One Season Wonders: Lance Johnson

The 1995 Mets were only two years removed from the team's first 100-loss season since 1967.  But they were one of the surprise teams in the National League, finishing in a second-place tie in the NL East with a 69-75 record in the strike-shortened season.  The future looked bright for the Mets, especially with Generation K, their highly touted trio of homegrown pitchers, about to make a splash.

However, one thing was missing for the Mets going into the 1996 season.  In 1995, the Mets traded their leadoff hitter, Brett Butler, to the Los Angeles Dodgers during the stretch run.  That left the Mets with a musical chairs situation in the leadoff spot, with Damon Buford, Joe Orsulak and Alex Ochoa trying to be the last person to sit on the leadoff seat.

Neither Buford, Orsulak or Ochoa figured to be the team's leadoff hitter in 1996, especially with general manager Joe McIlvane openly shopping for one.  Two months after the conclusion of the 1995 season, the Mets found their man in Chicago.  And he provided the team with the best season a leadoff hitter had ever produced to date.

"Leading off and playing center field, No. 1, Mook -- correction -- Lance Johnson!"

Kenneth Lance Johnson was not a young player when the Mets signed him.  At 32, he was entering a time in his life when speedsters tend to lose a step or two.  But the Mets decided to take a chance on Johnson after he had reached career highs in at-bats (607), hits (186), runs scored (98), home runs (10) and RBI (57), while batting .306 with 12 triples and 40 stolen bases in his final year with the White Sox.

Despite the fact that the Texas Rangers offered Johnson a three-year deal with a fourth-year option, guaranteeing him $8.35 million, the centerfielder chose to take his talents eastward, signing with the Mets for two years and $5.7 million.  Johnson settled on the Mets after talking to Bobby Bonilla, Daryl Boston and Mookie Wilson, all former Mets and good friends.

The Mets now had their leadoff hitter in place, but Johnson was a centerfielder.  Their Opening Day starter from the previous year, Brett Butler, had been the team's leftfielder.  That was also the position played by Damon Buford and Joe Orsulak.  One month after the Mets acquired Johnson, they orchestrated a trade for leftfielder Bernard Gilkey.

With the outfield set, the addition of a defensive wunderkind at short in Rey Ordoñez, and Generation K on the way, the Mets were ready to take the 1996 season by storm.  They didn't wait very long to make a positive impression on the fans, and Lance Johnson had a lot to do with it.

On April 1, before a packed house at Shea Stadium, the season opened ominously for the Mets, who fell behind early to the Cardinals by six runs.  But the Mets began to chip away at the lead and by the seventh inning, the Cardinals' lead had been halved.  After an exciting conclusion to the top of the seventh, where a perfect relay from Gilkey to Ordoñez helped nail Royce Clayton at the plate to keep the score 6-3, the Mets rallied for four runs in the bottom of the inning.  Smack dab in the middle of the rally was Lance Johnson.  The Mets' new centerfielder used his speed to generate a run, plating Ordoñez with an infield hit, then scored the go-ahead run on a sacrifice fly by Rico Brogna.  Johnson's run proved to be the difference in the 7-6 Mets' victory.

Although Johnson helped contribute to the Mets' Opening Day victory, he didn't start the season very well.  One month after the season opener, Johnson had a decent batting average (.272), but was only reaching base at a .286 clip, drawing three walks in the season's first month.  The Mets expected more from their leadoff hitter, and beginning with the second game of a doubleheader against the Montreal Expos on May 1, Johnson gave the Mets exactly what they wanted and more.

Photo by David G. Whitham

Over a six-game stretch from May 1 to May 7, Johnson batted .500 (14-for-28), scoring five runs and driving in another.  He also collected his seventh triple of the season, after hitting six in the season's first month.  The season was barely a month old and Johnson was already only three triples short of Mookie Wilson's single-season franchise record for three-base hits.  Before the season was half over, that record would be history.

