There Are No L’s in Heaven

If Dwight Gooden was the symbol of the Mets prosperity of the 80’s, the can’t miss pitcher with the golden arm and humble grace, Anthony Young was a similar symbol of the baseball bankruptcy of the early 90’s. He had a similar golden arm, similar humble grace. Only difference is that he missed, at least in terms of how you measure “missing” in baseball.

In 1990 for the Mets AA affiliate in Jackson, Young went 15-3 with a 1.063 WHIP and a 1.65 ERA. It convinced the Mets that this is the young man who should get a shot at the starting rotation in 1991 after the Mets had traded Ron Darling and the season had gone south. After a couple of relief outings, Young joined the rotation and started 2-1 before losing four straight, including a couple of hard luck losses which saw Young only give up a run in two separate starts where he went at least six innings. It would be the type of hard luck which would define him.

Young started 1992 with a complete game victory in St. Louis, and a win in relief ten days later. And then the wins stopped. There were three losses in a row before the Mets put him in a setup role. Then after a return to the starting rotation another four losses in a row before being removed again, eventually becoming the team’s closer. That’s the amazing part about the first part of this epic losing streak that Anthony Young had: He was 2-14 with 15 saves. That’s a line you don’t see a whole lot now.

Then after John Franco returned to the closer role to start 1993, Young was put in every imaginable scenario. Yet the losses kept coming. Thirteen more to Young’s ledger to bring the streak to 27 losses, capped by a three inning outing against the Dodgers which ended in the tenth on a bases loaded walk. (Loss number 26 was a two run eight inning loss to the Andy Benes and the San Diego Padres.) Just as we thought the misery of the ’93 Mets would never end, the Anthony Young losing streak had no end in sight. Saddled with a team that lost 103 games, Young was the hard luck symbol of all that was wrong with the Mets. If this losing streak had endured now, advanced metrics combined with the knowledge of how unfair a pitcher’s W-L record is would have Brian Kenny argue that Young should be making $15 million a year. Instead, Young became the undeserving punch line on a team that was built only to tell a good joke and steal our money.

Then … it happened.

Just as some of Anthony Young’s losses were marked by outings that would be good enough to win most games, the game he won was a “vulture” win, as Young gave up a run in the tenth inning only to have his teammates bail him out in the bottom of the tenth. After all the hard luck losses, Young was entitled a vulture win. They talk about unbreakable records in sports, Cy Young’s 512 wins, Cal Ripken’s Iron Man streak, half of Wayne Gretzky’s records, Anthony Young might have an unbreakable record. A pitcher may never again get an opportunity, especially in his second season, to reach 14 straight losses let alone 27 before going back to the minors and being encouraged to find another position or career.

Young may have been the symbol of the ’93 Mets, but as we look upon that streak many years later, he’s really the symbol of us … Met fans. Young’s losses piled up but he was always willing to give it another go and risk getting his head beat in. Didn’t matter how many knots he took. Getting that elusive victory was important, but it was less important than the opportunity to try. Sure, we want that World Series trophy to come back to Queens, but even if the team loses, we’re willing to go back to the fray through traffic and long lines and rain delays and Yankee fans at Citi Field to get our collective soul crushed, just for the opportunity to see the Mets do something special. Any night could be that night, just as it was with the end of the streak. For us, that win against the Marlins was that night. For Anthony Young, to get that win after going through that 27 game losing streak was a triumph of resiliency.

I saw a meme recently that said, paraphrasing: “If you’re going to screw it up, screw it up so bad that people wonder how you did it.” It’s true, isn’t it? That got Young a guest spot on the Tonight Show for crying out loud.

“Anthony was a true gentleman,” said Turk Wendell, a former Mets pitcher, who participated in Mets fantasy camp with Young during the last several years. “At this year’s fantasy camp, he told us he had a brain tumor. That was Anthony. He never ran away from anything.”

It’s Young’s theme, really. In life, and in his passing. Never running away from anything. He never ran away from the streak, and he never ran away from his fight. Young passed yesterday morning at the age of 51, and I’ll quote a friend of mine because he put it better than I ever could:

“Somewhere, in some other life, I hope he is getting all the breaks, every possible speck of good luck.”

I think that safely speaks for us all. Thank you, Anthony. You embody our spirit.