It should not have been easy to homer on a slider traveling well below the strike zone at Citi Field, not with wind chills in the 30s. But new Mets outfielder Luis Robert Jr. did so anyway.
Through nine innings, hitters on both teams failed to get the ball out of the infield enough to score a run, let alone threaten the fences. Heck, a few minutes before his 11th-inning blast, Francisco Lindor, Juan Soto and Bo Bichette all came to bat with the bases loaded. None of them could square up a ball well enough to score a run.
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But Robert Jr. found a way, turning what would have been a frustrating loss into a light-hearted win with a physics-defying swing that not all players can provide.
“It was unbelievable,” Mets starting pitcher David Peterson said. “I was facing him a lot in spring, and I was getting real tired of facing him.”
Robert Jr. made it look easy on those warm February afternoons at Clover Park, when Mets starting pitcher after Mets starting pitcher would have peaceful live batting practice sessions interrupted by loud cracks of Robert Jr.’s bat.
He hit so many line drives that it became almost comical, and he hit them to all fields. But he hit them on the back fields and really, who knows what to make of a .699 OPS in spring training? After all, he has shown promise before. For two games at least, he is showing it again.
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“With the conditions today, with the way the wind was blowing — especially from left field — to be able to leave the yard like that in that situation,” Mets manager Carlos Mendoza said. “It goes to show you that this guy is special.”
Robert Jr. admitted there were times during Saturday’s frigid 11-inning saga when he could not feel his hands. Most of that, he joked later, was the fault of the man hitting in front of him: Jorge Polanco saw seven pitches when he walked in the seventh, six more when he walked in the ninth, and a half dozen more when he walked to bring Robert Jr. to the plate in the bottom of the 11th – so many that his hands started to freeze while he waited in the on-deck circle, out of range of dugout heaters.
“I asked [Polanco], ‘how many walks are you going to take this season?’” Robert Jr. said through Mets interpreter Alan Suriel. “But it gives me an advantage because I’m able to see all the pitchers that that pitcher has. I’m able to see how he’s pitching him. And I also know that pitcher is really working hard to get him out, so he’s starting to exert a little more energy.”
The presence of Polanco and three perennial Most Valuable Player candidates ahead of him in the lineup is one of the many reasons to believe Robert Jr. could make mid-career improvements as a Met.
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Thursday, he highlighted one of those reasons when he worked a 10-pitch walk heard around the world, one that set up a go-ahead triple from Brett Baty and matched the longest plate appearance he has had in the last three seasons, according to Sports Info Solutions.
Mendoza said the Mets have been pushing Robert Jr. on his pitch selection, work that has yielded multiple late-count takes in the first two games of the season – including a few tempting breaking balls that Robert Jr. has almost visibly willed himself to leave alone.
“We’ve been working on that a lot,” Robert Jr. said Saturday. “I think the one thing great players have is knowing how to select the proper pitches to swing at. And I think for me to go back to being the player that I was and that I know I am capable of being, that’s going to be a big part of my game.”
Robert Jr.’s locker also sits a few feet away from an ideal role model, his fellow outfielder Juan Soto, with whom Robert Jr. trained at Scott Boras’ facility this offseason. Players like Soto are another reason Robert Jr. could look different this year: During his time in Chicago, he was not often in the presence of the kind of accomplished veteran players who would, consciously or subconsciously, prod him to push for more.
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But Soto and fellow superstar Lindor have combined to miss just 30 games over the last four seasons. Marcus Semien is two years removed from setting the record for most plate appearances taken in a single baseball year. If Robert Jr. needed tips on preserving himself for the rigors of a long season, he has never had better mentors than now.
He will also have a medical staff with a fresh approach to preventing the hip and hamstring injuries that prevented him from playing more than 110 games in only one of his first five seasons. Mets trainers decided to hold out of spring training games until he built strength in his legs and had time to ease into game-shape.
“We’re working on strengthening the parts of my body that were the cause of my injuries before,” Robert Jr. said then. “Up until this point, my legs feel very strong. And hopefully when I get out there, they will keep responding and feel the way they feel right now.”
Mendoza has said multiple times that the Mets will have to be careful with Robert Jr., though he has also been clear that they did not acquire him to be a part-time player. They are hoping they will be the ones to transform him into a full-time star.