Tackling Destiny

John Stearns certainly had a productive career and was a fan favorite for nearly a decade in New York. However, if you look a bit closer at the four-time All-Star’s career from start to finish, you’ll see that he just missed being part of something special not once, not twice but three times.

Stearns, 70, was drafted out of high school by the Oakland Athletics in 1969 but opted for college, where he starred on Colorado’s baseball and football teams. That decision likely cost him a chance to be the catcher for the great Oakland teams that won three consecutive World Series [1972-74] and made the playoffs in five consecutive seasons.

The Denver native did eventually get drafted by Philadelphia with the second overall pick in the 1973 First-Year Player Draft but was traded to the Mets the following winter in the deal that brought Tug McGraw to the Phillies. Stearns would endure the demise of the Mets as they wallowed in last place for the better part of a decade while Philadelphia went on to finish first four times and win a World Series in 1980.

“I’ve been so lucky to have played sports and played in the big leagues and to have been to New York as much as I have and experience being around the eastern part of the United States I have,” said Stearns, who was also drafted by the NFL’s Buffalo Bills in 1973. “When I was 10 years old, I knew I could play any sport I wanted at the major league level. I could have played in the NFL. Everything came easy. I can’t explain why. My parents gave me all the right genes and I got the best of those genes.”

“The way I always thought that if you’re going to play sports, don’t let the other guy beat you. You have to beat him and to do that you have to be faster, stronger and meaner than the other guy.”

ROCKY MOUNTAIN HIGH

Stearns came from a family of athletes and that environment helped mold him into a star basketball, football and baseball player. He had many choices of where he wanted to go and what he wanted to do coming out of high school. While most players would have had to decide between football and baseball, Stearns ultimately chose both and headed to the University of Colorado.

However, his collegiate journey didn’t begin until after the Oakland A’s selected him in the 13^th round of the 1969 First-Year Player Draft. The Athletics were about to embark on one of the most dominant runs in baseball history and had Stearns signed he could have been part of that journey. One of the areas in which Oakland lacked was the absence of a dominant catcher and Stearns, by 1972, could have changed that. However, signing never really entered his mind.

“I was never close with Oakland,” said Stearns, who was an honorable mention All-American football player at Thomas Jefferson High School. “I waited for the draft and they picked me in the 13^th round. I should have gone in the second. I had already signed a football deal with Colorado so signing a pro baseball contract didn’t affect me. If someone had drafted me where they should have, in the first or second round and given me a decent bonus, I probably would have signed.

“The agreement I had in Colorado was that I would play baseball in the spring and not play spring football. I played both sports at the same time in the spring of my freshman year because it would be my first time with the varsity football team. This was still when freshman couldn’t play. There was one day that a doubleheader started at 10 o’clock and after it was finished I ran up to the locker room and changed into my football uniform. I caught two and then went to play football.”

Stearns proved to be a dynamic football player for the Buffalos. He was a free safety and played only three seasons because of the NCAA rules at the time. Yet, he still holds the school record for career interceptions [16] and yards returned off interceptions [339]. The Buffalo Bills saw what Stearns was capable of but knew that he was more than likely going to go high in baseball’s amateur draft. That, however, didn’t stop them from taking a flyer on him in the 17^th round, making him the 423^rd out of 442 players drafted that year. FootballReference.com lists Buffalo’s pick as John ‘Bad Dude’ Stearns.

“I wanted to play in the NFL and I was disappointed that I didn’t get drafted until the 17^th round,” Stearns said. “I think the reason was that when I was a junior, I led the Big Eight [Conference of which Colorado was a member] in hitting. They knew I was a baseball player. But if they had drafted me in the first two rounds, I might have gone football instead.

“I still hold the school record for interceptions and yardage. I could play football, especially free safety. I liked football a lot. But I was probably a better prospect in baseball. I could have played a long time at free safety in the NFL, though, and intercepted a lot of passes.”

Dreams of the NFL were pushed aside, though, when the Phillies made him the second overall pick on June 5. Stearns hit .366 with 28 homers in 147 games over four seasons at Colorado. He left the Buffaloes as the career leader in hits, runs [169 runs], RBIs [101] and homers. He hit a Big Eight record 15 homers runs as a senior after hitting .492 as a junior.

High schooler David Clyde had gone to Texas with the top pick that year while Hall-of-Famers Yount and Winfield followed.

“I was shocked when I went second,” said Stearns, whose brother Bill spent six seasons [1971-77] in the Yankees farm system. “Someone called me and told me the Phillies picked you second. I was hoping to go in the first round but to go number two to the Phillies, that was a shock. So, after going number two I decided to go with baseball.

“I would have played both, but nobody had been doing that. So, I picked one and went with one. I definitely would have tried to do both today. I did it in college with no problem. I got my signing bonus and they had me go to Reading [of the Double-A Eastern League].”

That’s when things started to go a little sideways for Stearns.

WE HAVE HIM, NOW WHAT DO WE DO WITH HIM?

It all began well enough for Stearns at Reading. He made his pro debut on June 20 against Bristol and went 2-for-3 with two runs scored and an RBI after entering the game as a pinch-runner in the fifth inning. That, however, seemed to be one of the few positive experiences Stearns had in Reading. He hit .241 in 67 games with three homers and 24 RBIs while competing for time with Jim Essian. The 22-year-old Essian had signed with the Phils as a free agent out of high school and was in his second season with the R-Phils, for whom he hit .292 with 10 homers and 55 RBIs in twice as many at-bats as Stearns.

