Via Amazin’ Avenue, from the transcript of Sandy Alderson’s Tuesday-night appearance in the SNY booth:
Mets Weighing Changes To Home Park
Gary Cohen: Let’s parlay that question about team speed into the next question about the configuration of the ballpark. Do you see it changing appreciably next year?
Alderson: How do those relate, Gary? [laughter]
We’re certainly talking about it, and I think it’s conceivable that, yes, we will see some changes at Citi Field, but no final decisions have been made. We’re still looking at different possibilities. I think if we do something, it’s not likely to be subtle. I think it’s probably a decision that we’ll make sometime in October, as well. There’s no reason not to.
We’ve looked at a lot of possibilities, we’ve done at lot of analysis, none of which is all that precise. We haven’t done wind analyses, but those are a complete crapshoot. We’ve tried to do as much analysis as we possibly can, and I think we’ll have some recommendation in October.
Hey, isn’t the real news here that wind analyses are a complete crapshoot? And did you ever just roll the term “crapshoot” around in your mind, sort of weigh the implications? If not, don’t. You’ll be gone for hours, and you’re not getting that time back.
I looked at the Mets' home-run data since moving into Citi Field in 2009, and they (the data) are weird. The Mets have hit only 157 home runs at Citi Field, but they've also hit only 182 on the road. While you would normally hit more homers at home, simply because of the home-field advantage, those numbers don't suggest that the Mets have been particularly disadvantaged by their ballpark's dimensions.
The Mets have allowed 182 home runs at home. If anything, that number suggests that the Mets simply don’t have as much power as their opponents; maybe they should move the fences out and give up on home runs completely!
Ah, but you still have to play half your games on the road.
Which brings up the one amazing number: the Mets have given up 251 homers in their road games.
Moving the fences isn’t going to fix that.
Or maybe it will. Maybe the Mets’ pitchers get used to throwing certain pitches at home that turn into loud outs; but those same pitches, thrown in Philadelphia or Atlanta or wherever, turn into home runs. Maybe they need to learn to pitch in a ballpark that’s not quite so forgiving.
Something’s not working. It’s usually a bad idea to tinker around with the fences, but it’s been three seasons and Sandy Alderson doesn’t do things capriciously.
See More:
