Marlon Byrd Could Do What No Met Has Done Before

Power hitters don't usually run very well.  And speedsters aren't prone to hitting home runs.  So it would be reasonable to say that players who are among the league leaders in home runs don't usually find their names near the top of the triples leader board.  Of course, there have been some exceptions over the years.

Hall of Famer Stan Musial led the league in triples in 1948, 1949 and 1951.  He hit 39, 36 and 32 homers in those years, respectively.  More recently, in 2007, Jimmy Rollins led the league with 20 triples while hitting 30 homers to capture the National League Most Valuable Player Award.

Only three players in the modern era of baseball (since 1900) have led their respective leagues in triples and homers in the same season.  Those players are Willie Mays (13 triples, 51 homers in 1955), Mickey Mantle (11 triples, 37 homers, also in 1955) and Jim Rice (15 triples, 46 homers in 1978).  All three are in the Hall of Fame.

As you can see, it's quite rare for a player to be among the league leaders in both triples and home runs.  Just nine players have finished in his league's top ten in triples and homers over the past 20 years, as seen in the chart below.

Player	Year	Triples	Place	Home Runs	Place
Sammy Sosa	1994	6	T-6th	25	9th
Ellis Burks	1996	8	T-5th	40	T-5th
Vladimir Guerrero	1998	7	T-8th	38	T-6th
Barry Bonds	1998	7	T-8th	37	9th
Nomar Garciaparra	1998	8	T-4th	35	T-10th
Vladimir Guerrero	2000	11	T-2nd	44	T-4th
Luis Gonzalez	2001	7	T-8th	57	3rd
Ryan Braun	2007	7	T-6th	37	T-4th
Carlos Gonzalez	2010	9	6th	34	4th
Curtis Granderson	2011	10	3rd	41	2nd

Of the nine players in the last 20 years who have finished in the top ten in both three-base hits and homers, only Vladimir Guerrero accomplished the feat twice, doing so for the Expos in 1998 and 2000.  But notice that none of the nine players played for the Mets.  That shouldn't be surprising.  After all, only 16 Mets have ever cracked the year-end top ten in triples.  And of those 16 players, none of them hit as many as 20 homers. (Jose Reyes' 19 homers in 2006 are the most.)  Obviously, that means no Met has ever finished in the top ten in both triples and homers in the same season.

But that could all change this season.  And it might be done by an unlikely candidate.

Word.

Marlon Byrd currently has five triples and 20 home runs.  His five triples are good for a ninth place tie in the National League, while his 20 homers are tied for the eighth highest total in the Senior Circuit.  Should Byrd finish in the top ten in the league in triples, he would become the first Met to hit 20 homers in a season in which he cracked the top ten in triples.  In addition, should Byrd remain in the top ten in both triples and homers, he'd also become the first Met ever to do so.

Not Jose Reyes.  Not David Wright.  Not Darryl Strawberry.

Marlon Freakin' Byrd.

No one expected Marlon Byrd to do much for the Mets this year.  He was supposed to be part of a rotating outfield who could perhaps hit well against left-handed pitching.  But instead, he's become the team leader in home runs, runs batted in, and slugging percentage.  He also has a chance to be among the league leaders in both triples and homers.  That's something very few players can claim over the past 20 years.  That's something no Met has ever been able to claim.  Until now.  Maybe.

This has truly been a remarkable season for Marlon Byrd.  And it also has a chance to be an historic one.

Ten Things You Didn't Know About The 2012 Mets

And so it goes.  Another Mets season has been put in the books.  Here are the things you know about the 2012 Mets.

The Mets finished 74-88.  R.A. Dickey became the first Mets pitcher to win 20 games since Frank Viola in 1990.  Johan Santana pitched the first no-hitter in team history.  Jason Bay couldn't even hit Charlie Brown.

That you know.  This you don't.

Here are ten things you didn't know about the 2012 Mets, listed in no particular order (kind of like what Terry Collins did when he had to choose which relief pitcher to bring into a ballgame).

Was Terry Collins trying to hitch a ride out of town?  Or was he doing it for his relievers?

1.  The Mets just completed their fourth season at Citi Field.  In each of those four seasons, the team finished in fourth place in the NL East.  Prior to the opening of Citi Field in 2009, the Mets had ended a season in fourth place only twice (1996, 2004).

2.  In 2012, the Mets scored 650 runs, an average of 4.01 runs per game.  That's the fifth lowest average since the end of the 1983 season, when Tom Seaver pitched his final game as a Met.  The Mets averaged fewer runs per game in 1991 (3.98 runs per game), 1992 (3.70), 2001 (3.96) and 2003 (3.99).  Had the Mets scored nine fewer runs in the just-completed season, it would have been their lowest runs per game average in twenty years.