“I was upset about going to Reading because they already had a prospect [Essian] there,” Stearns said. “I sat on the bench and played less than half the games when they first sent me there. I was the second pick in the first round and the Phillies send me to a team that already had a prospect.

“I struggled. You can’t come in twice a week and expect to have success. Then they took me down to instructs and did the same thing. They had five guys catching and I didn’t get any playing time. I went to Spring Training the next year and I tore it up. I was pissed off. They put me on an A-ball team and then jumped me to Triple-A.”

Stearns’ time with Rocky Mount of the Class-A Carolina League showed the Phillies of what he was capable. He hit .344 with four homers and 38 RBIs through 62 games before getting bumped up to Toledo of the Triple-A International League, where he hit .266 with three homers and 28 RBIs.

His effort at both stops earned him a callup to Philly, where he made his Major League debut in the final game of the 1974 regular season. Stearns went 1-for-2 in what turned out to be his only game with the Phils. Philadelphia had Bob Boone behind the plate, though, who was just beginning a decade-long run as the starting catcher so it was only a bit of a surprise when Stearns was traded to the Mets with Mac Scare and Del Unser for Tug McGraw, Don Hahn and Dave Schneck that December. McGraw would be on the mound when the Phillies won the World Series in 1980 while Stearns was busy riding the train to the bottom of the National League standings with New York.

The 1975 season only brought more disillusionment. The Mets were two years removed from being in the World Series yet the cracks that would bring the organization tumbling down were beginning to show. Yogi Berra was fired as manager two thirds of the way through the season and was replaced by Roy McMillan as the club squeaked out a third-place finish in the NL East at 82-80. It was another disappointing experience for Stearns.

“The Phillies put me in one game and then I went home and got traded to the Mets,” he said. “I went to the Mets and the same thing happened. They had me sit on the bench behind Jerry Grote. I was the number two pick in the draft, they took me to the big leagues with them out of Spring Training but Grote was their catcher. So, I made the team and sat my ass in the bullpen.

“After two years of pro ball I was pissed and couldn’t see straight. Both teams I played for were screwing me around.  It took me another couple of years before they finally let me play. It was really strange. The Phillies drafted me and they didn’t know what they were doing. Why they drafted me, I didn’t know. And if the Mets wanted Grote, they should have just sent me to Triple-A and let me play every day. The first two years I played I wasn’t even in the starting lineup. I had two teams sit me on the bench. It was pretty crazy, so I went into the manager’s office [in 1976] and asked him to send me to Triple-A.”

Stearns hit .189 in 59 games in 1975 and was back on the bench in New York in ’76. He hit .262 in 32 games that year but had a much better showing when he requested the club send him to Triple-A Tidewater of the International League. He hit .310 with 10 homers and 45 RBIs in 102 games.

He would finally get his chance to start in 1977 but by then all hell was breaking loose in Flushing and the Mets essentially dropped off the baseball map. The stunning and organization-crippling trade of Tom Seaver that June sent the club into a seven-year spiral from which they would not exit until the 1984 season.

POST-PLAYING AND THAT NICKNAME

Stearns scouted, coached and worked as a television analyst in the years following his retirement. He also managed several seasons in the minor leagues and served as a Major League coach for several teams, including the 2000 Mets team that went to the World Series. But he never achieved his goal of becoming a Major League manager.

“I wanted to be a big-league manager and thought that I could easily do it,” Stearns said. “I even went to the minors and won several minor league championships. I managed at several different levels and spent 10 years doing it, but I never got that call. It was the only thing I was never able to achieve. There is a town in West Virginia [Princeton] that still has a plaque for me in City Hall. They liked me there.”

Everyone liked Stearns despite the Bad Dude nickname for which he is remembered – yet never liked. He acquired the nickname and it stuck while playing football in college after he spoke without thinking to a reporter.

“It was a stupid nickname that I didn’t like,” Stearns said. “Bad Dude. A writer asked me what I wanted to be remembered for as football player back at school and I said, ‘I just want to hit people, I want to be remembered as a bad dude’ and that stayed with me forever. Everyone called me John ‘Bad Dude’ Stearns. It wasn’t anything I planned or wanted. I answered a question and used that phrase and I couldn’t get rid of it. When you’re 21, anything can come out of your mouth.

“The way I always thought that if you’re going to play sports, don’t let the other guy beat you. You have to beat him and to do that you have to be faster, stronger and meaner than the other guy. That was my theory and I couldn’t get rid of it. People started calling me Bad Dude and it followed me to the big leagues.”

Stearns, however, had a hand in keeping that reputation going. His hard-nosed no-nonsense style was his trademark, and it was evident during his well-known run-ins with Chief Noc-A-Homa, the fellow dressed like a Native American warrior that used to dance around Fulton County Stadium in Atlanta celebrating the Braves. Stearns had no use for the Chief and on at least one occasion went out on the field and downed him with one of his best open-field tackles.

“He used to come out and do that dance and my pitcher was trying to warm up and he was taking too much time,” Stearns said. “He was dancing around the infield so I went out and tackled the guy so my pitcher could start throwing again. I just got pissed off and ran out and tackled him. I didn’t mean it to be any big deal. I was pissed because the pitcher was out there having to wait for him. I didn’t hit him hard; it was just basically a pull-down thing.

“Everybody wrote it up like it was a big deal, but it was no big deal and that’s just what I said when they asked me. I was just upset because of our pitcher. No one was doing anything on the part of the Braves to stop it, they just let the mascot run around the field. It was going on for too long.”

The incident is just one of the many reasons he remains a fan favorite in New York nearly four decades after he last suited up for the Mets.