Bats

Even to ardent Met fans, a book about the team's second-place finish in 1985 might seem not worth bothering with, but that would be making a mistake. Probaby no better volume has ever been written about a baseball team's season from the viewpoint of an intelligent and sensitive manager. Wherever he has been the skipper, Johnson's teams have finished better than predicted, and that was the case in 1985 as well. Here, aided by Golenbock (The Bronx Zoo, Balls, Johnson tells what it was like to run a team plagued by injuries, a team made up largely of young players who needed to be encouraged, a team that had almostbut not quiteenough talent to be the best. He writes of his enthusiasm for his players, especially Gooden, Carter and Hernandez; his travails with the media; and, above all, his cornering the market on Rolaids. A grand baseball book. (May 2)