Looking back in awe at the longest losing streak in Mets history

Relief pitcher and future U.S. congressman Vinegar Bend Mizell, nicknamed for a town in Alabama near his native Leakessville, Mississippi, was pinned with a hard-luck loss for the Mets despite turning in 5.1 innings of one-run ball in relief. The game was tied at 2-2 until the bottom of the eighth (an inning which would soon come to be synonymous with terror for the Mets), when Houston’s 38-year-old Jim Pendleton knocked a pinch-hit triple off the left-center-field wall and was promptly brought home on a sac fly. The Mets threatened in the ninth thanks to hits from Sammy Taylor and All-Star Richie Ashburn, but could not tie it.

GAME 2: NYM 2, HOU 3 (Tuesday, May 22)

Jay Hook, owner of the first win in Mets history the previous month, took the ball for a nighttime getaway game in Houston. Hook went eight strong, surrendering a game-tying solo shot to Román Mejías — the right fielder who delivered the sac-fly the day prior — and nothing else until the eighth inning, when the Colt .45s rallied for two.

Houston starter Turk Furrell, who would go on to put up 7.0 bWAR that season despite going just 10-20 with a 3.02 ERA in 241.2 innings pitched, worked around trouble. The Mets mustered ten hits but just two runs. A promising rally seemed to be building in the ninth inning when they got two on with nobody out while trailing by two, but Sammy Taylor flew out and the pitcher Hook (who was not pinch-hit for in this situation, probably making Casey Stengel delighted there was no Twitter at the time) struck out. The Mets’ lone All-Star Ashburn once again came through late, hitting an RBI single to make it a 3-2 ballgame, but an Elio Chacón grounder ended it.

The Mets were now bound for the West Coast to face their New York forefathers, the Dodgers and Giants, for the first time. The flight from Houston to Los Angeles was scheduled to arrive at about 5:45am, though Roger Craig, the next day’s starting pitcher and the ‘62 team’s de facto ace, had already made the trip.

GAME 3: NYM 1, LAD 3 (Wednesday, May 23)

The first-ever contest between the Mets and Dodgers was, fittingly, a pitchers’ duel, as Roger Craig and NL Cy Young winner Don Drysdale kept things locked at a 1-1 tie until the eighth. The Dodgers got on the board in the third thanks to NL MVP Maury Wills, who hit a one-out single just out of the reach of a diving Richie Ashburn and drew enough attention at first to cause a balk from Craig after multiple pickoff attempts.

The Mets got on the board with an RBI single the following inning from right fielder Joe Christopher, who had been promoted from Syracuse two days earlier (meaning his first game with the Mets unfortunately aligned with the start of the losing streak). The next batter, Frank Thomas, nearly put the Mets ahead with a deep fly ball to left field, but the Dodgers’ Tommy Davis caught it before it could land in the sparkling new Dodger Stadium seats.

The Dodgers finally got to Craig in the eighth, of course, scoring a pair. Meanwhile, Drysdale was impenetrable, retiring nine of the last ten Mets to complete a dominant four-hitter. Speaking of streaks, the game began a stretch lasting through early August in which Drysdale went 16-1.

GAME 4: NYM 2, LAD 4 (Thursday, May 24)

The Mets’ defense got off to a hot start in this one, with Wills shockingly being caught stealing by Mets catcher Harry Chiti before Tommy Davis was robbed of a hit in right. The game then became a battle of the Franks, with the Dodgers’ Frank Howard and Mets’ Frank Thomas trading early homers. The Mets were up 2-1 until an error by second baseman and former Dodger Charlie Neal set up an L.A. run in the seventh, and the familiarly stubborn eighth inning yielded two more. For four consecutive games, the Mets had surrendered the go-ahead run in the eighth.

Aside from Thomas’ homer, the Mets couldn’t get anything going against Johnny Podres — the man on the mound for 1955 World Series MVP who was on the mound when Dem Bums finally won a championship — and were four-hit for the second straight day.

With the loss, the Mets were now relegated to last place in the National League. It was a slot in the standings they would never escape.

GAME 5: NYM 8, LAD 17 (Friday, May 25)

Unlike their previous four losses, this one wasn’t a tight, low-scoring affair decided by a late rally or defensive miscue. The Dodgers barraged the Mets for 17 runs on 18 hits, tying a record for the most runs the Dodgers had scored since moving to Los Angeles four years prior.

