Thanks to Mike for keeping me apprised of the magic number for the Mets to clinch first place in the NL East during the past week. I’ve decided to keep track every few days here on my blog. After a win by the Mets today against the Padres and a win by the Phillies against the Braves, the Mets now have a magic number of 37 with 50 games to go. In order to clinch first place, a total of 37 Mets wins or Phillies losses are required.
On a side note, it’s nice to see Mike Piazza doing so well this season with the Padres after spending the past 7+ seasons with the Mets. Even better was reading about the NY fans giving him a standing ovation after he hit his first of two home runs during the game today. During his career with the Mets, Piazza batted .296, with 220 HR’s and 655 RBI’s. Piazza ranks 2nd all time with the Mets in HR’s and RBI’s and 4th in BA. Stats courtesy of mlb.com. Anyone care to guess who is first on the Mets all time list for HR’s and RBI’s?
Lets go Mets!
I’ll leave the trivia question for someone else, since being a Met fan means the answer is second nature to me.
I was at the Met game on Tuesday night and witnessed all of Piazza’a return, from BP to his exit in the 8th inning. It was a wild night, with Piazza getting standing ovations from the minute he came out to stretch, to a nice video montage of his Met’s days, to EVERY at bat. I really was tired by the end of the night.
It was also a little nice, when in the 6th inning (??), Piazza was at bat, and LoDuca threw out Cameron trying to steal 2nd. The fans started cheering “Paul LoDuca” to shift support to the current Met catcher, tho which Piazza promptly rifled a line drive single into CF. Kind of a “take that LoDuca”.
All in all, it was a great night with lots of admiration for Big Mike, and well deserved. If you ask me, #31 should be retired right next to Tom Terrific, Gil Hodges and Casey Stengel.
PS – Thanks to Vinny for the ticket, and nice to see Piazza hit two bombs last night (and glad it didn’t result in a Met loss)
Sounds like you had a good time Mike, wish I could have been there with you and Vinny. I agree Piazza should be placed in the Mets HOF as he brought the Mets back from the dead in the late 90′s.