J.D. Martinez is headed to Queens, agreeing to make the New York Mets his next team.
The San Francisco Giants were thought to be in play for Martinez with an offer on the table early in free agency. The slugger spoke on why he looked past them and waited for other opportunities to materialize.
It had nothing to do with not wanting to be in San Francisco, not liking the organization, or anything like that. It has everything to do with the unchangeable factors about where the Giants play their home games, Oracle Park.
For Martinez, who could have signed with the Giants, him turning his back on the Bay Area team had nothing to do with anything other than how he thinks he can perform there. Specifically, Martinez, 36, felt he probably wouldn’t hit as well, and might be looked down upon for poor performance, ultimately leading to his career being cut short.
“It’s not the best hitter-friendly park for me. I go there and I hit .260 with 20 [home runs], people are gonna say I’m old and I’m washed up and I’m kind of, you know, done and find myself out of the game.”
Martinez continued:
“I wanted to give myself the best opportunity. It was nothing against the Giants organization at all. I just wanted to give myself the best opportunity to continue my career in baseball and keep playing.”
If those lines were too hard to read through, Martinez made it abundantly clear: The black and white dimensions of Oracle Park were something that Martinez looked at and decided to find other options for.
“San Fran’s a tough ballpark to hit in especially when you go the other way there. You know, Citi Field’s not like that. Most fields aren’t, that’s one of the big ones.”
Notably, the Giants have missed out on other free agent hitters, like Aaron Judge and Shohei Ohtani. Is it possible they took a similar line of thinking?
San Francisco is 23rd in park factor per StatCast, with the Dodgers and Yankees (where Ohtani and Judge ended up signing, respectively) not much more advantageous for hitters. Citi Field actually ranks worse at 27th.