To add insult to injury, the Mets’ offense actually put up a valiant effort, scoring eight runs off 19-year-old Dodger rookie Joe Moeller. It was the only game during the 17-game losing streak in which they would score more than six runs, and yet they still somehow lost by nine. Frank Thomas hit another home run for New York, while third baseman Cliff Cook — who had been traded to the Mets from Cincinnati as part of a package for veteran third baseman and baseball legend Don Zimmer — notched his first Mets homer.

The Mets also got the first four-hit day in franchise history from Félix Mantilla, who somehow accomplished the feat despite only entering the game in the third inning after starting shortstop Elio Chacón was ejected. But this one was all Dodgers, leaving the Mets searching for answers as they departed north for San Francisco.

GAME 6: NYM 6, SF 7 – f/10 (Saturday, May 26)

It seemed the Mets might finally pull one out, leading 5-4 with only six outs to get. But that pesky eighth inning struck again, as the scorching hot Willie Mays — coming off three homers in his prior two games — drilled a solo homer off the Mets’ starter Jay Hook. Just like that, the first Mets-Giants contest was going to extra innings.

Félix Mantilla, despite his four-hit performance in L.A. the previous day, once again was forced to prove himself off the bench. Entering late at third base, Mantilla hit a go-ahead solo homer in the top of the tenth, putting the Mets back in position to win. But with one out in the tenth, Mays struck again, hitting a two-run, walk-off homer off Hook, who was still on the mound facing his 39th batter of the game.

While one established Giants’ Hall of Famer proved the hero at the plate, a 23-year-old rookie named Gaylord Perry proved himself with four quality innings of relief in just the seventh appearance of his career.

GAME 7: NYM 1, SF 7 (Sunday, May 27)

The Mets didn’t show much fight in this 7-1 loss, though they did fight in a much more literal way with the Giants. It just wouldn’t be a seventeen-game losing streak without a brawl, would it?

Trailing 4-1 after a Willie Mays RBI single in the seventh inning, Mets starter Roger Craig — who had pitched up and in on Mays a earlier in the game — drilled Orlando Cepeda in the back. Cepeda went for Craig at the mound before being tackled by his own manager Alvin Dark, preventing a larger melee at least for the moment. Craig then tried to pick off Mays at second, with the Say Hey Kid supposedly spiking shortstop Elio Chacón as he slid back to the bag. Chacón then threw a punch at Mays, who, in the words of the New York Times’ John Drebinger, proceeded to “pick up Elio bodily and throw him to the ground as though he were a sack of flour.”

While the idea of Craig and Chacón going toe-to-toe with Hall of Famers Mays and Cepeda during a blowout loss might seem like the ultimate encapsulation of the ‘62 Mets, the funniest part was actually yet to come. Craig immediately tried to pick off Cepeda at first after the brawl was over, but the throw got by first baseman Ed Bouchee, allowing the runners to advance before Felipe Alou singled them both home. Talk about an embarrassing inning. Additionally, Chacón, who had been ejected two days prior as well, managed to be the only player ejected after the scuffle. But he was right back in the lineup for the back half of the doubleheader…

GAME 8: NYM 5, SF 6 (Sunday, May 27)

This time, it really seemed the Mets’ misery was coming to an end. The lovable losers were up 5-2 with four outs to go, having jumped against San Francisco’s 23-year-old starter and future Cy Young Award winner Mike McCormick.

But the curse of the eighth inning came back to haunt them, with Mays, Cepeda, and Alou all delivering clutch hits as the Giants mounted a three-run comeback. Reliever Bob Miller looked to keep the game tied facing a young Willie McCovey, but instead the go-ahead run came home on a passed ball charged to catcher Harry Chiti.

The Mets made a familiar late comeback attempt, getting a pair of two-out hits in the ninth from Marv Throneberry and Richie Ashburn, but Rod Kanehl flew a 3-2 fastball into the glove of left fielder Harvey Kuenn to bring the Mets’ losing streak to eight games as they departed Candlestick Park.

GAME 9: LAD 13, NYM 6 (Wednesday, May 30)

The Mets returned home to New York for a Memorial Day doubleheader with a familiar old friend: the Dodgers.

