65 Mets Leaders / 66 Fantazy Cards

_____________________1965 Mets Team Leaders___________________

Ed Kranepool? Really? Congratulations Mr. Kranepool. A .253 average nets you team leader. I don't know if I could have followed the team these barren years. You older Met fans who stuck with the team before 1969, I tip my hat to you all.

Rocky with 19 kaBOOMS in his rookie year. That's the most he ever hit in one season. The Mets waited for the sometime slugger to become a steady slugger. They were very patient with the outfielder, even trying him at first base for a time. Swoboda's .228 average in 1965 was pathetic even by 1965 Mets team leader standards. But the Mets would have been happy if he could have hit 19 HRs every year.

Kool, Charlie Smith at the Sadecki Spot.

Johnny Lewis always has that same expression. Look at him on the "BATTING" card.
Ha! Messin' with ya. It's the same pic, different backgrounds. As a matter of fact, only two of the player images used have their original backgrounds.

Now look at Spahn. That background: field, fence, scoreboard, is from the colorization of Jim Bunnings perfect game. I did that on a whim and now I'm kicking myself for not making his regular '65 fantazy card look that way. I might go back and do that.

I know the scoreboard slideshow was kaput by 1965 but still they managed to get Al Jackson up there one more time for his fantazy card.

1965 Met Fantazy Card Opening Day Line-up

An April 12th, 1965 the Mets opened the season at Shea for the first time. It didn't effect their luck however, as they were victims of Don Drysdale who pitched a complete game. The Mets did plate a run but lost to the Dodgers by a score of 6-1.
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As read by Ralph Kiner:

"Well hi everybody I'm Ralph Kiner along with Bob Murphy and Lindsey Nelson bringing you Mets baseball. Today is opening day of the 1965 season, and a beautiful day it is. New York will take on the Los Angeles Dodgers here at Shea stadium. Casey Stengel's opening day line-up for the New York Mets:



Leading off for the Mets and playing Center Field-

Playing shortstop and hitting second-

Batting third the right fielder-

In the clean-up spot and playing 1st base is New York hometown favorite-

The left fielder-

will be batting 5th followed by third baseman-

The second baseman-

Will bat 7th. Batting 8th today is the catcher-

and on the mound for the Mets pitching his second opening day start-"

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CREDITS:

David Rothenberg from facebook for the Bobby Klaus picture. Thanks also for the daily birthday notices.

"Batmagsleadoff" of the CPF for the Chris Cannizzaro picture and for spotting an error card, "Al Cowan".

You will find either your initials or your name on the card. When I do this I don't really want it to distract from the card, so I try and blend it in somehow, so it's there if you look for it, but it doesn't stand out. I do this to show how much I appreciate and promote people sharing with each other online.

64 Mets Leaders / 65 Fantazy Cards

__________The New York Mets 1964 Team Leaders_____________



Joe Christopher had a very excellent Cleon Jonesy kinda year at the plate in '64.
.300 Average, 161 hits, 16 KaBOOMS and 76 ribbys. Thats sweet.

And I didn't know til recently that Charlie Smith launched 20 longballs to lead the team. He had 106 hits in '64 and 20 of them were homers. I thought WOW! and then I saw he also struck out 101 times. YOUCH!

1964 Met Fantazy Cards: Thomas/Stengel/Smith/Coleman

Figures the picture captures Bobby making an error.

Yep, that's the Petener.

Fantazy 1964 Frank Thomas card^

Frank Thomas-the Mets first bona fide slugger. Clubbed 34 home runs in their inaugural year of 1962. As a matter of fact, he set almost every Met offensive record in '62 and many of them were not topped for years. He led in games (156), at bats (571), runs (69), hits (152),doubles (23), home runs (34) and runs batted in (94). Franks 94 R.B.I. stood as a team record until 1970 when Donn Clendenon drove in 97, and his 34 bombs wasn't topped until Dave Kingman smacked 36 in 1975.
He had a great season. In 1963 he dropped down to 15 long balls and I guess Mets President George Weiss figured we could win 40 odd games without you Mr. Thomas, and he was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies for Wayne Graham, Gary Kroll (aka Mister Spock) and cash.

No wonder he hit so many homers. He swung like 20 bats!


He had played quite a bit of baseball before he became a Met. Frank debuted with the Pirates in 1951. In a 16-season career, Thomas posted a .266 batting average with 286 home runs and 962 RBIs in 1766 games. Read about him.
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Fantazy 1964 Casey Stengel card^

I love the '64 Topps Stengel, which I've posted, but when I saw this photo of Casey I had to colorize and use it, and it fits that '64 border the best.


Instead of lounging on the dugout steps as he entertained the press (which he was very good at) the ol' professor is standing proudly on the steps lecturing whoever would listen (which he was also very good at). That's the way I want to remember Casey.
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These additional Stengel's were created for some more recent posts and were added here.

Fantazy 1964 Charlie Smith card^

Charlie Smith had a dreadful start to his Met career going 0 for 25 before getting a hit. He played mostly third, with some games at short and a few in the outfield. He ended up with 20 home runs in '64, leading the team. But he only batted .239 while driving in 58. He hit 16 round trippers in 1965 while driving in a team leading 62 RBI. Unfortunately he struck out 123 times. After the '65 season he and Al Jackson were shuffled off to St. Louis for third baseman Ken Boyer.
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Fantazy 1964 Choo Choo Coleman card^

All I know about Choo Choo Coleman was that when I started collecting old Met baseball cards in the eighties I had to spend fiddy bucks for his high-number 1966 Topps card. 

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For the '64 set I really dug how Topps had the top portion of the player, usually the hat, go out onto the border/team name area. Sometimes Topps was ahead of its time. Sometimes behind. I think with this set they were right with the times. IMO this is the best looking Met card border design of the decade, a graphic embodiment of the sixties.

I'm sure that the use of the 64/65 Worlds Fair blue & orange colors on the Met cards is a big factor in my thinking.

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The 1964 Fantazy JFK cards:

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SHEA STADIUM

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