WALK IT OFF - 3/9/07 Options

[birtelcom]

Using the play index at baseball-reference.com, I've put together a list of all the walk-off home runs in Mets history.

The Mets have hit 107 regular season walk-off home runs in their 45-season history, an average of about 2.4 per season (about one every 67 games, though keep in mind, a walk-off home run can only happen in a home game, so it's more like one every 33 or 34 home games).

The highest career total for walk-off homers by a Met is 4, which has been accomplished by four different Mets. Mike Piazza is one of then, which you would expect. Kevin McReynolds is another, and although he might not be the first person you would think of, he did a lot of homers (6th all time in Met homers) for good Met teams, so it's not really surprising. The third guy with 4 career Met walk-off homers is Cleon Jones, which is interesting as Cleon only had the twelfth most homers overall in Mets history, but is still not a complete surprise. But how about the fourth guy with 4 Met walk-off homers? That would be another Jones, Chris Jones, who played for the Mets as a fourth/fifth outfielder for two years in the mid-90s. Indeed, he was basically a fourth/fifth outfielder everywhere he went, in a nine year career spread across 7 different teams, all in the NL. Chris Jones hit a grand total of 12 homers for the Mets -- and 4 of them were walk-off home runs. That's a ridiculous percentage. About one of every 52 Met homers on average has been a walk-off home run, but for Chris one of every three Met homers was a walk-off.

On May 31, 1995, John Franco came in for the ninth try to save a one-run lead for Bobby Jones against the Padres, but gave up a home run in the ninth, and then an unearned run in the top of the tenth. In the bottom of the tenth, Trevor Hoffman came in to get the save but with one out Jeff Kent and Joe Orsulak singled and Chris Jones (pinch-hitting for Franco) slammed a three run homer to left to give the Mets the win. Less than two months later, John Franco again blew a save in the ninth this time against Pittsburgh – Bret Saberhagen had shut them out on three hits and a walk in eight innings but the Mets had scored only one and Franco let them tie it on two hits in the ninth. Chris again saved Franco's bacon, leading off the bottom of the ninth (batting for Rico Brogna) with another walk- homer.

The next April, Jones had come in to play the outfield in the eighth inning as part of a double switch (just before Hal Morris tied the game for the Reds with a homer) and came up in the tenth with Rey Ordonez on first and hit another game winning home run for the Mets, this time off Jeff Shaw.

Then on July 31 of that year, 1996, Paul Wilson started for the Mets and had given up only one hit to the Pirates in 8 innings, but trailed 1-0. Bernard Gilkey hit a homer in the ninth to tie it, but Jerry DiPoto gave up a run on a couple of singles in the top of the 10th. In the bottom of the 10th, an infield error, a fielder's choice bunt by Ordonez and up comes our hero again, Chris Jones who ends it with a two run homer off Dan Plesac. The New York Times game story the next day began "There may be no more popular player on the Mets than Chris Jones, whose work ethic and determination, despite his status as a reserve player, are admired throughout the team. That's why the jubilation had an extra bit of verve after Jones crushed a two-run home run over the center-field wall in the 10th inning last night to give the Mets a dramatic 3-2 victory over the Pirates before a soggy but thrilled crowd of 15,787 at Shea Stadium." The story did not pick up on Jones's uncanny string of walk-off homers, and he joined the Padres as a free agent after the '96 season. If a scrappy backup guy like Chris sounds like the kind of fellow who might become a manager some day, that would be an accurate instinct. After managing the independent Newark Bears the last couple of years, Chris is taking over as a manager of the White Sox Class A affiliate in the South Atlantic League this coming season.

Chris is also the only Met to have two walk-off homers in a season twice. Nine other Mets have managed two walk-offs in a season (no Met has ever had three in a season), including Carlos Beltran in 2006, and of all people, Marvelous Marv Throneberry in 1962. Interestingly, the two biggest walk-off homer years as a team in Mets franchise history were 1962 (six total walk-off homers) and 1963 (seven walk-off homers).

