It just resonated on so many levels….

I was just going by the 73-76 Met Teams as far as the biggest MetFro.

I was just looking at some of my old Met cards and it does look look like Nino 1979 Topps was the biggest Fro. Nino ’78 was pretty big as well.

Here are some other players that had pretty big Fro’s during the 1977-1981 time period:

1978 Topps Leo Foster
1978 & 1979 Topps Elliott Maddox
1980 Jose Cardenal

1979/1980/1981-Topps Pat Zachery has a pretty crazy White man Fro. Zachery looks all together kind of crazy and out of sorts with beard and basic disheveled look.

Bob Apodaca had some really long hair 1977-1981.

Jeff Reardon had some long hair on the 1981 Topps.

A quick (and NOT thorough, nor definitive by any means) perusal of some old programs from the late ’70′s vouches favorably for the superiority of Sr. Espinosa’s afr-etic gifts. After his departure, the torch at Shea seemed to have be carried most admirably by Cardenal’s world-class ‘do, with honorable mention going to perennial “on-the-way-up” page-r Mario Ramirez.

Despite sharing his name (if not his mane) with some of the disco-era’s most generously-coiffed booty-shakers, (http://image.listen.com/img/356×237/3/9/8/8/658893_356x237.jpg)
…Frank Tavares seems to have done most of his best work in Pittsburgh.

Man, I miss that era.

Bibby could have easily been the FIFTH starter on those 70′s Mets: Seaver, Ryan, Koosman, Matlack, and Bibby.

As far as the biggest Metfro during the mid 70′s, there’s not one that stands out but I remember Tom Hall having a fairly decent Afro, Cleon Jones and John Milner didn’t really have long hair for the time period. I think Gene Clines had a half-way decent Afro.

Truth be told, The Watcher, described as being “anywhere from 15 to 50 feet tall, usually depending on who was drawing him,” by Stan Lee in that treasured tome of my childhood “Son of Orgins of Marvel Comics,” cast a pretty big shadow, but was never quite as…LOUD as the eminince grise of 8th Street Wines and Liquors. I can hear Morty’s voice echoing, even now, through my subconscious: Bigger than Bibby, indeed…

During my own tenure at the legendary establishment, I feel certain that I must have heard “Man plans, Petey, God laughs!.” on more than one occasion. Or at least it sure seems that way. Along with a steady stream of Yiddish insults, of course.

Whenever something has you down, it may (or may not) cheer you up to think along the lines you describe.
“May (this) be the worst thing that happens to you,” can be cheering, even in its foreboding. Yes… things aren’t SO bad… if we’re lucky, there always WILL be something worse coming up for us in the future…

Great lead off to the third paragraph by the way. Hit the nail on the head.

I always speculated what the mid-70′s Mets would have been like had they not packaged a minor-league Bibby to St. Louis in the deal that brought them a few middling, but vital cogs on their ’73 pennant winners. (Ace pinch hitter Jim Beauchamp and versatile righty Harry Parker.)

Besides being the best fourth starter on an astounding pitching staff, he would have had the biggest afro in Flushing by a long shot on those pre-Espinosa/Cardenal rosters. I guess Felix Millan probably had the biggest Metsfro in those years. Is that correct? Pepe Mangual got into 41 games back in ’76, but he didn’t stick around.