Skip to main content

'Berry Worried about Beltran

Perhaps when the baseball team returns to Flushing they could sprinkle some pixie dust, or whatever it is they do at a Salvation Miracle Revival Crusade and heal Carlos Beltran's home sickness.
 
The splits are both alarming and amazing. Consider the following stats after Tuesday's win.
 
Carlos Beltran in road games:  .346 BA, 17 HR, 54 RBI, 42 games
Carlos Beltran in home games:  .207 BA, 10 HR, 24 RBI, 40 games
 
Observing closely as I do regularly, I couldn't help but notice that Beltran's swing has appeared much smoother on the road. I'd be willing to bet he leads the Mets in home popouts (not talking about curtain calls) because he has a propensity to overswing to try to impress the denizens of the Queens ballpark.
 
This is not a new situation for the Mets. Many a quality hitter has been spooked by Shea and shined elsewhere, though this is certainly an extreme situation.
 
It is somewhat reminiscent of one overlooked by fans of the 1986 Mets. This was a team that had a great player who, statistically speaking, was Sheaphobic.
 
Through his first 46 games entering June 13, Darryl Strawberry hit a perfectly respectable .279, but with only 7 home runs. This was due in large part to his home numbers. Through his first 18 games in New York, Strawberry hit .217 with 1 HR and 9 RBI. To that point, he was hitting .314 with 6 HR and 22 RBI in 28 road games. Perhaps some off-field factors came into play here, though I suppose we'll never know that.
 
Anyways, not only was Strawberry struggling at home, but he was also struggling against lefty pitching, so he was likely quite happy to see soft-tosser Rick Reuschel working for the opposition, the Pittsburgh Pirates that day. The Mets contrasted that with Dwight Gooden, who opened the game by striking out a rookie named Barry Bonds, who was making his Shea Stadium debut in his 13th big league game. It was one of 13 punchouts that day for Gooden, who was unusually wild for a brief spurt. Four walks and a wild pitch in the 2nd inning helped the Pirates grab an early 2-0 lead. The Mets rallied quickly and evened things up at 3-3 by the close of the 3rd inning, than took a 5-3 edge in the 5th on a 2-run home run by Keith Hernandez.
 
The Mets had a chance to add to their cushion after Straweberry started a one-out rally in the 8th by doubling off southpaw Larry McWilliams, but they failed to do so and stranded the bases loaded. That came back to bite the Mets in the butt.
 
Jesse Orosco relieved Gooden in the 9th and allowed a single to Rafael Belliard and a walk to Met-to-be Lee Mazzilli. Pirates manager Jim Leyland, fearful of his rookie being overmatched against a lefty, than pinch hit Mike Diaz for Bonds (!) and Orosco walked him as well. Two sacrifice flies later, the game was evened at 5-5 and shortly thereafter headed to the home 9th.
 
Leyland chose lefty Bob Kipper to face a lineup in the 9th that would feature fellow lefties Hernandez and Strawberry in position to do damage. Mookie Wilson gave them a chance to do so, singling with one out and advancing to second on a Wally Backman groundout. The Pirates wouldn't give Hernandez a chance to beat them. With two outs and Wilson on 2nd, they purposely bypassed Hernandez to pitch to the struggling Strawberry.
 
Kipper, like Reuschel, was a soft tosser, and on an 0-1 pitch, Strawberry lined a curve into the outfield, easily scoring Wilson with the winning run.
 
"Tonight, I gained some respect," Strawberry told the media after the game.
 
Unfortunately, he didn't gain much statistically. Strawberry's home struggles lasted throughout the 1986 season, though they were overlooked due to the Mets great record. In the regular season, he finished with the following splits
 
Home: .227 BA, 11 HR, 33 RBI, 8 SB, 65 games
Road: .284 BA, 16 HR, 60 RBI, 20 SB, 71 games
 
The good news is that when the postseason came around, the numbers didn't tell the whole story. True, he had only 4 hits in 22 at-bats at Shea in the playoffs and World Series, but the significance of 3 clutch home home runs allowed us to overlook his foibles. Mets fans hope they'll be able to say the same thing about Beltran.
 
True Metberrys know...Darryl Strawberry's .227 batting average at Shea Stadium in 1986 was one point better than Sid Fernandez's batting average at Shea Stadium that season.

Comments

So the All-Star Game fiasco works in our favor, giving Beltran up to four road games to hit grand slams in the World Series?

Popular posts from this blog

Best Games I Know: Phillies (Updated)

  The best wins against the Phillies in Mets history …   May 5, 2022 – Mets 8, Phillies 7 The Mets score 7 runs in the 9 th inning to overcome a 7-1 deficit and win in Philadelphia.   April 29, 2022 – Mets 3, Phillies 0 Tylor Megill and 4 Mets relievers combine on the second no-hitter in franchise history.   September 22, 2016 – Mets 9, Phillies 8 (11) The Mets tie it in the 9 th on a Jose Reyes home run and win it in the 11 th on a 3-run home run by Asdrubal Cabrera.   July 17, 2016 - Mets 5, Phillies 0 Jacob deGrom pitches a one-hitter. Only hit is a single by Zach Eflin in the 5 th inning.   August 24, 2015 – Mets 16, Phillies 7 David Wright homers in his first at-bat in more than 4 months. The Mets hit a team-record 8 home runs.   July 5, 2012 – Mets 6, Phillies 5 The Mets score 2 runs with 2 outs in the bottom of the 9 th to beat Jonathan Papelbon. The winning run scores on David Wright’s bloop down the right field line.   August 13

The best Mets ejections I know

When you think of the Mets and famous ejections, I'm guessing you first think of the famous Bobby Valentine mustache game, when after Valentine got tossed, he returned to the dugout in disguise. You know it. You love it. I remember being amused when I asked Bobby V about it while we were working on Baseball Tonight, how he simply said "It worked. We won the game." (true) But the Bobby V mustache game of June 9, 1999 is one of many, many memorable Mets ejection stories. And now thanks to Retrosheet and the magic of Newspapers.com , we have a convenient means for being able to share them. Ever since Retrosheet's David Smith recently announced that the Retrosheet ejection database was posted online , I've been a kid in a candy store. I've organized the data and done some lookups of media coverage around the games that interested me post. Those newspaper accounts fill in a lot of blanks. Without further ado (and with more work to do), here are some of my findings

Walk-Offs in Movies, TV, and Other Places

Note: I'm leaving this post up through the end of the week, a) because I don't have time to pump out something new and b)because I was hoping to build a really good list of entertainment industry walk-offs...so if you're looking for something new, check back on Monday or so... Of course, if there's a major trade or move, I'll adjust and try to post something... In the meantime, click on the "Table of Contents" link as well. It has been updated. SPOILER ALERT: Read at your own risk Caught the ending of "A League of Their Own" on one of the movie channels the other day and it got me to thinking that it would be fun to compile a list of walk-offs from movies, television, and other forms of entertainment. Here's the start, and only the start, as I spent about 30 minutes or so thinking it over Help me fill in the blanks by filling out the comments section. "A League of Their Own"-- Racine beats Rockford for the All-American Girls Profess