Ultimate Mets Database - Memories of Kenny Rogers

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Kenny Rogers
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Memories of
Kenny Rogers

Kenny Rogers
Ultimate Mets Database popularity ranking: 338 of 1252 players

Kenneth Scott Rogers
Born: November 10, 1964 at Savannah, Ga.
Throws: Left Bats: Left
Height: 6.01 Weight: 217

Kenny Rogers has been the most popular Ultimate Mets Database daily lookup 10 times, most recently on May 4, 2023.

First Mets game: July 28, 1999
Last Mets game: October 19, 1999

Share your memories of Kenny Rogers

HERE IS WHAT OTHER METS FANS HAVE TO SAY:

Dan
He didn't lose it for the Mets -- Franco did in the 8th. The Mets needed one scoreless inning from Franco before Benitez would close it in the 9th. He didn't deliver. Then, Benitez had a shot to close the door in the 10th and couldn't do the job. It shouldn't have even gotten to Rogers. I'll remember his masterful four-hit shut-out vs. Houston in late-August, as well as holding the Braves at bay in extra innings in Game 5.

murphy
Rogers, you are a gutless wonder. You proved it in a Yankee uniform and reinforced it in a Mets uniform. I can't stand pitching wimps. Losing on a bases loaded walk is just plain spineless.

Mr. Sparkle
Kenny is a good pitcher who pitched very well during the season for the Mets. He blew the big game but shouldn't be remembered for only that. The Mets had already blown two leads, not to mention the fact that Leiter couldn't get out of the first inning. Rogers came in with his back to the wall. True he blew it but the Mets would have been better in 2000 if they signed him back.

CJM
January 25, 2001
This "pitcher's" name is unmentionable in my house. Walked in the losing run. I would have had more respect had he given up a grand slam. WALKED in the losing run. What a way to end one of the most exciting games in our team's post-season history.

NL
March 18, 2001
I'm inclined to be more charitable. Yeah, he walked in the winning run that ended the season but didn't Franco and Benitez BOTH fail in that game? Besides, you bring a starting pitcher - a finesse pitcher who can't blaze it past anyone - into an extra inning game with the bases loaded and no room for error and hope he can hit his spots. It's definitely tough.
My memories are that they won almost every game he started and that he threw two complete games when the whole staff looked as if it would throw none.

Coach HoJo 20
March 25, 2001
Thank you Ken for breaking my heart when you cost the Mets the NLCS. I hated you when you were on the Yankees and I knew it was a big mistake when the Mets got you. Who knew the Mets would pay for that mistake in such a severe way.
WALK!!!!

TVDUDE
January 12, 2002
Thank you kenny for causing the most heartbreaking moment in recent Mets history. How do you walk a guy with the bases loaded? A single I can understand, but a walk? You're a veteran and you should have acted like one.

revolve
February 5, 2002
Terrence Long may end up being to the Mets what Jeff Bagwell is to the Boston Red Sox. To paraphrase Eric Cartman: "I hate you Kenny."

perndude
April 15, 2002
Not a big Kenny Rogers fan, but I have to say that the Mets do not make the playoffs in 1999 without him. Dotel should have been pitching.

Oren
April 20, 2002
Another Kenny Rogers once sang, "You gotta know when to hold em, Know when to fold em." Kenny The Pitcher should have folded a long time ago. I still see that damn bases loaded walk. UGH

Shari
May 21, 2002
I will never forget him shrugging his shoulders on the mound after he blew it for us in 1999. Really nice, thanks a lot, LOSER. At least he kept his choking in the play-offs streak alive.

Larry Burns
June 18, 2002
This guy had the mental toughness of Corky. He absolutely collapsed in 1999 and then did not seem to care. He actaully pitched well during the year, but in the same vein as Benitez, he collapsed when we needed him most. I guess I can live with an occassional screwup, but the fact he feigned indifference when he got shelled made me want to go to the ballpark and beat him to an inch of his life. He alone made my blood pressure double. A complete loser.

