NL CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES : New York vs. Houston : Mets, Astros: Two Styles Collide Tonight

Under one roof tonight, New York Met arrogance meets Houston Astro audacity in the first game of the National League playoffs. Something in the Astrodome will have to give.

Most likely it will be the hitters on both sides, especially in tonight’s opening serenade of Cy’s--Dwight Gooden of the Mets, the 1985 Cy Young Award winner, vs. Mike Scott of the Astros, the Cy Young favorite this season.

“If hitting dominates this series, everyone will be surprised,” said Davey Lopes of the Astros, “including the hitters.”

Ray Knight of the Mets is braced for the worst.

“If Doc (Gooden) throws the way he is capable of and Mike Scott does the same, we may play the first game for two or three days,” Knight said.

It shouldn’t get much easier the rest of the week, either. Game 2 will feature Houston’s Nolan Ryan, the all-time king of K’s, and Bob Ojeda, the leading winner on the Met staff. In Game 3, Bob Knepper, who had more success against the Mets this season than any other Houston pitcher, will pitch for the Astros, and Ron Darling, a Yale man almost as unbeatable in the National League as he was in the Ivy League, will work for the Mets.

But this series between teams that made their debuts in 1962 offers much more than a wealth of pitching.

There is, for example, the contrast in style. The Mets, who won 108 games this season, matching the 1975 Cincinnati Reds’ record for wins since division play began, have been primed for the playoffs since May, when they had all but obliterated the rest of the East Division.

“I know more people probably pick the Mets,” Astro Manager Hal Lanier said. “Of course, in spring training they had already won the World Series.”

Not since the Yankees in their glory years has any team been as hated as the Mets, but they apparently thrive on it.

“Any team that wins 108 games and plays as consistently as we have all year . . . the fans want us to come out and wave our hats, but people call us arrogant,” Met Manager Davey Johnson said.

” . . . I hope we are confident, and arrogant. That means we’re ready.”

No one, on the other hand, expected the Astros to be ready for this. They were, in the words of a well-known Los Angeles manager whose team finished half a game out of last place, merely renting first place in the National League West.

To the surprise of Tom Lasorda and many others, however, the Astros wound up winning a club-record 96 games, including 24 in which they won in their last at-bat.

“We’re like David going against Goliath,” Lopes said. “And we have our slingshots ready to see if we can knock the s.o.b.’s down.

“They have a lot of Goliaths. We have a lot of slingshots. We’ll have to be on target.”

The Astros have more than slingshots. They also have the Astrodome, which may be a wonder (Judge Roy Hofheinz) or a blunder (R. Buckminster Fuller) but either way may give Houston a significant dome-field advantage.

Imagine holding a primal therapy session in your living-room. Then you’ll understand what it’s like to have 50,000 people screaming indoors here. And thanks to TV considerations, the Astros get the extra game here in the best-of-seven series, even though the West had the home-field edge last season, too.

“I remember playing here in 1979 and wearing cotton in my ears because it was so deafening,” said Knight, who was then with the Reds and later played with the Astros before being traded to the Mets.

“I know what it’s like. It’s hard to concentrate because of the ringing in your ears.”

It’s not just the noise.

“I don’t particularly care for the dome myself,” Lopes said.

“There’s the visibility factor, No. 1. It’s not as good indoors. And the turf is horrendous.

“Go out walking there and you might fall down. Seams, platforms, holes, and potholes--just like in New York City.”

In New York’s Shea Stadium, of course, the Astros will have to contend with the LaGuardia-bound planes buzzing overhead, not to forget other flying objects launched from the stands.

“I’m staying under cover in the bullpen,” Astro reliever Charlie Kerfeld said. “The last time we were there, a guy threw a hot dog with mustard at me. Got mustard all over my arm.”

But Kerfeld is ready for the Mets and their fans. Tuesday, the irrepressible rookie and cartoon fan unveiled his newest T-shirt: “The Jetsons Invade New York.”

Said Kerfeld: “I’ve only been intimidated by one thing in my life, and it was inhuman--a weight scale. . . . I’ve made the playoffs before. We won the state championship in my high school. This is no different.”

Well, there might be one difference. Kerfeld took a look at the crowd of reporters attending Tuesday’s workout and said: “There’s more media here than people in my hometown--Knob Noster, Missouri.”

If Knob Noster has never seen such crowds, neither have the Astros, at least not since 1980, their only other appearance in the playoffs, when they lost in five games to the Phillies, four of which went to extra innings.

“The greatest playoffs in the history of baseball,” Pete Rose, then of the Phillies, said after the Astros had lost, blowing late-inning leads in the last two games.

The Mets haven’t been in the playoffs since 1973. They last won the World Series in 1969. Is it their destiny to win another?

Knob Noster--and the rest of the nation--awaits an answer.