The LCG Weekly Reminiscence: Mookie, Ferris and the Super Bowl Shuffle

Welcome to the first installment of the LCG Weekly Reminiscence. This feature will be part sports history, part personal memories and part pop culture redux. Today, we take a stroll down memory lane 1986-style. Come back next week for '87.

I'd gone to sleep. I wasn't actually asleep, but I'd gone upstairs to my bunk bed in an act of stubborn defiance (at least in my own mind), refusing to give this team one more second of my precious time.

I'm not sure what was more pathetic...that I had already given up on my team, consequently leading to my missing one of the more memorable moments in Mets franchise history. Or that I just wrote that last sentence [technically, a fragment]. Probably the latter. So where were we again?

Oh yes, October 25, 1986. I had recently celebrated my ninth birthday and had long since been indoctrinated into Mets fandom by a Brooklyn-born mother and a father who was somehow bamboozled into being a believer back in 1969. On the transistor dial (OK, Z100 and 95.5WPLJ), DJs were cranking out tunes from Lionel Richie, Belinda Carlisle and Huey Lewis and the News. I couldn't get enough of Spy Hunter at our local pizza joint, and it was a close race between Maverick and Ferris as to who was the coolest (Cameron Frye had also convinced us a Gordie Howe Red Wings sweater had to be our next sports jersey purchase).

Earlier that evening, the family had gathered for some form of takeout served in our fairly cramped kitchen. We "dined" at a familiar, worn wooden table with metal legs and collapsible leaves on each side that I strangely recall pinching me on multiple occasions, forever drawing my scorn. It also had rollers on the bottom of the legs, which is an important point for absolutely no reason at all.

In stark contrast to the 50' Pioneer plasma screen I recently purchased, our viewing experience was delivered compliments of an 8' Panasonic black-and-white model. I believe it also had a radio function, which I always found wickedly-cool and innovative. There was a button marked "VHF" on the lower right that you always needed to press in to ensure proper functionality. UHF was apparently bad. VHF = good. UHF = bad. The whole playing with the antenna thing was also an art that took years to perfect.

In terms of the game, for those not from Planet Earth, it was Game Six of the 1986 World Series. The Mets trailed the Sawx 3-2 in the best of seven. Mom, Dad and I had watched every minute of the action together (my sister was three at the time; I have no recollection of her existence from this particular evening). Despite being a lifetime nocturnal creature, by 10 p.m. or so that evening, I was starting to fade. I was nine, cut me a little slack.

More precisely, I was experiencing that sinking, empty, horrifying feeling that mature sports fans can't help but suffer through multiple times in their lifetime. For me, it was one of the first. The awful, sickening realization that it was all going to end. After 108 regular-season wins...after six agonizing games in Houston...16 innings...enduring Billy Hatcher...it was all for naught. The Sox were going to win the World Series. The champagne was already on ice. And I was done with the Mets. Definitely for that evening, maybe forever (employing the always logical rationale a 9-yr old fan often calls upon).

While I sulked upstairs, away from the TV, it began to happen. Watching it today, it seems even more unbelievable. The Mets were down and out. Two outs. Calvin Shiraldi and his 1.41 ERA on the hill. Bottom ten. Shea funeral parlor silent since Dave Henderson went yard in the top of the 10th, and the Sox tacked on another to stretch the lead to 5-3. Vin Scully telling listeners that Oil Can Boyd will have a day off and the camera pans to Roger Clemens flashing a sh*t-eating grin. 2-1 count to Gary Carter.

Then Carter lines a single. Kevin Mitchell. Single. Shea stirs. Ray Knight singles. Carter scores, Mitchell to third. 5-4 Sox. Bob Stanley replaces Shiraldi. Mookie Wilson steps to the plate. On a 2-2 count, Stanley uncorks a wild pitch. Knight scores. Tie game. Pandemonium in Queens. Then, on a full count, Mookie hits a weak dribbler towards you-know-who and the the rest as they say is history...plus, Vin Scully says it so much better.


I, meanwhile, laid upstairs staring at the ceiling and fuming. Then came the shout/shriek from downstairs. My mother. Screaming for me to "hurry! come downstairs, come downstairs!" I responded with melancholy silence. Mother repeating: "COME DOWN! They scored...they won...Mookie...[garbled nonsense]."

It took awhile to get convince me. But after a few more shouts, I begrudgingly sauntered down the stairs. After imploring me to look at the TV and wipe the dried up tears away, reality hit. They had done it. Two strikes away from elimination with nobody on, no hope in a stadium that resembled a funeral home, the improbable had happened. And I'd missed every second of it.

Here's a quick-hitting look at what else was going on back in 1986...Chernobyl, The Challenger Disaster, Iran-Contra Affair, Run D.M.C, Dire Straits, The Bangles, Slippery When Wet, Top Gun, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Platoon, Aliens (sick movie year!), the hi-top fade, Swatch, ALF and, of course, these guys.



See you next week as we stroll down memory lane, 1987-style.