December 10, 1984: The Mets Trade for Gary Carter

December 10, 1984: Having made some awful trades in their history, both before and after this day, the New York Mets make perhaps the best trade in their history.

It was nearly a reverse of their 1977 trade, sending their signature player, pitcher Tom Seaver, to the Cincinnati Reds for 4 players. This one sent 4 players to the Montreal Expos: 3rd baseman Hubie Brooks, catcher Mike Fitzgerald, outfielder Herm Winningham, and pitcher Floyd Youmans.

Brooks was popular among Met fans, and would continue to hit well in Montreal, making 2 All-Star Games. The other players were journeymen at best, basically designed to flesh the trade out, so it looked like the Expos were getting some talent beyond Brooks for Carter.

Carter, whose big smile and infectious enthusiasm got him nicknamed "The Kid" -- and whose propensity for self-promotion had gotten him the nickname "Camera Carter" -- was already considered Johnny Bench's successor as the best catcher in the National League, and only Carlton Fisk was an American League rival to the title of the best catcher in all of Major League Baseball.

The Mets had won the World Series in 1969, and the National League Pennant in 1973. As recently as 1976, they had finished a decent 3rd in the NL Eastern Division. Then they collapsed, due to mismanagement. They were sold in 1980, to Nelson Doubleday and Fred Wilpon, and the rebuilding began.

In 1983, Darryl Strawberry was Rookie of the Year, and they traded for Keith Hernandez. In 1984, they hired Davey Johnson as manager, and they benefited from several young players coming into their own, including Brooks, none more so than pitcher Dwight Gooden. They finished 2nd, and the acquisition of Carter was a huge upgrade at a key position.

On Opening Day of the 1985 season, one day after his 31st birthday, Carter hit a home run -- off Neil Allen, 1 of the 2 pitchers the Mets had traded to get Hernandez -- in the bottom of the 10th inning to give the Mets a 6-5 win over the St. Louis Cardinals, before 46,781 rapturous fans at Shea Stadium. The love affair between the Met fans and the best catcher the franchise has ever had began.

As with Reggie Jackson, across town on the Yankees a few years earlier, he was in New York for only 5 seasons, but no one can say they were dull years. Most significantly, it was Carter's single that kept the Mets alive in the bottom of the 10th inning of Game 6 of the 1986 World Series, leading to their 2nd title.

Gary Carter died in 2012. The Mets knew he was ill, and that he had already been elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame. They elected him to their team Hall of Fame. But they have never retired his Number 8. They gave it to Dave Gallagher in 1992, Carlos Baerga in 1997, and Desi Relaford in 2001, but no player since Relaford left that season. But it has not been officially retired.

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December 10, 1984 was a Monday. Baseball was out of season. On ABC Monday Night Football, the Los Angeles Raiders beat the Detroit Lions, 24-3 at the Silverdome in the Detroit suburb of Pontiac, Michigan.

There was 1 game played in the NBA: The Atlanta Hawks beat the Indiana Pacers, 104-98 at the Market Square Arena in Indianapolis.

And there were 2 games in the NHL. The New York Rangers beat the Los Angeles Kings, 4-2 at Madison Square Garden. And the Detroit Red Wings beat the Minnesota North Stars, 4-3 at the Metropolitan Sports Center in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota.

November 26, 1998: A Turkey of an Overtime Coin Flip

November 26, 1998: The Detroit Lions' annual tradition of hosting a game on Thanksgiving Day turns into a delicious result for them, because of a turkey of a turn of events.

The Lions were hosting the Pittsburgh Steelers at the Silverdome in the Detroit suburb of Pontiac, Michigan, in a game televised nationally on CBS. With Barry Sanders in the backfield, the Lions came into the game 4-7. With an offense with quarterback Kordell Stewart (known as "Slash" because he was a quarterback/runner/receiver) and running back Jerome Betts (known as "The Bus" because he was as big as one), the Steelers came in 7-4, and were leading the AFC Central Division.

