Seaver, Murphy, and other what ifs in Mets history

Hundreds, if not thousands, of books and articles have been written in the realm of speculative history, also known as “what if” history. The idea is to figure out which way things would have turned out if events did not go as they actually did. Some examples:

What if – the British sniper who had General George Washington in his sights had not declined to shoot? Would the New York Mets in 2016 be playing in the British Empire Cricket League, American Colonies conference?

What if – the south had won the Civil War? I read a book on that while a teen. Spoiler alert. Slavery gets abolished and the two countries reunite.

Some World War II what ifs. What if one of the 30 plus assassination attempts on Adolph Hitler had been successful? Conversely what if the Nazis had successfully created the atomic bomb before the Americans? Bye bye London and Moscow. Or what if the Brits don’t successfully escape doom at Dunkirk? The war to Germany’s west would have ended quickly and Hitler could have thrown everything he had at the Russians.

Let’s get to baseball.

What if – Horace Stoneham, owner of the New York Giants in the 1950s, resisted Walter O’Malley’s plea to move with him out to the west coast? O’Malley reportedly said he would not go unless the Giants would go with him. Both owners were miffed at New York City for its unwillingness to build them each a new stadium.
My strong suspicion is that had Stoneham said no then O’Malley would have found some other taker, maybe Pittsburgh or Milwaukee, to join him on the left coast. In that case the Giants would be the only National League team in New York. The city, having lost one of its three teams, would relent and build the Giants a new stadium perhaps in Flushing Queens out by where the World’s Fair would be in 1964. Instead of reading Mets 360 right now you would be reading Giants 360 and your favorite pitcher would not be Jake deGrom or Noah Syndergaard but rather Madison Bumgarner.

What if – the Mets did not win the Tom Seaver drawing? As many of you know in 1966 Seaver was signed by the Braves to a pro contract but since his college team had played a couple of preseason games the then commissioner voided the deal. Then since the future Tom Terrific had signed as a pro he was ineligible to pitch in college. MLB decided (under threat of a lawsuit) to allow other teams to match the Braves’ contract. The three interested teams were the Mets, Phils, and Indians. One chance in three to sign what turned out to be their “Franchise” player.

What if – instead of selecting catcher Steve Chilcott with the first pick of the 1966 draft the Mets had taken outfielder Reggie Jackson? We don’t have to remind any Mets fan that injuries can happen and they do so a lot to pitchers and catchers. Chilcott ended up being one of only two 1st overall picks to never reach the majors (Brien Taylor was the other). In ’67 Chilcott seriously injured his shoulder in a Florida State League game and was never the same player after that. The second pick of that 1966 draft went to Oakland who took Reggie. Ah, what could have been.

What if – Mookie Wilson was unable to avoid getting hit by the pitch during his historic at bat in game 6 of the 1986 World Series? This You Tube video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3UXgwqlDAo shows highlights of the most important inning in Mets history. 1:01 into the video is where Mookie used all of his agility to avoid a pitch headed right towards his ankles. By avoiding the pitch and allowing the tying run to score it set up the dribbler that “gets by Buckner. The Mets win, they win!” Maybe the Mets could still have pulled out game 6 but we will never know and the odds would have still been heavily in Boston’s favor.

What if – the Mets’ doctors don’t raise a red flag on the proposed Wilmer Flores + Zack Wheeler to Milwaukee for Carlos Gomez trade last year? Then there is no Cespedes and quite likely no playoffs for the 2015 Mets. It must have been a close call since Milwaukee had no trouble unloading Gomez the next day.

And finally…

What if – Daniel Murphy had opted to accept the qualifying offer by the Mets? Surely the team offered it up expecting him to decline it so they could pick up a supplementary 1st round pick. There would have been no Jon Niese for Neil Walker trade. With Murphy making over $15 million for the season the budget might not have allowed the team to sign Yoenis Cespedes. Meanwhile if the Mets got the 2016 version of Murphy that the Nats are now enjoying they would have an MVP candidate with tremendous on base skills and power. When David Wright went down for the season Murphy would have been the natural candidate to take over fulltime at third base.
Meanwhile if Murphy had this kind of season during his second walk year he would be setting himself up for a contract as a free agent worth in the neighborhood of $20 million a year.

Personally I love this what-if stuff but it can boggle the mind.