The Gooden billboard!

I knew someone had to have a shot of it. That someone is a guy by the name of Matt Weber, and the photo was posted on a blog called peripherybaseball. Many thanks. This brings back a lot of memories.

So far, worth the Price

Back before the draft, a story in Sports Illustrated described agent Scott Boras telling the Nationals that two "50-year players" -- the kind of talents that only come around twice a century -- would be available to them in 2009 and '10 in the form of Stephen Strasburg, a 50-year pitcher, and Bryce Harper, a 50-year hitter.

And as good as Strasburg has been, perhaps he's not the first pitcher selected No. 1 overall to finally be worth the choice. In 2007, two years before Strasburg was drafted, the Rays took David Price out of Vanderbilt. A little more than a year later, he was closing out the Red Sox to send the Rays to the World Series. Now, three years and a month after being drafted, Price, at 24, is the youngest All-Star Game starting pitcher since a 23-year-old Dwight Gooden in 1988. (That's how good Gooden was back then -- at 23 in '88, he made his second career All-Star Game start, two years after his first.)

Looking back at the pitchers selected first overall, it's not a very notable bunch. Price has now tied Floyd Bannister, Mike Moore and Andy Benes for the record in All-Star selections and just one other hurler taken first, Tim Belcher, joins those three in pitching at least 10 seasons. And those four pitchers, plus the heralded Ben McDonald (who pitched nine seasons), are the only ones with a career WAR higher than 10. As of this All-Star break, Price is already at 4.2 in his career.

It feels premature to do so, but based on his success thus far -- an All-Star starting assignment, a key save in the ALCS and career numbers over 257 innings (what used to constitute a full season for a top starter) that would garner Cy Young consideration -- Price may be the best pitcher selected No. 1 overall in the history of the sport. Of course, the praise was similar for Gooden during his first few impressive seasons, but the early returns are promising. We'll just have to see how it plays out -- not just how Price ranks historically, but in a career that will unfold alongside that of Strasburg over the next decade or so, we can hope.

Pitchers selected No. 1 overall

Year	Pitcher	Throws	Team	WAR
2009	Stephen Strasburg	RHP	Nationals	1.8
2007	David Price	LHP	Rays	4.2
2006	Luke Hochevar	RHP	Royals	-1.1
2002	Bryan Bullington	RHP	Pirates	-0.2
1997	Matt Anderson	RHP	Tigers	-1.4
1996	Kris Benson	RHP	Pirates	11.1
1994	Paul Wilson	RHP	Mets	0.5
1991	Brien Taylor	LHP	Yankees	--
1989	Ben McDonald	RHP	Orioles	19.8
1988	Andy Benes	RHP	Padres	29.6
1983	Tim Belcher	RHP	Yankees	24.6
1981	Mike Moore	RHP	Mariners	24.9
1976	Floyd Bannister	LHP	Astros	24.1
1973	David Clyde	LHP	Rangers	0.4

Mets -- and baseball -- history on iTunes

Happened to be browsing through the games available for purchase at Baseball's Best on iTunes and noticed these Mets-related gems:

Game 5 of the 1969 World Series

Game 3 of the 1986 NLCS

Game 6 of the 1986 NLCS

Game 6 of the 1986 World Series

Game 7 of the 1986 World Series

Game 5 of the 1999 NLCS (Ventura's "grand slam single")

Plus, these heartbreaking or bittersweet games:

Sept. 16, 1978, Tom Seaver's no-hitter

Game 4 of the 1988 NLCS (Scioscia and Gibson homer as L.A. wins in extras)

May 14, 1996, Dwight Gooden's no-hitter

July 18, 1999, David Cone's perfect game

Game 2 of the 2000 World Series (Clemens' roid rage)

And, for a bit of schadenfeude:

Game 7 of the 1993 World Series (Joe Carter's walk-off)

Game 7 of the 2001 World Series (Luis Gonzalez singles off Mariano Rivera)

Washington chooses its history

Pennants atop the scoreboard

Two weeks ago, I drove down to Washington to meet up with two college friends and see the Nationals play the Reds. We'd speculated a couple of weeks before and bought tickets hoping it would be Stephen Strasburg's debut. But unlike many Nats fans, we didn't bitch when the team announced his first start for June 8. We held our annual reunion at a ballpark and got drunk anyway. (And then Brad, the one of us who lives near D.C., went again on June 8 and fell in love.)

