Noah Takes Back The Plate As The Mets Start To Take Back The Series

SynderGAWD. Toed the rubber, took back the plate with one pitch, missed enough bats, and gave his team enough time to explode. Enormous night from The Captain as he bounces back in a major way from all the criticism. 2 hits, a ding dong Don Johnson, 4 RBI and a big old “Fuck You” to everyone who wanted him on the bench. I dont need to be dropped in the order, I dont need to sit down, I’m just gonna go lead my team back into this series, thank you very much. (Btw, giving 100% credit for David Wright’s to him switching his walk up music back to I Got 5 On It. That country music was AWFUL.)

Another monster night from Contact Curtis. Also with 2 hits and a bomb. The Return Of Dark Sexy who hadnt had a hit in A MONTH. Not since September 25th. Just grabs a bat, steps up to the plate in a big spot, and its a Hog Show for New York City. Uribe Magic. Cespedes gets in on the action, and even the Rook Conforto got himself a very Royals-esque rib eye. The bullpen throws up 3 zeroes on 3 perfect innings and bingo bango you’ve got a decisive W that can change a series.

But obviously the big hubbub is with Noah’s first pitch. Which the Royals are CRYING about. Moustakas flapping his gums from the dugout, Escobar crying in the postgame. Hilarious. The Royals know who they are, right? Like they know which team they are? They know that Ventura and Herrera throw at whoever they want, whenever they want? They know they had like 9 bench clearing incidents every other week earlier this season? They know their pitching coach was talking about doing this exact thing with Daniel Murphy? I mean at some point when a team has issues with like every team they face, you gotta start to look at the common denominator:

The best part of all this outrage is that A) it was the first pitch of the game. They had all game to respond and retaliate with their own hot headed fireballer on the mound. They didnt, most likely because Ventura couldnt hide behind the DH, and only after they got spanked the rest of the game did this become a major problem for them. B) the Royals had like 6 hits the first 2 innings. They did all of their damage after that first pitch. If they were so rattled and scared and offended by that pitch at the time, they sure as fuck didnt show it.

And the people comparing this to the Utley slide trying to catch Mets fans in some sort of hypocritical double standard can get lost. You legit dont have a brain if you think those 2 situations are comparable. Noah didn’t even hit the guy. There was no injury, it didnt effect the outcome of a game. The intent was to make Escobar uncomfortable (again, the exact same thing KC said they were going to do with Daniel Murphy), and I’d say mission accomplished. Chase Utley’s intent was to crash into Ruben Tejada as hard as he possibly could. He didnt intend to break Ruben’s leg but he was either A) reckless enough with his “slide” that he didnt care he what the result was or B) not able to execute the slide in a safe enough way that it didnt hurt anyone. Noah was able to accomplish his goal – intimidation – and execute it without hurting anyone. It was one single pitch out of 140 that was planned and executed to perfection. Nobody injured and the game unaffected. Other than the Royals thinking twice about their approach at the plate. If Noah hit the dude in the head then obviously we have a bush league Utley situation on our hands. He didnt because he was in control and careful. The consequences and results of your actions matter, folks. A brush back pitch is comparable to a regular take out slide. What Utley did was well beyond that line.

And hey Kansas City, remember, people dont forget:

Compare that Danny Duffy pitch to Thor’s last night:

That ball is very high but its honestly it aint even that inside. Who knows, a little lower and FoxTrax probably woulda called that a strike. Just because Escobar was shook and ducked doesnt mean that pitch was ever going to hit him. Its like Manny all those years back when he ducked on the Clemens pitch that wasnt really anywhere near him. If Thor wanted to hit him, he would have.

Anyway, enough about one single pitch. The Mets are one win away from wiping the slate clean and starting this series over. Dug themselves a little bit of a hole with KC having home field 6 and 7, but if you win tonight against that Big Bird ass motherfucker Chris Young, Harvey and deGrom lurking ready to seize this series. But you cant get ahead of yourself. Matz up next, getting dropped off by his parents, ready to win another ball game for the home town. LGM.