TBS' Ron Darling talks Cooter's arrest, epic 1986 NLCS vs. Astros and how this year's team stacks up
New York Mets players Ron Darling, center, and Tim Teufel, left, arrive July 25, 1986, for an examining trial on felony charges that they assaulted Houston police officers outside a local bar. Accompanying them is their attorney, Dick DeGuerin.
A judge referred the case to a Harris County grand jury.A couple hours before the American League Championship Series began Wednesday night, Ron Darling said the opportunity to help call the Astros-Yankees matchup for TBS was “special,” adding that late October baseball is “a great time of year for me.” His third time calling an Astros ALCS also brings Darling back to the site of one of the greatest triumphs of his big league career, a tantalizing what-if and an infamous arrest he can laugh about 36 years later.On July 19, 1986, the then-25-year-old Darling and teammates Rick Aguilera, Bob Ojeda and Tim Teufel were arrested at Cooter’s, a bar on Richmond Avenue. The four were out celebrating the birth of Teufel’s first child when a disturbance occurred. According to the police report, Teufel tried to leave the bar with his drink but was stopped by two uniformed police officers working security. That led to Teufel scuffling with them and his teammates jumping in. When the dust settled, Teufel and Darling were charged with aggravated assault of a police officer while Aguilera and Ojeda were charged with hindering an arrest. Given the notoriety of the Mets, a swaggering bunch whose games were aired across the country on superstation WOR, the incident generated national headlines. It remains a part of franchise lore. The July 20, 1986, front page of the Houston Chronicle after four Mets players were arrested following a disturbance at Cooter's, a Richmond Avenue bar.In January 1987, Darling and Teufel pled no contest and received $200 fines and a year’s probation, which was lifted a month later. The charges against Aguilera and Ojeda were dropped.“That was young guys acting foolish and ended up embarrassing themselves and their families,” Darling said. “It’s a long time ago and I never think about it and get angry. I only think about it and I’m more bemused.” But there is one regret: Not getting one of the “Houston Police 4, Mets 0” T-shirts that Astros fans had made and sold after the kerfuffle.These T-shirts were sold after four Mets players got into an altercation with a pair of Houston police officers at Cooter's in July 1986.What happened four months later on the field was just as memorable, as the Mets in 1986 battled the Astros in one of the greatest league championship series ever played. That NLCS featured thrilling games, controversy over Astros ace Mike Scott allegedly scuffing the ball and ended in a six-game Mets triumph over the Astros thanks to three games won in New York’s final time at-bat. Darling, who had a no-decision in his only series start in Game 3, said while pundits expected an easy victory for the 108-win Mets, they knew better against an Astros team that played them tougher than any regular-season opponent, winning 5 of the 12 games against New York. “We knew they had outstanding starting pitching, great relief pitching and a real tenacious kind of offense,” Darling said. “They had one big power hitter in Glenn Davis but the other guys were just so tenacious. Billy Doran was my favorite player even though I had to play against him. I just loved the way he played, switch-hitting and all that kind of stuff. “They had such a good team. I think because the Mets got so much notoriety, people thought it was going to be a runover. The ’86 team knew that it was going to be so hard against Houston to get through. If it wasn’t for a couple breaks, we probably didn’t get through them.”
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