17
2009
If It Was Your Choice, Pitchers Park or Hitters Haven?
An article by 
During Wednesday night’s broadcast, Gary Cohen talked about some of the drives he felt would have been homers at Shea Stadium, specifically citing Wright and Beltran’s long outs.
He went on to say how Jeff Wilpon mentioned that the Citi Field was setup so that if necessary they could bring in the fences next season if the park effected the Mets offense adversely.
After many, many years of playing in a pitchers park like Shea Stadium, and never getting a no-hitter to show for it, I was kind of hoping to see a different kind of baseball in Queens with the new ballpark.
I was envious of how the Phillies left the deep caverns of Veterans Stadium for the launching pad that is Citizens Bank Park.
I think I would have enjoyed seeing David Wright and Carlos Beltran toying with 40-45 HR seasons, and Jose Reyes upping the ante to 25 homers.
It looks like this season will sap some of the power from this team, a contingency that wasn’t well thought out in my opinion. Especially when you already had little power coming from Dan Murphy, Brian Schneider and Luis Castillo.
Sure, everybody loves a pitching duel, but I was kind of hoping to see a brand new era of Mets baseball where maybe the longball would have been more prevalent, and the cheers and excitement as well.
And if we are going to stick with a park that is even more pitcher friendly than Shea was, why don’t we have more than one lights out pitcher in our rotation?
Most teams tailor their rosters to fit the park. You have a short porch in left, then you bring in some right-handed power hitters, you have a short alley in right then you load up on lefthanded thumpers. Shouldn’t we have loaded up on at least one other top of the rotation starter to really take advantage of our park effects and have a real home-field advantage?
We can always make Citi Field a little bit more hitter friendly next season. Wilpon said, “We can make the dimensions smaller if we have to, but we wanted to start off deep and then go from there.”
What are your thoughts? Pitchers park or hitters haven?
About the Author: Joe DeCaro
Went to my first Mets game, a Mayors Trophy game at Shea, in '73. We beat the Yankees 8-4 and I was hooked. I marched in two Banner Day parades, and before the Grand Slam single, there was the "Hendu Can Do" grand slam - I was there. I've collected Mets memorabilia all my life and started Mets Merized Online to feed my addiction.
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NL East Standings
| Team | W | L | Pct. | GB |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nationals | 26 | 18 | .591 | - |
| Braves | 26 | 19 | .578 | 0.5 |
| Mets | 24 | 20 | .545 | 2.0 |
| Marlins | 24 | 20 | .545 | 2.0 |
| Phillies | 22 | 23 | .489 | 4.5 |
Last updated: 05/24/2012
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In 3 regular season games there has been 7 homeruns and a total of 31 runs at citifield. Not to mention, the homerun hit in the exhibition game by “the mighty” Jed Lowry. Its mid-April, they are playing in 40 degree weather and, yet, they are averaging over 2 homeruns and 10 runs per game and you are crying about it not being a hitters park. In June when it starts to warm up and the ball starts to carry more and these numbers increase are you going to whine about it being too hitter friendly?
Matt, if that happens I’ll be jumping for joy. So let it be written, so let it be done.
Oops, one more thing I forgot to mention regarding the stats you cite. It’s a very small sampling, and my point was based largely on what Jeff Wilpon SAID and Gary Cohen SAID.
I have no idea what type of park it would be, I was simply stating what my preference was. Thanks for the comment.
Hi Joe –
I agree with your comments as to how the field and the team should interact.
In many ways, Fred Wilpon has built a monument to the past – the Dodgers – long before the Mets ever existed. It’s too bad that this season will have to be a season of adjustments to the field, both for the fans, the ownership, and the team.
Who knows what will happen?
Very true Annie, and lets not forget the Bklyn Dodgers had the perfect players to suited for that field in Jackie Robinson, Junior Gilliam, Sandy Amoros and Pee Wee Reese.
It seems to me there are many shortcomings in the design of the OF. One of the good features of Shea was the regularity of the OF wall. It was a consistent arc around the field and a consistent height. The Citi wall is all over the place, back and forth, in and out, up and down. That makes the playing field unpredictable. Why are we deliberately giving fielders a challenge in our own park? Even the foul lines and their closeness to the stands is ridiculous. Sharp grounders down the lines rebund off the stands into the middle of the OF. The short wall near the side stands is awful (remember Castillo’s tumble; only luck prevented an injury). The overhang in RF is ridiculous. I hope this was not done as a memory of the Polo Grounds, because the Polo Grounds overhang was hated by the fans. The Modell sign is ridiculous. All in all, the design was botched badly with poor decisions which will hamper our team’s performance in its home park. Very poor decisions in the design review stage are apparent to me.
I know its early and they have to learn thier park (although the visiting team hasn’t seemed to have had a problem yet), the thought did strike me the other night what if this place turns out to a house of horrors for the Mets like the old Astrodome was? How do they “fix” it? Personally I also agree, stop with all the “nooks and crannys” and different outfield wall heights nonsense. Make the outfield consistent.