1981 TOPPS MARK BOMBACK
During a game in the recent Mets-Phillies series, talk in the broadcast booth turned to hitters who over the years have owned the Mets.
And as these discussions are wont, the topic soon shifted to Willie Stargell and his 60 career HRs against our boys.
In an effort to lionize Stargell, Ron or Keith mentioned some of the great Mets’ pitching staffs against which Pops had accumulated those numbers.
Ron and Keith continued to chatter on the subject, and one of them mentioned that Stargell also had the luxury of hitting against some not-so-great Mets’ staffs. The name “Mark Bomback” was brought up derisively as an example of such subpar pitching.
Now, imagine you’re Mark Bomback, and maybe you’re watching this broadcast. You’re getting ready to celebrate your 58th birthday (April 14, if you’d like to send a card), and you look back with pride on the fact that you once pitched in the bigs.
Hell, you’re extra proud of your one season with the Mets, when you went 10-8 with a 4.09 ERA for a team that finished 67-95. You were the only arm on that squad to win in double digits.
And then along come these blathering renaissance Mets, defaming your abilities.
Well, let history show that in addition to having a solid year in 1980, you never faced Willie Stargell even once in your career.
Let history show that we faithful appreciate what you did for us at the shadowy dawn of our most prosperous decade.
Let history show that we praise you, Mark Bomback.
While Stargell never faced Bomback, I think we should point out that Keith Hernandez faced him 18 times and had a .375/.444/.688 line with two doubles and a HR in 16 ABs.
Well played, Mr. Joura. Well played.
This one comes with a brief data supplement…
Here’s the year-by-year breakdown of HRs vs the Mets for each of Stargell’s 21 seasons, courtesy of baseball-reference.com:
1962: 0
1963: 2
1964: 5
1965: 3
1966: 10
1967: 5
1968: 4
1969: 3
1970: 4
1971: 4
1972: 2
1973: 4
1974: 2
1975: 1
1976: 5
1977: 1
1978: 2
1979: 3
1980: 0
1981: 0
1982: 0
So if we take away Stargell’s monster 1966 season, he still hit more HR versus the Mets than Chipper Jones. The fact that Stargell hit that many in 1966, during the deadball portion of the decade when the Mets played their home games in Shea Stadium and not the Polo Grounds is very impressive. And he hit 5 at Shea and 5 at Forbes Field that year.
Also, I’d like to point out that while my earlier comment explains why Bomback was used as a reference point, it does not excuse his selection, which as Doug points out was erroneous and unfair.
I remember that Bomback had a nice curveball.