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“For me to be at the right place and the right time and to come through I can only think it comes from above and a lot of people that put wind under my wings,’’ Piazza said, words flowing like the emotion of the time. That blast on Sept. 21, 2001 — in the first sporting event in New York following the 9/11 attacks — helped beat the Braves and elevated the All-Star catcher into another realm among NYC sports heroes. Both the New York Mets and the New York Yankees got the OK from Major League Baseball to don commemorative hats to honor 9/11 first responders in their Sept. 11, 2020, games. Major League Baseball had not previously allowed either the Mets or Yankees to wear caps during games featuring the logos of the FDNY, NYPD and other organizations that aided in the effort.
Scaramucci and two friends bought the jersey and immediately donated it to be rotated between the National September 11 Memorial & Museum, the Baseball Hall of Fame and Citi Field. "I'm friends with the Wilpon family ... but I just think that was a mistake," says Scaramucci, who spent 11 days as former President Donald Trump's director of communications in 2017. After Marc Anthony sang the national anthem, players poured into the middle of the diamond from the base lines.
Members of 2001 Mets share their stories during '9/11: The Mets Remember'
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When he finally started taking his catcher's gear off, a police officer approached with a mom and her three smiling boys. The Gies family introduced themselves and Piazza told the boys, "I'm not a hero. Your father was a hero." "It was nice to pay your respects and start moving on again," Greg Maddux remembers about the sentiments on Sept. 21, 2001. "Something good finally happened -- there was a baseball game people could go to, and things were gonna start to get better."ohn Iacono/SI/Icon SMISometimes they held hands without actually holding hands. Ronnie was a member of New York City's special operations firefighting unit, and he would leave for his job in the morning and kiss her goodbye and hold her hand for a second in the kitchen. Then he'd walk out the back door and they'd have one more exchange.
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"It was a surreal scene before the game, an emotional tug of war," Piazza says. "And then when the bagpipes came out ... it was really difficult to focus." Eventually Braves outfielder Brian Jordan came over and gave her and the boys each a hug, then pointed a finger at the group of photographers. They didn't listen, and now Gies is glad they didn't.
Over the next two months, the Gies family began to move on. Gies says she saw her boys laugh more and more, and they officially laid Ronnie to rest when they held a memorial and funeral for him in October, even though his body had never been recovered. "We kind of limped to the finish line," Piazza says now. He was a successful Wall Street guy who'd taken his son and two boys whose fathers died in the towers to watch the game from a suite. He couldn't believe that the Mets could have let such a prized piece of history go, and he vowed to buy it back. And he did, rallying $365,000 to reclaim the Piazza's No. 31 uniform from that night.
Mike Piazza on first Mets game in NYC after 9/11: ‘A lot of fear. A lot of prayer’
In the bottom of the inning, with one out and a man on base, Piazza stepped to the plate. He had seemed more affected by 9/11 than most of the players. Maybe it was because he lived in an apartment not far from Ground Zero. In the fifth inning, I climbed the stairs to buy more beer. But when I got to the concession, I was told they had run out.
But on Sept. 21, both teams looked sluggish at the plate. The game was 1-1 heading into the bottom of the seventh before the Braves went to their bullpen. After Liza Minnelli delivered "New York, New York" between innings, relievers Steve Reed and Mike Remlinger got a inning against the hitters in the Mets' lineup.
“It’s okay to cheer”
Ten days after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the New York Mets had returned home in what would be the first professional sporting event to take place in the city since that tragic day. Nearly 20 years later, the events of that night are still remembered for being a pivotal moment in the nation’s healing. With one out in the home half of the eighth inning, Edgardo Alfonza walked on a could-have-gone-either-way 3-2 count, and Desi Relaford came on as a pinch runner.
The Mets had improbably won nine of 10 games before Sept. 21 to start breathing down the Braves' necks so, even amid the uncertainty and the gravity of the night, it was a game both teams wanted to win. Fifteen years later, Karsay was on the mound for the Atlanta Braves at that same stadium for a moment just as much a part of baseball history, for an entirely different reason. You may see it replayed on MLB Network this weekend as the nation marks 20 years since the tragic attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Of the 427 home runs hit by Mike Piazza throughout his 16-year career, it's the two-run homer in a regular-season game against the Braves at Shea Stadium, 15 years ago today, that still resonates most profoundly. “That moment, I think, gave the fans in the stadium and the city of New York a small amount of time to take their mind away from the outside world,” Karsay said. Piazza was asked if there was one encounter with the fans since the monumental blast that has stuck with him over the years. He recalled a flight he was on and being approached by somebody who had lost a family member at the World Trade Center. The fan recalled his state of mourning and how his decision to attend the game that night at Shea Stadium lifted his spirits.
The Mets had swept three games in Pittsburgh from Sept. 17-19, and Piazza struggled badly. Not on the field -- he had two home runs and four RBIs against the Pirates. He'd grown to love New York, being a New Yorker, being a Met. He wasn't sure how he or his teammates would possibly be able to play with the destruction just a few miles away. When I walk the city now I do find a lot of people want to talk about the home run.
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