smoked a home run to right field<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\nA person known as a baseball player and not an entertainer \u2014 a throwback who does not show much emotion on the field \u2014 made an exception. The 23-year-old watched the ball fly, touched first base and took a leap, his back to home plate, while his arms crept toward his torso and flexed. The moment he had dreamt about as a child had become a reality.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI just got chills,\u201d said Benge, who was a spring star and only learned Monday that he won an Opening Day job. \u201cThis is where I\u2019m supposed to be and just having fun.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Carson Benge is greeted by his teammates after the Mets\u2019 Opening Day victory. Corey Sipkin for the NY POST<\/p>\n
He resumed his gait, rounded the bases and arrived at a rocking dugout. Manager Carlos Mendoza \u201ctold me it\u2019s fun here,\u201d Benge relayed with a smile. \u201cI was like, \u2018You\u2019re right.\u2019 \u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
He went through the high-five line, which was punctuated not by a slapping of hands but a big hug from Juan Soto.\u00a0<\/p>\n
From there, Benge heard the sold-out crowd swell louder until he made his way to the top step of the dugout, where he took a curtain call.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt means the world,\u201d said Benge \u2014 whose parents made the trip from Oklahoma, and who had 22 friends and family at the park. \u201cHaving all the people that have sacrificed so much for me come up and watch that happen is definitely big.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tDelivering insights on all things Amazin\u2019s\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSign up for Inside the Mets by Mike Puma, exclusively on Sports+\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\tThank you\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Offensively, Benge added a five-pitch walk in the eighth and swiped second base, which was the last normal \u201cfirst\u201d he could check off. There was the bizarre one \u2014 perhaps one proving that Benge can take whatever that is thrown at him in stride.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Late in the game, \u201cI heard a thud,\u201d Benge said. He looked over and a bird had fallen from the sky a few feet away in right field.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI looked over and it was just down,\u201d Benge said. \u201cDown for the count.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
He did not panic, his eyes trained on the batter. At least on the field, he appeared to be the only one aware of the animal.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Mets starting pitcher Sean Manaea dumps water on right fielder Carson Benge during the Mets\u2019 Opening Day win. IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect<\/p>\n
\u201cI just looked around and was like, is anyone going to grab this?\u201d Benge said. \u201cNo one was looking at it, so I wasn\u2019t about to stop the game for it.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Unfortunately for him, the fans noticed, too, and they began chanting for him to pick it up. He declined, and after the frame a stadium worker ran onto the field and removed the bird, ending a surreal first day of Benge\u2019s major league life.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Is this a good or bad sign?\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not superstitious,\u201d Benge said. \u201cIt worked out.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A bird defecating on a person\u2019s head promises good fortune, according to the old superstition.\u00a0 There is less…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":684851,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,98413,1266,285164,405,403,1305,5226,5225,5228,5227,62,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":["post-684850","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-america","tag-carson-benge","tag-mlb","tag-mlb-opening-day","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-mets","tag-newyork","tag-newyorkcity","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-sports","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116299554250872196","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=684850"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684850\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/684851"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=684850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=684850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=684850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}