Tag: Lucas Duda

Based on merit, the following headline doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, I’ll give you that. Since his recall from Buffalo, Lucas Duda is only batting a measly .225 with one home run and seven RBI’s. Those are hardly the numbers that scream more playing time.

There is no other way to slice it: Duda’s 2012 season has been a major disappointment. For a guy that finished the 2011 season on fire and began this season amid much fanfare, Duda has failed to deliver on the promise that he showed last year.

In the second half of the 2011 season, Duda hit .322 with 10 home runs and 38 RBI’s in 205 at-bats and there was every reason to think that he would grow on that finish. Thus far in 350 at-bats this year, Duda is sporting a not-so-impressive .243/.332/.389 slash line.

However, for the Mets to truly know what they have in Duda, they need to start playing him on a regular basis and even against lefties.  Just why in the hell should Jason Bay get more playing time at this juncture of the season? And now comes word that Terry Collins will be using Duda more at first base (like he did in Wednesday’s game) to see what he can do there while not being such a liability in the outfield.

Obviously all this jockeying with Duda is for perhaps a possible trade down the line. The Mets would ideally love to move either Duda, Ike Davis  or Daniel Murphy (all players could conceivably play first base) while upgrading the outfield. In this scenario, the Mets could also include a pitcher (say Jon Niese, Colin McHugh, etc.) to sweeten the pot.

Hence, it is very important that Duda get as much playing time as possible down the stretch to either enhance his chances for success with the Mets in 2013 or use this time as a way to showcase himself for a trade.

I still think there is upside in Duda’s game. The guy clearly has power, but sometimes Duda is too passive while not being aggressive at the plate. You also have to realize that Duda is still young and has only 735 major league at-bats to his credit.

I think the jury is still out on Duda. That’s why playing him more in September is both vital for the personal growth of Duda and beneficial for the Mets in knowing what they really have in the young, hulking hitter.

Maybe Duda is not part of the future, but at least use this last month (which has now been rendered meaningless outside of R.A. Dickey’s starts) to know what you have in him before you start making plans for 2013.

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It’s hard to concentrate on anything other that Johan Santana’s no-hitter right now and it is an achievement that deserves every bit of attention it is receiving. But with two stories on the site already about it, I’d like to talk about another recent development that is big news for the Mets. And that’s the return of Lucas Duda’s home run stroke.

Duda delivered a home run in Santana’s masterpiece, giving him 4 HR in his last 23 ABs, a stretch covering seven games. The Mets are 5-2 in that stretch. Before the recent longball outburst, Duda went 77 ABs without a homer. In that stretch, which went from April 29th to May 24th, the Mets were 12-12.

Santana’s remarkable comeback from shoulder surgery has been a key item in the Mets’ surprising play in 2012. David Wright flirting with .400 has been a fun little ride and his return to form has been the other key storyline for the surprising start that the Mets have enjoyed in the first two months of the 2012 season.

But if the Mets hope to keep their hot start going, they will need to have production from Duda. This was probably a necessary thing anyway, but the pronounced struggles at the plate from Ike Davis – and to a lesser extent the complete lack of homers from Daniel Murphy – has only magnified the need for power from Duda.

In 2011, the Mets played their best baseball when Davis and Wright were on the DL and the team hit very few homers. The lineup put runners on base at a high rate, thanks to big efforts from Beltran, Reyes, and Murphy, and kept rallies alive by not striking out. While they missed the power of Davis and Wright, they compensated by not having hitters in the heart of the order strike out one-quarter of the time.

But the 2012 team has high strikeout guys in Davis, Duda and Kirk Nieuwenhuis. And the lineup suffered a hit when Josh Thole went down and was replaced by guys with higher strikeout rates. And it is the increased strikeouts that make over the fence power a necessity in 2012 that it wasn’t a season ago, at least while Beltran and Murphy were in the lineup.

Now the club has Thole back and Duda hitting for power, we can hope for continued good things from the Mets. The team is 15-8 when Thole starts behind the plate and 5-1 in games when Duda homers.

Last year Duda did not hit his first homer until July 23rd. But he hit 10 HR in his final 185 at-bats of the season. Hopefully he is in the beginning of a prolonged homer binge. In his last 10 games, Duda is batting just .235. But the Mets are 7-3, thanks to his homers. It’s a tradeoff the Mets should be happy to make.

With the Mets now getting a little more production from Ike Davis (3-7 in his last two games with two home runs and four RBI’s in his last two games), it’s high time that Lucas Duda starts contributing to the Mets’ bandwagon.

While the Mets lost in Miami last night 6-5, the team was right there in the mix after mounting another comeback, only to see it foiled by Frank Francisco.

For this team to score runs and win more games consistently in the future, Duda has got to start pulling his weight. There is no other way to spin it: Duda has not lived up to expectations thus far.

In last night’s game vs. the Marlins, Duda did go 2-5, but prior to that outing, he was only four for his last 20. Duda has only one home run in his last 21 games and is struggling to find a groove. For the season, Duda has a pedestrian .247/.342/.397 slash line.

While we should admire the fact that Duda has a great eye and has shown great discipline at the plate in his time with the Mets, it seems to me that he is playing a little timid. Maybe it’s just me, but Duda is looking at for too many hittable pitches. It’s good to be patient, but when you got a chance-go for it.

We all know of Duda’s erratic tendencies playing outfield, so for him to pull his weight with the team, he needs to start hitting-and hitting with some aggressiveness and authority.

