June 10, 1963 - Tracy Stallard, who hadn’t won a game in 21 months, and Tim Harkness, who hadn’t gotten a hit in 21 at-bats, reversed those negative statistics tonight as they led the Mets to a 3-2 verdict over the Cincinnati Reds before 9,089 Polo Grounds onlookers. Stallard, best remembered as the pitcher off whom Roger Maris hit his record 61st home run, won his last major league game on Sept. 3, 1961, while with the Boston Red Sox. Harkness’s fifth homer of the season — a solo shot — off loser Joey Jay in the seventh inning proved to be the winning run. The victory brought the 6-foot-five-inch Stallard’s season record with the Mets to 1-3 and marked the first complete game he has ever pitched in either the National or American League. “He gets more curves over than he did as a reliever,” exulted Casey Stengel after the game. “And he pitched better to [Frank] Robinson than anybody I’ve ever seen. If you can stop him, that’s one way to beat them.” The Mets presented an errorless defense for a change, and that helped, especially since Stallard, who had whiffed 25 in 18 previous innings, had only 1 strikeout.
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