They Said It Couldn't Be Done: The '69 Mets, New York City, and the Most Astounding Season in Baseball History

Synopsis

The astonishing story of the 1969 Miracle Mets, the most improbable World Series champions in baseball history, from Wayne Coffey, the best-selling author of The Boys of Winter.

Here is an iconic season brought back to riveting life on its 50th anniversary. Gracefully told with unprecedented depth and detail and set against the roiling backdrop of the Vietnam War, the wonder of the moon landing and the music-filled mayhem of Woodstock, They Said It Couldn’t Be Done is the finely wrought,  uplifting chronicle of a brilliant manager, Gil Hodges, and his overachieving roster of heroes, who together produced a triumph for the ages.

The story of the 1969 New York Mets’ season has long since entered sports lore as one of the most remarkable of all time. But beyond the “miracle” is a compelling narrative of an unlikely collection of players and the hallowed manager who inspired them to greatness. Future Hall of Fame ace Tom Seaver snagged the biggest headlines, but the enduring richness of the story lies in the core of a team comprised of untested youngsters, lightly regarded veterans, and four Southern-born African-American stalwarts who came of age in the shadow of Jackie Robinson. Most of the Mets regulars were improbable candidates for baseball stardom. The number two starting pitcher, Jerry Koosman, grew up on a Minnesota farm, never played high-school ball, and was only discovered because of a tip from a Mets’ usher. Outfielder Ron Swoboda was known for long home runs and piles of strikeouts, until he turned into a glove wizard when it mattered most.
 
All of these men were galvanized by their manager: the sainted former Brooklyn Dodger Gil Hodges, whose fundamental belief in the power of every man on the roster, no matter his stats, helped backup players like Al Weis and J.C. Martin become October heroes. As the Mets powered through the season to reach a World Series against the best-in-a-generation Baltimore Orioles, Hodges’s steady hand guided a team that had very recently been the league laughingstock to an improbable, electrifying shot at sports immortality. In these pages, bestselling author Wayne Coffey has captured the voices of players and fans, reporters and umpires, to bring to life a moment when a championship could descend on a city like magic, and when a baseball legend was authored one inning at a time.