The Mets had transformed from a 94-loss club in 1983 to a 90-win dynamo the following year, thanks in large part to first-year skipper Davey Johnson and two phenomenal rookie campaigns from Dwight Gooden and Darryl Strawberry.
Perhaps the biggest contributor to this early turnaround, however, was first baseman Keith Hernandez, who posted a 6.3 bWAR in his first full year with the team. With a 1979 National League MVP and 1982 World Series champion with the St. Louis Cardinals, the then-29-year old ushered in a new, palpable culture of brash, winning baseball.
Team general manager Frank Cashen understood the advantage of a more adjusted and accomplished clubhouse of players, and for this reason, doubled down the following winter. Cashen sent the Montreal Expos a package that included fan-favorite third baseman Hubie Brooks, catcher Mike Fitzgerald, outfielder Herm Winningham, and pitching prospect Floyd Youmans, and in return received a future Hall of Fame backstop in Gary Carter, whom Expos fans had affectionately dubbed “The Kid” for his relentless hustle and affable engagement with the fans.
What ensued in 1985 was a 98-win season in which they spent 56 games atop the NL East before losing steam and finishing three games behind the Cardinals. On a team that ranked third in the league in homers and total bases, Carter’s 32 and 271 (respectively) led the way, and his .853 OPS, though second-fiddle to Strawberry’s .947, would remain the highest single-season mark for a Met catcher until Todd Hundley surpassed it in 1996 (and then Mike Piazza four more times).
Once reviled from his days with the division rival north of the border, Carter came with five years and a $13.1 million price tag that made him the league’s second-highest-paid player (behind Mike Schmidt). He instantly ingratiated himself with Mets fans on Opening Day, when he swatted a tenth-inning walk-off homer off Cardinals reliever (and former Met prior to the trade for Hernandez) Neil Allen in a 6-5 win. The blast, which won him a standing ovation in his debut and set off a chain of curtain calls for players to come, would be just the first of Carter’s 26 go-ahead hits that year.
The team’s proceeding 7-10 record against the eventual division winners would cost the team a date with the Los Angeles Dodgers, but Carter’s performance in the final month certainly kept things in the balance for New York. From August 29th through the end of the season, he batted .323/.405/.677 with 15 longballs – at one point homering nine times in nine games – before ultimately taking home NL Player of the Month honors in September. Respectively, Carter would rank 16th and 18th in all of baseball in wRC+ (139) and OPS+ (138) en route to his seventh All-Star Game appearance and fourth Silver Slugger title in 11 seasons.
Perhaps Carter’s greatest impression on these mid-1980s Mets, however, was on the other side of the ball. His career 26.1 defensive WAR ranks 15th all-time, only second to Ivan Rodriguez among catchers, and his 1.8 mark in 1985 placed third behind backstops Bob Boone and Tony Pena. Though his 6.9 bWAR ranked miles behind Gooden’s team-leading 13.3 (a present-day, single-season franchise record), his impact as a game caller tend to fly under the radar:
“The previous year, in ’84, Keith Hernandez was like my assistant pitching coach on the field. He knew all the hitters, he knew the hitters’ weaknesses… Gary was great because, when you’re dealing with pitchers… you’re dealing with five different personalities,” Gooden said in a remote interview on Baseball Night in New York. “Some guys, you gotta get in their face, some guys you need to make them think their stuff is better than it is to get it going; Gary was good at that…
“[He] liked to communicate between innings. It didn’t matter if he was hitting or not… He always wanted me to pitch like it was one-nothing. It didn’t matter what the score was… He wanted me to dominate. He wanted ten strikeouts. He wanted complete games. He wanted shutouts. He wanted the best out of me… Having a veteran catcher, an All-Star catcher who had been around the league and [knew] the hitters was a big plus.”
One of Gary’s more emblematic moments as a Met came on the Fourth of July that year, as he caught the entirety of a 19-inning, 29-run, 46-hit, six-hour road affair with the Atlanta Braves. In a 16-13 final, Carter went 5-for-9 and scored the eventual game-winning run on a Ray Knight double.
The 1986 season would go down in history as the franchise’s most dominant and dramatic display of baseball, and Carter, even with a lower OPS (.776), fewer homers (25), and fewer games played (132) remained a staple both behind the plate and in the cleanup spot. He’d lead a 108-win team with 105 RBI (which tied Rusty Staub for the club’s then-single-season record) and ranked third behind Hernandez and Lenny Dykstra with a 3.6 bWAR, and ultimately finished third in MVP voting along with his usual All-Star selection and Silver Slugger award.
A mid-August thumb injury sidelined Carter for two weeks, though he returned in style, slashing .299/.347/.486 in the month of September before leading a charge of clutch hits in the NLCS and World Series.
