PORT ST. LUCIE — The People’s Choice wanders the grounds at Digital Domain Park wearing a sunny grin and a salty gait, a fungo bat in his hands and the most appropriate number a clubhouse worker has ever distributed a uniformed employee.
“We love you Wally!” the fans forever bellow.
And Wally Backman — a foot-tall No. 86 in the middle of his back — smiles and acknowledges the love, then goes and tosses 10 minutes of batting practice, or hits ground balls to busy infielders. It isn’t his turn. Backman will be in Binghamton this summer, furthering his organizational internship and deepening his resume.
There remains a lot of Mets fans disappointed Backman — the firebrand, eff-off face of the ’86 Mets, the fuel behind the franchise’s last championship fire — finished tied for second in the derby to become Jerry Manuel’s successor last fall, and Backman, in the weeks after, was one of those dissenters.
But what the Mets needed every bit as much as Backman himself was the theories and philosophies Backman embodies, both in memory and in reality: a dirty uniform, a dyspeptic disposition, an inclination to suspend niceties when necessary and get in the face of any and every offending party — opponent, umpire, sportswriter, teammate.
And if Terry Collins has proven nothing else in three months on the job, it is this: The only thing that separates the man who got the job from the man who wanted the job is a spot on that ’86 roster and the permanent slot in the New York heart that goes along with it. Everything else? Close your eyes, you’d have a hard time distinguishing the two.
“I give a [bleep] how this team plays,” Collins said yesterday.
And that should play like “Rhapsody in Blue” in the ears of Mets fans, so many of whom grew frustrated watching Manuel gently riff while Rome burned the past few years, who would routinely beg for Willie Randolph to change expressions in the dugout, who weren’t entirely certain Art Howe was ever entirely conscious in two years.
There is no one way to be as a manager, of course, no mandatory personality — Gil Hodges won just as many championships for the Mets by keeping his feelings and thoughts mostly to himself as Davey Johnson did as the social director of the ’86 Mets frat house, after all. But this much is certain: It’s never a bad thing to err on the side of the guy whose face gets easily flushed.
So yesterday, given the chance to offer his first address to his full team, show it who he is and what to expect, Collins meticulously crafted and drafted his introduction. As late as 10 minutes before outsiders were ushered out of the clubhouse, you could see him jotting thoughts onto note cards. He’d been impressive at his press conference in November, but it’s one thing to impress knuckleheads with notebooks.
A roomful of ballplayers, that’s a tougher room.
“Was the speech more Patton or more Lincoln?” Collins was asked.
“Patton,” he said. The question was meant as a joke; the answer most certainly was not. He told his players he was pleased with the optimistic sound bites he’d heard them deliver in the winter, then challenged them to buy into their own beliefs.
“I’ve waited 12 years for this chance again,” Collins said. “It’s a baseball team. It’s what I do.”
As first impressions go, it was favorable. Several Mets lauded their new manager’s “positive energy.” David Wright, who has been around long enough to hear a lot of these new-leaf speeches, said Collins “wins for being probably the most red in the face. Even when he pulls you aside one-on-one, it’s just a different intensity or a different volume.
“He’s just that excited about baseball and that excited about this season,” Wright said. “He gets all fired up and it’s like a snowball. He starts up with a normal voice and it picks up a few decibels and then a few more and by the end of it he’s yelling and screaming and sweating and red in the face. It makes it fun, and those are the type of guys you want to run through a wall for.”
The wall awaits. And Wally waits.