The highly-anticipated return of the Dodgers resulted in a crowd of 55,704 fans, the largest attendance at the Polo Grounds since a matchup between the Dodgers and Giants on September 6, 1942, and overtaking the opening of Dodger Stadium on April 10 for the largest crowd at a Major League game that season. Unreserved seats were sold for a sum of $1.30, while bleacher seats cost 75¢, and fans lined up as early as 7 a.m. on the day of the games.

The Mets faced off against 26-year-old Sandy Koufax, who was yet to win a Cy Young but had earned his first All-Star selection the prior season. The Mets managed six runs and thirteen hits off Koufax, but the Dodgers put up 13 runs, reaching that total for the second time in six days against New York. Maury Wills continued his MVP campaign by clubbing two homers, one of the inside-the-park variety to right-center and one which landed in the left-field seats. Four different Dodgers got at least three hits, and Jay Hook wound up on the hook for the loss.

GAME 10: LAD 6, NYM 5 (Wednesday, May 30)

The Mets put up quite the fight with Johnny Podres back on the mound for the Dodgers. Gil Hodges, after hitting a homer off his old teammate Koufax in the opener of the doubleheader, hit two more in the back half. The second homer moved Hodges into a tie with Ralph Kiner for 10th place on MLB’s all-time home run list, and it was the second-to-last homer Hodges would hit in his big league career.

The Mets even turned a triple play to end the sixth inning, the first in franchise history and the first in the Majors since July of 1960. The triple play preserved a 4-3 Mets lead, but homers by Frank Howard and Willie Davis gave the Dodgers a late edge. The Mets, of course, rallied with a pair of singles in the ninth, but could not push the tying run across.

While their losing streak wasn’t snapped, another Mets streak was: Frank Thomas’ hitting streak, which had reached 18 games. It would hold as the longest hitting streak by a Met until Tommie Agee hit in 20 straight in 1970.

GAME 11: LAD 6, NYM 3 (Thursday, May 31)

The festive series served not only as a chance for fans to see their formerly beloved Dodgers take the field once again, but for ex-teammates to reunite as well. Former Dodgers Charlie Neal and Frank Thomas got to reunite with old friends, while pitchers of days past Ralph Branca and Don Newcombe returned to throw out batting practice. Casey Stengel embraced the pregame atmosphere by talking to devoted Mets fans in center field, vowing that the team would attempt to do better while the fans assured him they would support the Mets even in bad times.

Such times were not difficult to find, as the Mets suffered their 11th straight defeat, while the Dodgers conversely picked up their 11th straight win. It was a meager effort, with the Mets’ lineup recording only three hits while the Dodgers scored six off Al Jackson.

Above all else, the series was perhaps a spiritual a sort of spiritual passing of the torch for fans, affirming the Mets as New York’s new team rather than — though unmistakably in the spirit of — the departed Dodgers. The New York Times’ Arthur Daley wrote in a May 31 story:

“Yet even when the Mets were being hanged, drawn and quartered, their new rooters cheered wildly at every feeble and hopeless counter-rally by their heroes. It’s the same sort of fierce devotion the Dodgers used to get from the Flatbush Faithful when they were so fearsomely inept in ancient days. Perfection cannot evoke such deep emotions and, heaven knows, the Mets are far, far from perfection.”

GAME 12: SF 9, NYM 6 (Friday, June 1)

After the Dodgers’ dramatic return to New York, now it was the Giants’ turn to come into town for a four-game set, with the two California squads tied for first place in the N.L. The Giants blasted four homers during the opener in their old home ballpark, with one from Willie Mays, one from that season’s Gold Glove Award winner Jim Davenport, and two courtesy of Willie McCovey.

The Mets trailed 9-1, appearing doomed to a dismal twelfth-straight loss. But their curse of miserable eighth-inning meltdowns was suddenly reversed, as an error by San Francisco’s shortstop José Pagán ignited a five-run Mets rally. A two-run homer from Félix Mantilla brought the score to 9-6, apparently leaving the crowd in such a frenzy that play had to be paused when one fan actually made their way into the Mets’ dugout.

Frank Howard came to bat as the tying run with two outs in the bottom of the ninth, but the Giants held on as Thomas grounded into a 5-4 forceout to end it.

GAME 13: SF 10, NYM 1 (Saturday, June 2)

Any logical hope of the Mets’ losing streak ending at 12 was quickly quenched when the Giants pounced on Jay Hook for five runs in the first inning, before adding two more against Bob Moorhead in the second. The remarkable duo of Willie Mays and Orlando Cepeda continued to shine, with each homering and driving in three runs.