One thing that caught my eye on my second visit to Nationals Park was the celebration of baseball history, beginning with the statues of Walter Johnson, Frank Howard and Josh Gibson and continuing throught the concourse with banners depicting Hall of Famers from throughout the Major Leagues. And then, atop the arched "NATIONALS" sign atop the scoreboard, fly four flags, three of which display the years 1924, 1925 and 1933 signifying the original Senators' three American League pennants.

Nowhere did I see any mention of the Expos' 1981 split NL East title or any recognition of Tim Raines, Andre Dawson or Gary Carter (though I imagine Carter may have a Hall of Fame banner somewhere). Granted, even with just one World Series title among two franchises that left town, Washington has a richer baseball history than Montreal, if only marginally. And I do understand the point of promoting the city's baseball bloodlines, both in the American League and the Negro leagues. And as far as the statues and banners go, it's a nod to individual stars, not other teams. The pennants are a different matter.

This all struck me as slightly odd, because essentially the Nationals are celebrating the history of the Minnesota Twins (Senators 1901-60) and Texas Rangers (Senators 1961-71), but not the Expos, the team from which the Nationals were born. The Mets may have a rotunda celebrating the life of an American pioneer in Jackie Robinson, but they don't have any 1955 pennants celebrating the Dodgers' World Series victory.

But now [... segue ...] the Nationals are building a history of their own to honor, specifically every fifth day, when Strasburg takes the mound. In that celebrated first start of his, he set a Nationals record with 14 strikeouts -- dating back only to 2005, of course. The franchise record is 18, set by Bill Gullickson in 1980. As noted in this week's Sports Illustrated cover story, the scoreboard couldn't even keep up -- the strikeout display only counts to 12.

Baseball is going nuts for Strasmas every five days, so I can only imagine the giddiness felt inside the Nationals' front office. The team that didn't want to announce his first start until two weeks before has now let it be known that he'll pitch every fifth day until the All-Star break -- in essense, they're rearranging their rotation around the new kid. In doing so, the Nationals ensure (barring a rainout) that Strasburg will pitch twice on this current homestand, tonight and again on Wednesday, the final day of a six-game stretch back in D.C. Had he pitched every fifth game, he would have gone tomorrow and then again on Friday in Baltimore.

Oh, and about that -- by putting Strasburg on an every-fifth-day schedule, the Nationals ensure (barring, again, a rainout) that he will not pitch in Baltimore next weekend. That would've surely drawn a big crowd, perhaps a sellout, to Oriole Park, no doubt bringing a lot of Nationals fans up from the south -- and from the fanbase battleground between the two cities. Whether they meant it this way or not, that's a pretty big f-you to Orioles owner Peter Angelos, who did all he could to prevent Washington from getting a team and then made sure he got a sweetheart deal regarding television rights, relegating most Nationals games to MASN2.

After Wednesday's start, Strasburg will pitch in Atlanta -- those showdowns with Jason Heyward may stand out when writers cast their Rookie of the Year votes in September -- and then face the Mets at home during the Fourth of July weekend, probably Saturday the third. He would then make his final start of the first half on July 8 at home against the Padres.

Then it remains to be seen what they do with his schedule. They want to keep him at 160 total innings, and with 55 1/3 in the Minors and 12 1/3 so far in the Majors, he's already at 67 2/3. If he averages six innings in these next five starts before the break, that puts him at 97 2/3 -- leaving roughly just 10 more starts this season. Washington will no doubt be tempted to alter that plan if they get to his 10th start and find themselves fewer than five games out of a playoff spot, but it might play a part in setting up the second-half rotation. Do they give him nearly two weeks off and start him in the fifth game out of the break, on Tuesday, July 20? Do they go with a six-man rotation when (if) they get Jason Marquis back or Chien-Ming Wang is ready?

