4
2011
3 Up & 3 Down -The Yank This Edition
An article by Gregg Hopps
I want to start off by saying I truly despise and detest not only the New York Yankees, but their fans as well. I’m not one of these writers who is worried about being “classy”, or tipping my cap to a worthy opponent. I just don’t like anything that has to do with Yankees. Having said that, the Yankees take two of three games this weekend at Citi Field. The Mets finish a nine games stretch playing all three American League Division winners going 5-4, and now its off to California. Here are the 3 Up and 3 Down from this series.
3 Up:
1) Bay’s Big Hit: Bases loaded in the 10th inning on Sunday afternoon, Jason Bay delivers a key hit to centerfold to score the winning run for the Mets! Its’ good to see Bay come up with a huge hit, and also of note, Mo Rivera had a blown save.
2) Our All Stars: Well, voters in the National League got it right by electing Jose Reyes as the starting shortstop. It remains to be seen whether or not Reyes will play in the game, but if there was any player who deserved to be elected to the team, it’s without a doubt Jose Reyes. Also congrats to Carlos Beltran for making the team as a reserve. The Mets have gotten so much more out of Beltran than anyone could have expected.
3) Reyes Being Aggressive: I’m thinking about the play Friday night, when Reyes tried to go from 1st to 3rd on a fly ball to center. Reyes tagged at first and easily got to second. When the ball was mishandled in the field, Reyes tried advancing to third but was thrown out. Good hustle, and without the big bats in the line up this is how the Mets need to play.
4 Honorable Mention: A rare 4th Up! Props to Gary Cohen on Friday night for mentioning a study that had been done superimposing the footprint of Yankee Stadium over the footprint of Citi. Cohen went to mention that over 40% (I believe 49% was the exact figure), of the home runs hit at Yankee Stadium, would have stayed in the park at Citi Field. Gary, at least in my opinion was inferring that the Yankee power numbers were inflated. It’s always nice to hear Gary, or Howie Rose take shots at the Yankees.
3 Down:
1) The Ump Is Blind: Home plate umpire Jerry Layne in this case, who called Jose Reyes out at third Friday night, although there was no possible way he could have clearly seen the play. Not only did Layne refused to ask his fellow umpires for help on the call, and ejected Terry Collins from the game for arguing. Replays clearly showed A-Rod never tagged Reyes. Interestingly, on Sunday Yankees manager Joe Girardi argued a similar call on a runner caught in a rundown. The only difference was Murphy clearly tagged the runner out on Sunday.
2) Reyes’ Hammy: Jose left the game on Saturday after feeling tightness in his hamstring. Early Sunday night it was reported that Reyes had a grade 1 type pull (the lowest possible grade). Speaking on SNY’s post game show, Terry Collins said he was unsure whether Reyes will play tomorrow night, especially after tonight’s long flight to Hollywood.
3) Dickey’s Glute: R.A. Dickey left the game on Sunday after 5 innings after experiencing tightness in his left glute. I guess we could say say he had a pain in the rear. One thing is certain the Mets do not need anymore injuries and we hope R.A. is well enough to go in his next start.
Happy 4th of July one and all!!
About the Author: Gregg Hopps
Gregg lives on Long Island, and has been a Mets fan since Bud Harrelson and Pete Rose slugged it out in the 1973 playoffs. "Keith Hernandez is the best defensive first baseman to ever have played baseball."
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Glute, shmute, why is all of this happening to us.
I believe he mentioned that 48% of homeruns the yankees hit would not have been home runs at Citi field, definitely a great shot at the hated yankees. Nevertheless, I think the walls should be brought in. The park is becoming ridiculous for right handed hitters. If we ever want to attract a hitting free agent, the park’s dimensions need to be adjusted.
Our focus should not be on free agent hitters. By the time they can become free agents their almost always already in decline. What good is that? We should be developing our own hitters who will have an advantage playing in the big field in terms of speed, athleticism, defense, arm, baserunning and line drives.
All your going to gain by bringing in or lowering the fence is more opposition HR’s and a higher ERA for our pitchers and other teams players have already shown how easy it is for them to hit HR’s here. What we haven’t seen is any indication at all that WE would benefit from moving the fences in. Tell me exactly who is flying out to the warning track? Who’s banging the ball off the top of the fence? Not anyone in a Met uniform that’s for sure.
Stop making excuses for the team anyway. Injuries, bad luck, the height or distance of the fence, on and on. You think good teams make excuses? Do you think Straw or Hernandez would have been whinning about it?
Moving the fence will only make it more difficult for us, not less. The next couple of years with Bay in LF and most likely Niuwenhauss in RF, Thole at C, it would serve us a lot better to leave them where they are.
I agree t agee, lets develop our own guys from within, who will be able to use the spacious stadium to our advantage. I’m thinking why not build a team similar to the Cardinals of the mid 1980′s?
If the walls were the problem then they would be hitting home runs on the road!
They don’t so obviously it’s not the walls that are a problem!
I have to respectfully disagree with both of you. The walls at Citi field are a big problem and looks what it’s done to Bay and Wright in two years. Did you hear what Francouer called it earlier this season, “A Joke” and I have to agree with him. You also can’t realistically hope to fill every position on your roster from a pre-molded line drive hitter in your farm system. Free agents are a part of any winning team, it’s about the right balance of home grown prospects and the free agents. Homeruns are an exciting part of this game and unfortunately Mets fans forgot what that’s like.
I’m not saying make it a band box like citizens bank park or yankee stadium, but make it reasonable for both the hitters and pitchers. I’m not the only one that likes a home run once in a while..
Yeah well what is their excuse when they play away games and STILL don’t hit HRs?
The same walls at Citifield?
They don’t hit homeruns because they are NOT home run hitters!
Not even Beltran is a pure HR hitter!
It’s not the walls that is the problems it is the fans expectations of the players that is bad!
The HR can be a game breaker and we all love it when a Met is the one hitting them but bringing in the fences would only result in other teams hitting more HR’s while we hit about the same.
I really don’t buy the whole in your head thing. The field is the same for both teams. 25 of the 57 HR’s hit here have been by the Mets. We do have a guy who can easily reach the fences coming back in Davis and a guy who can hit some in Wright but we’re also losing a guy who can hit them out of Citi Field in Beltran so I just can’t see how it would help us to move the fences in.
Chipper, Troy, Chase and Ryan haven’t had too much difficulty dialing 9.
Personally I don’t think it would really make any difference at all since the biggest reason for the lack of HR’s is the rotunda blocking the southerly winds from lifting and carrying the ball out of the stadium and that’s not being moved so the whole issue is moot. Bay and Wright were both hitting from too far away from the plate in an attempt to get pitches they could pull in their wheelhouse but it just made them suseptiple on the outside corner and consequently made them worse hitters.
The way for most players to hit HR’s at Citi is to just concentrate on hitting the ball hard and running it out like Angel Pagan who is no body’s idea of a HR hitter and yet has 11 at Citi Field (one inside the parker) He doesn’t go up there with the idea of hitting HR’s. They come when he’s just trying to hit the ball hard, anywhere.
Let the big boys swing for the fences and we’ll get many many more outs which will help our starters and pen a hell of a lot more than 10-20 cheapies will.
Overall our pitching is a full run worse than Philly and Atlanta. Move the fences in that will only get worse.
The walls turned David Wright into the strikeout king is he today? I thought HOJO was to blame for that! I’m joking of course. I think the game of baseball is returning to a pitching based game, especially in light of performance enhancing drugs. Throughout the league home runs are down. Keep the fences where they are and make the team have to string hits together and steal some bases. That’s exciting baseball.