On July 1st, my Dad texted me "Happy Bobby Bonilla and Rick DiPietro Day!"
I had to laugh; I had forgotten all about it, but a flood of memories instantly rushed through my mind.
For those uninitiated, Rick DiPietro was a goaltender for the New York Islanders. He was heralded as the next great goaltender and was signed to a massive (at the time) $67.5 million, 15-year contract, with hopes that he would become a franchise player, but he could never get his act together. Nicknamed "Old Grandma Hips," he unfortunately sustained several injuries that, allegedly (according to the NY press), were milked a little bit to secure a buyout of his extremely lucrative contract. With a deal worked out in 2013 between management and his agent, Rick earns a $1.5 million check every year on July 1st. That will finally come to an end during the 2028-2029 season.
Where did his agent come up with such a deal?
Why, the New York Mets, of course! Bobby Bonilla was one of MLB's best batters in the early 90s, but his career was on the downslide when it ended with the Mets.
He will forever be remembered for this unofficial holiday Mets fans call "Bobby Bonilla Day."
This year was the 16th year that the former outfielder earned $1.2 million from the New York Mets after being bought out of his $5.9 million contract in 2000. Instead of paying him the nearly $6 million to just go away, the Mets ridiculously agreed to pay 8% interest over 25 years if Bonilla waited ten years for his payments to begin.
In 2035, when the deal finally runs out, he will have earned almost $30 million (when his original contract was under $6 million) for doing absolutely nothing.
Reading articles about all of this brought back many memories, and I wanted to relive them here so at least they'll be documented somewhere.
I hope it's coherent, but let's begin!
There's nothing quite like the lazy rhythm of a summer afternoon, especially as a kid in the 90s. School was out, and the days stretched on seemingly forever during those long and humid "dog days" of a New York summer. Watching a baseball game on Channel 11 (WPIX) became my absolute summer go-to for quite some time in the mid 90s.
I sort of stopped following baseball around 2010, but for many years I was a diehard Mets fan.
The best part of the Mets being on WPIX back in the day? There was no cable subscription needed. Just a little patience with the tin foil-coated rabbit-ear antennas attached to Gramp's roll-away kitchen television, and suddenly I'd be connected to Shea Stadium straight from Granny's back porch.
In the mid-90s, baseball took hold of my interest. Growing up in the New York area, I started as a casual Mets fan on a whim during my tee-ball days in the late 80s, drawn to them over the Yankees purely because my two favorite colors are orange and blue.
My brother (and nearly everyone else I knew) was a Yankee supporter, which was typical for those in the suburbs north of New York City. Teased as I was, I stuck with the Mets. Growing up, I'd use Nintendo's Tommy La Russa Baseball, RBI, and later on, the EA Sports titles to fuel my daydreams of building my own bullpen and a batting lineup that would win the World Series.
Though my one season playing formal Little League in fourth grade was very forgettable, it didn't dim my fandom of the New York Metropolitans.
The 1997 introduction of interleague play by Major League Baseball turned that interest into a full-blown obsession for myself and the entire New York tristate area.
After the 1994-95 strike ended, regular-season matchups between AL and NL teams, previously reserved for the All-Star Game and World Series, became a source of fresh excitement. For New York fans, this meant the long-awaited first regular-season Subway Series between the Mets and Yankees in June 1997. The city buzzed with anticipation; kids and teachers joked about it in class, stores had handmade signs, and the tri-state area truly felt electric as those first games approached.
I wrote an article about this First Subway Series two or three years ago, so if you'd like more baseball stuff, check it out here.
I've written about Granny's back porch before. You can read about in articles: My Favorite Board Games Growing Up (under game #5), Show & Tell 01: Board Games at Granny's, and the back porch is even mentioned in the above-linked article about the 1997 Subway Series.
Their patio was nothing fancy, just a three-season room with nearly floor-to-ceiling screens that let the hot summer breeze flow through. I'd finish cutting the shared lawns (our houses shared one big backyard without a fence), crack open one of the room-temperature cans of Caffeine-Free Diet Cokes that she always kept in the neatly opened cardboard packaging, and settle into the slightly uncomfortable patio furniture that they used indoors.
I'd pay good money to have the swinging rocking chair and their loveseat back now. Man...
I'd wheel in the old kitchen television in its rolling cart, wheels squeaking in protest as it rounded the corner from the kitchen to the back porch. I'd always warn Granny and Gramps so they didn't trip on the extension cord stretched across the kitchen. I didn't want to be responsible for a broken hip or anything. Most often, Granny would sit with me on the porch, doing some knitting or just sharing some of her hidden stash of Snickers bars with me as I sipped on a warm caffeine-free Diet Coke.
