PASSING: Bud Harrelson, January 11, 2024
Derrel McKinley “Bud” Harrelson passed on January 11, 2024 in his home in East Northport, N.Y. of Alzheimer’s disease. Harrelson was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2016 and went public with his malady in 2018.
At the time of his passing Harrelson was a partner in the Long Island Ducks North Atlantic Independent League, Islip, Long Island based team team he helped to found in 2000. The link below tells the story:
One of my earliest trivia questions for my confounded schoolmates was:
Q: What is Bud Harrelson’s real name?
A: Derrel McKinley Harrelson!
No, Bud Harrelson was not related to Ken “Hawk” Harrelson.
Bud Harrelson was signed by the Mets as a free agent in 1963, before the free agent amateur draft which began in 1965, after a year at San Francisco State.
Bud’s professional career began in 1963 with the Salinas Mets in California League A ball. Bud was called up to The Show in September 1965 where he caddied for Roy McMillan.
That very same year Bud began his 5 year hitch in the National Guard for 1 weekend a month which partially accounts for Bud’s relatively low number of games played.
Fielding statistics give Bud short shrift. During his Gold Glove campaign of 1971 his % of chances to league average was a pretty good but not great. However it must be factored in that during his career Harrelson played behind Tom Seaver, Nolan Ryan, Jon Matlack, Jerry Koosman and Tug McGraw all of whom were fastball/K/fly out pitchers.
https://www.baseball-reference.com
Harrelson had a cannon for an arm and could hurl overhand from deep in the hole, whip sidearm from a set position and “shovel,” as Mets broadcaster Lindsey Nelson would put it to the 2nd. bagger for a 6-4-3 twin killing.
Harrelson had offensive value. After the success of Maury Wills, who finally made it to the Dodgers after 1100 minor league games by embracing switch hitting, speedy infielders such as Harrelson and his contemporary Don Kessinger were made into switch hitters during their minor league apprenticeships. Bud drew a good number of walks long before OBA became obsessional.
I recall a neighbor chortling with delight when Bud, hitting lefty, beat out a push bunt.
The 1973 Mets vs. Reds NLCS saw Harrelson gain national attention when the 160 lb. Harrelson clashed with the 200 lb. Pete Rose. The fracas had been precipitated by some verbal jousting following the Mets Game 2 9-2 victory lead by Jon Matlack’s 9 K complete game and Rusty Staub’s 2 HRs.
My brother and I were watching the game on a 12″ black and white TV perched precariously on the counter of Mr. Washington’s Sherwin Williams Main St, Port Washington paint store on a sunny afternoon…back when an NLCS game was still played in the afternoon!
On a double play ball Harrelson and Rose collided and Harrelson and Rose began throwing punches.
To my surprise and delight Harrelson did not back down and the Shea crowd cheered Bud even as the imbroglio was broken up by umpires.
Interestingly enough, neither player was ejected. This is hard to imagine happening in today’s MLB!
https://youtu.be/K8xKLbn04h)s?si=FbSHUy98PFLGb3Ar
What did happen was that Reds skipper Sparky Anderson pulled his team from the field for 20 minutes.
Meanwhile, the Shea loyalists began shouting that Rose was ingesting fecal material and did not cease until manager Yogi Berra, Cleon Jones, Rusty Staub, Tom Seaver and Willie Mays calmed the crowd.
The ‘Ya Gotta Believe’ Mets shocked the Reds and wound up pushing the mighty 1973 A’s to 7 games before going down swinging…just like Bud!
From 1965 until 1975 the Mets were New York’s team, especially on the North Shore of Long Island where a train from my home burg of Port Washington could travel to Shea Stadium in 22 minutes.
As the 70’s stumbled on my interest in baseball cards, street baseball and live games was supplanted by televised games, SPORTS ILLUSTRATED and Steely Dan’s PRETZEL LOGIC. Embarrassment too played a role as I recall an LRY girl telling me that baseball was “so 6th. grade” so I kept my fandom to myself even while rooting for Bud Harrelson and the diminishing number of players who had played for the Miracle Mets and the Ya Gotta Believe Mets.
