Hall of Fame pitcher Tom Seaver, Miracle Mets legend, passes on of dementia, COVID-19 at 75

Hall of Fame pitcher Tom Seaver has passed on of complications of Lewy body dementia and COVID-19, the National Baseball Hall of Fame said in an announcement Wednesday. He was 75.

He passed on calmly in his sleep Monday, the association said.

“We are heartbroken to share that our beloved husband and father has passed away,” said a family statement from Tom Seaver’s wife, Nancy, and daughters, Sarah and Anne. “We send our love out to his fans, as we mourn his loss with you.”

Tom Seaver played 12 seasons with the Mets, winning the National League Cy Young Award, honoring the league’s best pitcher, three times.

In the wake of having been a league-wide joke for the franchise’s hapless play since their debut season in 1962, the team, which was named the Miracle Mets, had the option to overcome years of disappointment and win the 1969 World Series as Tom Seaver won his first Cy Young Award.

He’s credited with 311 successes, 3,640 strikeouts, and a 2.86 earned-run average during a career that began in 1967 and finished in 1986.

“Tom Seaver’s life exemplified greatness in the game, as well as integrity, character, and sportsmanship — the ideals of a Hall of Fame career,” Hall of Fame Chairman Jane Forbes Clark said. “As a longtime member of the Hall of Fame Board of Directors, Tom brought dignity and wisdom to this institution that will be deeply missed.”

Tom Seaver additionally played parts of six seasons with the Cincinnati Reds, parts of three with the Chicago White Sox and one with the Boston Red Sox.

Tom Seaver changed a franchise and captivated a city, setting suffering norms as he whipped his incredible right arm overhead for the Miracle Mets and dirtied his right knee on major league mounds for twenty years.

A consummate pro and pitching icon, he said he was satisfied after a career recalled with wonder long after his final strikeout.

The Hall said Wednesday night that Tom Seaver died Monday from inconveniences of Lewy body dementia and COVID-19. Seaver spent his last years in Calistoga, California.

Tom Seaver’s family reported in March 2019 that he had been diagnosed with dementia and had retired from public life. He kept working at Seaver Vineyards, established by the three-time NL Cy Young Award winner and his wife, Nancy, in 2002 on 116 acres at Diamond Mountain in the Calistoga region of Northern California.

Seaver was diagnosed with Lyme disease in 1991, and it reoccurred in 2012 and prompted Bell’s paralysis and memory loss, the Daily News of New York announced in 2013.

Tom Seaver was appointed for the Hall of Fame in 1992 when he showed up on 425 of 430 voting forms for a then-record 98.84%. His mark was outperformed in 2016 by Ken Griffey Jr., again in 2019 when Mariano Rivera became the first consistent selection by baseball authors, and in 2020 when Derek Jeter fell one vote short of a clean sweep.

Seaver pitched for the Miracle Mets from 1967 to 1977, when he was traded to Cincinnati after a public disagreement with chairman M. Donald Grant over Seaver’s craving for another agreement. It was a conflict that aggravated baseball fans in New York.

Tom Seaver was a star at the University of Southern California and was drafted by Atlanta in 1966. He signed with the Braves for $51,500 just for commissioner William Eckert to void the deal. The Trojans previously had played display games that year, and baseball rules at the time disallowed a club from signing a college player whose season had begun. Any team ready to match the Braves’ signing bonus could enter a lottery, and Eckert selected the Miracle Mets from a cap that additionally included Cleveland and Philadelphia.

Among baseball’s most exceedingly awful teams from their extension season in 1962, the Miracle Mets lost in excess of 100 games in five of their initial six seasons and had always lost more than 73 in any of their initial seven years. With appreciated Brooklyn Dodgers star Gil Hodges as their manager, a youthful corps of pitchers led via Tom Seaver, Jerry Koosman, Gary Gentry a still-wild Nolan Ryan, and an offense that included Cleon Jones and Tommie Agee, the Mets overwhelmed the Chicago Cubs to win the NL East with a 100-62 record in 1969.

They cleared Hank Aaron and the Atlanta Braves in the first NL Championship Series to arrive at the World Series against highly preferred Baltimore, which had gone 109-53. Tom Seaver lost the opener 4-1 in a matchup with Mike Cuellar, at that point pitched a 10-inning six-hitter to dominate Match 4, and the Miracle Mets won the title the next afternoon.

Tom Seaver was an All-Star in every one of his initial seven seasons. Aaron acquainted himself with Seaver at the pitcher’s first All-Star Game in 1967.

“Kid, I know who you are, and before your career is over, I guarantee you everyone in this stadium will, too,” Aaron said.

For Tom Seaver, that All-Star appearance caused him to feel like he had a place.

“I may have been paid before, but that’s when I really became a professional,” he said.

Maybe Seaver’s most important second on the hill was at Shea Stadium on July 9, 1969, when he retired his initial 25 batters against the Chicago Cubs. Special hitter Jimmy Qualls circled a one-out single to left-center in the ninth inning before Tom Seaver retired Willie Smith on a foul out and Don Kessinger on a flyout.

“I had every hitter doing what I wanted,” Tom Seaver recalled in 1992. “Afterward, my wife was in tears and I remember saying to her: ‘Hey, I pitched a one-hit shutout with 10 strikeouts. What more could I ask for?'”