3.  If you think you saw a lot of strikeouts in Mets games this year, you're absolutely correct.  In 2012, Mets players struck out 1,250 times, establishing a new franchise record.  The previous record was held by the 1968 Mets, who struck out 1,203 times in "The Year of the Pitcher".  This year represented the fourth time in the team's 51-year history that the Mets struck out over 1,100 times, as they also accomplished the embarrassing feat in 1965 (1,129 strikeouts) and 2004 (1,159 strikeouts).  But look on the bright side.  Of all the Mets teams that struck out over 1,100 times, the 2012 Mets finished with the best record at 74-88.  However, it wasn't just players in Mets uniforms taking or swinging at strike three.  Mets pitchers also set a franchise record by striking out 1,240 batters, surpassing the old record of 1,217 strikeouts originally set by the 1990 Mets.  That's a whole lot of swingin' and missin', y'all.

4.  Last year, Jose Reyes and Angel Pagan combined to hit 20 triples for the Mets.  With both players moving on to other teams in 2012, dodos were seen at Citi Field more often than triples.  The 2012 Mets hit a total of 20 triples.  Only three times in team history had the Mets hit fewer than 20 triples in a season (1992, 1999, 2001).

5.  A total of 2,242,803 fans paid their way to see the Mets play at Citi Field.  That figure ranked them 11th in home attendance in the National League.  This is the ninth time the Mets finished outside of the top ten in home attendance in the league.  But hey, you can take solace in knowing that the 74 wins registered by this year's team represented the most wins by any of the Mets teams that didn't finish in the top ten in home attendance.

6.  With 41 doubles in 2012, David Wright registered his seventh season with at least 35 doubles.  How great of an achievement is that, especially in relation to those Mets who came before him?  No other Met has ever had more than two such seasons.  Only Howard Johnson (1989, 1990), John Olerud (1998, 1999), Edgardo Alfonzo (1999, 2000), Carlos Beltran (2006, 2008), Jose Reyes (2007, 2008) and Daniel Murphy (2009, 2012) reached the 35-double plateau twice as Mets.  Wright achieved his 35-double campaigns every year from 2005 to 2010 and once again in 2012.

I'm really glad David Wright hasn't tried to slide like this every time he's hit a double.  Ouch.

7.  Daniel Murphy drove in 65 runs for the Mets in 2012, despite only hitting six home runs.  In doing so, he became the fifth player in team history to collect 65 RBI while keeping his home run total in single digits.  Murphy follows John Stearns (9 HR, 66 RBI in 1979), Joel Youngblood (8 HR, 69 RBI in 1980), Dave Magadan (6 HR, 72 RBI in 1990) and Lance Johnson (9 HR, 69 RBI in 1996) as the only Mets to achieve this rare feat.

8.  Much has been said about Jason Bay having the lowest single-season batting average (.165) of any player in Mets history with at least 150 at-bats.  But one thing that has been overlooked is that Jason Bay collected a grand total of two doubles all year.  One.  Two.  To put that into perspective, on August 17, Scott Hairston hit three doubles in the same game.  I'm not even going to mention that Bay's hit total for the year (32) matched Ike Davis' home run total (32).  Okay, so maybe I did mention it.

9.  Speaking of Scott Hairston, he finished the year with 25 doubles and 20 homers, accomplishing his lofty extra-base hit totals in only 377 at-bats.  Prior to Hairston, only one player in Mets history had ever reached the 20 double-20 homer plateau in the same season with fewer than 400 at-bats, but that comes with an asterisk attached to it.  In 1998, Mike Piazza hit 33 doubles and 23 HR in 394 at-bats as a Met.  But Piazza didn't play the entire season in New York, as he also collected five doubles and nine home runs for the Dodgers and Marlins in 1998 prior to his trade to the Mets in May.  The closest any player came to doing it in a season spent entirely in New York was in 1994, when Bobby Bonilla collected 24 doubles and 20 HR in 403 at-bats.

10.  Finally, R.A. Dickey and Jonathon Niese were the two workhorses of the staff, making 33 and 30 starts, respectively.  No other Mets pitcher started more than 21 games (Johan Santana was third on the team with 21 starts), making this the first non-strike-shortened season since 1967 in which only two pitchers made more than 21 starts.  In 1967, Tom Seaver made 34 starts as a rookie.  He was followed by Jack Fisher, who made 30 starts.  Don Cardwell finished third on the team, but he only made 16 starts.  The 1965 Mets were the only other squad in team history with two players making more than 21 starts, as Fisher made 36 starts, Al Jackson started 31 times and Warren Spahn took the hill 19 times.


THAT'S ALL, FOLKS!  HOPE YOU TOOK NOTES.  YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN THERE WILL BE A QUIZ...