Campbell just doing his job
SAN FRANCISCO — Eric Campbell never will be an All Star like Jacob deGrom.
He never will have that feeling of success. He is a baseball grunt and Wednesday he made the most of that experience in what has been a difficult season.
Campbell lined a tworun home run into the leftfield bleachers at AT& TPark to give deGroma 40 lead in the ninth and as he rounded the bases he had one thought.
“It feels good to help the team win, that’s all I could think about,’’ Campbell said after the Mets’ 41 victory over the Giants that gave them a 42 West Coast trip. “It’s going to be good to go into the clubhouse and feel that I contributed a little bit.’’
It’s about survival. Campbell had the game of his life because he now understands the life of a bench player.
“I have finally learned to take it daybyday,’’ Campbell said. “I have been told that my whole career and that’s easy to do when you are playing every day, but I’ve really learned a lot about myself. It’s tough at times.’’
But at least he is in the major leagues.
“That’s what I tell myself,’’ Campbell said. “It could be a lot worse.’’
Campbell entered the day hitting .167. That’s about as low as you can go.
On Wednesday he did his job, hitting the Mets’ first home run in 10 games.
“This coaching staff has stuck by me, Kevin Long and [ Pat Roessler],’’ Campbell said. “They’ve been awesome, keeping my spirits up.’’
“He’s real good with the approach here, which is get good pitches, swing at good pitches,” Long said. “For the most part he has hit the ball hard.’’ That’s the toughest part. “It’s frustrating, but you can’t control where the ball goes, you can’t control the results,’’ said Campbell, who started in left for Michael Cuddyer, who has an aching knee. “I’ve been staying positive. To finally see a couple balls fall in is definitely nice.’’ Soup was finally hot. “That’s what bench guys have to do,’’ Campbell said. “They have to help the team win.’’
Backup catcher Johnny Monell came up with ahuge double in Monday night’s 30 win over the Giants.
General manager Sandy Alderson said the backups are rotating through the lineup more so he expects them to contribute more. That may be code for don’t expect any big changes there.
Campbell’s single in the seventh was big, too, because deGrom was batting behind him and executed a perfect hitandrun single that sent Campbell to third. Juan Lagares grounded into a force and the Mets had their second run of the game.
Noted deGrom: “[ Campbell] did go through a stretch where hewas hitting the ball hard and not getting rewarded. For him to hit that home run was nice. We really root for him.’’
Campbell also made a terrific defensive play in the third when the soft Giants lineup was mounting a rally. With runners on first and second and one out, Joe Panik lifted what looked to be a single to left.
Campbell was caught in between and decided not to dive because he didn’t want to take the chance the ball would get past him “and have the inning explode,’’ he said.
The Giants’ Justin Maxwell froze and did not get a good break to third as Campbell picked up the ball and fired to Daniel Murphy for the Little League force out.
That turned out to be a huge play as the next batter Matt Duffy drove a pitch deep into rightcenter where Lagares made a nifty catch to end the inning.
“When you are in the fifth inning and you see our pitchers putting up zeroes every inning,’’ Campbell said, “you realize we are going to only need one or two.’’
Cuddyer noted with a smile, “With our pitching staff, sometimes one is the magic number.’’
Terry Collins put the day in perspective. “Eric has had no luck hitting, but I tell you one thing, he comes to win.’’ On this day, the baseball everyman did his job.