Gordon
December 18, 2002
I think I stared in disbelief at the TV screen for many minutes without as much as blinking or taking a breath!!! THAT outside pitch, offered by the Mets "chicken" Rogers, will be one of the lowlights in my Mets memories! I shudder any time I think about that awful pitch!

Jeff In Floirda
May 27, 2003
I'll never forget Rogers walking in the winning run in game 6 of the 1999 NLCS. I truly believe that with all the heart the Mets had they would have won game 7. I can still see Bobby Valintine banging on the dugout railing and yelling, "NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!"

Shari
May 28, 2003
Jeff I remember that game like it was yesterday. I wanted to punch his non-challant face inside out for not only his walking in the winning run, but his reaction after he did it. He had no remorse, no emotion, all he did was shrug his shoulders like it was a Sunday afternoon softball game that meant nothing.

David G
June 5, 2003
Kenny Rogers' Met tenure is incrediblly underrated. The bottom line is that the Mets do not make the playoffs in 1999 if not for Kenny Rogers. All people seem to remember is that one playoff game against the Braves when Rogers was forced to become a reliever for a game after both Benitez and Franco both blew leads and he walked the winning run in.

Shari
July 15, 2003
David give me break, he stunk. There are reasons teams like the Yankees dump guys like Kenny Rogers on teams like the Mets. He's another one of what I like to call Steve Phillips' "IF ONLY......." players. If Only he can get his rhythm back, if only he can be like he was 2 or 3 years ago...etc." Like Benitiez Rogers had a track record of choking when it matters. He was awful, he got the Mets' first complete game that year while giving up 7 or 8 runs in a 12-8 victory if memory serves me correctly. Underrated? Surely you jest. If anything he is highly OVERRATED as a pitcher for any team he's played on.

Frank
July 15, 2003
I agree with all the people that say Kenny Rogers did not blow Game 6. If Franco and Benitez do their jobs it never gets to Rogers. The Mets wouldn't have been in the post season if not for his 5 wins in the regular season. Is everybody forgeting the Mets had to sweep Pittsburgh the last 3 games of the season? If Rogers goes 4-2 instead of 5-1 there is no one game playoff with the Reds. This guy pitched a perfect game with Texas, how can you people say he can't handle pressure?

Anthony
September 16, 2003
I fell asleep before the Kenny Rogers meltdown in Game Six. Yeah, he was a big reason why the Mets lost to the Braves, along with the lack of offense. Yeah, I do think they did give up too much for him considering he is not an ace, and the fact he was going to be a free agent. But, he was also a big reason why they made the playoffs. He did go 5-1 with the Mets, which shockingly turned out to be very key in them making the playoffs at all. It is a valid point that if John Franco does his job, and Armando Benitez does not pull off one of his many chokes after they regained the lead, Kenny Rogers never has to pitch. He never should have anyway. Yeah, he deserves blame, but not as much as some give him. He also deserves credit for helping a lot in them making the playoffs.

MetsHead
September 30, 2003
I will never forgive this guy. All he had to do was throw a damn strike. I could have lived with it if he gave up a homer or a single, but he walks Andruw Jones. The classic small market pitcher who could never make it in New York.

Kiwiwriter
June 22, 2004
New York has always brough out suicidal and self- destructive tendencies in Kenny Rogers. I think he's done more to help the Yankees and Mets when he's wearing the opposing team's uniform.

Joe P.
September 24, 2004
My only memory of Kenny Rogers (Roasters) is seeing him throw ball 4 to the free-swingin' Andruw Jones & hearing Bob Costas saying, "Bring on the Yankees". That was a tough one to swallow.