Through the first four games of the NLCS against the Houston Astros, Carter had managed just one hit in 17 trips to the plate and was particularly overmatched versus team ace (and former Met) Mike Scott, who’d held the Mets to just eight hits in two complete-game victories. With the series tied at two games apiece and one game left before flying back to Houston, the Mets were desperate for anything against the 39-year-old legend (and, regrettably, also former Met) Nolan Ryan.
Tied at one heading into the twelfth and hitless since the seventh, the Mets emerged from the doldrums against Charlie Kerfeld. A one-out single and then a stolen base from Wally Backman before an intentional walk to Hernandez set the stage for Carter. The Kid found a hole, smacking an outside fastball up the middle and chasing in Backman to give the Amazin’s their second walk-off win in three days and prolong their next matchup against Scott.
Somehow, the sixth game of the series managed to be even more exhausting, as a parched Met offense again climbed uphill at the eleventh hour. Going into the top of the ninth down 3-0 with just two hits to show for, the Mets refused to roll over, stringing together hits both big and small, productive outs, and even a couple of walks (one from Carter himself to cap off a seven-pitch battle with closer Dave Smith) to tie things up.
The stalemate raged into the 14th inning, before a leadoff single to right off the bat of Carter set in motion an eventual go-ahead hit by Backman. Of course, Billy Hatcher would take Mets closer Jesse Orosco deep the next half to get even.
Gary would again single in the 15th, this time to no avail, but the Mets would eventually score three the following inning and hold off one final rally from Houston to close out a 6-5 win and punch their ticket to the Fall Classic with the Boston Red Sox.
Every Mets fan knows about the final two games of the World Series: there’s, of course, the series-tying win in which a Mookie Wilson grounder snuck through Bill Buckner‘s legs, as well as the seventh and deciding game, which the Mets won. Not as many, however, know about the role Gary Carter played in bringing the Mets to this stage.
The two-out, tenth-inning rally off Calvin Schiraldi in game six – one that ended in complete pandemonium – began with a bloop base hit from Carter himself. He’d go hitless in the clincher, and Ray Knight, with the game of his life, ran away with World Series MVP honors. Carter’s performance in the series’ third and fourth games, however, render him a very close second in the conversation, at least among hitters.
After dropping the first two games of the series, the Mets headed to Fenway Park in dire straits. Dykstra’s leadoff home run off Oil Can Boyd in the first inning sparked a four-run frame in which Carter doubled in a run of his own, but the Mets went on to post zeroes through the next five innings. Up 4-1 in the top of the seventh with Boyd still on the mound, Carter came up with the bases loaded, two outs, and two strikes. He whacked a base hit into left to score two, and the third game later ended in a 7-1 final.
With the Mets still down a game the following night, Carter launched two home runs in a three-hit, three-RBI performance to tie the series. The first shot came in the fourth inning off Al Nipper to get the Mets out to a 2-0 lead, and the next for good measure in the eighth off Steve Crawford to bring the lead to six.
With this performance, Carter became the first Met to ever hit multiple home runs in a World Series game and would remain the only one until Michael Conforto registered two of his own in the fourth game of the 2015 World Series. Carter collected at least one hit in five of the seven games between the Mets and Red Sox, driving in nine runs and slugging .552 in his first (and last) trip to World Series.
Entering his age-33 season in 1987, Carter’s production at the plate began to fade. His .235 batting average was his lowest in over ten years, and his slugging percentage dropped below .400 as the Mets dropped him to sixth in the order. Nonetheless, he remained a fan favorite and a generally trusted bat in his new role behind Strawberry and newcomer Kevin McReynolds, appearing in a ninth-straight All-Star Game and cracking 20 homers.
The Mets’ path back to the postseason wasn’t nearly as clear, though, as the pitching staff took a step back after a historic 1986 and the team wilted in an early-September series against the Cardinals that proved to be their only ticket to sole possession of the NL East. They squandered a three-run, ninth-inning lead in the opener (highlighted by a home run off the bat of Terry Pendleton), lost in extra innings, and dropped the following game before avoiding a Sunday sweeping. Carter went 1-for-9 in the series with an RBI bunt hit.
1988 saw a return to 100 wins, and the team clinched the division on September 22. Carter’s eight homers, 24 RBI, and .264/.353/.480 line through the first two months of the year suggested a return to form, and he sat just one dinger shy of 300 for his career. At one point in the year, the Mets even appointed him a co-captain alongside Keith Hernandez.
The next two months would be arguably his most frustrating in a Met uniform, however, as Carter went over 200 plate appearances before finally eclipsing 300, coincidentally off Nipper – who now pitched for the Chicago Cubs.
