Mike's Mets - The Party Crasher

 

By Mike Steffanos

Please don't show up at someone else's party just to rain on their parade.

If you'll indulge me for a minute, I'd like to start this post by throwing some numbers at you: 1-6, 2-5, 2-4, 0-7, 3-4, 4-3, 2-4, 1-5, 3-4*. Those numbers represent the New York Mets' regular season record against the Los Angeles Dodgers for every season from 2021, going back to when the Dodgers were sold to their current ownership group early in the 2012 season. (They didn't play at all in the 2020 pandemic season.)

Cumulatively, the Mets have only won 18 out of 60 regular season contests with LA over that time period. That's a winning percentage of exactly .300. To put this into perspective, the two worst teams in baseball last season, the Orioles and the Diamondbacks, finished with a .321 winning percentage. On the plus side, the Mets did manage to beat the Dodgers in the 2015 NLDS 3 games to 2, but the Mets' record of futility against LA over those years is starkly awful nonetheless.

I've watched most of those games in that period. Some were blowouts, but many featured a final score that was quite close. Honestly, that's how it felt watching many of those contests — tantalizingly competitive, but almost inevitably ending up as just another "L" in the ledger. Being a Mets fan in the dying years of the Wilpon era was often a challenge, but those games against the Dodgers were often the smelliest turd in the larger sh*t sandwich. They highlighted just how far from being a legit contender the Mets really were.

2022 has been a transformative year for the Mets. Sitting at 85 wins even after the dreadful weekend against the Nats, the Mets have already exceeded their win totals for all but 7 seasons since the year 2000. With 27 games still to play, the Mets should exceed 100 wins for only the fourth time in their existence — last accomplished in 1988 when mullets were still considered cool. They've taken care of business quite well against lesser teams to build up that impressive win total, but they've also fared well against most of the better teams they've played. After splitting 4 games in LA earlier this summer, the Mets won the season series by taking 2 of 3 at home earlier this week — a feat only accomplished once before in the time period cited above, by the 2015 Mets, who made it all the way to the World Series.

Now, no reasonable Mets fan is going to claim that winning one more game than LA "proves" the Mets will be the better team in October. That would be quite silly. Almost as silly as some of the stuff written in the local papers when the Mets lost 4 games to the Astros earlier this summer or those 2 recent contests in the Bronx to the Yankees. Most of us who have followed this game for a while understand that nothing that transpires before October really proves much of anything, except for baseball writers who want to bury your team.

To finish reading this article on Mike's Mets, please click here.

* Thanks to the indispensable Ultimate Mets Database for being the source of the W-L info cited in the first paragraph.

The LTJ Editorial: “The best memory Mike Piazza gave me”

“The LTJ Editorial”
Author: Luis Tirado Jr.
Date: 9-27-13
Twitter: @LTJ81
Website: http://www.TheNYExpress.com

“The best memory Mike Piazza gave me”

I will have the privilege of attending the final NY Mets game this coming Sunday, September 29^th, 2013 at Citi Field and it won't just be another baseball game for me. This will be the day the Mets will induct Mike Piazza into their own Hall of Fame and will honor him in a pre-game ceremony tribute. I have plenty of memories about Pizza especially a huge one that I'll never forget to this very day. More on that later in this article but for now, let us take a look at some of the accolades Piazza earned wearing a Mets uniform.

Piazza is a 12-time All-Star and in the eyes of most baseball enthusiasts, easily one of the best catchers to ever play the game. When you look at professional baseball as a whole, he holds the most home runs hit by a catcher at the amazing number of 427. The last time the Mets went to the World Series back in 2000, one of the biggest reasons they were able to get there in the first place was because of the hot bat of Piazza. I remember he had a hitting streak of 15 straight games where he at least got one run batted in. During his tenure with the Mets, he honored every single game in the contract he signed back in 1998 and played for about 7 years. During that stretch, he played in 972 games, had 532 runs, 1028 hits, 193 doubles, two triples, 220 home runs, 655 runs batted in, 7 stolen bases, a batting average of .296, and a .373 on base percentage. Absolutely incredible stats and many say that the trade the Mets made to acquire Piazza was one of the best in baseball history to turn a franchise into the right direction. A winning direction at that.

When you look at his career, he has not only been quite the class act, but he's been a phenomenal superstar no matter where he ended up playing. Even though he debuted for the Los Angeles Dodgers and played for teams like the Miami Marlins, San Diego Padres, and the Oakland A's, he will almost always be remembered for his tenure with the Mets. He even said when his time comes to get into the MLB Hall of Fame, he wants to be inducted as a Met. Before his professional baseball debut, ever since he was a little boy, baseball was his world. Did you know when Piazza was just five years old, his Dad was working on his arm strength by making him throw baseballs and practice catching? Another fun fact is that when he was just twelve years old in his custom-made backyard batting cage, he had a very special instructor. One who showed him what kind of batting stance he should always use. It was Boston Red Sox legend Ted Williams! It was Williams who actually showed him how to bat and made sure to teach Piazza that no matter what any coach ever told him, to never change his batting stance.

Many baseball fans, especially Mets fans, cherish every memory he brought to this team. I remember one very big memory though because it helped distract me during a difficult time not only in my life but in the lives of millions. I will never forget the terrorist attacks that struck this nation, especially in New York with the September 11^th, 2001 attacks. I remember just a huge sadness that hit me the day it happened that lasted that entire week and still bothers me to this day. Everything in New York was on lock down, every night I went to bed I would worry if in the news the next day more attacks would occur. The sports world stopped and you couldn't even watch TV or even listen to Sports Radio because everyone was focusing on the coverage of what would be another upcoming war this country would face. After the week was over, some kind of sports returned that weekend I remember. It was another NL East game featuring the Atlanta Braves coming to Shea Stadium to take on the Mets. Everyone was sad, crying, it was really emotional since all the players wore NYPD/FDNY caps to honor New York. It was the first sporting event held after the 9/11 attacks, so it meant a lot to a ton of people, regardless if you followed baseball or not. What's my all-time favorite Piazza memory? That at-bat where Piazza hit a ball for a home run that even though I wasn't physically at the game, I heard the Shea Stadium crowd from my home in Queens. It was huge and gives me goosebumps every single time I see that hit. At the time, it lifted the entire city to forget just for a little bit of what occurred earlier that week.

Mike Piazza stands for a lot of things. Integrity, loyalty, and of course, doing things the right way. I know a number of years ago he admitted to using something called Androstenedione but at the time it wasn't anything banned by MLB. Piazza used it for muscle mass and it really isn't any kind of Performance Enhancing Drug when you think about it. It's not like he was a horrible player, took Andro, and starting to hit 10 home runs a game thereafter. As far as I'm concerned, he has brought nothing but great memories and will be remembered as an incredible player. Does he belong in the MLB Hall of Fame? Absolutely! No catcher in the history of the game has made as much an impact as Piazza did and while he didn't get enough votes the last time he was eligible, he will eventually get in. This time though, in Cooperstown.