PHILADELPHIA – The Mets, two games back of the division-leading Phillies, tied with the world-champion Marlins, continue to be an unexpected pain in the neck, worse than the one with which Cliff Floyd woke up Monday morning.
What kind of a stiff would tell him to take the night off? We are talking about a player whose career almost ended on a collision with Todd Hundley, who has bounced back from Achilles, wrist and hamstring problems that would drive a lot of men to their knees, which in Floyd’s case have been operated on, too.
The last thing a guy who has been on too many teams whose playoff chances have slept, funny or otherwise, from Memorial Day on, would do is beg out of a pennant race with a crick. And if anyone suggests otherwise it’s a crock.
“I’m not a guy to not run into a wall, worrying about missing tomorrow’s game,” said Floyd yesterday, 20 hours after denting a new wall here. “It’s better today. I took a shower. For an hour.”
The Mets lost the opener, never mind the good intentions of their rubbernecking left-fielder, who, his head always on a swivel, noted even after his four-RBI, two circus-catch game in Monday night’s 6-5 loss, that Randy Wolf was starting last night and thus volunteered to take his sorry .207 average against lefties out of the clean-up spot.
Thank you, said Art Howe after an office tete-a-tete of less than two minutes. “I knew the numbers,” the manager smiled later. So Floyd, originally penciled to hit cleanup, was dropped one place in favor of the sizzling Richard Hidalgo, who in the fifth inning with the score 1-1, drove in Kaz Matsui with the lead run, then scored on Bobby Abreu’s misplay of Floyd’s single.
The Mets managed to beat the Phils, 4-1, thanks to manager Floyd, who let the record show would not have brought in Branca, had a bad feeling when Casey didn’t start Whitey in Game 1 in 1960, never trusted Bill Buckner’s defense and told The Post exclusively last night that “Pedro would have been out of there far earlier” if he had been running the show.
What else would we do but believe him after Floyd, leaving himself in last night for defense, reached up at the wall to snag Jason Michaels’ fly ball in the fifth, gave himself the green light to steal second after driving in Hidalgo, perfectly positioned himself to run down Jim Thome’s gapper with two on in the eighth and secretly signaled Howe to bring in Braden Looper to get Met killer Pat Burrell for the final out of the eighth.
“Awesome move by me,” said Floyd, laughing. “Really, I was laying there last night thinking ‘what’s the worst thing that can happen if I go in [to Howe]?’ He says ‘no’ and I’m hitting fourth. If I didn’t do it, it would have bothered me.
“I thought about it when the Yankees walked Piazza [SunDay]. I broke my bat, I wanted to hit so bad. I said, ‘this can’t happen, our team needs [Piazza] to be swinging at good pitches. I have to swing better.
“I have always gained manager’s respect by how I approach the game. He thought it was a good idea right off the bat. Sometimes a manager doesn’t want to hurt a [hitter’s] feelings. He was relieved.
“It could have backfired, but after I swung at fastballs away [bouncing to third and striking out the first two times up], I felt awful. Coming up after Richard drove in the run, I was able to go up there relaxed and hit [Wolf].”
The manager, who said “it speaks volumes for Cliff” hardly speaks volumes himself, but did a gotcha during Floyd’s pre-game stretch, saying he was taking his advice and “using Spencer in left.”
We use a little Art Howe humor there only to humor Art Howe. We know who is really calling the shots.