24
2011
Will Jason Bay Decide The Future Of Citi Field For The Mets?
An article by Former Writers
I think it’s safe to say that Jason Bay’s first year as a New York Met was a bust after be signed to a 4 year deal worth 66 million dollars. Coming into the 2010 season Jason Bay was supposed to provide much needed power for the Mets. Unfortunately things did not go as planned as Bay’s power was nowhere to be found last season. Besides his offensive numbers taking a huge nosedive last year Bay’s season was ended when he suffered a concussion and was not to be seen in a Mets lineup for the rest of the season.
Bay much like David Wright suffered a loss of power in his first year playing in the ridiculously big ballpark that is Citi Field. It’s important to note though that Bay’s numbers at home were better than his numbers on the road:
| Split | PA | 2B | 3B | HR | BA | OBP | SLG | OPS | BABIP | OPS+ |
| Home | 186 | 12 | 4 | 3 | .277 | .371 | .459 | .830 | .333 | 121 |
| Away | 215 | 8 | 2 | 3 | .243 | .326 | .354 | .680 | .326 | 94 |
Those splits are courtesy of Baseball Reference.
Now there’s no denying that Bay numbers at Citi were better across the board except for home-runs.
Now if Bay can’t adjust to Citi Field and has another year in which he hits less than 30 home-runs something needs to be done about the ridiculous dimensions of Citi Field. Making the park smaller would not only help Jason Bay in 2012 it will help the New York Mets in the future. Players who make their livings based on their power numbers have to be hesitant to play 81 games in Citi Field after seeing how Wright and Bay have struggled. It’s hard enough these days attracting free agents to the Mets, their ballpark shouldn’t be another obstacle.
There was 1 at bat last year that Jason Bay had that has been stuck in my head. Bay hit a ball pretty hard, it looked like it was going to be a home run but instead it was only a very long double. Bay’s face as he went to second told the story; he couldn’t believe that ball didn’t leave the park. I believe that the park was indeed in Bay’s head and he altered his swing to accommodate for the size, which hurt his power.
Hopefully Bay will rebound this year but if he doesn’t and the power is still nowhere to be found he might be the one player who decides the future of Citi Field
About the Author: Former Writers
13 Comments + Add Comment
NL East Standings
| Team | W | L | Pct. | GB |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Braves | 42 | 30 | .583 | - |
| Phillies | 35 | 37 | .486 | 7.0 |
| Nationals | 34 | 36 | .486 | 7.0 |
| Mets | 27 | 40 | .403 | 12.5 |
| Marlins | 22 | 48 | .314 | 19.0 |
Last updated: 06/19/2013
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Greg, poppycock! In case u hadn’t noticed PNC is larger than CITI & Bay raked @ PNC over 6.5 yrs compiling an overall .283 BA along with 132-2B, 18-3B,138-HR!
Greg, I believe, like lemmings Met faithful have been led, by the press, to believe Citi is this unassailable castle, on the contrary, while the dimensions combined with all of his supportuing offense being MIA, certainly combined to overwhelm Wright that innaugral campaign; however he DID bounce back nicely last season & to blame Citi’s vastness is grasping for the low hanging fruit of excuses, in Jason’s case, he most likely suffered from BIG CONTRACT” heebie jeebies, psyched himself as so many do. Bay plays 6.5 yrs in a canyon(PNC) & only 1.5 seasons in cozy Fenway, yet we’re to believe only that latter period is valid for comparisons. Whgile PNC IS LONGER! CITI IS TALLER(Great Wall of Flushing. PNC’s LF wall is merely 6′ high compasred to Citi’s 12′ jumping to 18’5″ Cettainly negates PNC’s 410′ distance to LCF compared to Citi’s mere 379′.
My solution would be to add enough rowsw of seats in front of the existing ones that lowers the height 6 or 7′ at least, thus potentially increasing revenue fcreated by additional capacity. How this detracts from ERA is yet TBD.