On June 16, Johnson picked up his 11th triple of the season against the St. Louis Cardinals, breaking Mookie Wilson's club record that he set in 1984.  For Johnson, the moment was extra-special because it was the Cardinals who originally drafted him in 1984 before trading him to the White Sox just months after he played for St. Louis in the 1987 World Series.

By the All-Star Break, Johnson was already having an historic season for the Mets.  Through his first 87 games, One-Dog (as he was affectionately referred to by his teammates) was hitting .322 with 16 doubles, 13 triples and five home runs.  He also had 40 RBI out of the leadoff spot, which was an unusually high number for a No. 1 hitter.  What was not unusual for a leadoff hitter was his 65 runs scored and 28 stolen bases.

For his efforts, Johnson was selected to his first All-Star team, joining catcher Todd Hundley to become the first Mets' teammates in five years to represent the club in the Midsummer Classic.  Due to an injury to Padres' outfielder Tony Gwynn, Johnson started the All-Star Game and surprised everyone by playing the entire game, going 3-for-4 with two singles, a double, a run scored and a stolen base in the 6-0 National League victory.

Johnson continued to hit after the All-Star Break.  In his first 32 games after the break, Johnson had 12 multi-hit games and stole 14 bases.  However, the team, who had remained within a few games of the .500 mark for most of the season, was starting to feel the dog days of August, especially the young pitching staff.  Generation K had become Generation K.O., as Jason Isringhausen's ERA was climbing near 5.00 and Paul Wilson's ERA had already gone north of that mark.

By August 18, the Mets had fallen 20 games behind the first-place Braves.  One week later, manager Dallas Green was gone, replaced by Bobby Valentine.  Despite the poor play on the field and the upheaval in the clubhouse, Lance Johnson continued to shine.

Beginning with his 2-for-4 performance on August 14, Johnson hit .399 over the team's final 41 games.  In addition, the centerfielder scored 35 runs and drove in 20 more during the final quarter of the season.  Mostly everyone else wilted in the summer heat (save for Gilkey and Hundley), but Johnson just got better.  Despite not being a big on-base percentage player or a slugger, Johnson had an impressive 1.004 OPS over the last month and a half of the season, reaching base at a .426 clip and producing a .578 slugging percentage (13 doubles, six triples, two home runs in 173 at-bats).  The Mets finished the season with a disappointing 71-91 record, but Johnson's season was anything but disappointing.

For the season, Lance Johnson hit .333.  At the time, it was the second-highest batting average in team history (Cleon Jones hit .340 in 1969).  Johnson also became the second Met to play in 160 games (Felix Millan played 162 games in 1975) and the second to reach the 50-steal plateau (Mookie Wilson stole 58 bases in 1982 and 54 bases in 1983).  But there were a number of offensive categories in which Johnson was second to none.

In 1996, Johnson set the Mets' single-season record for at-bats (682), runs scored (117), hits (227), total bases (327), multi-hit games (75), singles (166) and triples (21).  He also had the rare distinction of having more stolen bases (50) than strikeouts (40).  To this day, Johnson still holds the single-season franchise records for hits, multi-hit games, singles and triples.

Following Johnson's record-setting campaign, the Mets rewarded him with a two-year contract extension worth $10 million, keeping him under the team's control until 1999.  But Johnson was also a year older, and a year closer to breaking down.  The 33-year-old Johnson started the 1997 season where he left off in 1996, hitting .309 with five stolen bases over the Mets' first 13 games.  But shin splints knocked Johnson out of the lineup on May 1 and he missed six weeks of action, returning to the Mets just in time to see Dave Mlicki shut out the Yankees in the first regular season Subway Series game on June 16.

By early August, Johnson was still hitting above .300, but he was hitting mostly singles.  His 17 extra-base hits (ten doubles, six triples, one home run) were a far cry from his 1996 production, when he finished the year with 61 extra-base hits.  Johnson also wasn't running as much, stealing 15 bases in 25 attempts.  His 60% success rate was well below his 77% career rate.  Despite Johnson's regression, the Mets were overachieving and competing in the National League wild card race.  However, the team was leading the league in blown saves and needed to improve their bullpen if they wanted to have a realistic shot at making the playoffs.

