Author Jeff Pearlman, who has been a writer at Sports Illustrated as well as penning several other novels, was only eleven in 1986 but has memories of watching these events at the home of a neighbor, who was a die-hard fan like myself. To write this, he went back and interviewed many of the players from the 1986 club. Many were honest and gave details never heard before. Some of what is included in The Bad Guys Won! is a revelation, while some are old news.

What’s interesting in The Bad Guys Won! are the different personalities of the players. I never knew how naive Sid Fernandez and Kevin Mitchell were. Especially in Mitchell’s case, as he was the product of the streets of San Diego and had a brother killed in gang-related violence, this is surprising. However, there is a very funny anecdote about him in The Bad Guys Won! that actually had me laugh out loud.

Learning that all was not copasetic between the players on a team that seemed to have everything go right for them was also a revelation. The resentment of Gary Carter particularly surprised me, as did the occasional tension between him and co-captain Keith Hernandez.

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Now THIS is how you write a sports book. It seems like Pearlman talked to literally everyone who played in the 1986 season, and the level of through research really adds to the narrative. No question is left unanswered. His recollection of the wild, horrible group of rowdy idiots the Mets were in ‘86 is both a hilarious read and an interesting reflection on how much the sport has changed. If it’s possible to feel even worse for Bill Buckner, I do, and Pearlman also writes about the ‘86 World Series for four chapters in a way that had me on the edge of my seat. Certainly a feat to write about sport in an engaging way in the first place, and even more so because we all know what happens (it’s in the title)! The bad guys won is the perfect summary of the thesis of this book, and reminds us that we typically know so little about the lives of those we look up to. This book was chalk full of funny anecdotes that would interest even the most dedicated of fans, but would appeal to a more general audience as well. This book came out in 2004– so a point off for the called-out but generally unchallenged sexism of the players (Pearlman tends to write this as “unruly behavior”), and Pearlman’s own sexism when he recalls the narrative. One of my favorite sports books I’ve read!

When I go down the inevitable YouTube “rabbit hole” to devour vintage ‘86 Mets baseball footage, it’s surreal. Especially in the context of a global pandemic. Not just the cheesy “Get Metsmerized” song or “Let’s Go Mets” video. Not just the endless angles and slow-motion shots of Buckner’s D-R-A-MA-T-IC (and still unbelievable) Game 6 error. Not even the dude parachuting onto the field out of nowhere in the middle of the game. But mostly the scenes of a ravenous NYC crowd hurling reams of toilet paper and smoke bombs from the upper decks cheering their team to a miracle win. I miss the chaos of the crowd. I can’t wait to be back in a jam-packed stadium cheering my favorite teams again. And hopefully in a huge game like a Super Bowl, World Cup, or World Series.

This was a fun read even though it is almost two decades since written (and the Mets of course have still not won again). Pearlman is clearly a fan, but does not shy away from the sordid details of the World Series run. As hard it is to realize that players who were your idols when you were a kid were very flawed humans, they all at least owned it. I am glad the majority of them are still doing well.

pretty good. totally stalled on it halfway but it’s ok cuz now it counts towards my 2025 Reading Challenge!

i thought the inside look behind the team was really cool and especially liked the start where he runs you through how the team gets built.

Pearlman does come off a little bit … bigoted??? throughout ?? maybe it was just the time it was written and not to be the friend that’s too woke but i found myself doing a double take at how he characterized some of the players by their race or background idk. i also felt like he maybe made up some of the stuff LOL

i basically read this because he wrote the book that Showtime the lakers hbo show was based off , and i come away feeling like i might steer clear of another one of his books for a while but it was still a joy to read a baseball book and meet the mets

The '86 Mets were wild! This book has really good first has thoroughly engaging firsthand accounts from the players (and managers, etc.) involved. Great read for any fan of baseball, not just the Mets; I'm a Yankees fan and I loved it.

Pearlman's written a bunch of legendary sports-themed books, and while his analogies vary from corny to downright awful for the sake of reaching a common denominator, you can't argue that his books are incredibly well-researched. The '85 Mets got me into baseball and the '86 team cemented my love for them and the game; they were a game beyond the game, once the cleats were off and the day's opponents were washed off them. I learned a lot I didn't know from this book, and if you're a Mets fan you will too.

Pearlman does an excellent job giving you a behind the scences glimpse at the 1986 Mets. Who could ever forget the comeback by the Mets with Boston on the verge of winning the World Series. Mookie Wilson hitting a ball through the legs of Bill Buckner to cap the comeback in game 6 and send the Series to game 7 which the Mets win is something I will never forget.

You get to really know the Mets circa 1986 and quite frankly they weren't a likeable group. Gooden and Strawberry were the young stars who were unable to deal with their fame. Drugs, booze, women etc were rampant. I was always a Gary Carter fan but he is painted as being an ego manical jerk. The only really good people on the Mets appears to have be Mookie Wilson and Tim Tueffel.

The story about a man thinking Tim Tueffel was hitting on his wife by autographing a baseball with the notation Rom. 116 is hilarious. The man thought Tueffel was giving her his room number when he was referring to Romans 1:16.

I was also a big Kevin Mitchell fan. Before his star years with the Giants he was a young thug from San Diego learning to play baseball in New York. To think the Mets got rid of him because they thought HE was the bad influence on Doc Gooden and Daryl Stawberry is amazing.

Very good book that shows that it isn't always the good guys that win.

Thanks Eric and Matt! I thought because I lived through the '86 Mets that i knew it all. Well like Jon Snow ( sorry about the GOT reference but i have to), i knew nothing!

This book goes deep inside the locker room, as well as the plane rides, and hotel antics that made them the "Bad Guys". I remember how disappointed i was when Doc Gooden and Darryl Strawberry went from 1st round HOF to drug busts and issues with women. What i didn't know was how much they lied and were so out of it. The extent of the drinking and abusive behavior was also something that i had no inkling of, and the relationship between Cashen and Johnson was one of two opposites. This team was built to win, and was arrogant and cocky, but luckily for us Mets fans, they delivered. So many of my 'former' heroes were on the dirtbag side but Mookie Wilson comes thru looking like the true All-American hero.

Besides the inside stories about the bad behavior, the book really set up the NL Championship Series vs Houston w Mike Scott, and the World Series with great insight into the entire Buckner affair. Thanks to my sons for buying me this one and getting me to go outside my normal reading comfort zone. Fun read, and if you were a Mets fan back then, or are one now, it's a must read.

8 teams in the Expansion era (post-‘61) have won 2 of every 3 regular season games and only 6 of those won the World Series, making this team one of the best (‘01 Mariners and ‘69 Orioles didn’t win Series; ‘61 Yanks, ‘70 Orioles, ‘75 Reds and ‘18 Red Sox also won. ‘98 Yanks were probably best tho).

But the’86 Mets were despised outside Queens (including in NY...by Yankee fans) should have won more, and based on this book, they deserved it. Unlike other books about teams that focus on all off-field chaos, this book does a great job of mixing the off-field mania with on-field success and stories behind the games I hadn’t heard before.

On top of that, the writing style is just sarcastic and cutting enough (the bit on Let’s Get Metsmerized had me in absolute stitches) to fit the team and make it an entertaining read to really see inside this team rather than simply hate them. But what could have been...

I own like four baseball books, this is the first one I’ve read.

I hope I enjoy the rest more than I enjoyed this one haha.

Jeff Pearlman's "The Bad Guys Won!" is a very good history of the New York Mets classic 1986 season. Pearlman's book should be required reading all Mets fans. I think any fan of sports in general would get a lot out of this book too. "The Bad Guys Won!" was a very satisfying read.