With a runner on first in the bottom of the third inning of NLCS Game 2, Daniel Murphy stepped into the batter’s box to face Jake Arrieta. The Mets second baseman had already taken Arrieta, a possible future NL Cy Young Award winner, deep in the first, and now the Cubs, already down 3-0, wanted no part of him: Murphy was being walked, intentionally, not to get to get to a lesser piece of the Mets lineup, but to get to Yoenis Cespedes.
Of all the surreal events Mets fans have witnessed since the trade deadline, including New York being just two wins way from reaching the World Series, that Cubs manager Joe Maddon would elect to face Cespedes, a player whose 17 home runs in 29 games helped jolt a dormant franchise into the postseason, instead of Daniel Murphy, is just about the craziest thing they could’ve never imagined. It also tells you everything you need to know about Murphy’s sudden postseason power surge.
That’s not to say that his scorching success comes completely out of nowhere, because it hasn’t: Murphy has always been a talented, professional hitter, obsessed by the art. In 2009, Murphy told SNY this amusing story:
“When I came [to Jacksonville University], as a freshman, and we were introducing ourselves, and they ask, ‘What’s your name, what position do you play,’ and, of course, being the 18–year-old idiot I was, I told them, ‘My name is Daniel Murphy, and I bat third.’ I was just kind of half joking, and serious at the same time.”
As a Met, Murphy, who began his career as a middling prospect at Shea Stadium back in 2008, has been a likeable player who never quite lived up to the early excitement surrounding his hitting.
“When we signed Daniel, we always thought he was going to lead the league in hitting because every at-bat he treated with intensity and focus,” former Mets general manager Omar Minaya told the Guardian.
Murphy put up good numbers on bad Mets teams, but the inconsistent fielding and base running goofs were tolerated by management only because he plays first base, second base and third base, because he has been relatively inexpensive, and mostly, because he was there. Like his manager Terry Collins, Murphy was viewed as a convenient custodian, a bridge to an eventual replacement who would arrive when things got serious in Flushing.
Now Murphy finds himself at the center of a postseason run that was unlikely in mid-July, but even after literally stealing the show vs the Dodgers in the NLDS, and homering off Clayton Kershaw, Zack Grienke, Jon Lester and Arrieta across four straight playoff games – just like Lou Gehrig and Reggie Jackson did (heard of them?) – Murphy, who also made a sliding stop to thwart a potential Cubs rally in the ninth inning of Game 1, still attracts criticism. The Mets revered play-by-play broadcaster Gary Cohen, bizarrely saw fit to politely rip (if that’s possible) the free-agent-to-be before the NLCS.
“He’s not a big power hitter. He’s a good hitter, he’s a good hitter. He’s a good sixth or seventh hitter in a good lineup. That’s what he is. And he hurts you so badly in the field and on the bases, and with all the craziness I think it’s time to move on … Murph is a lovable guy, but I think he’s a net-negative, and I’ve always felt that way.”
Mets fans now clamoring for his re-signing disagree, and against the Cubs, Mr Net-negative is continuing to prove that he’s much more than a seventh hitter in a good lineup: that perhaps all he ever needed to become a hitting star was to be surrounded by talented hitters instead of the John Mayberry Jrs and Eric Campbells of the Mets, pre-trade-deadline, pre-Cespedes world.
Watch Daniel Murphy explode inside a deeper lineup, that is, if he gets the at bats. #Mets
— David Lengel (@LengelDavid) July 31, 2015
So, how much has the new, substantially more potent Mets lineup changed the way pitchers approach Murphy?
“To cut right to it, pre and post-deadline, there isn’t much of a change at all in Murphy’s pitch-type rates,” Jeff Sullivan of FanGraphs.com told the Guardian. “Almost identical. He has seen a lower rate of pitches in the zone the last few months, not that I necessarily know why. He’s also been getting more loft on the ball, which might come from hitting a bit more often in hitter-friendly counts, when he’s more able to zone in and hunt.
“It can also just be hard to see differences in strategies through overall pitch mix. Maybe he is being pitched differently, in a subtle way. Could be he just feels more comfortable airing it out, so to speak, in a lineup that puts less pressure on every individual member.”
Right now, the Murphy-led Mets look exceptionally comfortable in applying pressure to the curse-laden Cubs. Curtis Granderson has been menace in the field, at bat, and on the base-paths, Travis d’Arnaud flashed power while Juan Legares has contributed off the bench, minimizing the recent struggles of Cespedes, Lucas Duda and David Wright. The Mets’ soft underbelly, the middle-relief bridge to closer Jeurys Familia, who has tossed 7.2 lights-out innings in October, has not been exposed against the Cubs.
Then there is the starting pitching, which is nothing short of historic.
Matt Harvey, who is now questionable for Game 5 after taking a line drive off his right arm, and Noah Syndergaard have left a Cubs team that blasted 10 home runs against the St Louis Cardinals shaking their heads and their manager Joe Maddon looking for answers. The Mets are up two games heading to Wrigley Field and haven’t even showed their (third) ace yet, Jacob deGrom, who will pitch in Game 3 against Kyle Hendricks. New York have already dispatched Lester, and most importantly, Arrieta, who took his first road loss since 7 May in a game his team positively had to have.
Absolutely everything is breaking New York’s way: the Mets have been so good that their notoriously negative fans haven’t even started dreaming up ways they could screw this all up … but, of course, there’s still time.