Aside from squeaking out a run in the first with help from an error charged to Mays, the Mets’ offense got nothing across against 33-year-old Jack Sanford, the former 1957 N.L. Rookie of the Year with the Phillies who would go on to finish second in N.L. Cy Young Award voting with 24 wins in 1962. Seemingly the hardest hit at the Giants’ expense came when Jim Davenport had to be removed after being struck by an errant throw from Mets right fielder Jim Hickman.

Before the Mets could recover from the rout, they headed right back onto the field for another contest with the Giants.

GAME 14: SF 6, NYM 4 (Saturday, June 2)

The Mets found life in the back half of the doubleheader, erasing an early 4-0 deficit. The Mets had help from a pair of unearned runs, with Felipe Alou making an error in the third and second baseman Chuck Hiller dropping a throw from catcher Tom Haller (you’re forgiven if you think you’ve just stumbled upon a lost Abbott and Costello bit) in the fourth, allowing the Mets to tie the game. The score held at 4-4 until, of course, the haunted eighth inning, when Harvey Kuenn took Craig Anderson deep and handed the Mets a 14th consecutive loss. Over the course of the doubleheader, there were apparently six arrests made for disorderly conduct in the stands, meaning the number of spectators detained outweighed the number of Mets to score in both games combined. I suppose there are only so many losses a fan can take in a given day.

Anderson was pinned with his fourth loss of the losing streak, and he would end the season with a total of 17 losses while accumulating -2.6 bWAR. 64 years later, no player has managed to put up a mark that low with the Mets since. Craig’s -3.6 career bWAR over three seasons in orange and blue is also the lowest of any pitcher in franchise history.

But Anderson’s role in this story wasn’t over. Not yet.

GAME 15: SF 6, NYM 1 (Sunday, June 3)

The Giants’ stars were at it again in the Sunday afternoon series finale. 24-year-old Juan Marichal tossed a six-hit complete game, allowing just one unearned run on an error from Chuck Hiller, while Willie Mays hit yet another home run — his fifth in seven games against the Mets.

The score was even at 1-1 until the top of the seventh, when Mets reliever Bob Miller surrendered a single to Tom Haller, hit Chuck Hiller (welcome back Abbott and Costello), allowed a hit to José Pagán and then egregiously walked Marichal to force in a run, igniting a four-run Giants rally.

Having now been swept at home and on the road by both the Dodgers and Giants, the Mets’ losing streak reached fifteen games. The New York Times ran a piece on June 3 by Robert L. Teague titled “Close-up of the Met Fan: Loud, Happy Desperation,” which I believe is just as relevant 64 years into the franchise’s history as it was two months in. Here is just one excerpt from it:

“Baseball’s latest phenom is so singular a performer that he strains credulity even when observed at close range with the naked eye. He is a Met Fan—a warm-hearted mixed breed that cannot be explained but merely described. His natural habitat is the Polo Grounds, where he cheerfully and regularly pays from 75 cents to $3.50 to suffer the exquisite tortures involved in watching the objects of his unbounded affection battle valiantly but vainly against clearly superior forces.

He voluntarily put himself on the rack again yesterday while the Mets scrambled and stumbled through a doubleheader with the mighty San Francisco Giants. Deep in his heart he know [sic] that the odds against his heroes were prohibitive, to say the least. But he does not believe in odds, facts, league standings, or diamond statistics. He concedes defeat almost daily, but only after the very last Met has been retired…”

GAME 16: NYM 0, PHI 2 (Wednesday, June 6)

The Mets and their 15-game losing streak were bound for Philadelphia to face the fledgling, eighth-place Phillies in a quick doubleheader. Ace Roger Craig turned in his best performance of the season thus far, tossing eight innings and allowing just two runs, but the Mets ran into a buzzsaw in the form of 36-year-old Phillies starter Cal McLish. The Mets had a golden opportunity to score in the top of the seventh with the bases loaded and nobody out, but a questionable call on a forceout of Elio Chacón at second ended the threat. Stengel and Chacón argued with the umpire, though Chacón avoided being ejected for at least the third time of the losing streak.

In case you happened to be wondering, Cal McLish’s full name is Calvin Coolidge Julius Caesar Tuskahoma McLish. When asked for an explanation of his name, McLish pointed to the fact that he was his parents’ seventh child, and the first that his dad got to name. Despite the many historically relevant options, his nickname of choice somehow wound up being “Bus” or “Buster.” Go figure.

