Mets 1986 Lineups
I was looking at some of my logs and noticed that I registered a few hits from web searches for information on the starting lineup of the 1986 Mets. So as a public service I now bring you some information on lineups the Mets used in ’86.
The ’86 team was very odd for a championship team in that there were three platoons. Also, the large lead the team had late in the season led to a lot of lineup variation as manager Davey Johnson tried to balance his players’ playing time to keep them well rested but hot at the same time.
The Mets opening day lineup in 1986 was as follows:
Len Dykstra, CF
Wally Backman, 2B
Keith Hernandez, 1B
Gary Carter, C
Darryl Strawberry, RF
George Foster, LF
Howard Johnson, 3B
Rafael Santana, SS
That day the Mets faced righthander Rick Reuschel of the Pirates. However, as mentioned above three of those players were platoon players so against lefties the lineup would look like this:
Mookie Wilson, CF
Tim Teufel, 2B
Keith Hernandez, 1B
Gary Carter, C
Darryl Strawberry, RF
George Foster, LF
Ray Knight, 3B
Rafael Santana, SS
The Mets released Foster in August as a result of poor performance and racial comments (the racial comments being the nail in the coffin). As result Wilson ended up spending a lot of the later part of the season in left field along side Dykstra who was in center and rookie Kevin Mitchell and fourth outfielder Danny Heep got some extra outfield time as well. Late in the season a typical lineup against righties looked something like this:
Len Dykstra, CF
Wally Backman, 2B
Keith Hernandez, 1B
Gary Carter, C
Darryl Strawberry, RF
Danny Heep, LF
Howard Johnson, 3B
Rafael Santana, SS
Against lefties it looked like this:
Mookie Wilson, LF
Len Dykstra, CF
Keith Hernandez, 1B
Gary Carter, C
Darryl Strawberry, RF
Ray Knight, 3B
Tim Teufel, 2B
Rafael Santana, SS
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