I do find myself drawn to Strasburg's starts. I was at the Trenton Thunder game on Sunday, but I DVR'd the Nationals-Indians game on TBS and watched Strasburg's 5 1/3 innings a day later. Tonight, the Mets and Yankees meet in the Bronx with the Amazin's on a seven-game winning streak (yes, against the lowly Orioles and Indians, but all on the road, which is definitely something for this team), but I may put that game on mute on the TV and watch Strasburg on MLB.TV -- with the White Sox TV feed so that I can hear Hawk Harrelson do his best to refrain from any praise of "the bad guy." I toyed with driving down to D.C. again today, but some car trouble and the current use of a rental and various other hassles had me decide against it. I hope to see him once this year, but it remains to be seen if the schedules -- the Nationals' and mine -- will allow it.

I'd like to experience just one of Strasburg's starts this year first-hand, whether in D.C. or elsewhere, because I was a bit too young to have seen Dwight Gooden in the mid-80s. First mentioned by Mets Police and echoed this week by Marty Noble, Gooden on a Friday night at Shea was an event (and "Gooden on a Friday night" should be the name of an essay or a play or something). I remember the buzz when Pedro Martinez would pitch a few years ago, and I have no doubt that the anticipation for Gooden's starts was much more elevated.

So far, Strasburg has nearly doubled the average daily attendance when he's pitched. His debut drew 40,315, nearly twice the 22,102 the Nationals are averaging -- and that's as of today, including that start of his. He also debuted on a Tuesday, which draws less on average to begin with, so he did bring in twice as many people as the Nats would otherwise get on a Tuesday night. On Sunday in Cleveland, 32,876 came out, just under twice the 16,604 the Indians had drawn. I just went onto the Nationals' site and put in for two tickets for tonight and found it only gave one option: $350 Lexus Presidents seats. Looks like another sellout.

I went back to look at Gooden's starts and compile the numbers from his first three seasons, 1984-86, which included his Rookie of the Year campaign ('84), his NL Cy Young season ('85) and the Mets' World Series season ('86), when they ran away with the NL East. Though Noble specifically cited Gooden's starts from mid-'84 through the first few months of '86, I averaged out his Friday night home starts for all three seasons: 38,385 over nine Friday night home games. Pretty damn good, and that doesn't include some high-drawing Saturday or Sunday games, or the 47,823 who came out on a Wednesday in September 1986 to watch him throw nine innings to clinch the division. Only twice in those nine Friday night games did the Mets draw fewer fans than their average for the season. One was June 1, 1984 -- 20,968 vs. the '84 average of 22,749 -- still early in the legend of Doctor K; the other was, surprisingly to me, July 4, 1986, when 28,557 came out in a year they averaged 34,168. I figured the holiday would bring more to the ballpark, but because it was a weekend, perhaps the throngs were barbecuing or at the beach. Or perhaps it was a day game.

Maybe at the end of the season, I'll go back and take a closer look at Doc's starts vs. Strasburg's, when we have more numbers to include. But if these first three dates are any indication, Saint Stephen is going to be a draw throughout the National League for the rest of the season.

Watching the good Doctor work

Late last night, Marty Noble put up a blog post reminiscing about crooner Johnny Maestro and hurler Doc Gooden, and it brought up some memories of my own that I didn't include in my post about Gooden's Nike billboard in Midtown.

I was 10 in 1986, and the two games I did see that year were started by Sid Fernandez (8-2 on June 20!) and Rick Aguilera (he homered!). I didn't catch Gooden until he faced the Phillies on Opening Day 1991, my first opener and definitely a thrilling one because my parents let me miss school to go. Sometime during that offseason, I asked (probably begged) my parents to buy tickets and call me in sick to school. They agreed -- "Just this once" -- and Dad took the bullet by calling out sick himself and driving my friend Will (he might've actually been off on his Catholic high school's two-week Easter break, but his parents would've let him go anyway) and me to Queens. It truly would've pained my dad to take the day off and make the two-hour drive from the Jersey Shore, across Staten Island, up the BQE and down Northern Boulevard (before the internet and GPS, he took the most direct route, rather than the fastest, which is the BQE to the Grand Central Parkway). He's a Mets fan, but he prefers to watch on TV; Will's a Yankees fan, but he's not the dick kind that starts chanting "Let's go Yankees!" on Opening Day in Queens.

