Casey Stengel and the Mets First Spring Training

2012 marks the 50th anniversary of the New York Mets and their first spring training held in 1962. It also marked the return of Charles Dillon ‘Casey’ Stengel as a major league manager after he was fired by the New York Yankees in 1960.

The Mets were built by former Yankee General Manager George Weiss. He was the man who asked Stengel to return to the bench. It was Weiss who had built the powerful Yankee teams that Stengel managed. Still smarting from his firing Stengel decided to take the job though he knew there was no chance the Mets would win in 1962.

When the Mets reported for spring training at Al Lang Field in St. Petersburg, Florida they were a collection of washed up players and youngsters not ready for the majors. In order to spark interest in the team, Weiss had used the expansion draft to acquire former New York big leaguers whom the fans remembered. Among them were former Brooklyn Dodgers Gil Hodges, Don Zimmer, Charlie Neal and Roger Craig. The team also drafted Yankees Gene Woodling and Marv Throneberry who would come to be known as ‘Marvelous.’

Despite the makeup of the roster, Weiss went into spring training with a positive attitude and tried to get Stengel to do the same. In an interview with Sports Illustrated it was reported that he though the team had a chance to be competitive. ‘I told Casey and the coaches that they have to keep telling these fellows, both the old ones and the youngsters, that they’ve got a chance, that it doesn’t take too much to be a winner in this even-up league,’ he is quoted as saying.

Stengel, on the other hand, knew he had no chance of winning so focused spring training on teaching the young players how to play. Those who only knew him for his ‘Stenglese’ were surprised to find out how knowledgeable Casey was. Rookie pitcher Al Jackson said that Stengel was one of the best teachers he ever knew. The old man spent the first week of camp showing pitchers and catchers base running technique and lecturing them on the sacrifice bunt.

There was no five year plan for Stengel. All he wanted was to match a good young player with a good veteran. Of course this would turn out to be a major problem in 1962. All of the spring training in the world could not save the Mets.

Though Stengel encouraged people to come out and see his ‘Amazin Mets’ (the lasting nickname which would be the only good thing to come out of camp) the team was far from good. The Sporting News had them pegged when it predicted that they would be lucky to win 50 games. Despite all of Stengel’s teaching the groundwork had already been laid for a disastrous season.

The Mets did not disappoint. They finished the 1962 season with the worst record in baseball history, 40-120.

All of the optimism that George Weiss could muster in spring training 1962 wasn’t going to save the New York Mets.