Jay Horwitz: The 2001 Mets have always made good on the promise to ‘never forget’

It's just two words: "Never Forget." For a quarter of a century now, that phrase has been the mantra of the 2001 Mets who helped the city heal after 9/11.

Those players have done everything possible to keep alive the memories of those 2,977 people who died that September day.

Now, 25 years later, the nucleus of that team is still heavily involved in anniversary events this month.

On Sept. 8, there will be a firehouse visit to Ladder 25, Division 3 in Manhattan. Two days later, the guys will gather at Citi Field to watch the debut of Todd Zeile's film "When America Took the Field." Then, on 9/11, they will return to Citi to participate in MLB's Baseball Meal Pack.

In attendance for most of those events will be Mike Piazza, Al Leiter, John Franco, Robin Ventura and Zeile. David Wright will be there, too. David has never missed a firehouse visit when he is in New York. In my mind, he is an honorary 2001 Met.

I have been doing Mets public relations for a long time, 46 years to be exact. I am often asked who my favorite player was, and what team was my favorite. I am reluctant to answer because I don't want to offend anyone. Let me say this: The 2001 Mets were the right team for the right time.

None of us had experienced anything like this before. Thousands of people had died. No one knew what to expect. There was a stoppage of play. When would we continue to play, would there be a follow-up attack?

Our guys met every challenge and then some. We had local players who took what happened personally. Leiter was born in New Jersey. Franco came from Brooklyn and Staten Island, and Bobby Valentine was born in Connecticut. Then we had a group of veterans who just "Got It." Piazza, Ventura, Zeile, Joe McEwing, Vance Wilson, Glendon Rusch, Jay Payton and Edgardo Alfonzo all stepped to the forefront.

There were countless visits to Ground Zero. There wasn't a charity dinner or hospital visit that we didn't make. No arms were twisted either.

We have tried to come together each September to make a firehouse visit to pay our respects to the 343 firemen who passed away. All of us still shed a tear when we walk into a house and see plaques honoring the men who were killed in the attacks. These kinds of visits keep us connected and help us to not lose track of our goal to "Never Forget."

We were in Pittsburgh on Sept. 11, 2001. I can still remember watching the "Today" show when the planes hit The Towers. At first, you thought this might be an accident but then you quickly knew that this was no accident.

Our hotel was next to a federal building, so we had to move to the suburbs for safety. We stayed in a small hotel next to Robert Morris University. Two days later, we bused back home. It took us 10 hours. I remember crossing the George Washington Bridge, and Todd pointed out that there was only smoke where the Towers used to be.

As we made our way to Queens, there was dead silence the rest of the way. None of us knew what would happen next.

What happened next was that half of the Shea parking lot was turned into a recovery area. It was originally supposed to be used as a morgue, but so few bodies were recovered from the Towers that plans were switched.

Bobby V, Sue Lucchi and Kevin McCarthy of our Stadium Ops. department ran the area. We received supplies from all over the east coast. People came from Maryland, Ohio, and Upstate to drop off food, medical supplies and clothing.

We had a routine. In the mornings, we would work out but in the afternoons all of our players and staff packed trucks to send down to Ground Zero.

We kept the parking lot open until we started to play again. Sue maybe slept a few hours a night during that period. When she did sleep, it was on a cot at Shea. You can't forget about Mike Landeen who worked for Aramark at the time. He would stay there nightly and barbecue for the first responders.

I have to say a special word about Bobby. He was like a man possessed. He had two jobs, being our manager and making sure the trucks were packed. One of his best friends had jumped from one of the Towers and his death deeply affected him. Bobby had a restaurant back then and he fed all the workers on a daily basis.

Another thing we did during this time was make huge donations to Rusty Staub's New York Police and Fire Widows' & Children's Benefit Fund. Each member of our team gave a day's pay to the foundation.

During our workouts, our owner Fred Wilpon met with city officials to decide when we should play. It was decided that we would host the first game back on Sept. 21 vs. the Braves.

Before that we went to play a three-game series in Pittsburgh. I don't know how Bobby did it, but despite all that was going on, we were still in a pennant race.

We had a meeting with our ownership on the day of the game. Honestly, so many of us had mixed feelings about playing. Was it too early? How could baseball matter with all that went on in the world?

Twenty-five years later, I am still so proud that I was a part of the first sporting event played in NYC after the attacks. We needed to show the world that it was OK to smile and laugh again, and our game was the first step in that process.

I still recall every detail of that historic evening. You have to start with the Piazza home run which brought tears to everyone at Shea. I admit I was crying in the press box. One thing about Mike, he never wanted to be called a hero. In the weeks after he turned down numerous attempts to put him on the cover of various magazines.

Then there were the bag pipes, the color guards, the 21-gun salutes and the messages of hope from our players on the scoreboard.

I can still see two teams, who did not like each other, embracing mid-field.

I can still hear Diana Ross singing "God Bless America," Marc Anthony doing the "Star Spangled Banner," and Liza Minnelli giving a rousing rendition of "New York, New York" during the seventh-inning stretch. After she was done, she walked over and embraced Jay Payton, who was in the on-deck circle.

Our team did so many good things. We became the first club to wear special hats to honor the agencies who lost someone on 9/11. We were only supposed to wear those hats for a game or two, but we defied MLB and wore them for the rest of the year.

We were the first team to work with Tuesday's Children (now Tuesday's Promise), an organization that took care of the more than 3,000 kids who lost a parent.

I vividly recall our players signing autographs for the first responders in the dugout after we won. It was there I first met Carol Gies and here three sons who went on to become firefighters just like their late father Ronnie.

We were in uncharted waters back then. No sports team faced the challenges that we did. We passed every test with flying colors. Through the years we have never deviated from the words that have bonded us together: "Never Forget."