Met's 2016 Season thread
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jerseyshorejohnny
Well-known member
How Drugs and Alcohol Fueled the 1986 Mets to a Championship
In his new book, former pitcher Ron Darling recounts how the Mets relied on a cocktail of amphetamines and beer between innings to get through a World Series-winning season
By RON DARLING
April 4, 2016 / Wall Street Journal
Thirty years after their dramatic World Series title, the 1986 New York Mets remain a study in how to make winning ugly look good. After dominating the National League with a 108-54 record, the combustible roster of mismatched personalities clawed its way to the World Series and stunned the Boston Red Sox, erasing a 3-0 deficit in Game 7 to win the franchise’s second championship. The Mets’ starter that night was Ron Darling, and as he recounts in his forthcoming book, “Game 7, 1986: Failure and Triumph in the Biggest Game of My Life” (St. Martin’s Press), the three runs he allowed have tormented him ever since. He also offers insights into a team remembered as much for its pharmaceutical pursuits as its starting rotation. In the following excerpt, Darling describes how the Mets’ in-game use of amphetamines and alcohol fueled their run through a grueling season.
When I first came up, there was a jar of pills that was kept in a prominent place—prominent, that is, if you knew where to look for it. It was called the jar because, come on, baseball players weren’t the most creative bunch. It became part of our language, our shorthand. If someone was scrambling, trying to mask an ache or a pain, or maybe to recover from an injury, he’d say, “I’m in the jar today.”
Each pill had its own name. The five-milligram amphetamines were known as white crosses—and these were passed around like candy, if that was your bag. The heavier doses were black beauties. Remember, this was well before the common use of steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs; in many ways, you could make an argument that the drugs of choice in our clubhouse were more performance reducing than anything else. But most starting pitchers were loath to mess with any chemicals that might mess with their mind-set—anyway, I was. You’ve got all that time between starts, the last thing you want is to be anxious and on the edge for four days; if anything, you want something to take the edge off.
Still, the jar was very much in evidence, very much a part of our team “chemistry,” even though the jar itself had disappeared by the 1986 season. We continued to use the same language, though, so you could still hear the terminology on the team plane and in the clubhouse, but the pill-taking became much more secretive. You either understood the euphemism—or you didn’t, because it didn’t apply. It was no longer out in the open. The talk went underground, but even there you’d continue to hear comments like, “Hey, I did a couple of white crosses but that didn’t do it so I threw a black beauty on top and it was perfect.” You’d see guys toward the end of a game, maybe getting ready for their final at bat, double-back into the locker room to chug a beer to “re-kick the bean” so they could step to the plate completely wired and focused and dialed in. They had it down to a science, with precision timing. They’d do that thing where you poke a hole in the can so the beer would flow shotgun-style. They’d time it so that they were due to hit third or fourth that inning, and in their minds that rush of beer would kind of jump-start the amphetamines and get back to how they were feeling early on in the game—pumped, jacked, good to go. How they came up with this recipe, this ritual, I’ll never know, but it seemed to do the trick; they’d get this rush of confidence that was through the roof and step to the plate like the world-beaters they were born to be.
Understand, there was no party in the use of these drugs—that part happened off the field, away from the game. No, this was all business. This was the care and feeding of the professional athlete. The “jar” was like our traveling medicine cabinet, a way to chase the aches and pains. You’d walk into the clubhouse and catch one of your teammates sitting in front of his locker looking like he’d just been through a spin cycle. There’d be dark circles under his eyes. The simplest movements would be accompanied by the groans of an old, beaten-down man. It would be the middle of August—game 141 on the schedule, say—the dog days of the dog days, and this poor guy could barely stand and straighten his knees because of all the abrasions running up and down his legs. He’d be bruised from head to toe, from being plunked by a season’s worth of pitches. He’d have a couple of broken bones in his hands, but he was determined to play through his injuries, to see his way to the butt end of the schedule. Maybe he was playing for his next contract, scrambling to keep his job over some upstart rookie.
These pick-me-up type drugs were just a way to mask or chase the pain. They were part of the landscape; they’d been around the game for generations. In the era of Mays and Aaron, the heroes of my growing up, it was all about red juice or Cuban coffee—the brews found in virtually every clubhouse, spiked with amphetamines and whatever else the prevailing “wisdom” suggested. Guys would down a cup, grab a bat, and head out for the most fearsome batting practice session you’d ever seen.
