Happy 25th Anniversary, Sidd!
Apr. 1st, 2010 09:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sdelmonteIt was 25 years ago today (or at least on the cover date of April 1, 1985) that Sports Illustrated, through the pen of George Plimpton, told the world that the Mets had a cannot miss prospect who could throw a pitch at 168 miles an hour. His name was Sidd (short for Siddhartha) Finch. And if you were a teenage Mets fan who was ready to think that this was the year, you were immediately enthralled.
It should have been easy to see that SI and Plimpton were pulling a prank. That cover day and the absurdity of it all made that clear. But it was so well done, with the help of the Mets and a high school baseball coach posing (from behind) as Finch. And we really did want to believe.
SI admitted the hoax two weeks later, and Plimpton turned the article into a slight but charming novel. The Mets did have a pitching phenom who came up that year, the amazingly talented but ultimately immensely troubled Dwight Gooden, as well as a pitcher named Sid Fernandez, so Sidd with two Ds was soon forgotten.
But I still remember believing every word. And every April 1, as I watch gags accumulate for this day of pranks, I remember the best April Fool's Day gag I ever saw. And link to it.
It should have been easy to see that SI and Plimpton were pulling a prank. That cover day and the absurdity of it all made that clear. But it was so well done, with the help of the Mets and a high school baseball coach posing (from behind) as Finch. And we really did want to believe.
SI admitted the hoax two weeks later, and Plimpton turned the article into a slight but charming novel. The Mets did have a pitching phenom who came up that year, the amazingly talented but ultimately immensely troubled Dwight Gooden, as well as a pitcher named Sid Fernandez, so Sidd with two Ds was soon forgotten.
But I still remember believing every word. And every April 1, as I watch gags accumulate for this day of pranks, I remember the best April Fool's Day gag I ever saw. And link to it.
