For Cubs fans, Saturday night centered on the successful major league debut of hot pitching prospect Cade Horton. We saw for ourselves what the heat was all about, as Cade made Citi Field hay of just about every Met batter for four innings (the second through fifth) except for one, our own hot prospect of 2022, perhaps our reborn contributor for 2025.
The budding career of Brett Baty, the Mets’ No. 1 draft pick of 2019 — the one who didn’t get away between 2018’s Jarred Kelenic and 2020’s Pete Crow-Armstrong — can’t be said to have fully imploded, but his extended big league trial surely experienced a failure to launch. Brett’s enjoyed good moments here and there across the past three seasons, but they’ve been interspersed with disappointment, whether injury- or performance-related. Last year’s Opening Day third baseman went to the trouble of learning a new position, only to become the odd man out in a roster squeeze.
Rosters have a way of opening up. After Jesse Winker strained his oblique last weekend, Opening Day second baseman Baty came back from Syracuse. This weekend, he’s the starting third baseman again, at least for a couple of days. Mark Vientos, who seemed to have put a stranglehold around the eternal slippery eel of Met defensive positions with his otherworldly 2024 postseason, rode the bench Friday and DH’d Saturday, perhaps a sign that an incandescent October doesn’t necessarily carry over to the following April and May. It’s just two days in which Mark has ceded his usual assignment. But what a two-day stretch it’s been for Baty.
Friday night, Brett smacked one of four Met home runs. When four Mets homer and all of the Mets cruise to victory, one homer doesn’t necessarily stick out. Saturday night, against bulk guy Horton in the fourth inning and Cubs setup man Julian Merryweather in the eighth, Baty went noticeably deep. Two runners were on in the fourth, one was on in the eighth. Baty took Horton to right-center and Merryweather to left. There was no doubt regarding either shot’s destination. Both home runs brought the Mets close, each trimming their deficit to one. Unfortunately, no other New York batter brought much to the plate, and the Mets lost, 6-5.
One more one-run loss (we’re 8-8 in that Rorschach category) generates its own burst of frustration, but the game’s outcome can be somewhat overlooked in light of Baty demonstrating that his potential hasn’t withered away at the ripe old age of 25. No player who excels when his team has been humbled can evince excess happiness in postgame interviews, but you couldn’t miss the glint of satisfaction in Baty’s response when he told a reporter, “I like hittin’ the ball hard. I’ve been hittin’ the ball hard.” Sometimes hard hittin’ doesn’t produce base hits because opponents’ gloves can create hard luck. Sometimes hard-hit balls leave the yard a couple of times. Sometimes the player who does that hittin’ keeps on playin’. If he’s the only one hittin’, how could he be sittin’?
Every Met year leaves behind names as it goes along. By the time 2024 turned magical via the wizardry of Vientos & Co., you’d have been forgiven for forgetting that Baty was the Opening Day third baseman. This season, when Jeff McNeil healed and Luisangel Acuña emerged, a more versatile Baty became newly extraneous, demoted, and invisible. His wasn’t the only name penned in disappearing ink. A.J. Minter and Danny Young are out for the season after having been part and parcel of an effective bullpen. Hayden Senger, who made the most of an unexpected opportunity, is back in the minors because clubs in the majors rarely carry three catchers. Now and then we’ll hear an update on Winker’s oblique or Jose Siri’s fractured tibia. Those fellas were contributors to the Mets as they got going in earnest, but, as Yogi Berra might have opined, until they return, they’re not here…which is what Baty wasn’t until he suddenly was. Good teams survive the deletion of names from their everyday plans. Good teams prove they have depth. Good teams sort among viable options. Brett Baty may be turning himself into one once more.
Baty’s success is not just a good thing in itself –
it also puts pressure on the established big guns (who failed miserably in the bottom of the ninth last night) to stay sharp.
Great to see Baty have success like this. Those were some serious home runs, especially going the other way.
One thing that irked me: twice on ground balls to the right side Soto was noticeably only jogging to first. It’s a small thing, but, come on: biggest contract ever, how are you not running everything out?
I spent the game alternating between being furious that we gave away Pete Crow-Armstrong, and elated that we held on to Brett Baty.
By the way, I will admit to thinking last year that Mark Vientos won third base fair and square, and that maybe Brett Baty was a candidate for the old change of scenery routine. Looks like I may be wrong. I would like to see Baty do it over a longer period of time, but I think he’s earned the chance to try. Show us what you got, kid.
As for Jarred Kelenic, given that we got Edwin Diaz in that deal and Kelenic’s been traded a few times since, I find it hard to get too worked up about that deal. PCA is a different story.
Good to see but I wouldn’t let 2 games determine that Baty has finally arrived. We’ll see. Also I kind of feel like Baty demonstrating that his potential hasn’t withered away at the ripe old age of 25 can be somewhat overlooked in light of the game’s outcome. The Mets lost, bottom line.
Someday Metkind will solve the inability to win them all. Until then, the occasional silver lining will be observed.
I’m all in.
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