Put this in the books: Howie Rose nailed it on calling Mets' wild playoff-clinching game

Howie Rose thought he had seen it all as a Mets fan and broadcaster. Then he saw Monday’s playoff clincher against Atlanta.

“This, with everything that was on the line and the changes in the flow of the game over the last two innings were unprecedented to me as a Mets broadcaster, and in Mets history,” Rose told Newsday.

“It created, I think, the most unique regular-season game they've ever played.”

Rose was speaking on Tuesday morning from Milwaukee as he prepared to call the first game of a wild-card series against the Brewers for Audacy Mets radio.

But like everyone who follows the Mets, he still was basking in the afterglow of an 8-7 victory that saw the Mets fall behind, 3-0, go ahead, 6-3, fall behind, 7-6, then win it on Francisco Lindor’s two-run home run in the top of the ninth.

Several of the calls that Rose made on radio and Gary Cohen made on SNY echoed throughout the night on social media and into Tuesday and drew rave reviews. Cohen punctuated the final out with, “From 0-5 to OMG, what a ride!”

But only one of the two longtime announcers and lifelong Mets fans will be along for the playoff ride.

All television coverage of the Mets in the playoffs is national. So Rose and Keith Raad will be the local soundtrack of the Mets from here to wherever this leads.

Prior to Monday’s thriller, Rose cited Johan Santana’s no-hitter in 2012 and the Mets winning the National League pennant in 2015 as two of his biggest thrills.

Now those have company.

.@HowieRose, perfection as always 🎙️ pic.twitter.com/aVEZXUbxsX

— x - New York Mets (@Mets) September 30, 2024

Rose said he was aware of the praise for his work on Monday – directly via texts from friends and indirectly through social media – and was appreciative.

“Look, I'm human, and I know what they're saying,” he said. “It just about moved me to tears [Monday] night, the way some of the people were flattering in their comments.

“I could sit here and say, ‘Oh, that's nice. I really don't pay any attention to that.’ Frankly, I would say a guy who tells you that he or she doesn't is full of [expletive]. . . When you see some of the comments, it's like, wow, it knocks me out.”

Rose said the highest form of flattery is when Mets fans tell him that he is their generation’s version of Bob Murphy, Lindsey Nelson and Ralph Kiner – the Mets announcers of Rose’s youth.

“They were my eyes and ears for six, seven months [each year], and yeah, their voices still linger in my mind all these years later,” Rose said.

“I was 15 in 1969 when the biggest thing that ever happened happened, as far as I was concerned then. To think that 15-year-old kid could have been told back then, this is what you'll be doing in 50-odd years, I wouldn't believe it. It's a fairy tale.”

The Mets are four playoff-series victories away from Rose’s ultimate moment as a broadcaster.

“That’s what keeps me going,” he said. “I've only got one thing left on my professional bucket list, and that's to make the ultimate Mets call. But I ain’t getting any younger.”

Rose, 70, cut back further on travel this season, in part a concession to age, in part because of how the bladder cancer for which he was treated in 2021 made road trips more challenging.

Rose was scheduled for 101 regular-season games, with the season-ending road trip to Atlanta and Milwaukee listed as optional if the Mets were in contention.

They were, but that ended up being an Atlanta-to-Milwaukee-to-Atlanta trip, followed by another trip to Milwaukee for the playoffs.

“I guess it's payback,” Rose said. “Somebody saw that and said, ‘All right, wise guy, you want to manage your schedule? I got some management for you.’”

But Rose said the added excitement that comes with calling big games would carry him through.

“Yesterday was really the first time this year when I felt that churning, I felt that nervousness, I felt that anticipation,” he said. “And once you're in the playoffs, then that doesn't go away until it's over. And it's a welcome feeling.”

One benefit of the Mets losing Monday’s second game to Atlanta was that rather than travel to San Diego for the wild-card round, followed potentially by an NLDS against the Dodgers, they now are in Milwaukee and will face Philadelphia if they advance.

Rose said this scenario is easier “from a very, very personal stress management standpoint, given the rigors of travel, how much more complicated they are for me now than they used to be.”

Before the season began, he said he would call every playoff game, even if they were played in Timbuktu. Milwaukee will do nicely for now.

“You know how many people are into it, and what the ramifications are for the most diehard fans, not to mention the franchise that I've grown up loving and working for,” he said.

“Once that adrenaline starts flowing, it carries you, despite the craziness of the schedule, and when it doesn't, that's when I’ll know I’m done.”