By 1977 the residue of the Miracle Mets and Ya Gotta Believe had been washed away by the dispatching of Dave Kingman, the auctioning off of Tom Seaver, the passing of Mets’ matriarch and majority owner Joan Payson and the resurgent Yankees who had returned to the Bronx and the 1976 World Series.
From 1977 on the Mets would remain mired in the sub .500 mire of the old N.L. East; absorbing countless pummelings from the Pirates and Phillies until re-emerging as contenders in 1984 under the ownership of Nelson Doubleday.
Fans were few and hostile.
A brief digression…
Anyone who thinks that Joe Torre is a great manager should look at the winning %s of the Mets during his reign. And while this is not entirely Torre’s fault, the dis-invested ownership of Linda DeRoulet, Joan Payson’s sister, surely played a major role, Torre’s management of the careers of Dave Kingman, Joel Youngblood and especially Lee Mazzilli says nothing good about Torre’s talent judgement.
In 1977 my brother and I jumped into a packed Port Washington LIRR car for Tom Seaver’s return to Shea as a Red. It was not lost on me that Harrelson had been Tom Seaver’s roommate and that Bud and Pete Rose had been combatants.
When Seaver took the mound an ovation erupted such as nothing I have heard before or since. Seaver stepped off the mound and tipped his cap, which only lengthened the ovation.
Jerry Koosman toed the slab for the Mets. Harrelson, Ed Kranepool and Jerry Grote were penciled into the lineup by Brooklynite Joe Torre.
Of course Harrelson got a hit, of course Ed Kranepool launched a sacrifice fly that proved to be the only run tallied by the Amazins’ and of course Jerry Koosman took the loss.
…but you already knew that…
During spring training in 1978 Harrelson was dispatched to the Phillies for “prospect” Fred Andrews. Harrelson spent 1978 and 1979 with the Phillies spelling the defensively challenged Dave Cash.
In 1980 the Phillies released Harrelson making him a free agent who wound up playing out the string with the Texas Rangers.
As a Ranger Harrelson returned to short where he platooned with the immortal Pepe Frias and played alongside fellow Flushing refugees Rust Staub and Jon Matlack before retiring…but not before hitting his 7th. HR in 5515 PAs!
Harrelson was far from done with baseball and re-emerged as the Mets 1st. base coach and occasional TV commentator for WWOR 9.
In 1984 Bud piloted the short season, 75 games, Little Falls Mets, to 1st. place with a squad featuring future Mets Kevin Elster, Shawn Abner and David West, to a 44-31 record and being named New York-Penn League Manager of the Year.
Harrelson at this point was still on my radar screen as Bud morphed into a company man for the Flushing fiefdom.
1985 found Harrelson at the helm of the of the South Atlantic A ball Columbia Mets which featured future phenom Gregg Jefferies while earning a 79-57 record. During the season Bud bounced to Flushing where he replaced Bobby Valentine who moved to Texas on Davey Johnson’s coaching staff.
1986 saw Harrelson as the 3rd. base coach chasing Ray Knight to home plate in Shea Stadium in the epochal Game 6 of the 1986 World Series.
…Please go to the home page for this blog enter ‘A Night to Remember’ in the Search function for my account of Game 6 while managing Our House in Allston, MA…
Q: Who is the only Met to be in uniform for both the 1969 and 1986 World Series champions?
A: Bud Harrelson!
Sure it is a bit of a trick question but I was still in my 20s!
In 1990 Harrelson replaced Davey Johnson who had gone 20-22 42 games into that season and got the Mets to 91 wins, their 7th. consecutive winning season, although not enough to catch the pre-wild card Bonds, Bonilla, Drabek Buccos of the Jim Leyland era.
1991 saw a near total collapse as Darryl Strawberry went to the Dodgers while Frank Viola and Dwight Gooden failed to repeat their respective 20 and 19 win seasons of 1990 respectively.
As loyal readers of the NEW YORK POST knew there was a significant public dust-up with David Cone that accompanied this plunge. With 2 weeks left in the season and a 74-80 record Harrelson was relieved of his duties and replaced by Mike Cubbage.