The 1st quarter was scoreless. Norm Johnson kicked 2 field goals for the Steelers in the 2nd quarter, and Jason Hanson kicked 1 for the Lions, so it was 6-3 Pittsburgh at halftime. Stewart threw a touchdown pass to Will Blackwell to put the Steelers up 13-3. Hanson kicked another field goal, and it was 13-6 after 3 quarters.

In the 4th quarter, Charlie Batch threw a touchdown pass to Herman Moore, to tie the game. Hanson kicked a field goal to give the Lions their 1st lead of the game. But with 4 seconds left in regulation, Johnson kicked a 25-yard field goal, sending the game to overtime, 16-16.

Referee Phil Luckett called the team Captain to midfield for the overtime coin toss. As the visiting team, the Steelers had the right to call the toss, as they did at the beginning of the game. Luckett told Bettis to call the coin in the air.

Bettis had started to say, "Heads," but changed his mind in mid-syllable: "He -- Tails!" But Luckett went with the first syllable he said he heard, and ruled that Bettis had said, "Heads," which he hadn't. The coin landed tails, meaning the Steelers should have had the ball. Instead, Luckett ruled that the Lions had won the toss, and gave them the ball.

Batch took the Lions down the field, and, just 2 minutes and 52 seconds into overtime, with the Steelers never even getting the ball, Hanson kicked a 42-yard field goal to win it, 19-16.

The Steelers cried foul, but there was nothing they could do. The NFL was never going to order the overtime replayed. And while the win didn't affect the Lions much, as they lost the last 4 games of the season, to finish 5-11, the loss ruined the Steelers' season: It started a season-ending 5-game losing streak. They finished 7-9, and missed the Playoffs completely.

This play inspired 2 rule changes. First, the player making the call now does so while the ref is still holding the coin, and the ref repeats the call before flipping, with his microphone being piped into both the stadium public-address system and the television microphones. This way, no one, inside the stadium or outside, has any doubt as to what the Captain's call is.

That change took effect the next season. But it would be many more years before the NFL changed its rule so that the team winning the toss must score a touchdown to automatically win; if they only kick a field goal, the opposing team then gets the ball and a chance to win.

Luckett was also the referee 10 days later at the Meadowlands, when Vinny Testaverde of the New York Jets appeared to score a touchdown against the Seattle Seahawks, but the replay showed that the ball did not cross the plane of the goal line. Head linesman Earnie Frantz ruled it a touchdown, and Luckett, the man in charge, let it stand. The following season, the NFL instituted instant replay.

That didn't stop Luckett from being involved in a controversial play again the next season -- and this time, it was in the Playoffs. Luckett ruled that Frank Wychek's pass to Kevin Dyson, leading to Dyson's touchdown run that won the game for the Tennessee Titans against the Buffalo Bills was a lateral, and thus legal, and the play stood. This was the right call to make: It was a lateral.

Since 2012, Luckett has been a supervising official, in charge of instant replay.

*

November 26, 1998, like all Thanksgiving Days, was a Thursday. In the NFL's other game that day, the Minnesota Vikings beat the Dallas Cowboys, 46-36 at Texas Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Irving, Texas.

There were 2 college football games played that day, both of them intrastate matchups. Tulane, so rarely ranked since the 1st half of the 20th Century, were ranked Number 11, and beat Louisiana Tech, 63-30 at the Superdome in New Orleans. And Mississippi State, ranked Number 25, beat Mississippi, a.k.a. Ole Miss, 28-6 at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium in Oxford, Mississippi.

Baseball was in the off-season. Traditionally, the NBA and the NHL avoid scheduling games on Thanksgiving Day, so as not to compete with football for TV ratings. This time, however, the NHL scheduled 2 games, and a New York Tri-State Area team was in both. And both lost. The New York Islanders lost to the Ottawa Senators, 4-1 at the Corel Centre in the Ottawa suburb of Kanata, Ontario. (It's now the Canadian Tire Centre. The town was absorbed into Ottawa proper in 2001.) And the New Jersey Devils lost to the Phoenix Coyotes, 3-2 at the America West Arena (now the Footprint Center) in Phoenix.