I always wondered what the point of "Caffeine-Free" was. It didn't taste good enough to drink on its own, but it's what they bought. Nobody drank water back then. At their house, for the kids, it was Caffeine-Free Diet Coke or Tang.
Birds chirped in the background (Gramps raised canaries) as the puffiest, soft-looking white clouds rolled through in the deepest of blue skies outside the window. The summer sky outside doesn't look the same to me anymore. The blue used to feel bluer. Even my wife mentioned this a while ago.
Maybe my eyes are going; I don't know.
The house smelled like Granny and Gramps. Not an offensive odor, but you know the kind. All homes have a specific smell, whether it's from the cleaning products they use, the food they cook, or whatever. I can't place it, but it's a distinct smell that would tell me immediately where I am, should I ever get the chance to smell it again.
The voices of Gary Thorne, Ralph Kiner, Howie Rose, and my favorite, Keith Hernandez, would drift out through the television screen, filling my ears with that unmistakable soundtrack to the New York Mets.
The booth was home to a mix of Mets legends and experienced storytellers. Gary Thorne's crisp, professional play-by-play made every ground ball or pop-up feel like a game-winning play. Ralph Kiner's folksy wisdom and Howie Rose's familiar, soothing voice. I always liked Howie, from when he called games on the radio for both the New York Rangers and the New York Islanders.
And then there was Keith Hernandez, who joined as a full-time analyst in 1998. He injected his sharp insight, dry humor, and long-winded, endless tangents and nonsensical stories, frequently reminding everyone of his championship run with the Mets in 1986.
When the action on the field slowed (which happened plenty during those "rebuilding" years), the booth switched to pure entertainment mode.
One sticky July stands out in my memory, in 1998, if I'm not mistaken. The Mets were down a few runs early in the game against some mid-level opponent, and Keith Hernandez started reminiscing about a kid from his old neighborhood named "Bucky."
For nearly three full innings, the trio in the booth milked that story for everything it was worth, which, to be honest, could have been wrapped up in two or three sentences. Stories went on about how Bucky was the ultimate class clown who pranked everyone, to how he walked funny, and even how he cut his hair in the bathroom sink at school once. Keith painted every detail so vividly in his dry, nonchalant way that you'd think there wasn't even a game going on.
At one point, he was on such a monologue that they went to a commercial in between innings, and when they came back, he was still talking about his old friend "Bucky" as if he hadn't even stopped during the break.
Even though the Mets were losing miserably (again), by the time they turned their attention back to the game, I had to wonder if I was the only one left watching the broadcast. In my memory of the day, when Keith finally mentioned something happening on the field, one of the guys in the booth joked with him and said, "Oh, so you CAN see the field from your seat!"
Of course, there is another famous story about Keith Hernandez, Bucky Dent, and a corked baseball bat that he'd often mention, but I'll let you Google that one because it's not exciting enough to retell here.
On another slow Saturday afternoon, Keith went into a deep dive on the art of playing first base. Breaking down several minor nuances of reading a pickoff move, the precise footwork required, and the way he would always stay "super limber" so he could stretch and make a catch to make sure the runner was "out."
Without missing a beat, he transitioned into a story about an old teammate who collected the weirdest socks imaginable. Every color, design, and even lucky superstitions that were attached to specific pairs.
The details were endless and occasionally humorous, but the really funny part was the way his partners would always try to steer his discussion back to the game. Keith would always acknowledge them when they tried to rein him in, but would immediately launch into another story about anything from socks or puppy dogs to a fan in the crowd eating a hot dog and how hungry it made him. He was even likely to discuss his favorite condiments.
These tangents signaled that Keith was bored with the game and disgusted by his former team's poor performance. Yet with each random story, I was hooked deeper and felt more connected to the team. His stories made every inning, rain delay, or blowout feel like hanging out with friends more than watching a ball game.
That was part of the magic of watching the Mets in those years. It wasn't certainly about winning; it was about the stories.
Plus, being on Granny's back porch for most of it, I had plenty of snacks at my disposal and a nice, cool place to hang out and beat the heat, so what could be better during the summertime?
The Mets of those days were a team clawing their way forward after years of below-average play. While most of the seasons were mediocre at best, the pitching staff tells the story of those ups and downs. Starters like Al Leiter gave true great performances. His competitive fire kept the team in so many games we had no business being in. Rick Reed was a reliable workhorse, while pitchers Glendon Rusch and Bobby Jones had a few moments of success. Steve Trachsel and Masato Yoshii added variety (and several headaches) to the team.
The bullpen is where the real drama lived, though.
