A .300 batting average will typically put a player in Cooperstown. A player needs to sustain this over the course of their career. Doing it once and seeing every New York Mets fan forget all about it won’t get you into the Hall of Fame.
The Mets have had many players hit the .300 mark by the end of the season with enough qualified at-bats. Even more have done it without enough official at-bats but we’re going to ignore those part-timers.
Instead, this is about focusing on those three Mets who had forgotten .300+ seasons.
NY Mets got a .300 batting average from Joe Christopher in 1964
Joe Christopher was a lifetime .260 hitter worth 0.1 WAR in his career. He was a member of the ill-fated 1962 Mets where he batted .244/338/.362. Christopher remained with the team for a few more seasons and in 1964 he happened to cross over into the .300 mark.
In 604 plate appearances, Christopher managed to hit .300/.360/.466 for New York. He added 16 home runs and 76 RBI. The season accounted for most of the offense in his 638-game career. He hit only .265 with the Mets in parts of four seasons with his 1964 campaign sticking out in the best of ways.
NY Mets got a .304 batting average from Lenny Randle in 1977
The 1977 Mets season is remembered for a lot of things. Lenny Randle hitting .304 is not one of those events. Having already hit .302 in his first year as a starter with the Texas Rangers in 1974, it wasn’t a complete surprise when Randle joined the Mets and topped it by two points.
Unfortunately, it was still much better than the lifetime .257 hitter would regularly achieve. Randle was only with the Mets one more season where he’d hit .233. His 1977 season, overlooked because of the Midnight Massacre, is all but forgotten.
NY Mets got a .307 batting average from Hubie Brooks in 1981
As a rookie in 1981, Hubie Brooks pieced together a strong campaign. The year was shortened due to a player’s strike so his 358 at-bats were enough to qualify for the batting title at .307. He didn’t win it but he does have one of the better batting averages in Mets history.
Brooks would flirt with .300 multiple times, actually going out and hitting .340 in 1986 for the Montreal Expos in 306 at-bats. He did finish with only a .269 lifetime career which included the .267 he batted as a member of the Mets.