November 25, 1976: O.J.'s Romp In Defeat

November 25, 1976: As usual, the Detroit Lions play at home on Thanksgiving Day. However, for the 2nd year in a row, it's being held at the decidedly untraditional venue of an indoor stadium, the Silverdome in suburban Pontiac, 30 miles northwest of downtown Detroit.

The Lions certainly had a high-profile opponent for their game, televised nationally on NBC. Not so much the team, the Buffalo Bills, as their leading offensive threat, running back O.J. Simpson. The top running back in the NFL in the decade, he was already the holder of the single-season record for rushing yards, with 2,003 in 1973.

At this point, the NFL record for rushing yards in a game was 247, by Willie Ellison of the Los Angeles Rams in a 1971 game. In this game, however, the Lions couldn't stop O.J. He set a new record with 273 yards, and scored 2 touchdowns.

But, much like the Boston Celtics treated Wilt Chamberlain in the 1960s, the Lions approached the situation as if O.J. couldn't be stopped, but the rest of his team could. Quarterback Greg Landry led 4 scoring drives before the Bills got on the board, leading to a touchdown pass he threw to David Hill, 2 field goals from Benny Ricardo, and another pass from Landry to Hill. Midway through the 3rd quarter, the Lions led, 20-0. Simpson's 2 touchdowns bookended a touchdown run by the Lions' Dexter Bussey. Detroit won, 27-14.

The game was fairly typical of Simpson's career. In 11 seasons, he played in 1 Playoff game, a defeat to the Pittsburgh Steelers in 1974. In this season, with his best single-game performance, not only did the Bills lose that game, but went 2-12.

A year later, Walter Payton of the Chicago Bears broke the record, rushing for 275 yards. That was still the NFL record in 1994, when O.J. Simpson was arrested for killing 2 people, including his ex-wife. He was acquitted, but was later found liable for their deaths in a civil trial, and later spent time in prison, not for those murders, but for a separate armed robbery.

The NFL record for rushing yards in a game was raised to 278 by Corey Dillon of the Cincinnati Bengals in 2000, to 295 by Jamal Lewis of the Baltimore Ravens in 2003, and to 296 by Adrian Peterson of the Minnesota Vikings in 2007. That record still stands.

*

November 25, 1976, like all Thanksgiving Days, was a Thursday. One other game was played in the NFL: The Dallas Cowboys beat the football version of the St. Louis Cardinals, 19-14 at Texas Stadium in suburban Irving, 10 miles northwest of downtown Dallas. The leading rusher in that game only had 54 yards, and it was the Cowboys' quarterback, Roger "the Dodger" Staubach.

There were 3 college games:

* Number 11 Texas A&M beat arch-rival Texas, 27-3 at Memorial Stadium in Austin.

* Number 17 Rutgers beat Colgate, 17-9 at Rutgers Stadium in Piscataway, New Jersey. This completed an 11-0, undefeated season for Rutgers. I have a separate entry for that event.

* And Kent State beat Northern Illinois, 42-0 at Dix Stadium in the Cleveland suburb of Kent, Ohio.

One more note from football on this day: Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb was born.

Baseball was out of season. In recent times, the NBA and the NHL have avoided playing on Thanksgiving, so as not to compete for TV ratings with the NFL. But, this time, there were 3 NBA games:

* The Cleveland Cavaliers, beat the Detroit Pistons, 111-105 at The Coliseum in the Cleveland suburb of Richfield, Ohio.

* The Houston Rockets beat the New Orleans Jazz, 105-99 at the Superdome in New Orleans. In defeat, "Pistol" Pete Maravich scored 35 points.

* And the Phoenix Suns beat the Washington Bullets, 104-98 at the Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum.

And there were 2 NHL games. The New York Islanders lost to the Detroit Red Wings, 3-1 at the Nassau Coliseum. And the Boston Bruins beat the Vancouver Canucks, 4-2 at the Boston Garden.

And there were 2 games in the World Hockey Association. The New England Whalers beat the Birmingham Bulls, 5-3 at the Jefferson County Civic Center in Birmingham. And the Quebec Nordiques beat the Indianapolis Racers, 5-0 at the Market Square Arena in Indianapolis.

This was also the day of the last concert by The Band, filmed for the documentary The Last Waltz. I have a separate entry for that event.

