PHILADELPHIA – It’s still colder than a Turk Wendell tribute at a Rickey Henderson testimonial dinner. So, please, chill out about the way the Mets have been playing. You can tell from the frost in Bobby Valentine’s breath whenever he gets asked about Henderson, that it’s still earlier
than you think. It was so nippy at the Vet last night that Rick Reed’s foot went numb in the second inning, all the while he continued hanging icicles on the Phillies’ bats.
Of course, there was no telling the Met pitcher that it was only the second week of April, or that the only thing slightly less forgettable than the first 10 games of a baseball season are the next 10. The ice water in Reed’s veins went down to his socks, which he changed every inning trying to warm up a 3-6 team.
True, it gets late early in New York, but objectively; trends to the season are still about as readable as Rickey’s trend of thought. Mike Hampton is 0-3, which is so hard to believe, it can’t be true. Edgardo Alfonzo is hitting .194. Rey Ordonez has three errors. Benny Agbayani has the best average of any Met with more than five at-bats, and he’s still ticketed for Norfolk.
You want rhyme after 10 games, open your umbrella and sing April Showers. You want reasons, don’t expect any detailed explanations from Valentine about his nightly lineup changes. All that is safe to conclude is that the Mets, cold to the thought of getting swept here, wanted this one as bad as some of the pitches at which Ordonez swings.
So when Mike Piazza lined a 2-2 Amaury Telemaco pitch into left center in the ninth inning with Jay Payton on first in a 1-1 game, the Mets centerfielder kept running. And running. And running.
No jokes, please about how Payton would have had to keep right on running up the tunnel and out the door if he had been thrown out at the plate with the suddenly hot Derek Bell on deck. This was no time for third base coach Cookie Rojas to hesitate and not just because the charter to Pittsburgh had hot chocolate, either.
The Mets have lost five of six and three in a row, which is three more than you are allowed to lose in New York before collars gets hot, even in the cold. So after Reed, frozen tootsies and all, had kicked butt through seven, Turk Wendell, Dennis Cook and Armando Benitez kept their cool and Piazza, his bat not exactly to this point of the season a smoking machine, hit a frozen rope that won the game.
“You gotta crawl before you can walk,” Piazza said. Hey, Payton would have crawled home if he had to, but it wouldn’t have been possible unless Piazza delivered in the manner to which Mets fans have become accustomed.
“I think I hit a split-fingered fastball,” the catcher said. “I swung over two of them and was able to make an adjustment.”
“It’s good to be able to provide a lift with a big two-out hit. Everybody has been struggling.”
Of course, it may have been silly to believe Piazza couldn’t come through in Philly, his hometown, with his dad Vince, in the ballpark. The winner was Piazza’s 36th career RBI at the Vet, the most he’s had in any park he has been strictly a visitor except for Three Rivers and Coors. We would suggest it has something to do with home and hearth, except the hearth part wasn’t applicable last night.
“I’ve always had fun playing here,” Piazza said. “It’s not really like a road trip for me. I stay at home and I think that really helps me concentrate. I see the ball well here.”
He sees the ball well everywhere, including behind the plate, where he has the best perspective of anybody as to how Reed, who gave up only his second earned run in 22 innings when Mike Lieberthal led off the seventh with a homer.
“His stuff is better than people think,” Piazza said. “But the biggest asset is his tremendous control. He’s always had a good sinker. I just think he’s throwing the ball lower, with more velocity. Guys are swinging at it, but it’s down and moving and very difficult to hit into the air.
“I’ve caught [Greg] Maddux three times in an All-Star game, and, obviously, hit off him, too, and I think he has a better breaking ball than Maddux has. And a change-up, too.
“But as far as the movement on their fastballs, it’s very similar. Both guys can throw the [two-seamer] away at left-handed hitters, then come back over the plate with [the cutter]. It freezes a lot of guys.”
That goes both in July, when Reed never has to sweat where his pitches are going, and in April, when opponents have had circulation on the bases to match that in the pitcher’s feet.
Reed kept the Mets warm until Piazza smoked one, enabling them finally to go with the floe.