What is also disturbing is Duda’s lack of success vs. lefties. Last year Duda was remarkably better hitting against southpaws, sporting a .274/.328/.387 line. This year those marks have dropped to .214/.281/.250. Some pitchers have adjusted to Duda and having him fishing for balls outside the zone.

Maybe Duda is just a slow starter. We all know about his pronounced slumps to start seasons and maybe he is more comfortable when the weather heats up.

Whatever it is, Duda has to start to contribute and once he does, then there is no telling how good the Mets offense can be. For the Mets to be 18-14 with the way Duda and Davis have underperformed, it’s actually quite astonishing.

For a guy who was described as nothing short of Thor, yielding his “Hammer of the Gods,” it’s about time for Duda to yield his big stick and start providing the Mets with some lumber-thumping hits

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There are some who say he was born of the Storm Giants who live in the clouds, and others who claim he was raised by bears in the Adirondacks, still more believe that he could fell a tree with one swing of his mighty club but Met fans know that he’s their best hope to survive this troubling 2012 season.

When I look at Lucas Duda, I can’t help but think of the frontier legends of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox.  Maybe it’s that Keith Hernandez is fond of calling Duda a giant, but it’s definitely there when I watch him.  From his humble origins as an early-mid-round pick to his rise as a power lefty all the way to his emergence as a legitimate MLB hitter, he gives off a legend that’s larger than life.  What follows is the All-American folk tale, Mets style.

Duda was born in Fontana, California on February 3, 1986. He attended Arlington High School in Riverside, California.  His high school coaches knew they had something special in the 6’4 gawky youth with hope in his eyes and hunger in his heart.  He grew into the hulking man he did eating nothing but rhubarb and a special blend of protein shakes mixed with the tears of a unicorn.

Duda then enrolled in the University of Southern California, playing for the USC Trojans baseball team from 2005—2007.  All seemed well for him until fate struck: A series of wildfires that began burning across Southern California. At least 1,500 homes were destroyed and over 500,000 acres (2,000 km², or about 770 mi²) of land burned from Santa Barbara County to the U.S.–Mexico border. Nine people died as a direct result of the fires; 85 others were injured, including at least 61 firefighters. The raging fire was visible from space.

Legend holds that Lucas personally saved an entire school of orphans, a convent full of nuns and the 2007 Swedish Bikini team by blowing the fire back and diverting it into a lake.  While reports of this feat are sketchy at best, it seems that someone was paying attention as Duda was drafted by the New York Mets in the seventh round of the 2007 Major League Baseball Draft, as the 243rd overall selection.

It wasn’t easy for Omar Minaya to draft a fella like Lucas in the 7^th round, but somehow he was convinced by that same magical sparkle that inspires Met fans to this day.  On that day, the legend that already was… became a New York Met legend that would soon be.

Duda began the 2010 season with the Double-A Binghamton Mets and was promoted to the Triple-A Buffalo Bisons on June 14. While in Buffalo, Duda homered in five consecutive games, tying a Bisons record and earning a supporting actor nomination for being the inspiration for George Clooney’s entire acting career. In 70 games for Buffalo, Duda hit 17 home runs, 2 triples, 23 doubles, and had 53 runs batted in, while compiling a .314 batting average and winning several underground fighting tournaments run by the Yakuza crime family. At the end of the season, the Bisons named him their Most Valuable Player and presented him with a gold plated AK-47.

Former Mets manager Jerry Manuel watched Duda during batting practice when he was first called up to the Majors and noted that Duda reminded him of Abraham Lincoln mixed with Bruce Lee and Shrek.

In 2012 Duda will be handed the starting right field job and be expected to shoulder the burden of, not only his great awesomeness, but also the success of the New York Mets.  What will he do with the opportunity?  We can only imagine what great things a man like Lucas Duda might… but I’m hoping he breaks every record in baseball and cures cancer.

The secret is out, Lucas Duda is good.

And while that is good news for the Mets, sometimes it’s best for some things to be kept a secret.

After blowing up in the second half of last year while batting .322 with 10 home runs and 38 RBI’s in 205 at-bats, a lot more is expected out of Duda this year. His power potential is tickling the fancy of many Mets’ fans in need of some good news. Reports out of Port St. Lucie is that Duda is launching some bombs in batting practice and he already has a grand slam to his credit this spring.

Because his legend is growing this spring, Duda won’t be able to sneak up on anyone this season. While, of course, this means little in the whole scope of things, I fear too much hype may get to Duda’s head. ( I know, I know, I could very well be overreacting.)

While Duda’s offensive potential will be on full blast this year, the same can’t be said about his defense. If there is one thing Duda has to prove this year is that he can hold up for a full year manning right field. Hopefully, Duda’s quest to make himself a complete ballplayer will keep him humble and driven all year.

The good news is that there should be hardly any pressure on Duda this year. With the fences being altered at Citi Field, more pressure will be on veterans David Wright and Jason Bay to make up for lost time and carry the load. Ike Davis also has to prove he is healthy (and getting over valley fever) and get back to what he was last year: an emerging slugger in the middle of the lineup.

The burden for Duda to live up to some of the promised being heaped on him could get dicey but at least he’ll have the comfort of likely batting sixth in the order where he’ll make way for the veterans.

Duda has to just go out and do his thing while making the natural progressions in his game. He has to let the game come to him. Although it would be nice if Duda could be our secret weapon, I would be more than thrilled if the results match the hype.

Duda is earning himself a lot of fans (and you can call me one too) this spring and the bar has been raised for him to exceed expectations. Here’s to hoping Duda makes good on his promise.

Follow me on Twitter @Stacdemon