Apr. 20, 1962 - At the insistence of Manager Casey Stengel, the New York Mets practiced baseball fundamentals in New York today before taking off from Newark Airport to Pittsburgh in search of their first victory. Stengel said the purpose of today’s drills was to develop the teamwork that a new club lacks at the beginning. “We’ve got ‘em running the bases together and getting signs at the same time,” the manager said. “They have to pay attention to one another.” Without mentioning names, the 72-year-old manager cited a few situations in which a lack of togetherness in execution had contributed to the seven Met defeats. In Pittsburgh, the Mets will be facing a club that has won all eight games it has played, two from the Mets. The modern major league record for consecutive victories at the start of a season is 10, set by the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1955.
