Tom Seaver, Ed Kranepool and Ron Darling all played for the New York Mets. Seaver and Kranepool were teammates for 11 years, from 1967 through 1977. Seaver and Darling were teammates for the final month of the 1983 season.
All three players, of course, are now retired, but in recent weeks they have been brought together in a way that is less than ideal.
About two months ago Seaver’s family revealed that the Hall of Fame pitcher was suffering from dementia and would withdraw from public participation. Several weeks ago Darling stepped away from his role as an analyst on Mets’ telecasts, disclosing that doctors had discovered a mass on his chest. Subsequent surgery revealed that he has thyroid cancer.
Kranepool, who at the age of 17 had two at-bats for the Mets in 1962, their first season, has emerged from the Mets’ medical malaise in the most positive condition of the three former players. Last week he received a kidney transplant at Stony Brook University Hospital in Stony Brook, N.Y., and three days later appeared at a hospital news conference with his surgeon and his kidney donor.
Kranepool is 74 years old, Seaver is nine days younger and Darling is 58.
Given the consistent success kidney transplant patients have had, Kranepool appears to have a good prognosis for a normal life. Darling’s doctors have spoken encouragingly about his chances for overcoming his cancer. There is nothing encouraging about a dementia victim’s overcoming dementia.
“Tom will continue to work in his beloved vineyard at his California home, but has chosen to completely retire from public life,” said a statement issued by the family March 7. “The family is deeply appreciative of those who have supported Tom throughout his career, on and off the field, and who do so now by honoring his request for privacy.”
Following his retirement as a player, Seaver started a second career. He and his wife Nancy lived in Calistoga, Calif., and he started a vineyard, where he grew grapes that became wine with a GTS label (for George Thomas Seaver). While working in his vineyard, Seaver contracted Lyme disease for the second time (the first occurred when he lived in Connecticut). There is speculation that a link exists between Lyme disease and dementia, but it has never been established scientifically.
Whatever the cause of his dementia, Seaver faces a future devoid of the baseball functions he would love to be part of: The last weekend of July is Hall of Fame weekend, a highlight of Seaver’s year ever since he was elected in 1992; On the last weekend of June the Mets will observe the 50th anniversary of their 1969 World Series championship, a celebration the Mets could not be holding if Seaver hadn’t been an integral part of that team.
[For more on Seaver, see Marty Noble’s March 17 column on this web site]
Kranepool plans to attend that celebration, complete with new kidney, healthier than he has been in years.
“We were out shopping,” Kranepool said at his news conference at Stony Brook. “My wife started to get down. She said, ‘It’s not going to happen.’ I told her we had to stay positive. We went in the house and 10 minutes later we got the phone call.”
A kidney match had been found, Kranepool was told, and surgery was set for May 7. He quickly said he would be there. The alternative was to begin dialysis treatment.
“No one wants to go through that treatment,” Kranepool said. “Dialysis is physically exhausting.” It’s also restrictive, and now Kranepool has his life back.
Darling wasn’t a member of the so-called Miracle Mets of 1969, but he did play for the Mets’ World Series champions in 1986, after Seaver and Kranepool had retired. He pitched for the Mets until they traded him to Montreal during the 1991 season but returned to the Mets as an analyst on their telecasts.
His presence in the television gave the Mets a solid set of announcers. Gary Cohen, Keith Hernandez and Darling are probably the best television trio in the majors. They are certainly more pleasant and easier to listen to than the Yankees’ television crew.
Though he can’t be certain where his thyroid cancer will take him, Darling has said he plans to resume doing games later this season.
“After the removal of the mass on my chest along with further tests, I have been diagnosed with thyroid cancer,” Darling said earlier this month. “My doctors have said they are optimistic that the cancer is treatable and that I would be back on air talking baseball in the next month or so.”
While the Mets have dominated baseball’s medical news recently, they are not the only ones making news. Bobby Jenks, a former relief pitcher for both Sox teams, reached a $5.1 million settlement last Wednesday the day before his medical malpractice lawsuit was scheduled to begin.
Jenks, 38 years old, had sued Massachusetts General Hospital and Dr. Kirkham Wood, who had been the hospital’s head of orthopedic spinal surgery. Jenks had suffered back pain, and the doctor recommended the operation to relieve the pain.
However, the operation didn’t do what it was reportedly intended to do, and the Boston Globe’s Spotlight team, an investigative unit about which a well-regarded film has been made, learned that Dr. Wood was involved in a second operation at the same time he was operating on Jenks.
The pitcher was never able to resume his career.