Traffic near Shea was a mess, and the parking lot where Citi Field now stands was full by the time we arrived. So we wouldn't miss the first pitch, Will and I got out of the car and walked across the lot and reached our seats in the left-field mezzanine with time to spare. Dad had to park somewhere in or near Flushing Meadows Park and caught up to us in the second inning, I believe. By then, the Mets were already ahead, 1-0, after Vince Coleman doubled down the right-field line in his first Mets at-bat and Gregg Jefferies followed with a double down the left-field line.

Gooden was on his game that day, getting through the first needing only 13 pitches to get Lenny Dykstra to fly out and fanning Darren Daulton and Von Hayes on seven total pitches. Doc went eight innings, allowing six hits and a walk and striking out seven. His only mistake was a 1-2 pitch to John Kruk leading off the fifth. Kruk belted a line-drive homer over the Mets bullpen in right field and hit one of the Phillies' buses parked beyond the 'pen.

The other game was on July 8, 2000, the Shea Stadium end of the first day-night Mets-Yankees doubleheader in both boroughs. Doc won that one, too -- for the Yankees, in his former home. I'm pretty sure that remains the loudest ovation given a Yankee in Queens since interleague play began, and the only time Mets and Yankees fans cheered in unison. That included myself and a college pal, Brad, another Yankees fan (he grew up in the Bronx suburb of Fort Wayne, Indiana). The game was Doc's first in his second stint with the Yankees, following his release by the Devil Rays, and it was his final victory at Shea. He won only three more games in his career.

So Gooden's combined stat line in the two games I saw him pitch reads like this:

13 IP, 12 H, 3 R/ER, 2 BB, 8 SO, .249 BAA, 1.08 WHIP, 2.08 ERA
He only struck out one Met that day, and his performace was overshadowed by the night game -- also a 4-2 Yankees win -- in which Roger Clemens beaned Mike Piazza, giving him a concussion and keeping him out of that year's All-Star Game.

It was clear from the beginning of the day game that the former Mets would do in the current Mets. Chuck Knoblauch led off the game by lining the first pitch to center for a hit, but Jay Payton threw him out at second base. After Yankees first-base coach Lee Mazzilli appealed to first-base umpire Robb Cook that first baseman Todd Zeile had interfered with Knoblauch, the call was overturned. Bobby Valentine argued and was objected, even though he was right -- the call was crap. Zeile barely moved from his position in the field, and Knoblauch took an unusually wide turn around first base. Valentine argued that Knoblauch never changed direction or came into contact with Zeile, but the blind umps wouldn't budge. I distinctly remember Valentine repeatedly and demonstratively walking in Knoblauch's footsteps on the otherwise pristine, freshly dragged infield to make his point. It's still a bullshit call. Knoblauch should've been out and Derek Jeter, who followed with an RBI double, should have one fewer RBI among his career totals.

There is one more memory of seeing Gooden in person, though he didn't pitch. Dad also took Will and me to the final weekend home game in 1989. The Expos won, 6-5, on Fan Appreciation Day (remember those?). Howard Johnson stole his 40th base and Darryl Strawberry hit his 29th home run. But the highlight came before the game, when Will and I were hanging over the railing at the end of the right-field loge, watching David Cone warm up for the start in the Mets bullpen. At one point, Gooden emerged from the small clubhouse beneath us and we called down to him, hoping we might get one of the baseballs lying on the grass. He didn't toss us a ball, but he looked up with a smile and a wave, and that made our day more than anything that happened in the game.

When Gooden was larger than life

Yesterday's news about Dwight Gooden has brought out a lot of old photographs of Doctor K, but this one is the one I like the best. Two young stars, their potential seemingly limitless -- 1985 All-Star! -- clowning around after a game in some wood-paneled office at Shea Stadium that still had NFL helmets on display years after the Jets had moved to New Jersey.

