Remembering Mets History (1973) Seaver Win 18th as Mets Take Over First Place

Friday September 21st, 1973: Yogi Berra's Mets (76-77) were now red hot. They had won three straight & seven of their last nine games. Going back further, they had won fourteen of their last twenty coming from 6.5 games out of first place to within a half game of the first place Pittsburgh Pirates. After last night's exciting walk off win in "the Ball on the Wall Game", the Mets were now tasting first place, as it was withing their grasp, a half game away. The largest crowd of the year at Shea Stadium up to that point, some 51,381 paid fans waited on the same day ticket lines & packed in to see their "franchise" the 1973 Cy Young Award Winner, Tom Sever (17-10) go up against the Pirates Steve Blass (3-8). You Gotta Believe was alive & well all around the city as Pennant Fever took over New York. Steve Blass had been a hero of the 1971 World Series & a 19 games winner in 1972 but he was having a rough season and would end his career after j