Tom Seaver, heart and mighty arm of Miracle Mets, dies at 75

NEW YORK — Tom Seaver, the gal­va­niz­ing leader of the Mir­a­cle Mets 1969 cham­pi­onship team and a pitch­er who per­son­i­fied the rise of expan­sion teams dur­ing an era of rad­i­cal change for base­ball, has died. He was 75.

The Hall of Fame said Wednes­day night that Seaver died Mon­day from com­pli­ca­tions of Lewy body demen­tia and COVID-19. Seaver spent his final years in Cal­is­to­ga, California.

Seaver’s fam­i­ly announced in March 2019 he had been diag­nosed with demen­tia and had retired from pub­lic life.

He con­tin­ued work­ing at Seaver Vine­yards, found­ed by the three-time NL Cy Young Award win­ner and his wife, Nan­cy, in 2002 on 116 acres at Dia­mond Moun­tain in the Cal­is­to­ga region of North­ern California.

Seaver was diag­nosed with Lyme dis­ease in 1991, and it reoc­curred in 2012 and led to Bell’s Pal­sy and mem­o­ry loss, the Dai­ly News of New York report­ed in 2013.

“He will always be the heart and soul of the Mets, the stan­dard which all Mets aspire to,” Mike Piaz­za, a for­mer Mets catch­er and Hall of Famer, tweet­ed when Seaver’s demen­tia diag­no­sis was announced.

Nick­named Tom Ter­rif­ic and The Fran­chise, Seaver was a five-time 20-game win­ner and the 1967 NL Rook­ie of the Year. For his career, from 1967–86, he had a 311–205 record with a 2.86 ERA, 3,640 strike­outs and 61 shutouts. He became a con­stant on mag­a­zine cov­ers and a media pres­ence, call­ing post­sea­son games on NBC and ABC even while still an active player.

He was elect­ed to the Hall of Fame in 1992 when he appeared on 425 of 430 bal­lots for a then-record 98.84%. His mark was sur­passed in 2016 by Ken Grif­fey Jr., again in 2019 when Mar­i­ano Rivera became the first unan­i­mous selec­tion by base­ball writ­ers, and in 2020 when Derek Jeter fell one vote short of a clean sweep.

His plaque in Coop­er­stown lauds him as a “pow­er pitch­er who helped change the New York Mets from lov­able losers into for­mi­da­ble foes.” He changed not only their place in the stand­ings but the team’s stature in people’s minds.

Seaver pitched for the Mets from 1967 until 1977, when he was trad­ed to Cincin­nati after a pub­lic spat with chair­man M. Don­ald Grant over Seaver’s desire for a new con­tract. It was a clash that inflamed base­ball fans in New York.

“My biggest dis­ap­point­ment? Leav­ing the Mets the first time and the dif­fi­cul­ties I had with the same peo­ple that led up to it,” Seaver told The Asso­ci­at­ed Press ahead of his Hall induc­tion in 1992. “But I look back at it in a pos­i­tive way now. It gave me the oppor­tu­ni­ty to work in dif­fer­ent areas of the country.”

He threw his only no-hit­ter for the Reds in June 1978 against St. Louis and was trad­ed back to New York after the 1982 sea­son. But Mets gen­er­al man­ag­er Frank Cashen blun­dered by leav­ing Seaver off his list of 26 pro­tect­ed play­ers, and in Jan­u­ary 1984 he was claimed by the Chica­go White Sox as free agent com­pen­sa­tion for los­ing pitch­er Den­nis Lamp to Toronto.

While pitch­ing for the White Sox, Seaver got his 300th win at Yan­kee Sta­di­um and did it in style with a six-hit­ter in a 4–1 vic­to­ry. He fin­ished his career with the 1986 Boston Red Sox team that lost to the Mets in the World Series.

Supreme­ly con­fi­dent — and not nec­es­sar­i­ly mod­est about his extra­or­di­nary acu­men on the mound — Seaver was a 12-time All-Star who led the major leagues with a 25–7 record in 1969 and a 1.76 ERA in 1971. A clas­sic pow­er pitch­er with a drop-and-dri­ve deliv­ery that often dirt­ied the right knee of his uni­form pants, he won Cy Young Awards with New York in 1969, 1973 and 1975. The club retired his No. 41 in 1988, the first Mets play­er giv­en the honor.