At that point Harrelson fell from my radar screen although he was a partner in the Wilmington Blue Rocks, an affiliate of the Kansas City Royals.
Harrelson began blipping again when USA TODAY announced that the Atlantic League of Professional Baseball had placed a team in Islip, Long Island on the footprint of the old Islip Speedway whose Figure 8 track Demolition Derby was featured frequently ABC’s Wide World of Sports. to be called the Long Island Ducks; not to be confused with the Long Island Ducks of the American Hockey league who played for many years in Commack at the Island Arena. Harrelson was the manager as well as an owner for the Ducks maiden voyage.
Harrelson was a Vice President, owner as well as the manager in the Ducks’ 2000 inaugural season and remained as a coach until his 2016 diagnosis of Alzheimer’s Disease. Harrelson retired from baseball in 2018.
Many times Harrelson referred to the founding of the Long Island Ducks as his proudest accomplishment. During his time with the Ducks Harrelson resided in East Northport in Long Island’s Suffolk County where he was well know for being neighborly and his many charitable doings.
Bud Harrelson’s passing effected me far more severely than the passing of Tom Seaver via dementia although both passings were sadly foreseeable.
Bud Harrelson’s saga almost perfectly matched mine…
Baseball cards…getting to The Show…the Miracle Mets…the Ya Gotta Believe Mets…baseball is so 6th. grade…the decline of the Mets franchise from ’77 through ’83…the triumph of Harrelson chasing Ray Knight home with the winning run in game 6 of the 1986 World Series…the maddening ’90’s…minor league management…founding and owning the Long Island Ducks…and passing from Alzheimer’s.
…Bud Harrelson will missed by this narrator for as long as I have left to go...
BASEBALL: HIGHLIGHTS OF THE OFF SEASON: Wayne Garrett, The Young & Mismanaged. (Or how a constellation of errors revolved around a 3rd. baseman who was too good to be good enough).
WAYNE GARRETT
would be on my mind if I were were 12 at this time of year.
Indeed, the annual revolving door regarding the Mets 3rd. base situation was a true sign of highlights of the off season as surely as a Joe Namath injury.
At 61 baseball is once again occupying my mind during this off season.
This has transpired during the 50th, !?!?!, anniversary of the Miracle Mets triumphant ascent to their 1969 World Series victory.
We Mets fans have an affinity, perhaps even a predisposition, to bipolar fandom. 2019 has given us the good; Pete Alonso, Jeff McNeil and Jake deGrom, the bad; relievers Edwin Diaz and Jeurys Familia being worse than the BoSox arson brigade and the ugly 1st. half of Amed Rosario and the better than O.K.ish 2nd. half of Amed Rosario.
Wayne Garret’s career personifies the essence of the binge and purge nature of the Mets history.
Wayne Garret was one of the Mets of my years’ ages 9 through 20 in Port Washington, Long Island, New York.
Wayne Garrett was not destined for the National Baseball Hall of Fame(NBHOF) and in this case a round-about determinism, deliberate, yet unintentional, prevented him from being the pretty good player that he pretty much usually was.
https://www.baseball-reference.com
Ronald Wayne Garrett was originally drafted by the Milwaukee Braves following his brothers James and Adrian, who played for the Cubs among others in a 163 game career spread over 8 years, in the 6th. round of the very first 1965 amateur draft. Wayne hailed from Sarasota, FL and attended the high school of the same name. After 4 years in the Braves system he was selected by the Mets via the Rule V draft for the princely sum of $25,000 in the only minor league transaction of the Mets prior to the 1969 season.
https://sabr.org>bioproject
Biography by Ron Masterson
Wayne Garrett’s rookie year at age 21 found Garrett being the left handed side of a 3rd. base platoon along with the 36 year-old Ed “the Glider” Charles. Garrett was primarily a 3rd. baseman but also saw some time at 2nd. and shortstop as Mets manager Gil Hodges juggled the Vietnam era National Guard commitments of second sacker Ken Boswell and shortstop Bud Harrelson.
Wayne’s 1/39/.218/.290/.268 slash line hardly excited anyone, least of all Strat-O-Matic’s Harold Richman, but as a 21 year-old rookie winning a World Series on the the very first winning season in the Mets history one would think that he had dibs on the job.