Bay ‘knows’ he can hit it far enough; fans are being misled by press Why doesn’t the length seem to impose an equal impediment to opposition? Significant design change MUST wait ubtil offseason
I think we can call last season for Bay a case of crappy luck. I still don’t think it was a great signing (mainly because of the status of the Mets rather than Bay’s abilites) but he should do fine. He won’t rake like he did (PNC is slightly friendlier to fly ball hitters than Citi) but he’ll do fine.
What amazes me about Bay is he has such a high BABIP for an over whelming fly ball hitter. That usually happens with line drive hitters.
Finally a fact included in a Pomes article. Unfortunately he arrives at the wrong conclusion. Based on the facts provided it would appear Bay DID adjust to Citi Field. I wonder how many other LFers OPS’d .830 (even in small samples) at Citi?
Facts are pitchers are going to use the big park to THEIR advantage. Ours as well as our opponents. Mistakes may be driveable to LF for RH hitters but no one’s going in their on purpose.
I really don’t think having wild hackers like Francouer and Barajas behind him followed up by Tejada or Arias and the pitcher really helped Bay out too much either.
An off season that left him only 6 weeks to find housing, schools, move couldn’t have helped too much. Living up to the big contract is always a difficult adjustment, especially here and especially now that he’s at an age where players normally begin their decline.
Our home field can and should be a home field advantage for us. Any moving in of the fences is going to result in more HR’s for both teams. The OFer’s that we have in the minors (by enlarge) don’t profile to be big slugger types. Puello, Den Dekker, Niuwenhaus, Ceccilini but speaddier better defending doubles type hitters.
I prefer to watch the all around player anyway. Home run derby is OK once a year but I’ll take the line drive, great defender anyday.
You have to again wonder about the thought process behind signing Bay. True we didn’t hit many in 2009. The summer was also wet and cool. That makes a difference. Our two best hitters went down early, so did Reyes who gets #2 and #3 a lot of fastballs. Murphy was lost at the plate for 3 months, Castillo got pitches cause he forces you to throw him some and he doesn’t exactly scare you. Church swung through a million pitches, Schneider and Santos aren’t protecting anyone and Cora wasn’t setting the NL on fire. The fact is we had a s*** line up.
If it’s all about the HR’s at Citi then you better get your pitch early because your not getting anything to pull later in the count, especially with men OB.
The Stadium does play long but I wouldn’t change a thing other than looking for line drive hitters who can run down a deer and posses a cannon out there.
T, your typical eruditely accurate assessment. BRAVO!
Did u happen to read Darling’s hatchet job on us in the current Sporting News? Projected us 4th! No explanation why he anticipates so much from the Fish’s inexperienced linrup & mngr. yet typically he lists the 3 inmportant notes on each as:
FISH:
–Mike Stanton’s on base percentage will improve in his second season; but strikeouts will remain a problem.
–Johnson won’t duplicate his NL best 2.30 ERA; but will remain an ace
**Ramirez won’t casually jog after ball or get into dugout confrontation.
METS:
–Out of contention by July, the Mets will try to trade their high priced players
–Bay won’t match his ’09 production(36 HR,119RBI(; but will dwarf last season’s(6,47)
– Francisco Rodriguez will be more focused on & off the field.
Somehow, I don’t comprehend how he can figure the team that’s exported MAYBIN,ROSS,UGGLA. and features such little MLB experience in 4 of their 8 lineup projerctions is going to maintain it’s third place finish after 162.
By my understanding improvments in production anticipated @ 1B,2B,SS,LF,#4,#5 SP should certainly easily translate into an additional #of Ws to bypass the Fish into 3rd or at minimum the 2 additional Wins needed to finish @ .500. Certainly too much focus is being put upon Santana’s absence(11-9) last season; but how many losses did we expell jettisoning Maine & Perez. Certainly the backend’s improvement delta should more than accomodate the frontend’s loss.
There’s certainly a lot to be contributed with the concept of “BEING A HOMER” in NYC as nearly as horrific as “BEING A PEDAPHILE” since to many of these socalled “experts” do backflips as to not be perceived as one.
