If the National League ever gets around to adopting the designated hitter, the New York Mets may want to consider allowing their young right-handed pitching phenom Noah Syndergaard to pull double-duty between trips to the mound. Syndergaard, nicknamed “Thor” thanks to his flowing blonde locks and the similarity of his last name to the fictional home of the actual Thor, Asgard, swings quite a mighty hammer of his own.
So far this season, Syndergaard has batted .444/.444/.788 in nine at-bats. Yesterday, he hit the first home run of his career, and it looked like no accident. Most of the time when a pitcher puts one over the fence, it looks like pure luck. Not so with Syndergaard.
Syndergaard absolutely unloaded on a fastball from the Philadelphia Phillies’ Sean O’Sullivan with a swing that looked less like someone closing their eyes and hoping for the best, and more like an actual Major League hack. The result?
Oh, just a 430-foot opposite field home run.
The home run traveled farther than both of the home runs hit by Mets’ first baseman Lucas Duda in the game. It was the fifth farthest home run hit by a Mets’ player this year, and the longest home run hit by a pitcher since Carlos Zambrano in 2013.
Zambrano wound up his career with 24 home runs. Noah Syndergaard looks to be quite ready to assume the mantle from Zambrano as the league’s least embarrassing hitting pitcher. To top things off, Syndergaard tossed 7.1 shutout innings as the Mets downed the Phillies 7-0.
Micah Owings, he is not.
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