On August 8, the Mets made a deal to improve their bullpen, but the cost was steep, as they had to part ways with Lance Johnson.  In a six-player deal with the Chicago Cubs, the Mets sent Johnson, starting pitcher Mark Clark and backup shortstop Manny Alexander to the Windy City for centerfielder Brian McRae, closer Mel Rojas and set-up man Turk Wendell.  Although McRae went on to record a 20-20 season with the Mets in 1998 (21 HR, 20 SB), he never quite replaced Lance Johnson in center.  Meanwhile, Mel Rojas went on to become one of the most hated relievers in Mets' history.  However, Turk Wendell became one of the most successful middle relievers in team history, and was a key player in the Mets' postseason runs in 1999 and 2000.

The injuries that sidelined Johnson during the 1997 season continued to keep him off the field for extended periods of time over the next three years.  As a member of the Cubs in 1998 and 1999, Johnson missed a total of 145 games.  He then played 18 games for the Yankees in 2000 before being released on June 6, just four months before he would have gotten the chance to play against the Mets in the World Series.  Although Johnson was only 36 years old, he would never play in the major leagues again.

Although his career was cut short by injuries, Lance Johnson still had plenty to smile about.

Lance Johnson became an everyday player in 1990 as a member of the Chicago White Sox.  Over the next six seasons, he was one of the best leadoff hitters in the game not named Rickey Henderson, batting .289 and averaging 12 triples and 34 stolen bases per year from 1990 to 1995.  Then he became a Met in 1996 and obliterated his six-year averages.  But injuries and a subsequent trade in 1997 curtailed his career, ending it at a relatively young age.

The Mets did not play well as a team in 1996, finishing 20 games below .500.  But Lance Johnson did all he could to make the season a memorable one for Mets fans.  Mookie Wilson captured the fans' hearts with his speed and smile in the 1980s.  Two decades later, Jose Reyes did the same.  The Mets did not have many players like that in the 1990s, but for one season, they did.

Lance Johnson was Mookie Wilson after the fan-favorite retired and he was Jose Reyes before anyone knew who Reyes was.  But without his one magnificent season in 1996, perhaps no Mets fan would have known who Lance Johnson was.  It's amazin' what one wonderful season can do to a player.


Note: One Season Wonders is a thirteen-part weekly series spotlighting those Mets who had one and only one memorable season in New York.  For previous installments, please click on the players' names below:
 
January 2, 2012: Bernard Gilkey
January 9, 2012: Terry Leach 
January 16, 2012: George Stone
January 23, 2012: Roger Cedeño
January 30, 2012: Frank Viola
February 6, 2012: Joe Christopher 
February 13, 2012: Dave Magadan 
February 20, 2012: Pedro Martinez
February 27, 2012: Bret Saberhagen 
March 5, 2012: Robin Ventura 
March 12, 2012: Willie Montañez

Joey's Soapbox: Las Vegas Gives The Mets No Respect

Last night, I wrote a special Valentine's Day piece on why I love the Mets.  Apparently, Las Vegas oddsmakers don't feel the same love.  Allow me to explain.

This morning, as I was reading the morning paper in bed (see photo below), I was pawing my way through the sports section when I happened upon America's Line, the section where the point spreads and odds are listed.

In addition to the lines for tonight's games, the 2012 World Series odds were also listed for each team.  Now I'm a realist, so just as I don't expect Jason Bay to become the second consecutive Mets' batting champion or Mike Pelfrey to toss the team's first no-hitter, I also didn't expect the Mets to be near the top of the World Series odds list.

