Mets’ Darryl Strawberry number retirement includes special Home Run Apple transformation

The Mets gave their guest of honor a berry good welcome.

On the day the organization retired Darryl Strawberry’s No. 18, the folks at Citi Field found a special way to celebrate on Saturday.

They turned the Mets’ signature Home Run Apple in centerfield into a strawberry by placing green seed decals on it with an extra large green leaf at the top. 

Strawberry’s No. 18 replaced the Mets logo in the middle of the apple also.

The crew at the Mets’ home ballpark also created a path with plastic strawberries on shrubbery walls for distinguished guests to walk through onto the field. 

Strawberry, who was honored before the Mets’ afternoon game against the Diamondbacks, raised the apple plenty of times as Met as the franchise’s all-time home run leader at 252.

He is also second to David Wright in RBIs with 733.

https://twitter.com/Mets/status/1796965229110124768

“The best baseball I ever played in my life was in Queens,” Strawberry wrote in a piece for The Post this week. “Everywhere else that I played I didn’t feel that kind of success. It was more of a part-time me in those other places compared to what I did for those eight seasons with the Mets.”

During those eight seasons beginning in 1983, Strawberry won Rookie of the Year, made seven straight All-Star teams and finished second in the MVP voting in 1988 after hitting a career-high 39 home runs.

Strawberry, the No. overall pick in 1980. was a part of the Mets’ legendary 1986 World Series championship team, hitting huge homers in Game 5 against the Astros in the NLCS and the title clincher versus the Red Sox in Game 7 at Shea Stadium. 

Strawberry, who left Queens after the 1990 season, also played for the Dodgers and Giants and won multiple World Series with the Yankees.

His Mets teammates, Dwight Gooden and Keith Hernandez, also have had their numbers retired by the Mets.