The Bad Guys Won: A Season of Brawling, Boozing, Bimbo Chasing, and Championship Baseball with Straw, Doc, Mookie, Nails, the Kid, and the Rest of the 1986 Mets, the Rowdiest Team Ever to Put on a New York Uniform--and Maybe the Best

BASEBALL BEATS THE SOAPS!

As a woman with little knowledge of baseball I happened on this baseball book about the Mets win in 1986. I loved the humor and perspective Pearlman gave to those outragously bad boys.

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Highly Recommended

As an original Met fan this book is both nostalgic and insightful of that team in 1986. Although I haven't completed it it brings back great memories of those times and being a sports fan in New York.

Unfortunately, our town and the sports world lost one of the main ingredients of that team, Gary Carter. A few years ago I had the pleasure to meet him at our health club. This meeting only reinforced what everyone said about him. This pleasant and cordial man will be greatly missed.

To ALL baseball fans and especially Met fans, read the book.

Great book

I could not put this book down. Very fun read for any eighties baseball fan.

Great job

Alot of good info

The York Mets

This looks like a good book.

Surprisingly Good Read

This is a well written, thoroughly researched, comprehensive and balanced account of an interesting group and their one time of truimph. It includes the viewpoints of management, veterans, upcoming megastars, and misfits. Pearlman describes a group cohesion centered around various levels of extreme aggression, rowdy plafulness and sheer confidence. Interwoven within the story of the team and it's development are vivid, revealing, balanced portraits of the individuals. Naively devoted Met Fans will need to remove blinders and swallow that belief that greatness equals integrity. It is a great read for any Baseball Fan except avid NY Met Haters. Highly recommended.

Great Read

Well worth the bargin book price that I paid for this. I didnt go in with much expecation but it ended up being one of most well written books I've read in a long time.

This era of Met team took place before the intenet age and unrivaled access to sports teams and athletes. This book makes it seem like you have today's kind fo access to a team from the 80's. A team the likely had the most interesting cast of charachters of any team ever.

Would reccomend this book to anyone with even a passing interest in baseball or sports in general. It also bares out to have a lot of truth. Many idolized these players, but the book called them out as kind of jerks and squanderers of talent. Strawberry, Doc Gooden, Dykstra all have remained jerks. Straw may be on his path to redemption but he's been there before and thrown it back away. Time will tell.

Revealing

Definitely not what I expected. The author brilliantly mixes the action of the New York Mets' Champion World Series 1986 Season and the behind-the-scenes doings that the fans generally don't see. The book is a great review of the entire season, and brings back lots of memories. Hearing what Gary Carter, Kevin Mitchell, and Ray Knight said to first-base coach Bill Robinson after getting on base in the sixth game of the World Series was amusing. But some of the other revelations, particularly regarding the players' social behavior, were more startling. For the most part, the book is a look-back at the 1986 season, which any true Mets fan will love. Just be prepared for the unexpected.

A new look at an old favorite

I lived the '86 Mets when I was growing up and I thought I knew how wild and wonderful they were. But it turns out I had no idea. Jeff Pearlman's look inside one of the most storied and star-crossed sports teams of all time is gripping, well-researched, and in many cases shocking. He discovers, with surprising details, the depths of the Mets' perversion. He takes the reader inside the clubhouse, onto the team plane, into the bar and even into the jail cell. Those are unexpected 'pleasures', but the beauty of the book is how those stories -- many of which avid Mets fans will be hearing for the first time -- are woven throughout the fabric of the Mets' incredible season. Because while the details are stunning, it's still the Mets' run to the 1986 World Series championship that makes them relevant. They're not just another championship team, and they're not just another team with boorish behavior. The two are related, and by the book that's clear. I never knew the Mets like I thought I knew the Mets. Now, thanks to this book, I know them too well.

