Facing Orlando Hernandez’s maddening array of breaking balls is the kind of thing that can put some hitters into a funk. Apparently it was just the tonic to help struggling rookie Carlos Gomez get out of his.
Gomez snapped an 0-for-18 hitless skid Saturday, and followed that up with a 2-for-4 performance yesterday that showed some promise. And the youngest player in the National League was quick to single out pregame work he’d done the last few days in the bullpen with venerable El Duque as the biggest reason why.
“I feel very good. My timing and my confidence have come back,” Gomez said after yesterday’s 4-1 loss to Arizona. “Before, I felt good and my swing was good, but we had problems with my approach. The last three days I came early and hit extra. (Yesterday) and (Saturday) I felt good.”
The 21-year-old Gomez said the problem hadn’t been with his swing, but with his timing of the breaking balls, and his recognition of balls and strikes. And what pitcher paints the corners and works the zone better than Saturday’s winner Hernandez?
“When the pitcher throws the ball, I didn’t . . . time the ball. I didn’t know whether it was a strike or a ball. I came a couple days early and tried to envision it, a strike or a ball,” Gomez said. “The last three days he threw, that El Duque threw in the bullpen, I was there. You know he has a good curve; he threw it and I hit it. Now I feel good.”
Gomez stroked a clean single to left-center in the fifth inning, then beat out an infield single to deep second base two frames later. That is how a speedster whose 64 steals in 2005 were second in all of minor league baseball – and who Jose Reyes admits is faster than he is – should be playing the game.
And while Willie Randolph wasn’t ready to put the prodigiously gifted outfielder in Cooperstown just yet, he had to grudgingly admit it was nice to see.
“It’s good. He made a contribution,” Randolph said. “When he makes contact, he has a chance to use his speed. It’s always good when the kid does well.”
That’s a huge understatement. Gomez won the Sterling Award at Hagerstown and then Binghamton the past two seasons. He’ll likely be a cornerstone when CitiField opens in 2009 no matter what he does the rest of 2007; but it sure does whet the appetite of the Flushing faithful.