Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Mike Piazza Retires
One of the greatest players in Mets history officially announced his retirement today. Mike Piazza, the face of the franchise from 1998 to 2005 and the player who led the Mets to the World Series in 2000 has called it a career.
Piazza is a sure-fire first ballot hall of famer, the only question that lingers is will he go into the Hall of Fame as a Met or as a Dodger.
As a biased Mets fan there really is no question in my mind that he should go in as a met. Piazza himself has said that he would prefer to go in as a Met, and although the Hall no longer allows the players to decide what cap they wear, I find it almost ridiculous that anyone would even suggest he wear a dodgers hat.
First and foremost, he played longer in New York, that alone is usually the deciding factor for the hall. Piazza played 7 full seasons in New York from 1999-2005, and played most of 1998 with the Mets as well. He only played 5 full seasons in Los Angeles.
Second, his statistics show clearly that he had a better career in New York than Los Angeles.Team G AB R H HR RBI BA Los Angeles 726 2707 443 896 177 563 .331 New York 972 3478 532 1028 220 655 .296
Third, He led the Mets to the NLCS in 1999 and to the World Series in 2000. He didn't play all that well in the two first round playoff sweeps the dodgers experienced in 1995 and 1996.
Fourth, Piazza was the unquestionably the leader of the Mets for 8 Seasons.
Fifth, he is probably the second best player in Mets history, whereas he's more like the 10th best player in Dodger's history.
Sixth, the Mets got robbed with the other great hitting catcher in their franchise's history when the hall decided to give Gary Carter an Expos hat because he had played more seasons in Montreal.
While all of these are good reasons for Piazza to go into the hall as a Met, the reason is far deeper than statistics or time played, or playoff achievements. Mike Piazza should go into the Hall of Fame as a Met because most people when they think of Mike Piazza, they think of him with the Mets, and when they think of the Mets of the late 90s early 2000s they think of Mike Piazza.
If Mike Piazza ends up going into the Hall of Fame wearing a Dodgers cap, it will be an atrocity for Mets fans, whereas if he goes in as a Met, it wont be that big of a deal for Dodger fans because they should expect that.
Labels:
Gary Carter,
Hall Of Fame,
Los Angeles Dodgers,
Mike Peters,
Mike Piazza,
New York Mets
3 comments:
Look, EVERYONE knows Mike as a MET.....not everyone knows the rest of his "baseball history". No question about it...HOF...METS. End of discussion.
ok Zac I see your point, but in all fairness, after piazza got injured and missed most of the season in 2003, he wasn't the same player after that. he was on and off the DL and he hit the down side of his career, that shouldnt be held against him... his first 5 years in NY was comparable to his 5 years in LA plus he had an additional 2 and a half years in NY after that.
he had 5 RBIs in 5 games with the marlins... thats a 162 RBI pace... clearly he should go in as a marlin, seeing as how he never amassed 162 RBIs in any other season.
so let me see if i get this:
piazza played roughly 250 more games and had about 700 more AB with the Mets than the Dodgers. During that time, me mustered less than 100 more runs, less than 150 more hits, less than 50 more HR and less than 100 more RBI, not to mention a worse batting average with the Mets than with the Dodgers (Yeah...not doing math here. You know what im saying), yet he should go in the HOF as a Met?
Huh. Ok...