Yearbook Cover Derby Round 1.17 1974 vs 2006

[Benjamin Grimm]

1974



2006

[MFS62]

This is a toughie because they are both good.
I voted '74 because it felt good to see that flag.

Later

[Benjamin Grimm]

The 2006 cover is appealing, but it's little different from most of the other covers from the recent era. I do appreciate that we're moving past the era of overly digitally edited images, so I guess this cover gets points for that. But I prefer the simplicity of a championship flag flying over Shea Stadium. I could very well have gone with 2006, but 1974 gets my vote.

[dgwphotography]

As one of my first yearbooks, 1974 is a sentimental favorite.

[Edgy MD]

I don't like it. The perspective of the flag is cold and removed and terrifyingly high. "N.L. Championship - World Series Edition" doesn't know whether it wants to be centered or flush right and winds up being neither. It uses a hyphen where it means to use an m-dash, because somebody just doesn't give a shit. It's a subtitle that is up top where the publication's title should be, and it frankly isn't particularly clear about what it's trying to say.

You had Rusty and Seaver and Fightin' Buddy, and Believin' Tug and you could have done better.

I love a single definitive, encapsulating photo. I do, but this isn't it. And even if it was, that doesn't absolve you from mailing in the layout, which they clearly showed themselves to be doing when they overlooked the glaring typo. 2006 shows that sometimes a collage takes you further.

[G-Fafif]

2006 offers quite the collection of talented players. If you wish to order one, be sure to flip through the accompanying catalogue and call the toll-free number to get yours today.

Only kidding. The Mets wouldn't spring for a toll-free number. But they were were generous when it came to dull, businesslike presentation.

This was the last year when the Mets stressed black as a yearbook (and overall marketing) design element. It would stick around for a while longer on the field, but the Mets made a decisive move away from what had been considered contemporary that postseason when they dressed in pinstripes for Games Six and Seven of the NLCS at Shea, as if they had to be true to their own selves to stay alive. But going into 2006, the franchise fancied itself as black as it did blue and orange, and the overstay of its welcome is evident here.

Photoshop must not have been as convenient to use as it would become, for the three new marquee additions -- Lo Duca, Delgado and Wagner -- are in Spring Training togs. It's a handy guide for knowing who was already a Met and who was about to become one, but it takes one out of the moment to see three guys in non-game gear.

No kidding regarding the impressive array of Mets, even if only three of them still had significant primes ahead of them. We've seen most of those veterans appear on Hall of Fame ballots over the past few years, and a couple inducted. A classic "go for it" season. Not a classic cover, though.

1974: a classic cover. An inspirational cover, if I do say so myself:

[fimg=360]http://i65.tinypic.com/2q3vlf4.jpg[/fimg]

I sometimes mistakenly refer to the 1974 yearbook internally as the 1973 yearbook because of what it commemorates. I appreciate that it makes clear what we're coming off of. It probably helps that the Mets made essentially no moves entering 1974, so there was nothing new to hype (though to this point in Mets history, only the coming of Gil Hodges was shall we say flagged on a yearbook cover).

The photo reinforced for me that pennant-winners win an actual pennant. Gave me something to look forward to heading into 1987. Seriously, this set my expectations in terms of prizes. Good to see a full Shea, too. Probably unintentional, but a nice throwback to Willard Mullin's tyke counting the house in 1965.

A dollop or two of sentimentality doesn't hurt its cause, either. I got this yearbook at the first win I ever attended, purchased for me by my sister's then-boyfriend, whose passing I learned of under unexpected circumstances not quite forty years later.

Simple, elegant, excellent. I love this cover.

[Edgy MD]

That yearbook frequently appears on ebay as a 1973.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I think the m-dash thing will really come back to haunt this 1974 cover if it advances to the second round.

[stevejrogers]

Agreeing with Edgy’s points. ‘74 seems way too understated in terms of telling the story. Granted some 23 years later the title would be reflected in just a logo on a pinstriped background, but still.

