Mark Vientos Has Subway Series Moment Against Gerrit Cole
In the latest chapter of the Subway Series on Tuesday night, New York Mets third baseman Mark Vientos added himself into Mets-Yankees lore. He not only had one home run against New York Yankees ace Gerrit Cole, but he ended up hitting two as part of the team’s four home runs against Cole.
Vientos became the seventh player to hit two homers in a game against Cole, and the Mets became the only team to hit at least four in a game against the reigning Cy Young winner.
The first one came in the bottom of the second when Vientos hit a 91.5 mile-per-hour fastball over the wall in left-center. Two innings later, he got another fastball and hit yet another solo home run for his ninth of the year and sixth over the last 30 games.
MARK DOES IT AGAIN!????
Vientos with a laser for his second homer of the game!
pic.twitter.com/MAb8sGgt8Q— Metsmerized Online (@Metsmerized) June 26, 2024
The six home runs by Vientos over that span tie Francisco Lindor and J.D. Martinez for the team lead. In addition, he had a stretch where he had home runs in three straight at-bats going back to the ball he crushed to dead center field in Wrigley Field on Sunday against the Cubs.
After the game, the third baseman told the media about some of the swing tips that another former Met and Yankee gave him in Carlos Beltran over the weekend that has helped lead him to this success.
“Recently, I talked to a couple of guys. Talking to Beltran. It’s just fortunate for me I have so many people to ask questions and give me such good advice. He was like you should think center, right center. I feel like that would simplify the game for you. I feel like I have been working on that in the cages and it has been helping me.”
Seeing Vientos’s home run barrages and streaks isn’t something that’s unfamiliar to Mets fans who were following his production at the minor league level (46 home runs at Triple-A from 2022-2024). However, now seeing that he is putting that success together and lengthening out the Mets lineup is something to be excited about for the future of the 24-year-old third baseman.
In addition, when Vientos is seeing a mistake fastball, chances are he will make a pitcher pay for it. According to Brooks Baseball, he is hitting .313 with four home runs and a .719 slugging percentage against that pitch. To add further context to that, when he gets a fastball in the upper quadrant of the strike zone, he damages it with an average exit velocity of 99 miles-per-hour.
It has not only been Vientos who has found the power for the Mets, but the team as a whole. In the month of June, the Mets have the highest slugging percentage (.504), OPS (.858), and runs scored (123) in the National League as well as the third-most home runs (33) behind only the Padres and Dodgers.
When the offense was in a malaise, many thought this offense had much more to give and they are showing that now with Francisco Alvarez back and Vientos bringing the Syracuse power to the big leagues. They are back in the wild card race because the bats have caught fire along with the New York heat.
It may not have been the David Wright walk-off against Mariano Rivera kind of moment, but Mark Vientos (who grew up idolizing Wright) having two home runs against a reigning AL Cy Young Award winner is one that will definitely be on the Subway Series top moments for fans down the line.
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