Five, Five, And Fly

I’ve been kinda sorta keeping track of Francisco Lindor since the birth of his second child.

Now that sentence would probably make me a “person of interest” if it didn’t have a baseball context attached. But when he hit a home run the day after his child was born, it got me thinking. Sure, the moment itself gave people fuzzies, but I wondered about his season up to that point, and after not realizing his wife was pregnant I got to thinking about how ballplayers are human beings and that they go through stuff that we have no idea about. And maybe, just maybe, his numbers were about more than simply “poor play.”

Going into last night I made note of his numbers from that game on June 18th on: .268/.377/.589/.966 with 5 HR 12 RBI in 16 games (69 plate appearances.) While he still takes wild cuts and pops the ball up plenty, those numbers were definitely an uptick from what he’s done previously. But after Thursday night’s exquisite 5-for-5 performance with two triples and a home run, his numbers are such: In 74 plate appearances: .328/.419/.738/1.157 with 6 homers and 13 RBI. Whoa.

TRIPLES MAKES IT SAFE. TRIPLES IS BEST. @Lindor12BC pic.twitter.com/zaoRaphJO9

— SNY (@SNYtv) July 7, 2023

All this isn’t to say that there’s a definite correlation between becoming a father and putting up big numbers. And it certainly isn’t to say that a new child “motivated” Francisco to play better because I’m not about the constant psychobabble that baseball fans indulge in a little too much. But maybe a more relaxed state of mind can enable you to do have better focus. And maybe the things that happen during a player’s personal life really do have an effect on your state of mind, good and bad. And maybe all the smarty pants like myself who think they know everything really don’t.

Or maybe I’m nuts and Lindor is just swinging a hot bat.

But what I do know is this: If the Mets are to continue this recent streak of good play (their winning streak is up to five games now after handing Arizona their first shutout of the season) and somehow make a run at a wild card spot, they need their guns like Lindor and Pete Alonso (2-for-4 with a home run and three RBI) to be themselves. The production from Francisco Alvarez, who homered in his third straight game, is great. The resurgence of Carlos Carrasco, who threw eight shutout innings, is fantastic. (I was in Canada when he discovered a new slider on Instagram from Pablo Lopez, also proving that if you’re going to take advice from the Internet, it’s not going to be from JohnnySackNuts69 on Twitter telling him to throw strikes.) But it’s Lindor, Alonso, Scherzer and Verlander who have to be lights out.

Today’s Hate List

I mean, it’s Jose Ruiz by default for plunking Alvarez after his home run, right? Though I don’t think it was intentional, and I don’t think Alvarez outside of his quick look to Ruiz after the pitch was all that concerned. But you have Alvarez’s look, Ruiz’s shoulder shrug, and Tripp Gibson racing out to prevent a donnybrook and then all hell breaks loose. It was nothing, and nothing is nothing.

But it’s funny that this happened after Joey Cora advised Alvarez to tone it down on his home run trots. So you know what that means, right? More talking points for Andy Martino to get wrong on Baseball Night in New York.