I saw the safe bets on top (Phillies, Yankees, Angels, Rangers) and was surprised to see that six of the top seven teams called the American League home, despite the fact that the NL has won four of the last six Fall Classics.  But the one thing I didn't see was the Mets.

I finally did find them, but not until I saw the names of the 23 teams ahead of them.

That's right.  That bold-faced name you see near the bottom of the list is our beloved team.  Now the thing that upsets me is not that at 80-1 odds, the Mets rank 24th out of 30 teams.  It's far more than that.

First, the only National League teams with longer odds than the Mets to win the World Series are the Pittsburgh Pirates, San Diego Padres and Houston Astros.  The Pirates hold the all-time record in sports for most consecutive losing seasons, with 19.  The Padres have finished higher than third place in the NL West only seven times in their 43 years of existence.  And the Astros are coming off their worst season (56-106) in franchise history.

Second, the other teams in the NL East not only have more favorable odds to win the World Series, they're far more favorable.  The Phillies (4-1 odds) are no surprise here.  The Braves (20-1 odds) came within one choke job of repeating as wild card winners in 2011.  The Marlins (also 20-1) apparently still had money left over after fattening the wallets of Jose Reyes, Heath Bell and Mark Buehrle, giving some of it to the Las Vegas oddsmakers to "earn" their high ranking.  And the Washington Nationals, a team that is still seeking its first winning season since saying au revoir to Montreal, is at 25-1.  Somewhere in the next time zone, you'll find the Mets at 80-1.  No respect.

But if you think the Washington Nationals ranking so much higher than the Mets is the ultimate lack of respect, you've got another "think" coming.

The Kansas City Royals, whose sole finish above third place over the past 22 seasons came in 1995, when they finished four games UNDER .500, rank higher the Mets.  But the one team that caught my eye is ranked even higher than the Royals.  That team is the Chicago Cubs.  The same Chicago Cubs team that hasn't won a World Series since 1908, the year Jamie Moyer was just getting the courage to ask his sweetheart to the prom.  At 35-1 odds, the oddsmakers believe the Cubs are more than twice as likely to win the World Series than the Mets.

The Mets haven't won the World Series since 1986, the same year a film called Back To School was released.  Perhaps you might remember it.  It starred an actor/comedian who knew a thing or two about not getting any respect.

 I respect a man who proudly wears the Mets' racing pinstripes.

Rodney Dangerfield made a living on not getting respect.  Now it looks as if the Mets are following in his footsteps.  In Back To School, Dangerfield's character comforted his son, who had just told him about his C average, by saying "A, B, C, you're in the top three, what's the difference?"

For the Mets, there is a difference.  They can forget about the top three.  They're not even in the top TWENTY-three, as far as World Series odds are concerned.

As everyone knows, the games are played on the field, not on paper.  It's too bad my paper felt the need to play a game with me.  I'm telling you, the Mets just get no respect.  Even Rodney Dangerfield would feel sorry for us.

Miami Unsound Machine: Carlos Zambrano Is A Marlin

The Miami Marlins are at it again.  Earlier today, the Marlins traded starting pitcher Chris Volstad to the Chicago Cubs for the human geyser, Carlos Zambrano.  Zambrano will etch his name on the long list of new players who will be calling South Beach home until the Marlins conduct their latest fire sale.

Chicago will eat $15.5 million of Zambrano's salary in 2012, leaving the Marlins to foot the bill for the remaining $2.5 million.  The Marlins needed the Cubs to take on most of his salary so they can use the savings to make repairs to all parts of their new stadium that Zambrano will eventually destroy after his first meltdown.

At first glance, it appears to be a good deal for the Marlins.  They were able to unload Chris Volstad, who was 5-13 for the team formerly known as Florida in 2011.  It was a disappointing season for Volstad, especially on the heels of a 12-9 season in 2010.  The 25-year-old has been in the major leagues since 2008 but has never pitched more than 175 innings in a season.  The same cannot be said for Zambrano.

