Five Mets moments we wish they could redo on Groundhog Day

The New York Mets have had their share of moments that they would like to redo. In honor of Groundhog Day and redoing moments a hundred times over, let’s look at five moments the Mets wish they could redo.

The team that was referred to as the “Lovable Losers” and was the laughing stock of baseball for years, including relatively recently, the Mets have plenty of moments most would want to redo.

Between terrible trades, poor endings to key games, poor investments on and off the field, keeping in pitchers a batter too long or taking them out just too early, and many other moments, the Mets have had their fair share of moments they want to redo.

Through the power of Groundhog Day and our imagination, we are going to redo five moments in Mets history that the Mets wish to redo and come up with a new result.

Even though it would be nice for the actual result to change, that is not a real possibility, unfortunately. For now, we will have to use our imagination and live in an alternate Mets universe. With that being said, let’s take a look at five New York Mets moments we wish could be redone.

5) 1988 NLCS Game 4

Starting off the five moments that the Mets wish they could redo, we have game four of the 1988 National League Championship Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Amazin’s were back in the playoffs after missing them in 1987 despite winning 92 games and coming off a World Series Championship.

The Mets were up two games to one going into game four of the NLCS and they had young phenom Dwight Gooden set to start. They were looking to be in good shape to go up three games to one as a result.

Despite the fact that Gooden gave up two runs in the first inning, he settled down and went on to pitch eight spectacular innings. In those eight innings, he only gave up those two runs in the first, 3 hits, and had 8 strikeouts.

Once the ninth inning rolled around Gooden got himself into a little bit of trouble. The Mets were up 4-2 on LA and had a win expediency of 94%. Gooden gave up a leadoff walk to John Shelby which brought the tying run to the plate in Mike Scioscia. On the first pitch of the at-bat, Scioscia connected for a line-drive home run over the right-field fence to tie the game at 4.

The game ended up going twelve innings which resulted in the Dodgers winning and tying the series at two games apiece. The Mets went on to lose the series in seven games which included them being shutout 6-0 in the seventh game. The Dodgers would then go on to beat the Oakland Athletics 4 games to 1 in the World Series.

There are a couple of different ways that the Mets could redo game four. The two obvious ones would be having Gooden pitch the ninth again and getting Scioscia out, with the end result being the Mets winning the game and going up three games to one in the series. The other option would be having closing pitcher Randy Myers come in and shut the door, also putting the Mets up three games to one.

In both situations of the Mets redoing the ninth, they would have been up three games to one in the series with only one win between their second World Series appearance in three years. With the Dodgers having gone on to win the World Series in only five games, it can be assumed that the Mets would have gone on to win the World Series as well.

If the Mets could redo game four of the 1988 NLCS, they would have likely gone on to win the series after going up three games to one. The Amazins likely then would have gone on to win their second World Series in three years and their third in their franchise history. Unfortunately, game four of the 1988 NLCS will always be remembered as a moment the Mets wish they could redo.