New York Mets legend R.A. Dickey is returning to Citi Field this Saturday for the Alumni Classic, where players from the recent past will face off against each other.
It’s been a long time since the All-Star knuckleballer pitched for the Mets, but Dickey’s spectacular Cy Young campaign in 2012 won’t be forgotten anytime soon.
Before Saturday’s game, Dickey spoke with MLB.com’s Anthony DiComo about his Mets tenure from 2010-2012. Here’s what he had to say.
Dickey reflects on Mets glory days
Dickey’s Major League ascendance was completely unexpected, especially when doctors discovered he was missing the ulnar collateral ligament in his right elbow after the Texas Rangers selected him in the first round of the 1996 Draft.
He struggled for years until developing his signature pitch—the knuckleball. The Mets signed him as a Minor League free agent before the 2010 season, and he drastically improved.
Then came 2012, when Dickey went 20-6 with a 2.73 ERA over 34 games (33 starts) en route to winning the National League Cy Young award. He even threw consecutive one-hitters during a franchise-record stretch of 32.2 straight scoreless innings that season.
“That two-and-a-half to three months, man, with the scoreless innings stuff, the back-to-back one-hitter stuff,” Dickey said, per DiComo, “all of that felt like a whirlwind.”
But following his historic season, he was traded to the Toronto Blue Jays for a handful of players, including Noah Syndergaard and Travis d’Arnaud. He had some solid seasons with Toronto and the Atlanta Braves before retiring in 2018.
“I look back and I think, ‘God, that happened so fast. I wish I would have enjoyed it more,” Dickey said. “But I don’t know if I would have taken the time at the time to enjoy it more, if I would have lost some of the [edge]. Those were the times in my life where I felt most in the zone, so to speak. And I didn’t want to get out of that.”
However, Dickey will have plenty of time on Saturday to enjoy the Alumni Classic, where he hopes to throw at least a few knuckleballs.