Mike Piazza Thread

[redban]

Growing up, my favorite ball-player was Mike Piazza, one of the greatest right-handed hitters of all-time. His 2013 Hall of Fame induction is approaching, and he has a memoir titled "Open Mike" due out next year.

Use this thread to discuss anything Mike Piazza related!

Here are some nice pictures and a video relating to Piazza's signature moment on 9/21/01, the first sporting event in NYC after 9/11:

http://scores.espn.go.com/mlb/recap?gameId=210921121

The swing:

mike-piazza-new-york-mets-hr-braves-game-post-autographed-photograph-3392446.jpg

Rounding the bases as Shea Stadium shakes:

Mike-Piazza-Home-run.jpg

Pointing to the sky in the curtain call:

piazza-9112.jpg

Mike Piazza sits on a rooftop near the World Trade Center disaster five days after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. The plume of smoke in the upper-right hand corner comes from the site and the Twin towers would have been able to have been seen above the middle buildings:

[scottmitchell74]

How does this not have any responses!!

I love Piazza's swing. I need to amend my "Most aesthetic swings" choices to include his unique high-finish violent swing.

[willshad]

I love how they said; 'this one has a chance' when the ball was hit at least 450 feet. Talk about trying to be melodramatic.

[Mongoose]

Very great player. He's what you'd call an underrated Hall of Famer.

[GoslinFan]

[GiambiJuice]

Highest ROAD batting averages, post-WW2 players (min 3000 PA):

.334 Tony Gwynn
.323 Rod Carew
.321 Mike Piazza

[scottmitchell74]

Highest ROAD batting averages, post-WW2 players (min 3000 PA):

.334 Tony Gwynn
.323 Rod Carew
.321 Mike Piazza

That's simply amazing.

[Honus Wagner Rules]

Highest ROAD batting averages, post-WW2 players (min 3000 PA):

.334 Tony Gwynn
.323 Rod Carew
.321 Mike Piazza

That's mind blowing.

I was curious about Kirby Puckett and Vlad Guerrero since both have a career .318 BA which is the highest career BA by a right handed hitter since Joe DiMaggio (.325) retired in 1951. Kirby "only" has a .291 career road BA. Vlad has a .312 career road BA.

[Los Bravos]

Puckett benefited greatly by playing half his games in that absurd bounce house.

[GiambiJuice]

That's mind blowing.

I was curious about Kirby Puckett and Vlad Guerrero since both have a career .318 BA which is the highest career BA by a right handed hitter since Joe DiMaggio (.325) retired in 1951. Kirby "only" has a .291 career road BA. Vlad has a .312 career road BA.

For some reason Kirby has never been knocked much for his extreme home/road splits. The 117/82 OPS+ split is virtually identical to that of Wade Boggs (118/82). It's more extreme than Jim Rice's (115/85), and it's barely discernable from Todd Helton's (119/80). All of these hitters have had a lot of negative chatter around their home/road splits, but Kirby seems to be immune from such criticism.

[bluesky5]

That's simply amazing.

Any thoughts on Teddy Ballgame’s influence and predictions for Piazza?

[Honus Wagner Rules]

For some reason Kirby has never been knocked much for his extreme home/road splits. The 117/82 OPS+ split is virtually identical to that of Wade Boggs (118/82). It's more extreme than Jim Rice's (115/85), and it's barely discernable from Todd Helton's (119/80). All of these hitters have had a lot of negative chatter around their home/road splits, but Kirby seems to be immune from such criticism.

I think the major reason for that is because the Metrodome never had an established reputation of being an extreme hitter's park like Fenway Park and especially Coors Field.

The Twins played in the Metrodome from 1982-2009

Only Kirby (.339, 1988) and Joe Mauer (3x) won batting titles.

No Twin ever led the AL in HR or runs scored.

Kirby is the only Twin to lead the AL in RBI and that was in 1994 a strike year.

Kirby is the only Twin to lead the AL in hits (3x).

Chuck Knoblauch is the only Twin to lead the AL in doubles (45, 1994).

No Twin hit 40+ HR. The Twins only have eleven 40+ HR seasons in franchise history and Hamon Killebrew had eight of those seasons, the last being in 1970. In the last 52 years the Twins have had only had two 40+ HR seasons.

Since no Twin was putting up crazy Jim Rice or Todd Helton numbers while Kirby was active Kirby got a pass for his extreme H/R splits.

[scottmitchell74]

Any thoughts on Teddy Ballgame’s influence and predictions for Piazza?

Just one more feather in the cap of a hitting savant. The dude knew hitting and he was a perfect pre-ped science experiment.





(Bonds showed us basically exactly what Williams would have done with peds. )

[Los Bravos]

Kirby Puckett has never been knocked for much of anything in spite of richly deserving a lot of it.

[Otis Nixon's Bodyguard]

No one looked cooler hitting an opposite-field home run than Piazza. Learning here that he was an underrated catcher, which puts him in serious contention for greatest catcher ever. Certainly the best-hitting catcher by miles and miles. Probably deserved an MVP somewhere along the way.