“From a team stand­point, win­ning the ’69 world cham­pi­onship is some­thing I’ll remem­ber most,” Seaver said in 1992. “From an indi­vid­ual stand­point, my 300th win brought me the most joy.”

Seaver lim­it­ed his pub­lic appear­ances in recent years. He did not attend the Base­ball Writ­ers’ Asso­ci­a­tion of Amer­i­ca din­ner in 2019, where mem­bers of the 1969 Mets were hon­ored on the 50th anniver­sary of what still ranks among baseball’s most unex­pect­ed championships.

Five months lat­er, as part of a cel­e­bra­tion of that team, the Mets announced plans for a stat­ue of Seaver out­side Citi Field, and the ballpark’s address was offi­cial­ly changed to 41 Seaver Way in a nod to his uni­form number.

Seaver did not attend those cer­e­monies, either, but daugh­ter Sarah Seaver did and said her par­ents were honored.

“This is so very appro­pri­ate because he made the New York Mets the team that it is,” said Ron Swo­bo­da, the right field­er whose sprawl­ing catch helped Seaver pitch the Mets to a 10-inning win in Game 4 of the ’69 Series. “He gave them credibility.”

When the Mets closed their pre­vi­ous home, Shea Sta­di­um, on the final day of the 2008 reg­u­lar sea­son, Seaver put the fin­ish­ing touch­es on the nos­tal­gic cer­e­monies with a last pitch to Piaz­za, and the two walked off togeth­er wav­ing good­bye to fans.

George Thomas Seaver was born in Fres­no, Cal­i­for­nia, on Nov. 17, 1944, a son of Charles Seaver, a top ama­teur golfer who won both his match­es for the U.S. over Britain at the 1932 Walk­er Cup.

Tom Seaver was a star at the Uni­ver­si­ty of South­ern Cal­i­for­nia and was draft­ed by Atlanta in 1966. He signed with the Braves for $51,500 only for Com­mis­sion­er William Eck­ert to void the deal. The Tro­jans already had played exhi­bi­tion games that year, and base­ball rules at the time pro­hib­it­ed a club from sign­ing a col­lege play­er whose sea­son had start­ed. Any team will­ing to match the Braves’ sign­ing bonus could enter a lot­tery, and Eck­ert picked the Mets out of a hat that also includ­ed Cleve­land and Philadelphia.

Among baseball’s worst teams from their expan­sion sea­son in 1962, the Mets lost more than 100 games in five of their first six sea­sons and had nev­er won more than 73 in any of their first sev­en years. With cher­ished Brook­lyn Dodgers star Gil Hodges as their man­ag­er, a young corps of pitch­ers led by Seaver, Jer­ry Koos­man, Gary Gen­try and a still-wild Nolan Ryan, and an offense that includ­ed Cleon Jones and Tom­mie Agee, the Mets over­took the Chica­go Cubs to win the NL East with a 100–62 record in 1969.

They swept Hank Aaron and the Atlanta Braves in the first NL Cham­pi­onship Series to reach the World Series against high­ly favored Bal­ti­more, which had gone 109–53. Seaver lost the open­er 4–1 in a matchup with Mike Cuel­lar, then pitched a 10-inning six-hit­ter to win Game 4, and the Mets won the title the fol­low­ing afternoon.

Per­haps his most mem­o­rable moment on the mound was at Shea Sta­di­um on July 9, 1969, when he retired his first 25 bat­ters against the Chica­go Cubs. Pinch-hit­ter Jim­my Qualls looped a one-out sin­gle to left-cen­ter in the ninth inning before Seaver retired Willie Smith on a foulout and Don Kessinger on a flyout.

“I had every hit­ter doing what I want­ed,” Seaver recalled in 1992. “After­ward, my wife was in tears and I remem­ber say­ing to her: ‘Hey, I pitched a one-hit shutout with 10 strike­outs. What more could I ask for?’”

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