Legendary Met John Franco, the Brooklyn-born lefty, was the team's veteran anchor for years. Then came Armando Benitez, acquired right before the 1999 season. This large, hard-throwing closer had some electric stuff, with an upper-90s fastball. When he was "on," Benitez was on fire. He racked up 128 strikeouts in 1999 alone and saved 41 games during the next season.
But, oh man, when Armando wasn't "on," I'd lose my mind. My Uncle Bob and I would always lament seeing his name in the box score, which was often accompanied by a tally in the "L" column. Benitez had a knack for dramatic meltdowns and blown saves. He'd start walking batters and give up towering home runs at the worst possible moments. Bob and I would watch the replays on SportsCenter when he was in town and grumble in unison. Talking about Benitez to Uncle Bob became part of my Mets fandom and a favorite part of my day when I'd check the box score if I didn't get to watch the game.
On those Saturday afternoons, after Granny had grown tired of sitting and left me alone on the porch to fix dinner, I'd occasionally flip the channel to WCW Saturday Night. I wrote about those glorious days on their back porch and WCW in an article titled "WCW Saturday Night and Fall Brawl 1995 at Granny's House," so I won't rehash the whole thing here.
One minute I'd be watching John Olerud smack another single up the middle, or Mike Piazza launch one into the bleacher seats, and the next minute I'd be watching some of the WCW "B" team run through a 5-minute squash match on "Saturday Night."
Life sure was good.
The 1996 season ended 71-91, but Todd Hundley smashed the franchise record 41 home runs as a catcher. The great Bobby Valentine took over midseason and brought his own wacky energy to the team, leading the team to 88 wins in both 1997 and 1998. John Olerud arrived in 1998 and hit .354 for the season, but the Piazza trade that year was history-making. The following year brought 97 wins and a wild card in 1999, followed by the 2000 Subway Series run that saw the Metropolitans earn themselves 94 wins (including the "Grand Slam Single" in the NLCS against the Cardinals) and a World Series clash with cross-town rival the Yankees.
Even in 2001, amid the emotions of 9/11, the Mets played with heart, highlighted by Piazza's tear-jerker home run in the post-9/11 opener on September 21st.
In those days, I often would fire off an email to Bob, dissecting the next day's box score. We'd celebrate Olerud's consistency, Robin Ventura's speed, Franco's gritty performance, or Benitez's latest... "mis-adventure."
Those conversations became a fun ritual, turning an individual game into a shared event with family. Granny would frequently sit and watch with me on Saturday afternoons in the 90s, but she was just "keeping me company" while I was there. I don't think she even knew what team we were watching (or what sport), but that's okay. I enjoyed her company.
Attending school in the shadows of New York as a Mets fan brought its own rivalries. In 7th grade, Mr. Metcalf, my history teacher (and die-hard Yankees guy), would rag on me constantly, especially heading into that first interleague Subway Series in 1997. In 8th grade, my math teacher, Mr. Pacella (an old buddy of Uncle Bob's), was a die-hard Mets fan. He'd sneak in quiet encouragement during class, but it often felt as if I was the only Mets fan in the entire town.
When the 2000 World Series "Subway" Series hit, the roasting was relentless, but I wore my blue-and-orange hat with stubborn pride.
As I wrote about in my Subway Series article, one of the most memorable days of my childhood was when Dad took me to a game at Shea Stadium. For my entire adult life, I had remembered it as playing hooky from school, but it turns out it was on a Saturday. Either way, the day was memorable and one I still think about. We almost crashed entering the tunnel when I couldn't find his glasses (and his sunglasses were too dark to see in the tunnel), but we made it. The hot dogs, the roar of the crowd, the ice cream sundae that came in a little Mets helmet (which I still have), and seeing "my" team on the field during my peak fandom is a day with Dad I wouldn't trade for anything.
Those summer afternoons of yesteryear taught me patience, loyalty, and the joys of rooting for the underdog. The Mets weren't always (or often) winning, but they were building toward something. It seems they are always building toward the future and that the "future" never arrives.
Whether on Granny's porch with a gentle summer breeze, flipping between baseball and wrestling, soaking in WPIX's hometown broadcasts and Keith Hernandez's endless anecdotes, dreading a blown save from Benitez, or trading barbs with teachers and friends... every moment felt meaningful and lasting.
Now, years later, I catch a Mets game from time to time and hear echoes of that old broadcast team drifting into another crazy story about a guy from high school. The team has had massive highs and painful lows since then, but those late 90s and early 00s summers remain locked in my memory. Even on losing seasons, those humid afternoons on Granny's porch still represent how I truly fell in love with a baseball team.
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