November 17, 1991: The Mike Utley Game

November 17, 1991: The Detroit Lions beat the Los Angeles Rams, 21-10 at the Pontiac Silverdome. But guard Mike Utley breaks his neck on a freak play, landing on his head on the artificial turf.

The Seattle native, who was in his 3rd season in the NFL, regained the use of his arms and hands, and returned to the Silverdome a year later, as honorary captain for their annual Thanksgiving game – just 3 days before Dennis Byrd of the Jets had his temporarily paralyzing injury.

An All-American at Washington State University, Utley was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame. As of November 17, 2022, he is 55 years old, and still raising money for spinal cord research. He's even gone skydiving. Told he shouldn't, he said, "What am I going to do, break my neck?"

*

November 17, 1991 was a Sunday. These other games were played in the NFL:

* The New York Giants beat the Dallas Cowboys, 22-9 at Giants Stadium in the Meadowlands.

* The New York Jets beat the New England Patriots, 28-21 at Foxboro Stadium in the Boston suburb of Foxboro, Massachusetts.

* The Philadelphia Eagles beat the Cincinnati Bengals, 17-10 at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia.

* The Atlanta Falcons beat the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, 43-7 at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium.

* The Houston Oilers beat the Cleveland Browns, 28-24 at the Astrodome in Houston.

* The Washington Redskins beat the Pittsburgh Steelers, 41-14 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh.

* The Chicago Bears beat the Indianapolis Colts, 31-17 at the Hoosier Dome in Indianapolis.

* The Minnesota Vikings beat the Green Bay Packers, 35-21 at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

* The Denver Broncos beat their arch-rivals, the Kansas City Chiefs, 24-20 at the Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City.

* The San Diego Chargers beat the New Orleans Saints, 24-21 at the Superdome in New Orleans.

* The Los Angeles Raiders beat the Seattle Seahawks, 31-7 at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.

* The San Francisco 49ers beat the Phoenix Cardinals, 14-10 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco.

* And the next night, on ABC Monday Night Football, the Buffalo Bills beat the Miami Dolphins, 41-27 at Joe Robbie Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida.

Baseball was out of season. There were 2 games in the NBA. The Seattle SuperSonics beat the Minnesota Timberwolves, 101-91 at the Target Center in Minneapolis. And the Los Angeles Lakers beat the Atlanta Hawks, 111-89 at The Forum outside Los Angeles in Inglewood, California.

And there were 3 games in the NHL:

* The Winnipeg Jets beat the Philadelphia Flyers, 2-1 at The Spectrum in Philadelphia.

* The Hartford Whalers beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, 3-1 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

* And the Chicago Blackhawks beat the St. Louis Blues, 5-1 at the Chicago Stadium.

November 7, 1983: The U.S. Senate Bombing

November 7, 1983: A bomb explodes on the Senate side of the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington. There were no injuries.

The Senate adjourned at 7:02 PM. For the next 2 hours, a well-attended reception was held near the Senate Chamber. At 10:58, there was an explosion on the 2nd floor of the Capitol's north wing. The adjacent hallways were mostly unoccupied at the time.

A few minutes before the explosion, a tape-recorded message was telephoned to The Washington Post news desk and the Capitol switchboard, claiming to represent the Armed Resistance Unit, and warning that a bomb was about to be detonated near the Senate Chamber, in retaliation for recent U.S. military involvement in Lebanon and Grenada. The "Armed Resistance Unit" also plotted to murder former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.

The force of the explosive device, placed beneath a bench at the eastern end of the corridor outside the Chamber, blew off the door to the office of Robert Byrd of West Virginia, the Senate Minority Leader. Byrd was an active supporter of involvement in Grenada, and had recently made attempts to garner support for retaliating against recent attacks against U.S. Marines stationed in Lebanon.

The bomb blast also tore a hole in a wall partition, sending pulverized brick and plaster into the Republican cloakroom. The cloakroom's glass windows were shattered.^[7] Major damage was done to arches, walls, and the glazed-tile floor near the blast.