NB, if yesterday’s game were “in season” Emaus nearly provided a full yr of Castillo offense in one game!
PNC PARK is not bigger than city park. PNC has one deep nook in left center that is deeper than city but is shorter down the left field line, shorter in center and much much shorter in right field. It is only 325 down the left field line and 399 in dead center. That one nook is 410 but even that is smaller that the nook in right center in city. And in right despite the high wall it is a only a pop up from being a HR.
Dennis? CF? Really? is that the significant dimension u really want to contradict me with? Personally for a RHH such as Bay, I’d value LCF &LF power alley dimensions much higher, dont u think? As each team’s site depects non standardixed dimensions to reveal for their home park,first consider these PNC dimensions:
Outfield Distances
Left Field Foul Line: 325 feet
Left Field Power Alley: 389 feet
Left Center Field: 410 feet
Center Field: 399 feet
Right Field Power Alley: 375 feet
Right Field Foul Line: 320 feet
Outfield Wall Heights
Left Field to Left Center Field: 6 feet
Center Field: 10 feet
Right Field: 21 feet
without getting into a pissing contest with u, I believe these dimensions provide at least a comprable challenge to Citi’s. I believe u’ll discover it’s more the wall height diffeential than tyhe length that matters most, as I’d indicated.
Hey, if you want to delude yourself into thinking PNC is the deepest park in the world be my guest. You are worng. If you wouyld have read you would have known that I gave PNC left center, but if you are claiming that very low wall of 6 feet is an impediment when in Queens the wall is not that low anywhere that fine, 6 feet is more than 10 feet or 15 feet or 8 feet. OK. And if you would have read I said the wall in right is high but it is so shallow that it is a pop up for a HR. Next time read carefully. But never mind, I see that with the exception of a few posters here, reading comprehension is missing.
Ok Jason Bay hits more HRs maybe even 15 more HRs…
Meanwhile Pelfrey, Dickey, Niese, Young and Capuano will give up 10 more HRs each so what did we gain?
You’ve got 4 ground ball pitchers (Niese should be keeping the ball down more now) and one fly ball pitcher. HRs should go up that dramatically.
I am going to assume you meant HRs should NOT go up that dramatically. My apologies if thats not what you meant.
What happens to a ground ball pitcher who gets the ball up?
OVER THE FENCE!
Right now those pitches are staying in the park due to it’s depth. You really got to get all of it to send the ball out.
If Bay can’t hit HRs in Citifield the solution is to replace Bay not the Fence positioning.
Get a guy who could hit it out of any park if you really want more homeruns. Me personally I say if you hit for average and can drive it to the Gap (which Bay did last year when he did hit) thats really all you need.
Lets stop blaming the field here. HRs are very exciting but most HRs are hits that would go out no matter how far away the fence is. To try and get 15 more from one batter by moving in the fences only increases EVERY batter’s chances (Including thr opposition’s) of hitting a HR.
So whatever you get from increasing the HRs of the 3 or 4 guys on your team who hit for power, you will lose by allowing the other side to hit that many more as well!
It’s just not worth it!
Why do you think the Phillies had to go out and spend all that money on Pitching? Because you need a pretty good pitcher to keep anything inside that park!
As the OP noted, Bay’s problems were far deeper than just Citi.
He didn’t hit them on the road Either.
Thats says to me the problem is Bay not the field. As has been true since the advent of baseball. Instead of swinging for the fences just hit the ball hard…the HRs will follow as a result and the average will ultimatly lead to more runs than waiting for the big HR will!
shucks. I was waiting for that “Beltran refuses RF; Ollie joins bullpen, I WAS RIGHT!!!!” article from ya, Greg.
oh wait…
HAHAHAH
Wonder what hatred rock he’s been hiding under.
parks should ideally be neutral. With Citi, I think the mistakes were the crazy deep RCF, and having both deep and high fences.
If you want to keep the fences where they are, drop them down to 8 feet, and maybe you can see the excitement of an over the fence HR robbing catch again!
I would also do something about the cavern in RCF, but that is much more significant of a change. Lowering the fences would be easy.