Wayne hit a HR off the Braves’ Pat Jarvis in Game 3, the NLDS being best-of-5 in 1969, which was the first playoff victory by a Mets team.
One would think…but the Mets didn’t… bringing in Joe Foy from the Kansas City Royals after having been dispatched to expansionville from Boston and putting up a semi-bounce-back season.
Foy was acquired for Amos Otis and Bob Johnson and was thrust into the starting lineup but was ineffective and developed what would now be called “issues.”
(Otis went on to be the Royals’ CFer for more than a decade but that is another story… which I might tell. Stay tuned).
Wayne Garrett was back in the starting lineup on a full-time basis after the 1970 All Star break. In spite of only playing 114 games Wayne exceeded all expectations, including mine, with a 12/45/.254/.390/.421 HR/RBI/BA/OBA/SLG slash line. Of course, this was a time in which walks were often overlooked but a .390 OBA should have given someone a heads up. While these numbers didn’t threaten the status of Ron Santo as the N.L’s top 3rd. baseman they are substantial in the light of the Mets team slash line of 120/640/.249/.333/.370.
About this time WOR 9’s Bob Murphy began to regularly refer to Wayne as “the Mets Huck Finn” for his red hair. Upon visiting Shea to see the Expos, Carl Morton pitched, with my folks and brother Peter I remember looking at Garrett from the box seats my father had bribed an usher $5 for and thinking he looked like a high school kid. Wayne Garrett was 22 and had taken a huge leap forward to where he looked to be a regular at a position that had been a perennial problem for the Mets.
The Mets had other ideas… none of them very good. They went out and acquired Brooklyn born Bob Aspromonte from the Houston Astros, the last Brooklyn Dodger to play in the big leagues. Aspromonte had been an All-Star but his better days were in the past and Garrett was reinserted into the hot corner.
Being jerked around didn’t suit Garrett well; he regressed in power but retained his batting eye. However the Mets, and most of their fans, focused on Garrett’s low BA and loss of power. Garrett didn’t seem to be the man for 3B.
In 1972 Jim Fregosi was acquired from the California Angels a a classic ‘highlight of the off season’ trade in exchange for future Hall of Famer Nolan Ryan and perennial prospect Leroy Stanton.
Fregosi had 6 All Star seasons behind him and about 6 weeks as a Met regular in front of him. I vividly remember seeing Fregosi’s pot belly cascading over his belt on a Mets WOR-9 telecast and wondering why Fregosi looked to have the physique of one of the guys manning the deli counter at Bohack rather than that of a professional athlete.
Once again Wayne Garrett stepped into the void and while a 5/29/.232/.374/.315 slash line hardly inspired euphoria it was the production of a player with a future rather than that of a player with a past.
Fregosi was sent on his way early into the 1973 season.
“You Gotta Believe” was the Tug McGraw inspired rallying cry of the 1973 Mets. And while the 83 win Mets did not scale the Olympian heights of the 1969 Miracle Mets they provided almost as many thrills.
At 15 years of age I was embarrassed by being a MLB fan. I was past the age of where being a Mets fan was cool and my shoulder blade length hair, fondness for Steely Dan and hitchhiking the local bi-ways concealed a heart that still bled orange and blue.
1973 saw a pennant race described by Bill at the Sherwin Williams store at ‘4 one-legged men in a ass kicking contest’ as the Mets outlasted the Pirates, Cubs and the newly ascendant Expos to weasel out 83 wins.
The Ya Gotta believe Mets featured the highlights of Garrett’s career.
In September Garrett clubbed 6 homers of his 16 round trippers while compiling a 16/58/.256/.348/.403 season which proved to be his career pinnacle.
Garrett also turned 36 double plays, second only to the 39 DPs of the Dodgers Ron Cey.
The playoff against the Reds had Cincy 3rd. sacker Dan Driessen, playing out of his usual 1st base role, tagging the base rather than a hustling Garret speeding into 3rd. on Felix Millan’s sacrifice bunt. Cleon Jones’ double plated Garrett with what proved to be the winning run as the Mets vaulted to the World Series to face the defending champion A’s,
shock the Reds in the N.L. playoffs and give the A’s all they could handle in the World Series before losing in 7 games.
