Harrison Bader entered a new Mets clubhouse for the third time in 18 months and felt confident as he met his new teammates.
“They might hear some stories about your personality. They might know your game, or they might look on Baseball Reference at your numbers, but they don’t know much about you,” he said.
“Waking up every day, coming to the clubhouse, there’s a lot of power in knowing that you can write your narrative here.”
Bader put the Mets in the lead in the eighth inning for the second consecutive day, hitting a two-run double off an upset Aroldis Chapman that lifted New York over the Pittsburgh Pirates 6-3 on Monday night.
New York bounced back from a 3-0 deficit in the sixth inning and reached .500 for the first time since June 6 last year, winning eight of 11 games after starting 0-5 under first-year manager Carlos Mendoza, with Bader’s improvement playing a big role.
Traded from St. Louis to the Yankees in August 2022, the Bronxville native lasted just over a year in the Bronx before being claimed off waivers by Cincinnati.
Bader became a free agent last fall and returned to New York on a $10.5 million, one-year deal with the Mets, despite his value being reduced by injuries in three consecutive seasons.
Sporting a brown beard and mustache that was not allowed by the image-conscious Yankees, Bader struggled early, hitting .192 with one run and no RBIs in the Mets’ first nine games. However, he has improved lately, going 9 for 20 with six runs and three RBIs since then, raising his batting average to .304.
“He brings a lot to the table,” Mendoza said. “He creates traffic.” New York was down 3-0 before a three-run sixth inning that included Francisco Alvarez’s bases-loaded walk, a run-scoring throwing error by right fielder Connor Joe, and pinch-hitter DJ Stewart’s RBI double.
A day after his infield single gave the Mets a 2-1 win over Kansas City, Bader faced his former Yankees teammate Chapman in the eighth inning.
Jeff McNeil struck out but reached on a wild pitch, Stewart walked on a full-count pitch, and McNeil and Stewart executed a double steal. Bader then hit Chapman’s fastball into the left-field corner for a 5-3 lead.