That shirt on Doc brings back a memory for me. His endorsement with Nike was the first time I ever associated an athlete with a company, but it wasn't from this photo. It was from one like this one to the right, only hundreds of times bigger and hanging off the side of a building in Midtown Manhattan. New Jersey Mets fans may remember it well: A giant image of Gooden, arm cocked, foot driving, the Nike logo and swoosh in a corner, affixed to the western side of a building and visible to pretty much anyone gazing out the windows as they emerged from the Lincoln Tunnel. People winding up the ramp into the Port Authority Bus Terminal parking deck got a closer look, but that wasn't necessary to notice the thing. It was huge. Billboards are made to be larger than life, but putting Gooden on that one made him into the city's Paul Bunyan. A true giant.

Unfortunately, the only images I have of it are in my head. I never really had a chance to get a picture of it, because my first camera -- the cheap and perfect-for-kids Kodak Disc (I was probably influenced by the commercial) -- wouldn't have been able to handle shooting from behind the window of a moving car, and it wasn't until the past four years that I found myself any further west in Manhattan than that exit to the tunnel, and with all the changes in New York, that building itself may not even be standing, let alone any monster billboards of the city's biggest sports star that may be occupying the space. Gooden, it seems, came down shortly after his drug suspension in 1994, though if I took note of its disappearance at the time, I didn't keep the memory for long.

A photo of that billboard -- not a reproduction of the particular image, but an actual photo of that billboard on that building -- may be the holy grail from my first years as a Mets fan. I recently came across one discovery when I uncovered the two ticket stubs to my first Mets games. I always knew that my family went to two one summer, one of which was on a brutally hot and muggy New York night, and the opponents were the Reds (I remember Pete Rose) and the Cubs (the blue jerseys). However, I was under the impression that both games were in 1985. Upon finding the stubs, I learned that they were from that dominating year, 1986.

That was truly a year in which everything came together, stars and planets included. The talent was undeniable and it should've carried over into another division title in 1987, if not another World Series win before the '80s were out. It just wasn't in the cards.

Acing Opening Day

After losing their first eight Opening Days from 1962 to 1969, the Mets finally got their first W on the season's first day in 1970, when they beat the Pirates, 5-3, in 11 innings. From that day forward, they're 31-9 on Opening Day following today's game in Cincinnati, and that .775 winning percentage is baseball's best in that span. Add in those eight losses for a 31-17 mark, and the .646 winning percentage still leads MLB.

Unlike some won-loss records in baseball, this one has some weight to it. Whereas some team-vs.-team records (or pitcher-vs.-team records) are a bit hollow -- because the players on both sides change, rendering the numbers little more than uniform-vs.-uniform -- the Mets' Opening Day mark is an indication of just how strong the front of their rotation has been over the past four decades. If the franchise has come to be known for developing a certain type of player over its nearly 50-year existence, starting pitching is it.

A look at their Opening Day starters shows a few Hall of Famers or potential Hall of Famers (and one who was believed ticketed for Cooperstown before derailing his career with substance abuse): Tom Seaver, Dwight Gooden, Tom Glavine and Johan Santana among them. Seaver started 11 openers, including 10 straight from 1968-77; Gooden had eight scattered from 1985-94; Glavine took the ball for four of the five from 2003-07, with Pedro Martinez getting the other one; and Santana has had the last two.

Those five hurlers account for 26 of the 48 openers including today, and with this afternoon's win, the Mets' record in those 26 games is 19-8. Also scattered in there are starts by Bobby Ojeda (a win in 1987), David Cone (a win in 1992), Al Leiter (a loss in 1999, wins in 2001 and '02) and Mike Hampton (a loss in 2000). Those arms don't belong to journeymen, at least not at that stage of their careers (particularly in Hampton's case, who was an ace when he arrived via trade but quickly fell to journeyman status when he signed with Colorado). They were all considered solid No. 1 starters, if not traditional aces, and their Opening Day starts led to a 4-2 mark, bringing the team's record in this selection of games to 23-10.

With that kind of pedigree on the arms the Mets have sent to the hill for the first pitch of the season, it's no wonder they've won more than 75 percent of their season openers since 1970 and 64 percent overall.