The 1981 Mets were a mess, but Joel Youngblood still managed to carve out one of the strangest All-Star seasons in franchise history.
The season itself was already warped. A midyear players’ strike split MLB into two halves, the 162-game schedule got thrown out of rhythm, and the All-Star Game was moved to August 9, roughly a month later than planned.
For the Mets, it was just another chapter in a lost year. For Youngblood, it became the stage for a performance that has largely faded from memory.
He was the club’s only All-Star, and for good reason. In the first half, Youngblood played 38 games and hit .359.
After the break, he added five more games and went 0 for 1 in his All-Star season, but still finished at .350. The catch is that he did it in only 161 plate appearances and 143 at-bats, so even in a shortened season, the numbers didn’t qualify him for the league lead.
That’s part of why the season gets overlooked. Youngblood is remembered most for his 1982 feat of playing two games, in two cities, for two different teams, and getting a hit in each.
His 1981 run was quieter, but it was excellent. For the Mets, he was a solid player overall, posting a lifetime .274/.333/.410 slash line with the team.
During the dark stretch from 1979 to 1981, he was even better, hitting .284/.350/.424 with 28 home runs and 154 RBIs.
The Mets needed somebody to represent a 17-34 team in the first half, and Youngblood was the obvious pick.
That 1981 roster had its bright spots, too. Hubie Brooks hit .307, and Rusty Staub was even better at .317.
But the offense had deeper issues than batting average. Dave Kingman accounted for 22 of the team’s 57 home runs.
Beyond him, Doug Flynn, Frank Taveras, Lee Mazzilli, and Ellis Valentine all hit under .250 with little power to speak of.
The record told the bigger story. At .398, the Mets were on pace to lose 100 games.
Youngblood stood out as an odd exception on a roster full of problems, and a knee injury early in the second half cut short any chance he had to keep pushing toward a batting title. Bill Madlock won it at .341.
If Youngblood had kept up his pace, he would have become the first Mets player to win a batting title.
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