Ed Kranepool grew up a Yankees fan in the Bronx, where the local baseball team had its share of New York City-bred stars, including Hall of Famers such as Lou Gehrig, Phil Rizzuto, Whitey Ford and manager Joe Torre.

But Kranepool took a detour to upper Manhattan and later Queens, where Mets fans got to embrace him as a hometown boy of their own — one whose modest personality and baseball resume fit the underdog franchise.

He was 17 when he debuted with the Mets at the Polo Grounds on Sept. 22, 1962, their first season, playing first base as a defensive replacement for his future manager, Gil Hodges.

He was still a Met when he retired after the 1979 season — leaving as their all-time leader in games played, by far, with 1,853.

It was that longevity, and his exclusive association with the team, that made him one of the franchise’s favorite figures for decades before he died on Sunday at age 79. The Mets announced his death Monday, saying Kranepool suffered cardiac arrest in Boca Raton, Florida.

“We are incredibly heartbroken to learn of Ed Kranepool’s passing,” Mets owners Steve and Alex Cohen said in a statement. “Ed continued to work tirelessly in the community on behalf of the organization after his playing career ended. We cherished the time we spent with Ed during Old Timers’ Day and in the years since. Hearing Mets stories and history from Ed was an absolute joy. We extend our thoughts and prayers to his family and friends.”

A Mets spokesman said that because it’s so late in the season, the team will wear a uniform patch honoring Ed Kranepool in 2025, not this year.

“A sad day for the Mets family and the whole organization after learning of the passing of one of the all-time favorites, Ed Kranepool,” said Mets manager Carlos Mendoza before Monday’s game in Toronto. “Condolences to his family. Like I said, Mets Hall of Famer, fan favorite, part of a big Mets team. Sad day for all of us.”

More than numbers

Kranepool’s statistics were modest. He finished with 1,418 hits, 118 home runs and a .261 batting average. In the championship season of 1969, he had 11 home runs, 49 RBIs and a .238 average.

“The best first baseman I ever played with,” former Mets lefthander Jerry Koosman, who played 12 seasons with Kranepool and was a member of the 1969 championship team, said in a statement. “We knew each other so well and I could tell by his eyes if a runner was going or not. He saved me a lot of stolen bases.”

Kranepool was an All-Star once, in 1965, principally because the Mets were required to send at least one player to the game. He spent most of his career platooning, at best, before a late-career transition to pinch-hitting specialist.

He was sent to the minors for a time in 1970, the season after hitting a home run in Game 3 of the World Series against the Baltimore Orioles.

Kranepool largely failed to live up to the potential star status predicted for him, but he was always valued as a bridge from the team’s dreadful early years to the breakthrough in 1969. He continued to be a piece of its institutional memory as he rode the downslope of the roller coaster, too.

The Mets lost 99 games in ’79, which at least was 21 fewer than they lost in 1962.

‘A wonderful person’

“I just spoke to Ed last week and we talked about how we were the last two originals who signed with the Mets,” former Mets outfielder Cleon Jones, who played 12 seasons with Kranepool and also was a member of the 1969 championship team, said in a statement. “The other 1962 guys came from other organizations. Eddie was a big bonus baby and I wasn’t. He never had an ego and was just one of the guys. He was a wonderful person.”

How much was Kranepool associated with the Mets? He was part of a group that tried and failed to buy them in 1980, losing out to Nelson Doubleday and Fred Wilpon.

Kranepool never met his father, Edward, who was killed in battle in France during World War II, when his mother, Ethel, was six months pregnant with him. He had an older sister who was 3 at the time.

A neighbor and youth baseball coach, Jim Schiaffo, served as a surrogate father figure and also taught Kranepool the finer points of baseball.

He went on to star at James Monroe High School in the Bronx, the alma mater of Hall of Famer Hank Greenberg, and opted to sign with the Mets, seeing more opportunity than the Yankees could offer.

That might have been a mistake, forcing him to adjust to life in the big leagues as a teenager. But he eventually began to fit in.

When 44-year-old Hall of Fame pitcher Warren Spahn joined the Mets in 1965, Kranepool gave him his No. 21 and switched to No. 7, the number the big lefthanded hitter wore for the rest of his career.

By the mid-1970s, Kranepool was the elder statesman himself and kept his career going by becoming a pinch-hitting artist. He finished his career with 90 pinch-hits and six pinch-hit home runs. In 1974, he went 17-for-35 in that role, a .486 average, and he hit .396 as a pinch hitter from 1974-78.

“Just devastated,” former Mets outfielder Art Shamsky, who played four seasons with Kranepool and was a member of the 1969 championship team, said in a statement. “I knew Krane for 56 years. We did so many appearances together. We had lunch last week and I told him I would be there next week to see him again. I’m really at a loss for words.”

Health struggles, recovery

Kranepool, for decades a resident of Nassau County, made headlines for unwelcome reasons in the 2010s. Diabetes, high blood pressure and failing kidneys left him in ill health and in dire need of a transplant.

He received one from a living donor at Stony Brook University Hospital on May 7, 2019, and by that summer was able to join his old teammates to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the 1969 championship.

“He battled for so long and never complained about anything,” former Mets outfielder Ron Swoboda, who played six seasons with Kranepool and was a member of the 1969 championship team, said in a statement. “I thought once he got his kidney transplant, things would be great. He was a wonderful guy and even better teammate. We went into the restaurant business together. I can’t believe he is gone.”

On the one-year anniversary of the transplant, Kranepool recalled the 50th reunion in an interview with Newsday, saying, “It felt so good that I was able to go there without any stress. This is 50-year friendships that we have, and to maintain them and still be part of it, it’s wonderful.

“I went to spring training last year and I went this year, and to be back on the field and be healthy or as good as I can be, it’s wonderful.”

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