There have been 5 walk-off grand slams in Mets regular season history: Jim Hickman and Tim Harkness in 1963, Mike Jorgenson in 1980, Tim Teufel in 1987 and Kevin McReynolds in 1991.

There have been three official walk-off homers for the Mets in their post-season history. That is a surprisingly high number if you compare it to the frequency of walk-off homers in the regular season. As pointed out above, the Mets in their regular season history have had on average about one walk-off homer every 67 games. In the post-season, however, the Mets have hit three walk-off homers in 74 playoff games, or better than one every 25 games on average (and that is not even counting Robin Ventura's walk-off grand slam that he hit but for which he did not get official credit). The three Mets post-season walk-off homers:

-- On October 11, 1986, Lenny Dykstra hit arguably the most important single home run in Mets annals, considering it was an utterly pivotal turning point in the Mets march to one of only two World Championships franchise history. With the NLCS tied one game apiece, the Mets were down 5-4 going to the bottom of the ninth inning, with All-Star Dave Smith (33 saves in the 1986 regular season) coming in to close it out for the 'Stros. Wally Backman bunted for a base hit, Danny Heep flied out and Dykstra (only 8 homers in 431 ABs in 1986) turned an impeding 1-2 deficit in games in the series into a 2-1 lead for the Mets. This was the first time in baseball post-season history that a batter for a team behind in the score had ever hit a walk-off home run.

--With the Mets and Diamondbacks tied at one game a piece in the 1999 best-of-five division series, Mike Piazza's sore thumb, injured in September and aggravated during game 2 against Arizona, left him unable to play. Instead of Piazza in the cleanup spot, the Mets now had Benny Agbayani and at catcher Todd Pratt. In the bottom of the 10th inning, on October 9, with the Mets now up 2-1 in games, Pratt finished off the series for the Mets with a solo, walk-off homer with one out off of Matt Mantei. Pratt's walk-off is the Mets' only series-ending, post-season walk-off homer.

--The most recent post-season walk-off homer for the Mets came in Game 3 of the 2000 division series against the Giants. After seven innings of scoreless, four-hit relief pitching for the Mets, Benny Agbayani came to bat with one out in the bottom of the thirteenth, with the series tied 1-1 and sent everybody home with a walk-off home run off rookie lefty Aaron Fultz, who is currently on the Indians staff.

And finally, there is the walk-off homer that wasn't. In all of the long history of the major leagues, there has never been a post-season, walk-off grand slam. As surely every Met fan knows, Robin Ventura did hit a fair ball over the fence in a post-season, bases loaded, walk-off situation, but it didn't count as anything more than a single. On October 17, 1999, facing elimination from the playoffs against Atlanta in the NLCS, the Mets fell behind in the top of the fifteenth inning as the Mets' ninth pitcher of the game, Octavio Dotel in his third inning of work gave up a triple to Keith Lockhart with a man on. The Mets came to bat in the bottom of the 15th and proceeded to work out a single and three walks to tie the game. With one out, Robin Ventura, already one of the great grand slam hitters in major league history smacked a pitch from rookie Kevin McGlinchy (who only pitched nine more innings in the major leagues after this at bat) over the right field fence for what would have been the only post season walk-off grand slam ever. But Todd Pratt, celebrating on the base paths, failed to complete his run to home and Ventura was credited with only a single. It didn't matter of course, the Mets won the game anyway: but baseball among other things is a game of historical record-keeping and numerical accomplishment, and this play is remembered no just for its spectacular comeback victory for the Mets but also for its odd illustration of how much attention the numerical record gets in baseball.

[gak29]

How could you forget Saturday, May 12th, 1962? Hobie Landrith hits a two-run HR off Milwalkee's Warren Spahn down 2-1 in the bottom of the ninth, the first walk-off hit of any kind in Mets history. After that, it only took about four hours until the Mets got their second walk-off HR ever as Gil Hodges (2nd HR of the day)broke a tie off Hank Fischer in the second game of a double header that day. In both games, reliever Craig Anderson was the winner for Casey's Metsies.