McLish’s name might be long but he made quick work of the Mets, shutting them out on seven hits to extend their losing streak to 16 games. It now tied the longest streak recorded by a New York major league team, a mark set by the 1944 Dodgers. That unfortunate streak began for Brooklyn on June 28, 1944, in a game at Wrigley Field which featured relief pitching from — you guessed it — 18-year-old Cal McLish. Et tu, Brute?

GAME 17: NYM 1, PHI 2 (Wednesday, June 6)

The 17th and final loss in the Mets’ streak might just have been the most painful.

The Mets seized an early lead in the top of the first when Richie Ashburn drew a leadoff walk, stole second, and came home to score on a single by Charlie Neal. The Mets struggled to manufacture any more runs against right-hander Art Mahaffey, but starter Al Jackson was masterful on the mound, holding the Phillies scoreless through seven innings. The Mets appeared in prime position to add on in the top of the seventh,

In the bottom of the eighth, longtime Philly second baseman Tony Taylor led off with a solo homer to even the score. Jackson escaped the rest of the eighth and came back out for the night, getting one out before allowing back-to-back singles, forcing Stengel’s hand. The ball was handed to Craig Anderson, who avoided being pinned with his fifth loss of the losing streak only because the run which he promptly allowed to score was charged to Jackson. Anderson threw just one pitch, and it resulted in a walk-off base hit off the bat of pinch-hitter Wes Covington. And thus, the streak had reached 17 games.

THE WIN: NYM 4, CHC 3 (Friday, June 8)

If the Mets overcoming the Cubs to win the N.L. Pennant in 1969 was one of the greatest miracles in sports history, perhaps this triumph over Chicago was a tinier but no less certain act of the baseball gods. How did the Mets, these Mets, who had lost 17 games in a row, finally taste victory? In the most bafflingly lucky way possible, of course.

It was an adventurous afternoon at Wrigley for starting pitcher Jay Hook, who put the Mets on the board with an RBI single in the third and held the Cubs to one run through six. The Mets clung to a 3-1 lead which nobody seemed to expect them to hold, and it evaporated when 22-year-old Ron Santo hit a game-tying, two-run homer in the bottom of the seventh.

The score was even at 3-3 until the top of the ninth, when the Mets loaded the bases on a series of Chicago miscues. Jim Hickman hit a leadoff single, Hook reached on a bunt thanks to an ill-advised forceout attempt at second, and Richie Ashburn reached on a bunt of his own thanks to an error by Ernie Banks at first. Charlie Neal hit a one-out fly ball to right to bring home Hickman, somehow giving the Mets a 4-3 lead. The New York Times’ Louis Effrat wrote that the run “should probably be donated to Cooperstown,” as it not only helped snap the streak but was also “one of the most uninspiring runs imaginable.”

Since the losing streak began, the Mets had now scored 58 earned runs. 14 of those 58 (24.1%) were unearned.

Hook was sent out to pitch the top of the ninth inning, but was removed after his warm-up pitches due to fatigue from baserunning (Hook had now reached base multiple times). Stengel handed the ball to none other than Craig Anderson. After loss upon loss, Anderson quickly retired Lou Brock and Bob Will to get the first two outs, putting the Mets on the cusp of salvation. Then, a pair of singles — the first a bloop hit, the second a grounder up the middle. Santo, who homered in his previous at-bat, came to the plate with the winning run on base.

The 1962 Mets, and Anderson in particular, had seen this movie a million times by now. They knew how it ended. A future Hall of Famer at the plate. A flimsy lead about to be obliterated. But somehow, against all odds, Anderson induced an easy grounder from Santo, one fittingly hit right back to the mound. Anderson fielded it cleanly and fired to Marv Throneberry at first.

It took a gift-wrapped run courtesy of botched fielding on a pair of bunts. It took arguably the worst pitcher in Mets history retiring two Hall of Famers in the final inning. It took 18 games and 19 days, enduring an eighth-inning hex, and surviving fights (of the baseball and brawling variety) with their city’s ex-sweethearts. But the Mets had finally won. Ya gotta believe.

How did they celebrate their long-awaited victory?

By immediately playing another game against the Cubs that very same day, and losing 3-2 when the game was called for darkness. In the eighth inning.