Archive for February 8th, 2010

Is it Monday already?

On the baseball field in 1975, Mike Vail was not a dork.

Mike Vail was acquired by the Mets in a trade for the great Teodoro Martinez with the St. Louis Cardinals. Mike Vail had quite the year in 1975.

From a Mets fans perspective, 1975 was another frustrating year. Mets fans were wired a little differently back then. We had 1969 and 1973 as reference points that showed us that a poorly constructed team could be lucky enough to get hot and come from behind and compete. We still had the pitchers, we had Rusty Staub, and we thought we had hope.

But as the summer wore on, it was no shock that this wasn’t going to be a Mets year with the big Red Machine in Cincinnati and we are family in Pittsburgh. So sometime in June, or even earlier we started to hear about this kid rippin’ it up down in Tidewater. The Mets would be losing a game with maybe two hits total, and Ralph or Bob Murphy would let us know that down on the farm this kid Vail had 3 hits again.

The hype got hotter and hotter as the summer went on, with some reminders that the pitching at triple A wasn’t quite up to the big league level so calling up this Vail kid might not work out. Mike Vail went on to win the International League Player of the Year award in 1975. Although the announcers stuck to the line that we probably wouldn’t see him until September, if at all, suddenly at the end of August Mike Vail appeared in a Mets uniform.

Vail got into his first game against the Houston Astros and got a hit. He then proceeded to hit in a total of 23 straight games, setting a then Mets team record and a major league record for rookies (since broken). The fans couldn’t have been happier. A kid that actually lived up to the promise. No, on the baseball field in 1975, Mike Vail was not a dork. Mike Vail ruled.

So why are we writing about him here in the dork column (see criteria below re: Stork Theodore) ?

On the basketball court, Mike Vail was a dork.

During a winter pickup game, Mike Vail either got faked out of his shoes, or couldn’t fake left and go right, or closed his eyes to take a charge, or whatever and ended up with a dislocated foot, despite his Pro Keds, tube socks, head band and short shorts.

Not a big deal for a lot of teams, quite a big deal for the Mets.

You see bad GMing wasn’t invented over the last couple of seasons.

The front office decided that more starting pitching was needed, and they traded for the once great Mickey Lolich from the Detroit Tigers. Mickey had a great World series in 1968 winning 3 complete games and had been a steady performer. Of course, in 1975 it fell apart for Mickey and he ended up losing 18 games for a bad Tigers team. So who should the Mets trade for this aged star with an enormous pot belly? None other than Le Grande Orange, Rusty Staub. They probably thought Rusty was getting a little old and probably a little expensive, but hey with this new kid Vail what do we need Rusty for?

The trade was made and shortly thereafter Vail’s foot exploded and the rest is history.

Staub went on to have 3 consecutive years with Detroit where he had over 100 rbi.

Lolich came to the Mets in 1976 and went 8-13. He then retired after the season and opened a donut shop back in Michigan.

Vail finally came back sometime in 1976 with a noticeable limp and no speed and ended the season with a .217 average. He did a little better the next year, but was never what the Mets thought they had. He ended up leaving the Mets for Cleveland and played for 4 other teams as he ended up becoming a baseball dork also.

That’s it kids. Look forward to more remembrances from Bossman Senior right here.

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