Jonathan Stern
January 19, 2005
Kenny really helped us down the stretch in 1999, our most exciting season since 1986. He pitched with intensity and intelligence and we don't advance without him. I remember thinking that he looked like a man on a mission during those last weeks of the season. And, as it turned out, he was on a mission: to lose a pennant in the most demoralizing way possible.
Mission accomplished.
Murphy: "Myyyyy, what a terrible way to end a season..."
The beer tasted particularly bad that night.

Matt Jensen
March 15, 2005
How can any memory about Kenny Rogers be anything else than: "My God they're calling in Rogers from the Bullpen. He can't pitch ball four and walk the winning run home. The season won't end like this. Wait...it did." We gambled on the gambler and not suprisingly we lost.

Hoose
March 30, 2005
Game 6, 1999 NLCS, this game was like a four and a half-hour long kick in the groin. Leiter comes out to start; running on fumes, and can’t get out of the 1st inning without giving up five runs. The Mets flirt with getting back into it, only to quickly fall behind 7-3, a Piazza homer ties the game at seven and the Mets pull ahead, only to let the lead slip away in the 8th. I know that they have already forfeited the pennant when the game rolls into extra innings, but they somehow reclaim the lead, only to blow another save in the 10th. Kenny Rogers comes out for the 11th and walks home the NL title, simultaneously cementing his role as the franchise’s #1 all-time biggest goat and disrupting a Bonilla/Henderson poker game.

Killa
March 31, 2005
The fact remains that Valentine brought in Rogers to walk the bases loaded, and then K the next guy. If you had just gotten to the mound, after warming up, and your first four pitches were an IBB, you wouldn't have such great control on the next seven either.

MetsChica
May 18, 2005
Actually Kenny Rogers started that inning. BV didn't just bring him in for the IBBs. Kenny gave up a leadoff double to our friend Gerald Williams, I believe throwing a fat fastball on an 0-2 pitch. After that, the Braves sacrificed him to third. With one out and the winning run on 3rd, walking the bases loaded was the best way to go, especially since it was Larry coming up next, followed by Brian Jordan who was actually good that year. Unfortunately we all know what happened next.
Its definitely one of the worst ways to lose a series. But still, I try not to think of Kenny too harshly. He was great during the regular season, I think the Mets were something like 10-2 in his starts. Without him there would have been no playoffs.

Kip Johnson
July 21, 2005
I remember being excited about the Mets acquiring Rogers and thinking that we would shore up the rotation and that all that nonsense about him wilting in the post season was just that, nonsense.
Two outta three ain't bad. Way to prove me wrong Kenny! Good pitcher, just not in October.

=Chuck=
October 6, 2006
Good pitcher, just not in October --- that is until today. He pitched the game of his life and shut out the so-called "best lineup ever" in baseball. The Yankees looked like helpless clowns at the plate. Rogers' performance *almost* makes up for '99.

dankind80
October 8, 2006
He pitched the game of his life on October 6, 2006. In the ALDS vs. the Yankees, a team that owned him both as a team and as individuals, he made the modern-day Murderer's Row look like the 1962 Mets. His curveball was tantalizing, and his effort made it into the eighth inning. He was emotional afterwards during his interviews, and you could see he knew he just pitched the game everyone will remember him for. It beats the previous memory of a certain bases-loaded walk...

Dave VW
February 23, 2023
Here's a memory of Kenny Rogers other than his appearance against the Braves in Game 6 of the 1999 NLCS: He actually started against the Mets when the Rangers and Mets played each other for the very first time. That occurred in a spring training game on April 1, 1994, which also happened to be the very first game played at the "Ballpark in Arlington" -- which has been renamed many times over the years, most recently to Choctaw Stadium in 2021. Kenny pitched well -- 5 innings, 4 hits, 1 run -- but the Mets jumped all over the Texas bullpen, scoring 8 times in the 6th inning during a 10-7 win.
It's funny because the Mets also "opened" Camden Yards in Baltimore just two years earlier. Either the Mets loved the exposure, or teams thought they could get an easy win against New York to christen their new field. If the latter was true, it sure backfired against the Rangers here.