Monday Mets: The all-time Met-Yankee team

There have been dozens of ballplayers to wear the uniform of both the Mets and the Yankees (plus four managers, all of whom played for at least one of the two clubs). With the arrival to the Mets last month of Kelly Johnson in a trade with the Braves — joining fellow ex-Yankee Bartolo Colon — I thought I’d dig into the list and pull together an all-star team of sorts. Most of the players on this list had their best years in Shea, with the exception of Yogi Berra (four games with the Mets as a player-coach) and Rickey Henderson; and only David Cone could be said to have played well for both teams.

C: Yogi Berra. Back-up: Rick Cerone/
1B: John Olerud. Back-up: Todd Zeille.
2B: Willie Randolph.
3B: Robin Ventura.
SS: Rafael Santana.
Back-up infielders: Sandy Alomar Sr., Miguel Cairo, and Kevin Elster
OF: Darryl Strawberry, Carlos Beltran, and Rickey Henderson. Back-ups: Dave Kingman, Lee Mazilli, and Curtis Granderson. Honorable mention to Bobby Abreu and Gary Sheffield, who both had great careers but were not great with either team.
P: Dwight Gooden, Al Leiter, David Cone, Ralph Terry, Doc Ellis, Bartolo Colon, Jeff Reardon, Mike Torrez, Armando Benitez.

 So, who did I miss?

Send me an e-mail.

Email me at grassroots at comcast dot net.
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Author: hankkalet

Hank Kalet is a poet and freelance journalist. He is the economic needs reporter for NJ Spotlight, teaches journalism at Rutgers University and writing at Middlesex County College and Brookdale Community College. He writes a semi-monthly column for the Progressive Populist. He is a lifelong fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks, drinks too much coffee and attends as many Bruce Springsteen concerts as his meager finances will allow. He lives in South Brunswick with his wife Annie.

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