Garrett contributed 2 home runs in the 1973 World Series with the first coming in the 3rd. inning of Game 2 off Vida Blue.
However, Garret’s homer would be overshadowed by the 10-7 12 inning contest which is best remembered for Oakland A’s owner Charlie O. Finley’s attempt to force A second sacker to claim to be injured following his 2 crucial errors in Game 2.
Game 3 saw Garret tag Catfish Hunter with a 1st. inning from the leadoff slot as the Shea faithful roared their approval and I watched from the Sherwin Williams store. Unfortunately, the A’s won, 3-2, but once again Garrett had shone in the October spotlight.
Ultimately, the Mets lost to the A’s in 7 games and there are still Mets fans posting on Ultimate Mets Database that manager Yogi Berra should have started George Stone in Game 6 and saved Seaver for Game 7 but that is another story…
1974 finally gave us Wayne Garrett as a full-time player. Garrett played in 151 games and posted a 13/53/.224/.337/.337 slash line. Defensively a Range Factor per 9 of 3.12 was a tad above the N.L. average of 3.04, although the extreme flyball tendencies of Tom Seaver, Jerry Koosman, Jon Matlack and Tug McGraw may have forced Garrett’s numbers down a touch.
However, 1974 also gave us Mike Schmidt and Ron Cey maturing into prominent N.L. third basemen and the slender statistics of Garrett surely looked less than the competent contribution that they were.
1975 saw another retreat on Wayne Garrett’s career trajectory as the Mets had acquired Brooklyn born Joe Torre to man the hot corner. Torre wound up starting 76 games but his 6/35/.247/.317/.357 resembled that of Garrett’s all too much while demanding that Wayne fill in as a late inning defensive replacement.
1975 saw a diminishing of my interest in baseball as Steely Dan and shoulder blade length hair had changed my vision.
However, I still perused the NEWSDAY box scores on a daily basis, which I would never admit to my friends at the North Shore Unitarian Universalist congregation, with slack-jawed incomprehension as the Mets diddled away what was left of Garrett’s potential while investing in the 34 year-old Torre…but, of course, Torre was a Brooklyn born name player.
1976 saw a revival of my baseball interest as my long delayed pubescence was near completion and I felt free to return to my boyish passion for baseball.
1976 proved to be the last full season that Garrett spent in Willets Point. His 4/26/.223/.359/.311 slash line offered some redemption with a more than decent OBA but 58 starts were all that manager Joe Frazier saw fit to offer the now 28 year old Garrett as the “promising” Roy Staiger was the primary player at the hot corner.
In October of 1975 principal owner Joan Payson passed, plunging the Mets into an abyss from 1977 to 1983, although 1976 was an 86 win team.
The Yankees, under the ownership of George Steinbrenner returned to Yankee Stadium after having spent 1974 and 1975 sharing Shea with the Mets, and with the Jets AND Giants of the NFL in 1974.
1976 also saw the Yankees return to the World Series, and although vanquished by the Reds, the Yanks had claimed the title of “New York’s baseball team.”
Garrett was traded July 21st 1976, along with Del Unser, to the Montreal Expos for Jim Dwyer and Pepe Mangual.
Garrett became a utility infielder in The Great White North, starting 44 games at 2nd. base and only 1 at the hot corner.
1977 saw a further diminishing of Garrett’s role as the Expos had obtained former Philly All-Star Dave Cash for 2nd. base and manager Dick Williams was committed to the potential of Larry Parrish at 3rd.
A sore shoulder and a strained knee ligament contributed to a lack of playing time
By this time I rarely though of Garrett as anything other than ‘a guy who used to play for us’.
Garrett’s trade, oddly enough on the very same July 21st. that sent him to the Expos, to the Cardinals confirmed his utility status even as he hit .333 in 39 games.
Facing professional extinction Wayne Garrett accepted a 2 year contract with the Chunichi Dragons of Nippon Professional Baseball.
