Hobie Landrith, the First New York Met, Dies at 93

Hobie Landrith caught for seven groups in his 14 main league seasons. He was principally a backup, adequate at dealing with pitchers however a lightweight hitter. He was by no means an All-Star. But he did possess a modest declare to fame.

When Landrith died on Thursday at 93 in Sunnyvale, Calif., he was remembered as the unique Met.

His demise was introduced on Saturday by Jay Horwitz, the Mets’ vp of alumni public relations.

The Mets and the Houston Colt .45s (now the Astros), based as 1962 National League growth groups, started stocking their rosters in an October 1961 draft. They alternated in choosing gamers whom the eight N.L. groups considered as too younger, too outdated or too odd to maintain.

Houston selected Eddie Bressoud, a shortstop with the San Francisco Giants, as the primary choose of the draft. The Mets selected Landrith, additionally a Giant, as their first choice.

When reporters requested Mets Manager Casey Stengel why Landrith, 31 years outdated, was anointed as the primary Met, he replied: “You gotta have a catcher or you’d have a lot of passed balls.”

The Mets performed their first recreation on the evening of April 11, 1962, going through the Cardinals in St. Louis. Landrith was catching Roger Craig, who was chosen from the Los Angeles Dodgers because the Mets’ sixth draft choose. Batting No. 8, Landrith went 0 for 4 and dedicated one of many Mets’ three errors, an errant throw to second base on a steal try by Julian Javier, who finally scored. The Cards stole three bases of their 11-4 victory.

Joe Ginsberg changed Landrith for the Mets’ second recreation and Chris Cannizzaro was behind the plate for his or her third recreation, each losses to the Pirates. The Mets went 0-9 earlier than Jay Hook stopped Pittsburgh in a 9-1 complete-game victory.

Landrith, a left-handed batter, listed at 5 ft 10 inches and 170 kilos, performed in 23 video games for the Mets. His shining second got here on May 12 when he hit a ninth-inning, two-out, pinch-hit homer into the higher deck on the Polo Grounds off the Milwaukee Braves’ future Hall of Fame left-hander Warren Spahn to offer the Mets a 3-2 victory.

The Mets used seven catchers of their inaugural season. After Landrith, Ginsberg and Cannizzaro, they trotted out Choo Choo Coleman, Sammy Taylor, Joe Pignatano and Harry Chiti, whom they obtained from the Cleveland Indians in April for money and a participant to be named. That participant turned out to be Chiti, whom the Mets returned to the Indians in June.

Landrith was traded to the Baltimore Orioles on June 7 though he was batting .289 with three doubles and his house run and had pushed in seven runs. His departure accomplished a deal in May during which the Mets obtained first baseman Marv Throneberry, higher referred to as Marvelous Marv for his stumbles within the discipline.

The Orioles despatched Landrith to the Washington Senators in May 1963. They launched him after that season after which employed him as a coach in 1964, his final 12 months in baseball.

Landrith had a profession batting common of .233 with 34 house runs and 203 runs pushed in.

“I was in the major leagues more because I was a good defensive catcher, and the fact that I was good at handling pitchers,” he as soon as informed the baseball historical past web site This Great Game. “I always thought I was a fairly decent hitter, but I realized that I wasn’t in the big leagues for my bat.”

Hobart Neal Landrith was born on March 16, 1930, in Decatur, Ill., one among 9 kids of Charles and Edna (Spalding) Landrith. When he was a baby, the household moved to the Detroit space, the place his father owned a meat refrigeration business. He was catching in sandlot baseball in the summertime of 1945 when a Detroit Tigers scout invited him to catch batting observe for the group.

Landrith was an excellent catcher at Northwestern High School in Detroit and with Michigan State. The Cincinnati Reds’ group signed him out of faculty earlier than the 1949 season. He performed for the Reds from 1950 to 1955 after which had stints with the Chicago Cubs, the Cardinals and the Giants earlier than becoming a member of the Mets.

After leaving baseball, he was a public relations govt with Volkswagen for a few years.

Landrith is survived by his spouse, Peggy; their sons David, Gary, and Randy; their daughters Carol Landrith, Beth Smith and Linda Warner; his brother Dale; 11 grandchildren and 11 great-grandchildren.

Although Casey Stengel, 71 when the Mets performed their first recreation, was reputed to have fallen asleep within the Mets’ dugout at occasions, Landrith recalled how “Casey had an immense knowledge of baseball.”

In a 2003 interview with the Society for American Baseball Research, Landrith remembered how Stengel greeted the 1962 Mets gamers on the primary day of spring coaching with “one pant leg up, one down, his shirttail hanging out and his hat cocked.”

“He looked like a character out of Norman Rockwell,” Landrith stated.

He famous that Stengel led the gamers on a tour of the bases, tutoring them on what they need to be alert for at every cease if varied conditions arose and at last asking, “What do you do when you get to third base?”

Stengel answered that one himself: “You score, score, score, and that’s what we’re gonna do and that’s why we’re gonna win some ball games.”

The 1962 Mets did win 40 video games. But they misplaced 120.