28
SPORT S ILLUS TR ATED OC T OBER 21–28, 2019
the Napa Valley—a 116-acre slice of earth as beautiful as
heaven allows. It was covered with trees then. Tom saw
how it faced south, tilted toward the Sun, and how it rest-
ed several hundred feet above the valley, less troubled by
fog. The soil was volcanic, porous, perfect for cooling un-
der all that sun and for growing small, intensely flavored
Cabernet grapes. He bought the
land and, with dirt under his fin-
gernails, has tended to it and his
31 / 2 -acre winery ever since.
He hired a friend from Massa-
chusetts, Kenneth Ken-Sin Mar-
tin Kao, to create the home on the
lot where he and his wife, Nancy,
have lived. The son of a minister
and teacher, Kao designed in the
spirit of his passions: bike racing,
boat building, Frank Lloyd Wright,
passive technologies, the environ-
ment. The Seaver house quietly
blends into the landscape, without
calling attention to itself or the
fame of its owner.
Four friends stood with Seaver in
his office that day: Bud Harrelson,
Jerry Koosman, Art Shamsky and
Ron Swoboda, teammates from the
1969 world champion Mets.
Left unspoken was the knowl-
edge that they might never again
see one another like this. And last
March, less than two years later,
the Seaver family announced that
Tom was suffering from advancing
dementia and “has chosen to com-
pletely retire from public life.”
We love sports for many rea-
sons, but none more than Pos-
sibility. What might happen in
the unscripted world of competi-
tion? And no team better defines
this inherent appeal than the
1969 Mets. They are the Patron Saints of Possibility. In
a year when man walked on the Moon, the Jets upset
the Colts in Super Bowl III, the Beatles released Abbey
Road, the first U.S. troops withdrew from Vietnam and
Woodstock rocked, the Mets carved a unique place in
the pantheon of what’s possible. They leveraged holistic
teamwork into one of the most unlikely championships
ever seen or even imagined. Fifty years ago this month,
and 100-to-1 long shots when the season began, New
York beat the mighty Orioles in five games to win the
World Ser ies.Behind him on this day in May 2017
were photographs and totems of a
career that in both form and sub-
stance stands as the closest man
has ever come to mastering the
art of pitching. There was a shot
of young Tom standing with Gil
Hodges, not only his manager with
the Mets but also a fellow Marine
and a second father to him. There
were his three Cy Young Awards,
from 1969, ’73 and ’75.
Body and coif still robustly thick
at age 72, Tom peered ahead, to his
grape arbors on Diamond Moun-
tain, with Mount St. Helena looming in the distance. Dear
God, he could not believe how lucky he was.
One day back when Tom was at the height of his pitching
prowess, his brother-in-law asked him, “What will you do
when you’re done?”
Tom shot back an answer without even thinking, one
of the few times in his life when he moved a piece on his
chessboard without meticulous study.
“I’ll go back to California and grow grapes.”
With that quick answer Tom Seaver cast his lot.
And in 1998 he found it on the sunny western rim ofTOM SEAVER LOOKED
OUT THE WINDOW OF
HIS HOME OFFICE IN
CALISTOGA, CALIF., HIS
BACK TO BASEBALL
AND THE PAST.
BRIAN COX (LEFT); HERB SCHARFMAN