Just Mets

Coming into Thursday night’s game, Wilmer Flores was quite possibly as close to a worst-case scenario in his start to the 2015 season as he could possibly be.

He had struck out in seven of his first 29 plate appearances. He had reached base only six times over the first nine games of the year. He had only four hits and no runs batted in.

To make matters worse, Flores had already committed three errors in his first 69 innings at shortstop, and failed to convert several double play opportunities on top of that. And, Terry Collins decided to use the much maligned Ruben Tejada at shortstop in his place the night before, perhaps signaling the Mets were beginning to grow impatient with Flores.

Maybe that served as a wakeup call for Flores?

On Thursday, as the Mets found themselves meandering to the Marlins trailing 3-0, Eric Campbell singled to left to start the fifth inning. Juan Lagares followed with a single to center.

Up came Flores, and boom.

Flores took a fastball on the inner half, turned on it and hit it beyond the original left field wall at Citi Field. His first homer, his first three runs batted in of the year. His second extra-base hit.

New life for the Mets, new life for Flores.

“I got the pitch I was looking for,” Flores said of his home run after the game. “I put a good swing on it and it went out.”

The Mets appeared to get jumpstarted from there, scoring two runs in the sixth and two more in the seventh to secure their fifth win in a row and seventh in their first ten games of the year.

“[Flores’ home run] was huge. It was huge for all parties,” Michael Cuddyer said afterwards. “It was huge for the team, obviously first and foremost, huge for him to able to come up in a situation like that and hit a three-run homer to tie the game when we weren’t doing much off Cosart. That got us into the game, and that’s a huge reason why we won tonight.”

Terry Collins is hopeful that home run is what Flores needs to get his season going.

“Tonight might really jump-start Wilmer,” he said.

In most of his at-bats prior to the one he homered in, Flores appeared over-anxious at the plate. He had been swinging and missing on very hittable pitches inside the strike zone, and when he was making contact, it was insignificant and obviously unproductive. It’s as if he was trying to do too much and prove he belonged. Given all of the talk and doubt surrounding his ability to play shortstop on an every day basis, that wouldn’t come as a surprise, but certainly his performance wasn’t helping the matter, either.

Flores spoke about his confidence issues to reporters last night.

“It’s going to help [my confidence],” Flores explained to reporters on Thursday night. “The other at-bats [on Thursday] I was more relaxed. It’s going to help tomorrow, too. It’s big.”

Flores needed a productive night at the plate. As difficult as it’s been over the first ten games of the year, he’s better than what he’s shown on both sides of the ball. It’s not always going to be pretty, and it’s important his offense begin to carry his inconsistencies on defense.

Hopefully, Flores’ season just got rolling.