In that time, Gary hit just .243/.290/.292, and even after his milestone, he’d only turn in six more extra-base hits. He’d done enough through the early months to earn another All-Star nomination, but his bWAR for the year sat at a career-low 0.1. His defense cratered, too, as his nine passed balls led the league and his metrics turned negative for the first time.
Fortunately, none of these developments stopped him from pulling his weight in October, as he notched five hits (two for extra bases) in their first four games against Los Angeles. His first breakthrough came in the top of the ninth inning during the first game when he lined a two-out, two-run double to center off Jay Howell to give the Mets a 3-2 lead and complete a comeback off Orel Hershiser to steal the opener.
Carter again struck in game four, now up two games to one at home. The Mets had already answered a two-run Dodger first with back-to-back homers to take a 3-2 lead. Dwight Gooden had since found a groove – likely thanks in some part or another to Carter’s mentorship – and promptly received insurance on a rare RBI triple from Carter in the sixth inning.
In an unfortunate and strange turn of events, however, the light-hitting catcher Mike Scioscia would burn the Mets in the top of the ninth to tie the game at four. Scioscia, who had hit just three home runs during the regular season, took Gooden over the right-field wall to tie a game the Mets would eventually lose in extra innings. The Mets would go on to lose the series in seven games, and Carter, like many of his teammates, couldn’t answer the bell at the plate, going 1-for-his-next-11. Down 6-0 in the seventh inning of the final loss, Carter was lifted in a double-switch for Mackey Sasser.
1989 would be Carter’s last tour with the Mets, and knee problems kept the longtime workhorse on the injured list most of the summer. He’d only play in 50 games, mostly in the shadows of Sasser and Barry Lyons upon his return the final week of July. The Kid had been hitting just .114/.186/.177 prior to his return, but swung back with a .290/.318/.435 line in his final stint with the organization. He doubled against the Phillies in his last home at-bat on September 27th, fielding a thunderous ovation one last time.
Both Carter and Hernandez were released by the ballclub in the winter following the 1989 season, as the team’s 87-75 finish marked a final separation from the characters from 1986 who had come and gone. By the end of the 1990 season, Davey Johnson had been fired, and only Strawberry and Howard Johnson remained on the lineup card.
Gary signed with the San Francisco Giants for 1990, platooning with Terry Kennedy through 91 games and posting a 104 OPS+ before signing with the Dodgers ahead of 1991, where he served as a backup behind Scioscia. The Expos claimed him off waivers in the offseason, and the 38-year old turned in another 95 games before announcing his retirement.
He was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame alongside first baseman (and one-time Met) Eddie Murray in 2003, with the committee choosing an Expos hat for him given his lengthy career in Montreal. Carter has also had his number 8 retired by the Expos, who have since moved to Washington as the Nationals.
The Mets inducted him into their team Hall of Fame in 2001, and while they have yet to retire the number, they have not used it since Desi Relaford that year. Despite ranking sixth among Met catchers with 600 games played, Carter ranks third in home runs (89), fourth in RBI (349), and fourth in OPS (.731).
He remained active with the Mets following his playing days, managing the Mets’ minor league affiliates at the Gulf Coast in 2005 and St. Lucie in 2006, and in prior and later years had voiced an interest in managing the big-league team. While residing in Florida, Carter and his wife Sandy also started a foundation to support lower-income children by offering lunch vouchers and incorporating reading programs into elementary schools.
Gary was diagnosed with malignant brain tumors in the spring of 2011 but continued keeping tabs on the college team he’d been coaching since 2009 at Palm Beach Atlantic University. Carter lost his battle to cancer on February 16th, 2012, at the age of 57. In his honor, the Mets wore black home-plate patches on their uniforms with “Kid 8” inscriptions. The team also unveiled a center field banner on Opening Day to commemorate his life and contributions to the game of baseball.
“I cannot conjure a single image of Gary Carter with anything but a smile on his face. I have no recollection of a gloomy Carter, not even as his knees began to announce a slow surrender… [He] played every day with the joy as if it were the opening day of Little League….” Tom Verducci wrote in a eulogy for Sports Illustrated.
[He] actually took a lot of grief from his teammates for being a straight arrow. It wasn’t the cool thing to do… [but] he was the ballast of that team. They did have a lot of fun, there’s no question about that, but they were also one of the fiercest, most competitive teams I’ve ever seen, and obviously their comebacks from the ’86 postseason defines that team. Carter was a huge part of that.”
In a 1987 book he co-wrote with John Hough Jr. about the 1986 championship team entitled A Dream Season, the Kid wrote, “I’ll always be grateful for the dream season of 1986. In a corner of my mind I will stand forever with my bat cocked, waiting for the two-one pitch from Calvin Schiraldi.”