Carlos Zambrano has had a winning record in each of the last nine seasons, going 120-71 (.628 winning percentage) since 2003.  Over those nine seasons, El Toro has averaged 190 innings pitched per year, surpassing 200 innings five times.  In 2011, Zambrano only pitched 145.2 innings, but that was mostly due to the fact that the Cubs suspended him for the final month of the season.

So why will this deal fall apart for Miami?  Because Carlos Zambrano makes Dennis Rodman look sane.

Other than fellow new acquisition Mark Buehrle, most of the Marlins' pitching staff is young and easily impressionable.  Is Carlos Zambrano going to be a mentor or just mental to them?  Do the Marlins have a long reliever for the games in which Zambrano loses his control on the mound (Big Z has led the league in walks twice and hit batsmen once) and then loses his control in the dugout (he famously confronted several of his teammates there in 2010)?

Also, who's going to replace Jose Reyes in the lineup when Zambrano blindly throws a Gatorade cooler in a fit of anger and hits the former Met in his fragile hamstrings?  Zambrano may be good friends with his new manager (fellow Venezuelan Ozzie Guillen), but can the Marlins handle making excuses for both of them when they lose their cool?

 Carlos Zambrano shows off his best smile for the camera.

Theo Epstein made a great deal today for the Cubs, ridding the team of its clubhouse cancer by finding the one club who was willing to take him off their hands.  The Marlins are signing and trading for anyone with a pulse right now and when Zambrano gets steamed, no one has a higher pulse rate.

Perhaps Zambrano will be a perfect fit in Miami (doubt it).  Perhaps this deal will even help the Mets in the long run.  After all, Volstad is now out of the NL East after posting a 3.35 ERA in eight career starts against the Mets, while having an ERA over 4.00 against every other team he's made a minimum of five starts against.

Miami already has volatile weather practically every afternoon during the summer.  Now they'll be experiencing a different kind of storm every fifth day when Carlos Zambrano takes the mound.  Hide your kids, hide your $106 million shortstop, because Carlos Zambrano is taking out everybody who gets in his way.  Let the countdown begin to his first Miami meltdown.

You Call This A Rivalry?

New York and Philadelphia are separated by less than 100 miles, making the Phillies the closest geographical rivals to the Mets in the National League. However, upon further inspection of the NL East standings over the past half-century, "rivals" might not be the correct word to use.

Since the Mets came into existence in 1962, both the Phillies and the Mets have finished with a winning record in the same season a mere eight times.

• 1975: Phillies (86-76, 2nd place); Mets (82-80, 3rd place)
• 1976: Phillies (101-61, 1st place); Mets (86-76, 3rd place)
• 1986: Mets (108-54, 1st place); Phillies (86-75, 2nd place)
• 2001: Phillies (86-76, 2nd place); Mets (82-80, 3rd place)
• 2005: Phillies (88-74, 2nd place); Mets (83-79, 3rd place)
• 2006: Mets (97-65, 1st place); Phillies (85-77, 2nd place)
• 2007: Phillies (89-73, 1st place); Mets (88-74, 2nd place)
• 2008: Phillies (92-70, 1st place); Mets (89-73, 2nd place)

Meanwhile, over the same time period, other well-known traditional rivals have had much more of a rivalry. Since 1962, the Red Sox and Yankees have both finished with winning records in the same season 30 times, including each of the last 13 seasons. The Dodgers and Giants have both been above .500 in the same season 22 times since 1962. Even the Cubs and Cardinals have both finished with winning records in the same season 14 times in the past half-century, which is remarkable considering that the Cubs have only had 18 winning seasons overall since 1962.

Prior to 2007, the Mets and Phillies never had a bonafide rivalry. Although the two teams finished in first and second place in the NL East in both 1986 and 2006, the Mets won the division handily each time. Not until the back-to-back collapses suffered by the Mets in 2007 and 2008 did the teams play for a division title. Unfortunately, those two seasons were the only two in which the Mets and Phillies had a legitimate rivalry in the standings, as the Phillies continued winning in 2009 and 2010, while the Mets forgot how to do so.

Therefore, although it is very early in the season, when the 3-1 Mets take on the 3-1 Phillies tonight at Citizens Bank Park, it will mark one of the few times over the past half-century that both teams have been in the top two positions in the NL East as they played each other.

It may be silly to say that tonight's game is a battle for first place, but why not say it? After all, battles for division supremacy between the Mets and the Phillies have been about as rare as the Cubs winning the World Series. But at least the Cubs have more of a rivalry with another divisional foe.

Enjoy seeing tonight's first place showdown between the Mets and the Phillies while you can. It might be the only time we can say that this season.

Are Mets Fans Loyal To Their Team? One Survey Says No!

The Mets were a mediocre team in 2010, finishing the season with a 79-83 record. That mark was the 20th best in baseball (or the 11th worst, if you're standing on your head while looking at the standings). That was a nine-game improvement over the dismal 2009 season, when injuries turned the Mets into Johan Santana and the Four Rainouts, but the improvement in the win column was still not good enough to put the fannies in the seats.

It's true that Mets fans did not turn out in droves for the 2010 season, but does that make us any less loyal than other teams' fans? Apparently so, according to a recently conducted survey by Brand Keys, Inc.

Does this look like a fan base that isn't loyal to their team?

The Mets ranked 23rd out of 30 Major League Baseball teams in fan loyalty. The two teams Mets fans love to hate, the Phillies and the Yankees, finished first and second in fan loyalty, respectively. Finishing third in the survey were the Boston Red Sox, while the San Francisco Giants, who won the 2010 World Series, finished fourth.

I have two issues with this poll, and they're actually not about the Mets. First, how are the Phillies No. 1 on this list? Sure, they attract fans now, but where were these fans prior to the 2007 season?

In 2006, the Phillies did well, finishing only three games behind the Los Angeles Dodgers for the NL wild card berth. Even with the team battling for a playoff spot, their attendance at Citizens Bank Park for the year was only 2,701,815. They ranked seventh in the NL in home attendance, just slightly ahead of the small market San Diego Padres. Once the Phillies started winning division titles in 2007, it became "cool" to go to a Phillies game again in Philadelphia. To me, loyalty is about sticking with your team through thick and thin. Phillies fans love their team when they're in the "thick" of things, but will find something else to do when the team is a little "thin". This brings me to my second issue with the survey.

How are the Cardinals and Cubs not in the top five? For years, we've heard players say that the fans are what make them love playing in St. Louis. The Cardinals fans who were there when they won the World Series in 2006 (home attendance of 3,407,104) were also there in 1997 (home attendance of 3,225,334), when they finished with a 73-89 record and Mark McGwire played most of the season in Oakland. St. Louis perennially draws over 3 million fans through its gates because the fans are LOYAL to their team, regardless of where they are in the standings.

Similarly, the Cubs, a team which has a history of being at the bottom of the standings, also has fans who define team loyalty. The Cubs haven't won a World Series since 1908 and haven't won a National League pennant since 1945, but they still draw over 3 million fans annually. (In 2010, Chicago finished with a 75-87 record, but still drew 3,062,973 fans to Wrigley Field.) They do this despite having one of the smallest seating capacities in the National League.

Only seven teams in baseball supposedly have less loyal fans than the Mets. But for the past decade, the Mets have been among the league leaders in home attendance. So in 2010, attendance at Citi Field dropped by about half a million. Does that place Mets fans among the least loyal in baseball?

Loyalty is not all about selling out every game. It's about being supportive of your team, win or lose. Phillies fans support their team when they're better than the Mets. Where will they be when the Mets surpass them in the standings, whenever that is? Cardinals and Cubs fans have more loyalty in their big toes than Phillies fans will ever have. Let's see what the survey looks like once the Phillies start to decline. Of course, when that day comes, it'll be tough to find a Phillies fan to poll.