Mets pitching on Wednesday was not a strong suit, an observation easily borne out by the 8-3 pounding the Minnesota Twins pasted on the staff as an up-and-down homestand concluded with a harsh thud, hardly providing an auspicious prelude to the pending Road Trip From Hell. Luis Severino (3 IP, 6 H, 2 BB, 6 ER) was the epitome of Did Not Have It. Tylor Megill (2 IP, 3 H, 1 BB, 1 ER) inspired thoughts of Do Not Want It. And Tyler Zuber, one of David Stearns’s several sensible rather than splashy trade-deadline acquirees, was immediately optioned to Syracuse, serving to delay a roster revision that’s been more than 62 years in the making.
On the very first lineup card Casey Stengel ever handed an umpire in what Warren Spahn might have cited as his post-genius phase — prior to the Mets-Cardinals game of April 11, 1962 — Don Zimmer was listed as batting seventh. But when you saw he was being joined by fellers named Ashburn, Bell, Craig, Hodges, Landrith, Mantilla, Neal, and Thomas on this Original Amazin’ journey, you knew who was coming in ninth among nine once everybody was aligned from A to Z.
Ol’ Case proceeded to make five substitutions in the club’s inaugural contest, pinch-hitting Ed Bouchee and Jim Marshall and pitching Bob Moorhead, Herb Moford and Clem Labine. After just one game (and loss), there’d already been fourteen Mets. Zimmer, thus, ranked fourteenth and therefore last in his distinct category. Just like the Mets in the 1962 National League standings.
Ze champion.
Thirty-one Mets played before April 30, consigning Zimmer to 31st place. An early-May trade sent the man to Cincinnati — “the Mets lost a record 120 games in 192 although, thankfully, they can only blame about 10 of ’em on me,” he calculated in his autobiography — but his stranglehold on the bottom rung of the Met alphabet remained undisturbed. Challengers to his shall we say crown intermittently appeared, then fell away, inadequate to the task of supplanting the quintessential baseball lifer from his life as the very last Met the folks in HR might cc. Pat Zachry…Todd Zeile…the single inning two years ago of Rob Zastryzny, who seemed so promising at first glance, until closer examination confirmed, nope, not it. Nobody could successfully negotiate our first third baseman’s southern flank. It was clear: if you come at the Zim, you best sequence your consonant-vowel combination correctly.
As an advocate applauding the alphabetical ascent of Aardsma above Aase in 2013, I’ve waited patiently for a Met to undercut Zimmer. I harbor no post-mortality grudge toward Don, despite his latter-day incarnation as Joe Torre’s pinstriped consigliere. It’s more about a yen for the slightest of change once in an enormous while. How could our storied franchise, on the scene for more than six decades now, have its final roll call entry go unaltered literally forever? Word on Tuesday that we’d gotten a reliever named Zuber thrilled me more than any dozen Paul Blackburn trades could have. Zuber, a righty with fifty-some major league innings under his belt since 2020, was going to upend the all-time list at last. What kind of repertoire does he have? What is his walks and hits to innings pitched ratio? Does he shave with Gillette Foamy?
Ze Challenger.
I didn’t care about any of that. I just wanted Tyler Zuber to get into a game as a Met and change that last line of history/trivia. The top line updated as the seasons progressed. Craig Anderson in 1962. George Altman in 1964. Sandy Alomar in 1967. Tommie Agee in 1968. Don Aase in 1989. David Aardsma, who not only usurped Aase’s position in ’13, but maintains the audacity to peer down at Hank Aaron on the very first People page of Retrosheet. (Aaron’s got 755 home runs and a brand new postage stamp, yet he’s compelled to look up at one of our myriad 2010s here-and-goners.) Our A’s have advanced across the ages, but Don Zimmer has sat stubbornly on the bottom line of Mets attendance sheets from eternity’s first day to its most recent. With Huascar Brazoban’s ninth-inning entry Wednesday, we can count 1,248 Mets in toto. Zim, bless his heart, is No. 1,248 out of 1,248 in alphabetical order, no different from when he was ninth of nine, thirty-first of thirty-one, and so on.
Warning: Alphabetical order may not be indicative of anything else.
Yet eternity is now on the verge of tantalizing revision, not unlike our relief corps. Phil Maton, Ryne Stanek and Brazoban (our first Huascar) have all arrived. Provisional Ghost Met Matt Gage lurks in the ether. Sean Reid-Foley is commencing a rehab assignment. Reed Garrett and Dedniel Nuñez shouldn’t be confined to the IL for long. The Mets will be sorting through a plethora of bullpen options in the days and weeks ahead. But for goodness sake, in the name of giving a person fighting off zzz’s on the East Coast motivation to stay fully awake when the Mets are playing deep into the West Coast night, let’s get Tyler Zuber up from Triple-A; let’s get him on a mound; and let’s get him inside a box score ASAP. In Anaheim. In Azusa. In Cucamonga, if necessary.
