mettle” the mule – that they kept in the bullpen. The fans nicknamed him “M. Donald Mule”. I think he ate the rest of Joe Pignatano’s tomatoes.
Yeah, I was a junior in high school when Seaver got traded, and promptly turned my attention away from the team I was born to love until 1981 when Hubie and Mookie came on the scene, when Nelson Doubleday emerged as the principal owner and when Frank Cashen took the reigns of our beloved franchise.
Rob, great piece, i am not going to pretend i knew everything that was going on, but my father (who is a dodgers fan) told this might’ve been the biggest mistake in franchise history, and till this day it is… the worst part of it was who he was traded for was what bother everyone, i don’t even think the players he was traded for felt warm in NY.
Doug Flyn was nothing special, a good glove and had a solid defense, never was the type of hitter you knew was gonna hit 300 or 20 hr’s in a season
Steve Henderson was the guy i liked the most, i really thought after his rookie season we had a position player who were gonna be a stud, after hitting almost 300 with 12 HR and 65 RBI during his rookie season i had really high expectation, and to be honest, I liked this guy as my new Fav met Lol… To be fair, he later was traded for kingman.. Feel Better?
Dan Norman… POS
Pat Zachry, the 1976 ROY had a lot of promising.. He struggle in his second year with the reds, but after being traded to us, i don’t think he was a bad pitcher, he was hurt and that is why he just became irrelevant…
Great piece though
I was a senior in HS when this trade went down. I openly rooted for the Reds whenever Seaver pitched. I was at Shea when Seaver returned. Ed Kranepool broke up a shutout with a 2 run shot in the ninth.
My most vivid memory of that era (78ish) was going out to Shea on a whim with my brother to see the Mets play the Giants. We arrived just as the 2nd inning ended – parked almost right in front of the big Shea Stadium sign (empty parking lot and even emptier ballpark). AND snuck down to seats right behind the Mets dugout. Nobody cared.
I openly rooted for the Reds whenever Seaver pitched”
so wait, you rooted for another team just because you like the player?? Hmmmm…. I will wait to see if you get the same comments i get when i say i root for Hansley and Jose Reyes…
So Alex are you comparing Jose Reyes, et. al. to the greatest player in Mets history? One of the greatest pitchers in baseball history?
Damn straight I rooted for Seaver! I followed him when he was with the Reds, Back to the Mets, and then with the White Sox and Red Sox!
Do I miss Carlos Beltran and Reyes? Yes, but they are a mere blip on the radar as compared to Tom Seaver and what Seaver meant to the Mets AND NEW YORK CITY!!!
If you want to take it a step further – look at Eddie G when he returned to face the Rangers; Walt Frazier when he came back to the Garden to face the Knicks; Patrick Ewing. These were guys who transcended their sports and became NYC Icons. Tom Seaver will always be my favorite Met.
Still remember reading the Star Ledger’s sports headline reporting the Seaver trade. Living in NJ that was the paper we had delivered at the time. Dad just handed it to me, I read it and said something like ‘What? Why?’.
‘It was the loss of innocence for many and served as a stark reminder that when all was said and done, Baseball was a business. Not a game.’
Well said. That’s exactly when I came to this realization. Watching as a kid back then you didn’t really get – or more to the point pay attention – to the business aspect of baseball. It was a game and you rooted for the team you loved. Having just graduated High School when that trade went down, it was the first of many lessons on the road to reality as an adult.
Should have never happened. Grant just never got the he wasn’t going to stop the free agency train. The business of baseball had changed but Grant refused to change with it.
I was ten years old. I cried, no lie.
I took all my Tom Seaver baseball cards the next morning and me and my father went to a hobby shop to buy a baseball card binder and a set of baseball card sheets and protectors. Before the Tom Seaver trade I didn’t collect baseball cards, they were just for flipping and using the scrubs cards to rev up your bike and putting them in your spokes. That binder became a lasting memorial to No. 41 and I added to it and tried to buy and trade for all the Tom Seaver Mets cards that I could. That was the day I lost my innocence. It felt like someone close to me died and it took a while to get over it. Grant became enemy number one. I didn’t even know or cared who the GM was for the Mets until that day.
A great posting T.D…..and so many great comments.
While so many fans have been angry at the Wilpon’s and very critical, I have not been one of them. I think they always were willing to give us a winner. The results were not good but they spent lots of money looking to better the team over the years. The one thing that has bothered me is that they did not have a big bronze statue in front of the new ballpark to honor # 41 who certainly changed the face of the franchise when he first took the mound in 1967 for us.
But without a doubt, I will never forgive M Donald Grant for that day in 1977. He and his crony Dick Young should both be reincarnated….only to die a slow agonizing death.
My favorite Seaver memory other than his “imperfect game” and the strikeout game against the Padres is remembering my father’s favorite words spoken whenever the Mets would get an early run or two in a game. Dad would always say, there’s your support Tom….make it stick!
Well done! And, yes I remember it well. I remember Seaver on the news with tears in his eyes. That one trade launched the Mets into a darl era that didn’t end until Wilpon and Doubleday took over. Shea was a ghost town during the late 1970′s. It truly was a sad time to be a Met fan.
Let’s hope all these years later Mr. Wilpon remembers that when it comes time to re-signing Mr. Wright. If David goes we’ll be re-entering the dark ages again.
“Dick Young was a well known and extremely controversial sportswriter for The Daily News”
What many may not realize is Dick Young was also hired by the Mets each year to write the scripts for thier YEARBOOKS which you can see since SNY replays them all the time.
A fan since 69 having just returned from exile to a foreign island, Puerto Rico, I has a sports team that I could listen too, not too many games on tv back the plus had only one b/w so had to share but listened to as many radio games as possible running home from school to listen to my beloved Mets.
When Seaver was traded I was in a state of paralysis for almost 6 years until the intro of Keith, Doc, and Straw AND a GM that knew what he had to do to build a winner, you listening SA?
Anyway it is hard to read this post as many of the details I have read over the years and the part that D. Young played has never been given it’s due in the Hall of Shame in Shea!