[majordivit]

You wouldn't really call Ryan for Fregosi worse than Tom Seaver for three no-names, would you?

They were both awful. Ryan's trade was the worst of the decade. At the time of Ryan's trade we all saw him as pitcher who posessed an unbelievable arm but who was not yet consistant with his control. My whole family loved Tom Seaver and Jerry Koosman but we all knew that it was a matter of time when Ryan would become a superstar in his own right. Do you remember Nolan Ryan's relief appearance in the 3rd game of the 1969 world series against the Baltimore Orioles? Most people remember that game for the two spectacular catches made by Tommie Agge in center field. However, I also remember how critical Ryan's relief appearance was in that game, coming in the 6th inning. Ryan got the last out in the sixth inning and breezed in the 7th and 8th innings. Then in the ninth inning, Ryan got the first two Baltimore Orioles out on the ninth inning beore walking the bases loaded in front of Paul Balir. He got a a full count with Blair and then threw Blair one of the most incredible nasty curve balls you will ever see which for an instant backed up Blair and then froze him as the umpire called strike three ending the game and giving the Mets a 2-1 series lead over the Orieles.

Tom Seaver was a tremendous pitcher who won 3 cy young awards as pitcher with the New York Mets. Seaver led the Mets to the world championship in 69 and the NL pennant in 73. By the late 70's Seaver had become less dominant a pitcher. He would still have a couple of good years for the Reds but he wasn't the same pitcher who struck out 19 Padres in one game or threw so many unbelievable 1 hitters for the Mets. Tom Seaver never made it to the world series as a pitcher for the Reds but he did toss his only no hitter with the reds. I was happy for Tom. Tom also won his 300th game pitching for the Chicago White Sox. I was glad that nbc let long time Mets radio and tv announcer Lindsey Nelson call the ninth inning of Tom Terrifics 300th win.

PS You are right. The three guys traded to the Mets were nameless forgetable players. I only remember one, Steveerson who was thought to be a real phenom who couldn't break into the big red machine but who turned out to be a bust. The Mets received a right handed pitcher and a second baseman besides Henderson. (I just cheated and looked up the names of the other two stiffs the Mets got...Pat Zachary and Doug Flynn..what a joke)

Tom Terrific. The Miracle Mets. It's Wednesday night, July 9, 1969, at Shea Stadium in Flushing, Queens. The Mets are on their way to a World Championship. Tom Seaver, 24, is headed for a 25-7 record and the National League Cy Young award. A perfect season, and on this night almost a perfect game for the future Hall of Fame right-hander. The scoreboard tells the story: one out in the ninth, the Mets leading the Cubs 4-0 and No. 42, Jim Qualls at-bat for Chicago. To this point, Seaver has been perfect - 25 straight outs, 11 strikeouts, no walks, no baserunners. With 59,083 fans cheering wildly for every out and gripped by every pitch, Qualls, a 22-year old rookie, will end the dream with a solid single to left-center, between LF Cleon Jones and CF Tommie Agee. Agony. For a moment. And then unending ovation as Seaver gets the final two outs. It is the second-place Mets' seventh straight victory and the first-place Cubs' fifth straight loss. The Amazin's are within three games. The rest, as they say, is glorious history. Note: The second baseman is Wayne Garrett.

[BluesDuke]

I remember the 1969 World Series very well - I either watched or listened to all five games (even to the point of sneaking my transistor radio to school and running the earphone up my shirt and into my ear to listen to the game). But even better than Nolan Ryan's relief of Gary Gentry in the World Series was his splendid seven-inning relief job in the second game of the League Championship Series against the Atlanta Braves, as the Mets were en route to a three-sweep of Henry Aaron and company...

As I remember, Doug Flynn was actually the most useful of the players the Mets got in the Seaver deal - a decent fielding second baseman (usually decently enough above the league average) who wasn't, alas, good enough with the glove that it was prudent to leave his rather limp bat in the lineup. Steve Henderson I remember having the tools of a power hitter but neither the consistency nor the workability, and he was a terrible fielder. And Pat Zachry started off well enough (he tied for Rookie of the Year in 1976) but began taking on too many arm and other injuries to follow up. Any way you define it, the Tom Seaver deal was a disaster.

Still, what goes around comes around. The columnist who did the most dirty work sullying Seaver's image in the contract dispute that provoked the trade was Dick Young of the New York Daily News - whose son-in-law just so happened to be working for Met general manager M. Donald ("We won two pennants without superstars and we can do it again") Grant at the time. Young tried - falsely - to paint Seaver as a welsher; Seaver, in actual fact, was looking toward his forthcoming contract, not his incumbent contract. The Young column which finally drove the nail into the coffin was the one in which he accused Seaver's wife of being jealous that Ruth (Mrs. Nolan) Ryan was now married to a richer man than her husband. But just a few years later, there was Dick Young, jumping the Daily News during a strike and joining the Post even though he was still under contract to the News...and looking like the biggest hypocrite in New York sports.

I've never forgotten the banner which hung from the Shea Stadium seats after the Seaver deal:

I WAS
A BELIEVER
BUT NOW
WE'VE
LOST SEAVER

Even A. Bartlett Giamatti was outraged by the Seaver deal, and he wrote a very pointed essay about it that was published in, I believe, The New York Times, which ended thus:...there comes along once in awhile a man of such quality and character that he transcends even the great and glorious game, and such a man is to be cherished, not sold.