This was how you played 155 games a season, because even your horses needed a day off every here and there. This was how you got paid, how you cheated time. You found a way to power through, and for a great many of us this could only happen with a pharmaceutical assist. The perception back then was that you couldn’t possibly make it to the end of a season without some carefully timed fistfuls of pills, and a shotgun blast of beer to wash them all down. You couldn’t get there on your own. But, of course, you could. Absolutely you could. It’s just that most of us didn’t trust that you could.
The white crosses and black beauties and all the colors and varieties in between were such a big part of our approach to the game, we still talk about it. The guys I played with, we get together and reminisce. We marvel, really, at the s— some of our teammates put into their bodies…into our bodies. We run the numbers in our head, try to calculate how many milligrams of amphetamines were actually in play during that great World Series run. Go around the diamond; do the math. Ten milligrams here, twenty there, maybe thirty over there…up and down the lineup, all across the field, we were shot through with so much of the stuff it’s hard to imagine how we thought it could shake out to the good.
—Ron Darling pitched for the Mets from 1983 to 1990 and retired from baseball in 1995. He is now an analyst for TBS, the MLB Network, SNY and WPIX. “Game 7, 1986” is his second book.
In his new book, former pitcher Ron Darling recounts how the Mets relied on a cocktail of amphetamines and beer between innings to get through a World Series-winning season
By RON DARLING
April 4, 2016 / Wall Street Journal
Thirty years after their dramatic World Series title, the 1986 New York Mets remain a study in how to make winning ugly look good. After dominating the National League with a 108-54 record, the combustible roster of mismatched personalities clawed its way to the World Series and stunned the Boston Red Sox, erasing a 3-0 deficit in Game 7 to win the franchise’s second championship. The Mets’ starter that night was Ron Darling, and as he recounts in his forthcoming book, “Game 7, 1986: Failure and Triumph in the Biggest Game of My Life” (St. Martin’s Press), the three runs he allowed have tormented him ever since. He also offers insights into a team remembered as much for its pharmaceutical pursuits as its starting rotation. In the following excerpt, Darling describes how the Mets’ in-game use of amphetamines and alcohol fueled their run through a grueling season.
When I first came up, there was a jar of pills that was kept in a prominent place—prominent, that is, if you knew where to look for it. It was called the jar because, come on, baseball players weren’t the most creative bunch. It became part of our language, our shorthand. If someone was scrambling, trying to mask an ache or a pain, or maybe to recover from an injury, he’d say, “I’m in the jar today.”
Each pill had its own name. The five-milligram amphetamines were known as white crosses—and these were passed around like candy, if that was your bag. The heavier doses were black beauties. Remember, this was well before the common use of steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs; in many ways, you could make an argument that the drugs of choice in our clubhouse were more performance reducing than anything else. But most starting pitchers were loath to mess with any chemicals that might mess with their mind-set—anyway, I was. You’ve got all that time between starts, the last thing you want is to be anxious and on the edge for four days; if anything, you want something to take the edge off.
Still, the jar was very much in evidence, very much a part of our team “chemistry,” even though the jar itself had disappeared by the 1986 season. We continued to use the same language, though, so you could still hear the terminology on the team plane and in the clubhouse, but the pill-taking became much more secretive. You either understood the euphemism—or you didn’t, because it didn’t apply. It was no longer out in the open. The talk went underground, but even there you’d continue to hear comments like, “Hey, I did a couple of white crosses but that didn’t do it so I threw a black beauty on top and it was perfect.” You’d see guys toward the end of a game, maybe getting ready for their final at bat, double-back into the locker room to chug a beer to “re-kick the bean” so they could step to the plate completely wired and focused and dialed in. They had it down to a science, with precision timing. They’d do that thing where you poke a hole in the can so the beer would flow shotgun-style. They’d time it so that they were due to hit third or fourth that inning, and in their minds that rush of beer would kind of jump-start the amphetamines and get back to how they were feeling early on in the game—pumped, jacked, good to go. How they came up with this recipe, this ritual, I’ll never know, but it seemed to do the trick; they’d get this rush of confidence that was through the roof and step to the plate like the world-beaters they were born to be.
