The Opening Day when everyone heard about Rusty Staub
Rusty Staub during Mets batting practice on July 12, 1984. Credit: AP
You heard it on the 7 train out of Grand Central, along with the usual “Let’s Go Mets” and “This is my 12th straight opener” and “Batting the pitcher eighth is overmanaging.”
You heard it on the walk from the subway station to the old Home Run Apple, as folks in the latest Mets gear posed for pictures in a cold drizzle.
“Did you hear about Rusty?”
Opening Day is for cheers, not tears, but there were plenty of both at Citi Field on Thursday morning. The news swept across the Internet and TV stations before 9 a.m. that Rusty Staub had died at age 73 at a hospital in West Palm Beach, Florida.
On Opening Day.
On a day so special to some that it gets circled on the mental calendar months before it arrives. A day that turns grown men and women into little kids again. One that brings back memories of that Opening Day when you saw the Mets do this or the Yankees do that, and you felt like spring was in the air no matter the temperature.
For those who remember young Rusty Staub from Mets games on Ch. 9 in the 1970s, before HDTV and streaming and Twitter and all of it, he was a sweet-swinging lefthanded hitter who hit three home runs against the Reds in the 1973 NLCS and batted .423 against the A’s in the World Series.
His second act in a Mets uniform began in 1981 and ended in 1985, when he was a pinch hitter extraordinaire and elder statesman. Fans of a certain age probably remember that older, thicker Staub more clearly.
Sure, he began his career in Houston in 1963 and earned the nickname “Le Grand Orange” in Montreal and also played in Detroit and Texas, but Mets fans claimed Staub as their own, and he returned the affection.
Staub’s post-career charitable endeavors through his foundation, especially his work for the New York Police and Fire Widows’ and Children’s Benefit Fund, made him beloved for more than just 2,716 hits in a 23-year career.
Staub never got close to the Baseball Hall of Fame, as he never received more than 7.9 percent of the vote, and he was dropped from the ballot in 1997.
He was inducted into the Mets Hall of Fame in 1986 and named one of the team’s “Goodwill Ambassadors.” Never was a title probably dreamed up in some marketing executive’s office more appropriate. Staub spread goodwill wherever he went.
As fans began to enter Citi Field at about 11:30, light rain was still falling and the field was covered by the tarp. There would be no batting practice for the Mets or Cardinals, and as fans milled about the concourses or checked out their seats or went to get some lunch, you probably could hear this along with the talk about the weather or Noah Syndergaard’s fastball or when Michael Conforto is going to be back:
“Did you hear about Rusty?”
The Mets observed a moment of silence for Staub and Ed Charles, another beloved Met from another era, before the game.
There was a game played after 1 p.m. Memories would be made and carried to future Opening Days.
This one — the Opening Day when everyone heard about Rusty — will never be forgotten. Neither will the man.
Anthony Rieber covers baseball, as well as the NFL, NBA and NHL. He has worked at Newsday since Aug. 31, 1998, and has been in his current position since July 5, 2004.
