Doc, Donnie, The Kid, and Billy Brawl: How the 1985 Mets and Yankees Fought for New York's Baseball Soul by Chris Connelly (review)

In the hoopla that often accompanies nostalgic lookbacks at historical events, one may lose sight of any underlying significance of the time immediately preceding the big occasion of focus. This is the case with Chris Donnelly's book that explores the 1985 season in New York City, a time at which the Mets were on the brink of returning to—and capturing—the World Series. Rather than train his sights solely on the Mets, however, Donnelly incorporates the doings of the cross-town Yankees into his narrative to relive an exciting and oft-forgotten year in Gotham's baseball history.

Using a bevy of interviews with personalities big and lesser known, contemporaneous accounts from metropolitan newspapers, and a dash of other secondary sources, the author spins a fast-moving tale that takes the reader through a baseball campaign in which Davey Johnson, now in his sophomore year as manager of the Mets, musters his troops for a run at the National League East pennant, while at the same time, Billy Martin takes the reins of the Yankees—for the fourth time—and maneuvers his team into contention against a formidable squad of Toronto Blue Jays who eventually capture the American League East. Donnelly crafts the narrative in simple terms and moves it along in measured doses that strategically alternate between the Mets and Yankees to inform the reader of what is taking place with both teams as the season progresses. Donnelly has much material to draw from: Don Mattingly, Doc Gooden, and Darryl Strawberry as emerging talents; Davey Johnson, cutting his teeth as a big league manager; and the saga of Billy Martin, at once embattled by self-inflicted miseries and carrying the baggage of his past; and not least, Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, whose will to win is matched—and often surpassed—by his ruthless meddling and bombastic demeanor.

For those who lived through this era thirty-five years ago, the book can bring back unwelcome memories of the nearly daily rants and tussles between Steinbrenner and (mostly) Martin, and Donnelly paints an accurate picture of this brutal interaction. The Boss, unaccustomed to extended periods in which the Yankees do not make the playoffs, finds fault with those who fail him, and his agony is multiplied as the once woebegone Mets assemble not just a contending team but one that positions itself to be formidably domineering for perhaps at least the next five years. As more fans flock to Shea Stadium to witness the Mets' rejuvenation, the media joins the crowd, with more good news to report from Flushing. To be sure, there are tics and foibles in the Mets clubhouse, where Gary Carter's cloying presence especially ruffled some feathers, but his love of the curtain call—and the camera—was the cost of having a Hall-of-Fame catcher in the lineup.

The Mets were an organization guided by sound business practices, which is to say that ownership, the front office, and the manager respected each other's territory. The same was not true under Steinbrenner, and while the Yankees' results in the late 1970s may have justified the means, by the following decade, the owner's act had worn thin. Yet in 1985, Martin's rehiring after Yogi Berra was fired in April nearly worked a miracle in the Bronx Bombers' quest for the AL East pennant. The author does well in encapsulating Martin's life and circumstances as he found his way back to the Yankees' helm and tried to keep his mercurial demeanor in check despite the interference of the overbearing Steinbrenner.

When the Yankees' resurgence paired up with the coalescing of the Mets under Johnson, the confluence of these happenings equated to much excitement in one city. Speaking of a significant mid-September date, Donnelly notes, "Fans from both sides...