Friendship, memories and a year with the 1969 New York Mets play Former Mets OF Art Shamsky relives the 1969 championship season (6:11) After a year of coping with the pandemic and the death of Tom Seaver, former Mets OF Art Shamsky shares with Jeremy Schaap his reflections on loss, forever friendships and the allure of '69. (6:11) ON A 68-DEGREE Saturday in late October, Art Shamsky left his apartment to see a friend. He grabbed a baseball and an old glove, and took the subway to a deserted train car on the Long Island Rail Road. New York was still skittish, and Shamsky had been too. He'd never been so vulnerable in his life. But he wasn't thinking about the pandemic, or himself. One thought kept floating through his head: "What if he doesn't recognize me?"