Aardsma-Zuber 2024. I don’t know if it’s a winning ticket, but it certainly looms as a change of pace.
That was good. The things I find out on this site. I had no idea I needed to know the alphabetical tail-end of the all-time Mets roster but this was a fun read so evidently I did. I’m sure, based on our track record of bullpen health, that Zuber will make an appearance.
Less fun was Severino wild in the zone. I lost track of how often Alvarez had his glove at a top corner of the strike zone and the ball ended up middle-middle. Was hoping he’d find it as the game went on but the Twins had other ideas.
Our offense is having problems. Take away 12 runs vs the Yankees and 15 the other night and it’s mostly been 3 or less since the break.
The RISP LOBs are up again. On the other hand, it’s possible to win games 2-1 or 3-2. Other teams do it. Only rarely for the Mets with their pitching staff this year, but maybe that’ll change for the stretch run.
As for our new Zuber, aside from the mandatory references to his pitch “shape-shifting”, perhaps he can pay tribute to beloved and departed Mets icon Buddy Harrelson (who used to wear a Superman T-shirt under his jersey), and also give a nod to Nietzsche, by having him sport a “Zuber-Mensch” T-shirt under his jersey. Curious as to whether others were as offended as I was by the Mets issuing Jesse Winker number 3 in a year we are collectively mourning Buddy’s death on our sleeves. Seemed a bit tone deaf to me. Just sayin’.
Nido wore 3 before he was let go. Winker wore 33 (Drew Smith–likely won’t pitch again for the Mets but still a Met for now) with the Reds, 27 (Mark Vientos) with the Mariners, 33 again with the Brewers, and 6 (Starling Marte) with the Nationals. 30 seems like a workable alternative, but Diekman had it when Winker was acquired.
Hi Greg,
Loved your awesome, ace, Amazin’, astounding alliteration. This is about as good as a column can get following a loss.
Folk wisdom, apparently repeated by Benny, says Azusa was named for ‘A to Z in the USA’, an alphabetical theme in keeping with your entry today. A rapid search indicates it’s actually of Native American origin. Been through Anaheim on I-5 (not on Track 5), never to Azusa, and only once to Rancho Cucamonga. It’s hot, blotto Inland Empire suburbia.
Time to start a new winning streak against the Troutless Los Angeles California Angels of Anaheim (lol). Should be a warm, dry weekend for the series out here. These opponents of the Mets’ Wild Card competitors are doing us no favors. Reminds me of the stretch run of ’99–but if this team overachieves like the ’97 team and finishes with 88 wins but short of a Wild Card, then we’d have to be good with it.
It gets really confusing when Zuber is in AAA ball — is he last, or first?
If Severino opted to wait for the day after the trade deadline to inform us that he’ll no longer serve as the team’s practical ace moving forward, that means more load for the bullpen. That means Zuber will get his turn and join your alphabetical listing. I’m hopeful that Severino isn’t wearing out or regressing, and it’s just one bad start (really, one bad inning) against a good offensive team that’s competing for its own wildcard.
Megill’s outing was disappointing because he should be able to do the Lugo role and free up Butto to start, which will matter more if members of the current starting rotation wear out and regress.
Remember when a .500 record seemed like enough for an NL wildcard? Not anymore. Winning the Twins series should be calming, but the other wildcard contenders have beefed up and they’re winning series too. They’re winning enough so that the NL division leaders need to worry, not just the Mets.
For now, winning series is still enough, but every loss is going to be stressful.
Hey, Joe G., now that you mention it….
They’ve also given out 24 like it is some kind of free bobblehead.
How Kelvin Torve got his hands on it is anybody’s guess (paid off Charlie Samuels?), but then giving it out to lazy reprobates like Cano and Rickey Henderson really takes the cake.
What, did Bobby Bonilla turn it down?
Never forget those two playing cards in the dressing room while the game was going on.
Hey, it’s “clubhouse,” not “dressing room!”
Reminds me of a guy I knew 20 years ago who called the “crowd” the “audience!”
Or my English friends who call it a “baseball match.”
I guess Don Zimmer was the Mets equivalent of the old Washington Senators: first in war, first in peace, last on the all time Mets roster. Perhaps not for long.
Me, I’m breathlessly awaiting the next installment of the immortal Huascar’s Cap Awards.
I worry that this alphabetical distinction might prove to be an unlucky omen. You might say I’m Zuberstitious.