Also its clearly a “Decades before Photoshop Photoshop” job since I doubt they’d raise the banner prior to Game 3 of the World Series, on an October evening!

[batmagadanleadoff]

SteveJRogers wrote: Also its clearly a “Decades before Photoshop Photoshop” job since I doubt they’d raise the banner prior to Game 3 of the World Series, on an October evening!

What does this mean? And how do you know that the picture is from game three of the WS? And if it's evening, why is the sky so blue? And how come you're not complaining that there was no right field flagpole at Shea Stadium and that the flags flew in center field? Or that the field looks like a ghost town with not a single player on it? Is that the ultimate game of shadow-ball taking place on a diamond? And are you gonna deduct points from this post because I used an em dash?

[Guest d'Kong76]

I'll always love the 1974 cover. I had the team picture from the back of this book
hanging in my room for many years. And only the Mets could celebrate a league
championship and issue an 'offical' yearbook. Not in my final four, but a solid fave.

[batmagadanleadoff]

d'Kong76 wrote: I'll always love the 1974 cover..

Me too. I'll go so far as to say that it's my favorite Mets yearbook cover of the 70s and perhaps, my all time non-illustrated Mets yearbook cover favorite. I'll have to give that last claim some more thought.

[Guest cooby]

Pennant

[Zvon]

batmagadanleadoff wrote: d'Kong76 wrote: I'll always love the 1974 cover.. Me too. I'll go so far as to say that it's my favorite Mets yearbook cover of the 70s and perhaps, my all time non-illustrated Mets yearbook cover favorite. I'll have to give that last claim some more thought.

Me three. It encapsulates the essential.

[stevejrogers]

batmagadanleadoff wrote: SteveJRogers wrote: Also its clearly a “Decades before Photoshop Photoshop” job since I doubt they’d raise the banner prior to Game 3 of the World Series, on an October evening! What does this mean? And how do you know that the picture is from game three of the WS? And if it's evening, why is the sky so blue? And how come you're not complaining that there was no right field flagpole at Shea Stadium and that the flags flew in center field? Or that the field looks like a ghost town with not a single player on it? Is that the ultimate game of shadow-ball taking place on a diamond? And are you gonna deduct points from this post because I used an em dash?

What in the hell are you talking about?

1) I was taking a little piss out of the composition of the cover.

2) As far as I can tell, no one, not even the MFY, Canadiens, or Celtics, would be so in your face arrogant as to raise a flag banner as they try to improve on what they had won the previous series.

3) Even if the sky color was changed for the composite photo, its still a plain Shea, with no lights on, both would be indicators of being on a pre-WS game October evening.

[stevejrogers]

4) You can see at least umps on the field, and you can make out what probably is the 1969 banner there in RF, so what ARE you babbling about?

My point was more on the understated nature of just the pennant flying high above Shea to represent the story of 1973 not being enough for me to vote for it over the 2006 one.

[G-Fafif]

The Mets quietly raised an NL East flag during the final regular-season series of 2015. No ceremony, just acknowledgment that the division had been won. It went into storage after the season, replaced in right field by the NL pennant.

[RealityChuck]

1974. The flag says it all.

[stevejrogers]

G-Fafif wrote: The Mets quietly raised an NL East flag during the final regular-season series of 2015. No ceremony, just acknowledgment that the division had been won. It went into storage after the season, replaced in right field by the NL pennant.

[Carson]I DID NOT know that![/Carson]

Still doesn't take away from my thoughts =

[Guest 41Forever]

Both are good. I like the composite photo of the pennant and the stadium. One of my favorites when I was a kid.

Thinking about the later covers and the kind of cookie-cutter aspect of them. I wonder if the team did those early yearbooks in house. I know the books started getting thicker and more polished in 1999. Now they have a company called Professional Sports Publications doing them. I’m assuming that such a company does yearbooks for a number of teams. Will have to look at some of those early yearbooks and see if there is any indication who did the designing.