A grandfather clock that had in been place by the Senate chamber since 1859 was destroyed, and 6 paintings were ripped, shredded or damaged, including a portrait of early 19th Century Senator and Secretary of State Daniel Webster. A conservator worked for months to restore the painting to a semblance of the original. While the explosion caused no structural damage to the Capitol Building, officials calculated damages of $1 million.

The group Resistance Conspiracy was a United States-based branch of the wider communist organization known as the May 19th Communist Order. This group existed from its first attack in 1976 until later attacks in 1985. Throughout the lifespan of the organization, 20 incidents of domestic terrorism were committed, including one murder. The organization is also known as the Armed Resistance Unit, the Red Guerilla Resistance, and the Revolutionary Fighting Group.

The group mailed a recorded communique to National Public Radio stating, "We purposely aimed our attack at the institutions of imperialist rule rather than at individual members of the ruling class and government. We did not choose to kill any of them this time. But their lives are not sacred."

After a 5-year investigation, federal agents arrested 6 members of the Armed Resistance conspiracy group on May 12, 1988, and charged them with bombing the Capitol, as well as Fort McNair and the Washington Navy Yard.

The area outside the Senate Chamber, previously open to the public, was permanently closed after the 1983 bombing. Congressional officials also set up a system requiring staff ID cards for entry and installed metal detectors at building entrances. These metal detectors were in addition to those already in place at the Chamber Gallery doors following a prior Capitol bombing in 1971.

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November 7, 1983 was a Monday. Actor Adam DeVine, known for his roles in the Pitch Perfect films and his role as Andy Bailey on the TV show Modern Family, was born on this day. This was also the day that the NATO military exercise titled Able Archer 83 began, triggering a close call between NATO and the Warsaw Pact. Despite the lucky fact that nothing ended up happening, I have a separate entry for this event.

The baseball season was over. There were no NBA or NHL games scheduled. On ABC Monday Night Football, the Detroit Lions beat the New York Giants, 15-9 at the Silverdome in the Detroit suburb of Pontiac, Michigan.

November 7, 1983: Able Archer 83

A Welsh tank unit (note the Union Jack and the daffodil logo)

taking part in Able Archer 83

November 7, 1983: Able Archer 83 begins. It is the codename for wargames by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which had been an annual event for a few years. The purpose was to simulate a period of conflict escalation between NATO and the Warsaw Pact, meaning the Soviet Union and their satellite nations in Eastern Europe. It was coordinated from NATO headquarters in Casteau, Belgium.

This came while President Ronald Reagan was placing Pershing II missiles in Western Europe; 8 months after he made a speech declaring the Soviet Union to be "an evil empire"; 67 days after the Soviets shot down Korean Air Lines Flight 007; 42 days after Soviet Lieutenant Colonel Stanislav Petrov figured out that the detection of 2 U.S. nuclear missiles heading for Russia were a false alarm, and refused to give the order to launch a retaliation, thus becoming known (years later, once the world found out) as "The Man Who Saved the World"; and would be followed, 13 days later, with ABC airing the TV-movie The Day After, which imagined a nuclear attack on the U.S.

Able Archer 83 included some steps forward that previous exercises had not. These, on top of everything else that had happened in 1983, led the Soviet government to consider that this was a setup for an actual war. So they placed their military units on the highest possible alert.

Able Archer 83 ended on November 11 -- appropriately enough, the anniversary of the Armistice that ended World War I -- and so the Warsaw Pact forces, seeing that nothing further had happened, were ordered to stand down. This may have been the closest the world came to nuclear war, except for the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 and Col. Petrov's moment.

The 1980s -- especially the Autumn of 1983 -- were not "a simpler time." Not even for those of us who were kids at the time.

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November 7, 1983 was a Monday. Actor Adam DeVine, known for his roles in the Pitch Perfect films and his role as Andy Bailey on the TV show Modern Family, was born on this day. And this was also the day a bomb exploded in the U.S. Senate. Despite the lucky fact that there were no injuries, I have a separate entry for this event.

The baseball season was over. There were no NBA or NHL games scheduled. On ABC Monday Night Football, the Detroit Lions beat the New York Giants, 15-9 at the Silverdome in the Detroit suburb of Pontiac, Michigan.