OPINION:
When the New York Mets take the field Monday at Nationals Park for their four-game series, you might notice the patch on their uniforms: “Davey.”
The patch honors the memory of former Mets manager Davey Johnson, who passed away in September 2025 at the age of 82. Johnson managed the Mets from 1984 to 1990, when they won a World Series championship (which they are celebrating the 40th anniversary of this year) and won 595 games during his time for a .588 winning percentage.
He did more than that, though – he changed the direction of the franchise, pulling the Mets out of the abyss they had been in since trading franchise icon Tom Seaver in 1977.
The groundwork had been set by general manager Frank Cashen (a former sportswriter) since the Mets were sold to Nelson Doubleday and Fred Wilpon in 1980. But it was Johnson who turned their preparation into results.
“Davey was a bold manager who led with a quiet confidence and an unwavering belief in his team,” Mets owner Steve Cohen said in a statement. “He cared deeply for his players both on and off the field. Some of the greatest players in our team history credit him for their successes. In the 40th anniversary of the 1986 championship, this is a fitting tribute to the man who guided the team to that title.”
This was what he did nearly everywhere he went. It’s what he did in Washington.
The Nationals share the legacy of Davey Johnson with the Mets.
He didn’t deliver a World Series. But you can etch in stone the moment when this franchise turned into the powerhouse that dominated the National League for nearly a decade – when the Nationals hired Johnson in the middle of the 2011 season.
He was here only 2½ years, but Johnson had a 224-183 record and led the Nationals to 98 wins and the National League East division title in 2012, for which he was named Manager of the Year.
He won the same award in the American League in Baltimore in 1997, when he led the Orioles to a wire-to-wire AL East division crown and to the League Championship Series.
That’s the resume. The numbers – 1,372 wins and 1,071 losses over 17 seasons for a .562 winning percentage. A Hall of Fame record.
But it was the fearlessness, the swagger, the intelligence that Johnson brought to each stop that made him special – like he did here in Washington.
It was a seminal moment for the Nationals, like the hiring of Mike Rizzo as general manager after the franchise was in shambles following Jim Bowden and the Smiley Gonzalez Dominican Baseball scandal.
In June 2011, manager Jim Riggleman abruptly quit in a contract dispute. He had led Washington to a 38-37 record in the first three months of the season, but now Rizzo had to quickly find a replacement, at a time when the team was either ready to take a big step forward or struggle in chaos.
He called on the 69-year-old Johnson, an advisor who had not been in the dugout since he managed the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2000.
The decision put the franchise on the path to success.
“It gave us tremendous credibility in the game,” Rizzo said. “Winning the pennant. Winning the division. Winning the National League,”
Johnson told reporters about his goals in November 2011, when the Nationals announced they were picking up his managerial option for next season.
He was a four-time All-Star second baseman with the Orioles, going to four World Series and winning two from 1966 to 1971. He was ahead of his time with the use of baseball analytics. Armed with a mathematics degree, he tried to convince his Orioles teammates to pay attention to the formulas.
The irony is that the game today is dominated by the sermon Johnson preached, yet he would hate it. He would never tolerate being told by a front office geek who to play in his lineup.
If anything, Johnson thought things should go the other way – he should be telling the general manager how to do his job.
Johnson was often several steps ahead of the opposing manager in the dugout. He knew how to handle a bullpen maybe better than any manager of his time.
“Davey really got a lot out of us players,” former Nationals coach Randy Knorr, who was Johnson’s bench coach, once told me. “The way Davey handled the pitching staff and the bullpen, it was the best I’ve ever seen. The way he handled a bullpen (Rizzo called him a ‘bullpen savant’) it was unbelievable. I loved him, he was tremendous. I learned a lot from Davey.”
His Achilles heel? Owners and bosses.
He had a falling out with nearly every one he worked for, from Baltimore to Cincinnati to, yes, Washington.
The Lerners were particularly foolish, though. They hated him from the beginning (too opinionated for the stuffed shirts) and forced him — after his team won 98 games and the NL East in 2012 – to agree in his one-year contract that he would not manage the club past 2013, when no one drove in over 100 runs and Bryce Harper missed 44 games, among other problems.
Johnson and the Nationals still won 86 games, just missing out on the wild card.
You heard the truth from the Lerners at NatsFest 2013 (remember those?), when Mark Lerner told reporters, “I think the way we handled spring training was not as good as it could be. I think it wasn’t as disciplined as it could be. I think we’ll go into this year, Matt (Williams, the new Nationals manager, who won 96 games in 2014 on the fumes of Johnson’s clubhouse, only to have it collapse the following season ) is very meticulous.”
They preferred Williams’ good penmanship over Johnson’s genius.
Catch Thom Loverro on The Kevin Sheehan Show podcast.
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