The Second Greatest Team ever: The '86 Mes

The Bad Guys Won was an absolutely amazing book. When Frank Cashen first arrived with the team in 1980, the Mets were a washed up bunch of losers. Then they traded away Mike Scott, George Foster, and Rusty Staub retired. By 1983, in came new players like 'Straw' Strawberry, 'Mex Hernandez.' By 1984, they'd sign 'Doc' Gooden, and hire a new manager, under the name of 'Davey' Johnson, who's philosophy was, 'Run as wild as you want, just as long you keep winning games.' 'Kid' Carter, Kevin Mitchell, and Bobby Ojeda came along in 1985 and New York sent Calvin Schiraldi to Boston. By 1986, it was all set: Gooden, Darling, Ojeda, Fernandez, Sisk, McDowell, Orosco, Aguilera, Carter, Hearn, Hernandez, Teufel, Heep, Backman, Santana, Knight, Wilson, Dykstra, Mazilli, Hojo, Strawberry, and some others. And with Davey Johnson and his philosophy, the team steamrolled to 108 victories. They trashed airplanes, bars, spent nights in jail cells (Teufel, Ojeda, Darling, and Aguilera), they hated every team, every team hated them, and yet they won 108 games. Unbelievable. In the NLCS, they beat Houston in six games and in that sixth game, they beat Houston 7-6 in 16 innings. They'd face 24-year-old fireballer Roger Clemens (24-4) and the Red Sox in the World Series. After Buckner's error in the 10th inning of Game 6, they'd win Game 7 8-5. The Bad Guys won it all. Unfortunately, it wouldn't last. Gooden and Strawberry were overcome by drug abuse, trades and retirements occured, Davey Johnson left the team, and by 1991, they were left with nothing. They've only reached the World Series once since (2000) and lost to the Yankees in five. To many people, the future once again looks bleak and dismal but the '86 team will live in the hearts of Mets fans forever.

Super Team Shot Itself In the Foot

I really enjoyed this book, being a long-time Mets fan. I liked how he described how bad the team was before Cashen took over, how he built the team, and saw it disintegrate before his eyes, with his own help. I didn't realize Gooden was already on the downhill by 1986, nor did I know how the Mets destroyed his pitching brilliance. A nice job.

NO BIG DEAL!

I eagerly awaited to read this but was greatly disappointed after I finished it. I expected new revelations about the 1986 Mets but walked away from this book without any new insights into the team. If you followed the Mets back then, you really don't find out anything new or earth-shattering about this so called 'Wild Bunch'.

A fantastic read...a real page-turner

I had heard an interview Jeff Pearlman had done for this book and as he relayed some of the stories of the 1986 Mets I was amazed. Only being eight years old during the season (but still a huge baseball fan) I really remembered very little about the team. All the drugs, parties, sex, disgusting practical jokes etc. were unfamiliar to me. I bought the book and was not disappointed. I finished off the book in no time as the humor and great stories kept on coming. Pearlman did a fantastic job. He certainly has a bright future if he can continue with strong efforts like this one.

Bad Guys Won

I love sports books, and this is one of the best I've ever read. Pearlman is a very funny writer (I first saw his articles when he was a young writer in Nashville in the early 90s), and this is a great forum. The Mets were crazier than anyone could ever imagine: The food fights, the women, the drinking. Pearlman presents it in a very breezy way. I really love this book.

Bad Guys Won

I've read a lot of baseball books, and few provided as much enjoyment. Unlike a lot of the recent releases, this is anything but a stiff biography. The '86 Mets were crazy, and you learn a ton about them here.

A Victory to Remember Put In Context

The 1986 Mets/Red Sox series was the first world series I ever followed. A New Yorker attending her freshman year of college in New England (where everyone was an adopted Sox fan), I made a bet on my hometown Mets when they were down 0-2 and got my laundry done by a cocky Sox fan for a month! Mr. Pearlman has done an excellent job of putting the series into perspective and providing colorful background on the players who pulled out that unbelievable come-from-behind victory. His humor and incredibly deep reporting made the book a fast read that delivered enjoyment and well as extensive knowledge. I'd recommend it to anyone, sports fan or no.

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