Mets honor their lefty and retire his No. 36

Sept. 30, 1978, was the last time the winningest left-hander in Mets franchise history took the mound for the club. Four decades later, the Mets retired Jerry Koosman’s No. 36 on Saturday in a touching on-field ceremony at Citi Field. Koosman’s children, two sons and his daughter, and four grandchildren were in attendance to honor his legacy.

Koosman became just the third Mets player to have his number retired, joining Tom Seaver (No. 41) and Mike Piazza (No. 31). The Mets have also retired No. 14 for manager Gil Hodges, No. 37 for manager Casey Stengel and No. 42 across baseball for Jackie Robinson.

“It’s a lot of emotions,” said Koosman on Saturday in a Zoom press conference. “It’s excitement. It’s a humbling feeling. I don’t know that I deserve it. But to be up there with these other greats, it’s quite a feather in your cap.”

Koosman, without a doubt, deserves it.

He ranks second in Mets history in starts (346), complete games (108), innings (2,544.2) and shutouts (26), third in strikeouts (1,799), and sixth in ERA (3.09). He pitched 21 seasons as a professional, from 1965 to 1985, 19 seasons in the major leagues and three in the minors.

He served in the United States Army as a 19-year-old in 1962, and the Mets signed him to a contract in August 1964 after scouting him when he was pitching for an Army team at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas.

“I’d never seen a big-league game, and all of a sudden I was playing pro ball,” he said.

After a few years of seesawing back and forth between the minors and majors, Koosman finally broke into the big leagues for good in 1968. In his rookie season with the Mets, he posted a 19-12 record and a 2.08 ERA. Mets team president Sandy Alderson on Saturday read aloud Koosman’s rookie stats in the press conference, and Koosman smiled as he remembered the good old days.

That season, he set the NL record for most strikeouts for a pitcher as a batter with 62, and tied the modern NL record for most shutouts by a rookie with seven. He followed that terrific breakout into the big leagues by going 17-9 with a 2.28 ERA for the 1969 championship Mets. He won both of his starts against the Orioles in the ‘69 World Series.

Koosman, 78, pitched alongside Seaver in the Mets rotation from 1967-77. Koosman and Seaver not only led the Mets to their first championship in franchise history, but they were close friends. Koosman played a prank on Seaver by crafting a fake trade, leading The Franchise to believe he was being sent to the Houston Astros, alongside Ed Kranepool, via a fabricated radio announcement. Kranepool nearby started breaking bats at his locker while Seaver froze.

“Seaver just went white,” Kranepool recalled on Saturday. “He was just standing there like he’d seen a ghost. I told him, ‘I can’t believe the Mets would do this. Trade you away? And for Doug Rader on top of that?’ He just couldn’t talk. He was stunned.”

Koosman spent 12 years in Queens before he was traded to the Minnesota Twins in December 1978. He went on to play for White Sox and Phillies and retired after the 1985 season with a 3.36 career ERA and 222-209 record over 612 games.

Well after his 19 seasons in the big leagues, Koosman echoed many of his teammates from that historic 1969 season and said on Saturday that Hodges was the best skipper he ever had.

“I had some good ones, but he was the best,” Koosman said. “He was always 2-3 steps ahead of the opposing manager. He was so far ahead of his planning all the time, and he never let a player get into a position they couldn’t handle. He knew his players’ talents very well and he made us look great.”

New Mets owner Steve Cohen said this past November that he would love to continue to celebrate the club’s history, whether that’s through number retirement ceremonies or an eventual Old Timer’s Day. Alderson, who said he was speaking on Cohen’s behalf, reiterated that sentiment.

“I think Steve and Alex [Cohen] and the organization, myself, are committed to celebrating our history,” Alderson said. “It’s a storied franchise; some people would say iconic. And it’s only that way because of the history that we have, and the players who created that history.

“Jerry is among the foremost who have done that. Baseball is a game of history, not only from a statistical standpoint but also from a personality standpoint and it’s important that we recognize that, and to some extent, educate current fans as to what took place years and years ago.”

This one’s for you, Jerry.