Few events in my life outside of family life and friendships and personal successes and faillures have created an imprint as great as the sweet stretch of fall in 1969. Those New York Mets, managed by the mensch Gil Hodges and powered by the arms of Seaver and Koosman, stamped baseball on my wordly existence forever. The team was special; it had to be, for outside of world-class starting pitching and decent defense, it was an underpowered squad, even in a pitching-dominated era. A few years ago, we lost one of the key members of that team when Tommie Agee collapsed outside his office near Grand Central Terminal and died of a heart attack. Today, we mourn quite possibly the greatest mid-season acquisition in Mets history - the big first-baseman Donn Clendenon, the most valuable player of that '69 World Series against Frank Robinson's Orioles. Clendenon came over from the Pirates, a veteran player with power, a strong right-handed bat, and he hammered 12 homers in half a season with the Mets, key blows during their big, surprising run. Often, he hit clean-up, right behind Cleon Jones. In the series, had had 5 hits in 14 at-bats for a .357 batting average, 4 runs batted in and 4 runs scored. His three home runs and 15 total bases set records for a five-game World Series. Life after baseball was up and down: he became a lawyer and worked for several firms, but became addicted to cocaine at age 50. He beat the addiction, moved to South Dakota, and practiced law quietly. He battled leukemia for the last decade. (Mike Lupica's column in today's News is worth reading). After winning the Series MVP, Clendenon's quote was telling: "there is no most valuable player on this team - we've got lots of them."