Understand, there was no party in the use of these drugs—that part happened off the field, away from the game. No, this was all business. This was the care and feeding of the professional athlete. The “jar” was like our traveling medicine cabinet, a way to chase the aches and pains. You’d walk into the clubhouse and catch one of your teammates sitting in front of his locker looking like he’d just been through a spin cycle. There’d be dark circles under his eyes. The simplest movements would be accompanied by the groans of an old, beaten-down man. It would be the middle of August—game 141 on the schedule, say—the dog days of the dog days, and this poor guy could barely stand and straighten his knees because of all the abrasions running up and down his legs. He’d be bruised from head to toe, from being plunked by a season’s worth of pitches. He’d have a couple of broken bones in his hands, but he was determined to play through his injuries, to see his way to the butt end of the schedule. Maybe he was playing for his next contract, scrambling to keep his job over some upstart rookie.
These pick-me-up type drugs were just a way to mask or chase the pain. They were part of the landscape; they’d been around the game for generations. In the era of Mays and Aaron, the heroes of my growing up, it was all about red juice or Cuban coffee—the brews found in virtually every clubhouse, spiked with amphetamines and whatever else the prevailing “wisdom” suggested. Guys would down a cup, grab a bat, and head out for the most fearsome batting practice session you’d ever seen.
This was how you played 155 games a season, because even your horses needed a day off every here and there. This was how you got paid, how you cheated time. You found a way to power through, and for a great many of us this could only happen with a pharmaceutical assist. The perception back then was that you couldn’t possibly make it to the end of a season without some carefully timed fistfuls of pills, and a shotgun blast of beer to wash them all down. You couldn’t get there on your own. But, of course, you could. Absolutely you could. It’s just that most of us didn’t trust that you could.
The white crosses and black beauties and all the colors and varieties in between were such a big part of our approach to the game, we still talk about it. The guys I played with, we get together and reminisce. We marvel, really, at the s— some of our teammates put into their bodies…into our bodies. We run the numbers in our head, try to calculate how many milligrams of amphetamines were actually in play during that great World Series run. Go around the diamond; do the math. Ten milligrams here, twenty there, maybe thirty over there…up and down the lineup, all across the field, we were shot through with so much of the stuff it’s hard to imagine how we thought it could shake out to the good.
—Ron Darling pitched for the Mets from 1983 to 1990 and retired from baseball in 1995. He is now an analyst for TBS, the MLB Network, SNY and WPIX. “Game 7, 1986” is his second book.
Thor!!!!!
Helis overheadHaven't been this pumped to go to a game today since the 1st home game of the World SeriesLGM !!!!!
I will try and put up the video we took from behind home plate.
If my brother gets clearance to send me the video I'll put up the video taken from his police helicopter as they fly over citifield in a few days
jerseyshorejohnny
Well-known member
Met's vs Nationals
May 18 @ Citi Field
SJU Alumni
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May 18 @ Citi Field
SJU Alumni
=EVNTEventDetail&EventID=2828
MJ Maher thanks for the cool picture. I was at the game with my wife and son. If you took the picture we were pretty close I was sitting in Section 514. Please tell your brother he was a "little late". LOL It looked like they were expecting the helicopters to pass over a little quicker and there seemed to be a little pause as they waited.
I was curious, all throughout the game helicopters would "circle" over the CF opening. Do you know if these were the same helicopters or maybe something else. I was wondering if it was security or just sight seeing. It seemed they would turn to give passengers a view.I have never seen this over a crowded stadium and with everything going on....
I was curious, all throughout the game helicopters would "circle" over the CF opening. Do you know if these were the same helicopters or maybe something else. I was wondering if it was security or just sight seeing. It seemed they would turn to give passengers a view.I have never seen this over a crowded stadium and with everything going on....
Yeah we were close to you. sect 417. My brother was annoyed because his boss decided to fly 4 copters and the guy who ended up being the lead in this formation screwed up the timing completely. They were supposed to be up over citified as soon as the anthem ended just like they did last year
That helicopter that kept circling was one of the 4 maybe a second one. My brother and the others flew back to floyd bennett but one had stayed behind for security being opening day and terrorism etc
My bro has video from his copter showing them flying up to citified and then over which was real cool but because of security his boss said it can't be put on social media since it shows inside the cockpit POV
