HARD to outrun the posse in a City of Alligators, Carlos Beltran says, when your legs come up as short as a New Yorker’s patience.
“Every time I would get to first I would know I could have stolen (second) but couldn’t because the leg was bothering me,” he said yesterday. “The fans know you are hurt and they want you to produce – it’s a little difficult.”
Tell that to Mike Piazza, who adjusted, to Robbie Alomar, who didn’t, to Kaz Matsui, who hasn’t. Having learned that hard knowledge can be a soft shoulder. Beltran says he will pass on everything that he didn’t realize about a big-contract move to New York to Carlos Delgado.
“You don’t really have a friend you can go to, to tell you what you think you should do,” said Beltran. “I didn’t know anybody.
“If Delgado goes through what I did, I’ll give him advice. But I think he will be fine.”
So do we, because of Delgado’s grace and dignity. It’s Beltran we’re not as sure about. If there is going to be any helping done between these two, our guess is it will be the first-year Met assisting the second-year Met.
Another producer takes that much more pressure off David Wright and Cliff Floyd, too. But it particularly will help Beltran, whose $119 million contract introduced him to New York as more than what he really is: A good player who never has bettered 30 home runs or 110 RBIs, superstar thresholds.
“I was coming from a great (Houston) postseason and as the season started I was doing fine,” he said. “Then I got hurt and it went downhill for me.
“The whole year I was battling to try to feel my hands, my legs, to feel comfortable out there.”
It didn’t help him to be batting third, after having been one spot higher most of his time in Kansas City and Houston. Though Beltran repeated yesterday he had no preference, the logic of batting Paul Lo Duca second and Beltran third today – and apparently in most days to come – was clear only to Willie Randolph.
If batting Beltran second would force him to take too many pitches so Jose Reyes can run, Beltran – who stole 41 and 42 bases in his two seasons before coming to New York and walked 92 times in 2004 – subsequently will get fewer opportunities to steal, as that would leave first base open for Delgado.
That said, the lineup will be deeper and Beltran should do better than .266, 16 home runs, 78 RBIs, simply by having Delgado anywhere behind him, assuming good health, assuming a good start and skin that has grown another layer, as he insists.
“Things happen for a reason,” Beltran said. “It was a learning experience, playing for a big market team, to get to know the fans. Nothing is going to surprise me because I went though everything last year.
“If I’m healthy, I’m going to have pretty good numbers. I feel more relaxed, more comfortable. I’m having fun, that’s the main thing.
“Julio Franco believes in God. I believe in God. I talk to him every single day about baseball, about hitting, about everything, because that’s a guy I can learn a lot from.
One hundred and 19 million can buy you a lot of things but not understanding. Beltran had a lot of adjusting to do to New York. In turn, New York has to adjust its expectations to a not-quite superstar who may do more out of the comfort of having to do less.