Deconstructing David
Last year, the first home run the Mets hit was off the bat of David Wright. This year, David Wright is the only starter not to hit a home run. The rest of the lineup has. Reserve Damion Easely hit one with two outs and two strikes in the ninth to tie a ball game. Oh, and backup catcher Ramon Castro has hit three. So what's up with David?
Last year, Wright had a hot first half. Hell, he gave eventual MVP and home run leader Ryan Howard a run for his money in the All Star home run contest. Then, afterwards, his offensive production dropped. He had 20 home runs and 74 RBI before the All Star break. He only had 6 home runs and 42 RBI afterwards, even though his batting average remained above .300. And in the playoffs, he choked like Peyton Manning used to.
This year, he started with a nice little hitting streak, but he was really only collecting one per game. Then, he fell into an 0-for-15 skid and just looks wrong at the plate.
As a big Mets fan and a huge David Wright fan, it's time for me to weigh in. And I say leave the guy alone. For crying out loud, it's still April. A lot of people have shitty Aprils just to turn it around later. Derek Jeter has seemed to do that often. I'd rather have my players heat up going into the summer instead of fizzling out at that time.
We don't need everyone trying to figure out what his problem is. The Star Ledger's Dan Graziano suggested it was because of his "lavish" life, where he mentioned having a wax figure at Madame Tussauds, being on the cover of MLB The Game, and appearing on David Letterman -- which was last year before his slump. Really wild right there. Maybe it's just mechanical. Maybe he just needs to get out of his own head but can't because everyone is suggesting what's wrong. It's not the big city because he's already shown he can thrive in New York. It's not the burden of being a star because that burden doesn't exist when you have Jose Reyes, Carlos Beltran, and Carlos Delgado also on the team to pick you up when you're down. Maybe it's because I wore my Reyes jersey opening day instead of my Wright one.
I think we'll be seeing David start to climb out of the slump real soon. Why? Because good ball players turn around a slump and Wright's a good ball player. Maybe it'll happen this weekend against the Nationals. He'll work out his mechanical issues and stop out-thinking himself. Before we know it, we'll be watching him hit a walk-off homer, completely forgetting this meaningless slump that resembles what all ball players go through.
