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A Valued Draft Pick: Gil Hodges
The Mets selected Dodgers star Gil Hodges with the 14th pick of the 1961 expansion draft. When he signed his new deal Hodges said, “I hope by a lot of hard work in spring training and regular play dur ...
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A Vote of Confidence From the Mayor
The day before the first-ever Mets home game, New York City Mayor Robert Wagner led a celebration of the city’s newest baseball club.
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Adding Roger Craig to the Mets Roster
With their sixth pick in the expansion draft, the Mets brought in former Brooklyn Dodgers World Series hero Roger Craig. “I knew I would be on the list for the new clubs and I was happy about it,” sai ...
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Bob Murphy Mets Hall of Fame Bust
For a half century, Bob Murphy was the voice of the Mets. His announcing career began with the team’s first game in 1962 and continued until his retirement in 2003, which included two World Series tit ...
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Casey’s Threads
Hall of Fame manager Casey Stengel wore this jersey in the first Mets game, a cool and wet night in St. Louis as New York fell to Cardinals, 11-4. It was a short road trip as the Mets only played one ...
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Ed Kranepool Mets Hall of Fame Bust
Ed Kranepool’s MLB career began in 1962, the same year the Mets first took the field. The Mets called up the 17-year-old to help a struggling team, and Kranepool stayed with the franchise through good ...
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Ed Kranepool: Joining the New York Mets
Although he grew up a New York Yankees fan, Ed Kranepool explains his decision to sign with the Mets on June 27, 1962 and his first experience in a Major League dugout three days later at Dodger Stadi ...
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Expansion Baseball: Mets 1962
On September 8, 1962, the Mets played their fellow expansion-class cousins, the Houston Colt .45s (now known as the Astros) in a Texas-sized doubleheader showdown. The Mets dropped a heartbreaker in t ...
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First of Many
More than 1,600 days passed between September 29, 1957, when the New York Giants hosted the Pittsburgh Pirates at the Polo Grounds, and April 13, 1962, when the Mets hosted the Pirates on the same fie ...
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George Weiss Mets Hall of Fame Bust
When New York City was granted a National League franchise for the 1962 season, the expansion club named former New York Yankees GM George Weiss as president. Weiss persevered through the initial grow ...