By the time the 1978 season ended I lived here in Boston and upon reading of Garrett’s plan to play in Japan all I could do was sigh.
“If I could have played well, run, and thrown normally, that would have been different. I went to Japan, took the money, and did as well as I could. I earned my salary there. It wasn’t the same. It was just to make a few bucks. It wasn’t a lot of fun,” he told Maury Allen, After the Miracle: The 1969 Mets Twenty Years Later (London: Franklin Watts, 1989).
https://sabr.org>bioproject
Mets fans still have considerable affection for a Met who played in 2 World Series. Indeed, fans reminiscences on
https://ultimatemets.com
praise Wayne Garrett as a friendly, approachable man to the many of us for whom the Miracle Mets were one of childhood’s great events.
The 1973 Mets who fell just short of triumph represented the high tide of Garrett’s career and my fond memories of watching the ‘Ya Gotta Believe Mets’ in the Sherwin-Williams paint store on Main Street of Port Washington, N.Y are always highlights of the off season.
A great player? Hardly. An All Star…well…he wasn’t; but he certainly made a contribution more than any of the “real” 3rd basemen who the Mets went through like the used hot dog wrappers that swirled above the Shea Stadium field.
Wayne Garrett was too good to be good enough.
BASEBALL: Red Sox vs. White Sox 8, Red Sox 6, Post-game wrap-up
POST-GAME WRAP-UP TOP TEN
1) 75 degrees and 52% humidity is just about perfect.
2) Eduardo Rodriguez was one of the few bright spots in last year’s last place debacle and seemed to be on his game but Todd Frazier’s 6th. inning HR put the Chi Sox ahead.
3) David Oritz was thrown out at home by Adam Eaton in the 2nd. inning on a short hit to center by Travis Shaw. Eaton played the hit well coming in rapidly and throwing accurately to Chi Sox catcher Dioneer Navarro who easily tagged out Big Papi. As we all know Papi is having an amazing season so far but:
a) He is 40.
b) He is at least 230 lbs.
c) The replay is not recommended for small children unaccompanied by adults.
3rd. base coach Brian Butterfield made an inexplicable decision to play for 1 run in the 2nd. inning with the Bo Sox down only 1-0 at home.
4) 1 bag of dry roasted peanuts from a vendor =$5.50. 2 Coca-Cola Zero(s) at $5.25 a whack. I opted for the Coca-Cola Zero rather than Diet Coke for the slightly acidic aftertaste which cleanses the palate.
5) $499 for a 1st. base box seat so you can text and take selfies. Am I the only one who thinks this is just wrong? Please advise.
6) Former Yankee and PED offender of 2014 Melky Cabrera now sports a beard sans mustache which gives him a vaguely Amish countenance. Is there an Amish community in the Dominican Republic or is Melky merely attempting to conceal the Shaquille Onealesque double chin sprouting from his 5’10” 210 lb. physique? You make the call.
7) Sandy Leon was picked off 3rd. in the bottom of the 4th where Brian Butterfield directs traffic. Ortiz is sent, then erased, Leon is picked off…hmmm…
8) “Everybody Wang Chung Tonight” was among the cavalcade of music cranked out by the Fenway sound system as is protocol for all sporting events. Fortunately, Josh Kantor’s organ stylings bring back fond boyhood memories of Jane Jacobs at Shea Stadium playing “3 Blind Mice” whenever an umpire’s call was disputed. The lovely analog tones echo in the grandstand and encourage enough conversation so that folks actually look at the game and each other rather than peering into their phone with earbuds surgically attached.
9) Peter Gammons bobblehead doll?
10) Koji Uehara served up home runs to Melky Cabrera and Matt Lawrie along with a screaming double hit by Dioneer Navarro before being mercifully relieved by Heath Hembree. “Relief” is truly the correct word. Koji is one of my favorites. Tending bar for the 6th. game of the 2013 World Series while a packed room chanted “Koji, Koji,” is one of my all-time sports memories and you have to love a man who has chosen the 1999 techno mega-hit “Sandstorm” by Darude as his entrance music but…Uehara is 41 and his 88 mph. “fastball” just might not be what it once was. Just saying…