Mike Piazzas uncomfortable role after post-9 11 home run

Table of Content

• Mets sign Japanese star pitcher to 5-year, $75M deal
• Karsay reflects on role in post-9/11 moment
• Piazza's post-9/11 HR brought 'incredible release of emotion' to NY, nation
• Members of 2001 Mets share their stories during '9/11: The Mets Remember'
• Mike Piazza’s ‘uncomfortable’ role after post-9/11 home run

Piazza retired after the 2007 season, finishing with a .308 batting average, 1,335 RBIs and a record 396 of his 427 home runs at catcher. He took home 10 Silver Slugger Awards and finished in the top-10 in MVP voting seven times. “It was just this incredible release of emotion," Piazza said. "And I think, you know, it became evidently clear that people just wanted to cheer about something." Mike Piazza had no shortage of standout moments during his Hall of Fame career – breaking Carlton Fisk’s record for home runs by a catcher, epic faceoffs with Roger Clemens, going deep to cap a 10-run comeback by the Mets in 2000. Piazza was a hero in New York long before that moment but his time with the Mets will always be highlighted by the legacy of that home run.

"There are a few where you hit it and you just know," Piazza says. The Braves went early to closer Steve Karsay. After Matt Lawton grounded out, Edgardo Alfonzo drew a walk to bring Piazza to the plate. He'd had two doubles earlier in the night and caught the whole game. "During the game, I just remember praying to God, 'Lord, please help me to get through this night,'" he says.

Mets sign Japanese star pitcher to 5-year, $75M deal

Atlanta players were solemn as the crowd erupted for 30 seconds, enough to lure Piazza out for a curtain call. But deep down, even the Braves were cheering. "It seems only fitting that Mike hit a game-winning home run," Maddux says.

First responders spilled onto the field, dozens and dozens of cops and firefighters in rows all over the infield. As she wound down, the bagpipers stood like statues behind second base. Cameras showed Piazza chomping on gum, trying not to cry, but eventually he broke down. When he had the chance to play on the field that night, alongside 50 to 60 other bagpipers, he was excited -- and nervous. As they began to enter the stadium and play "America the Beautiful," the crowd turned into a library.

Karsay reflects on role in post-9/11 moment

Many first responders and family members of those lost in the attack were in attendance that night, and the home run brought them – and the many watching at home – a sliver of normalcy, a reason to smile and a moment of healing. While there was no way to ever completely fill the void and the sense of loss left by that day, it was the game of baseball that helped America return to some sense of normalcy. Piazza said goodbye to the Gieses and took off the rest of his equipment.

The Mets had swept three games in Pittsburgh from Sept. 17-19, and Piazza struggled badly. Not on the field -- he had two home runs and four RBIs against the Pirates. He'd grown to love New York, being a New Yorker, being a Met. He wasn't sure how he or his teammates would possibly be able to play with the destruction just a few miles away. When I walk the city now I do find a lot of people want to talk about the home run.

Piazza's post-9/11 HR brought 'incredible release of emotion' to NY, nation

MILWAUKEE -- Brewers bullpen coach Steve Karsay grew up on the doorstep of Shea Stadium. And while that’s meant in a metaphorical sense, it’s not far off. When Karsay was 14 years old and the Mets played the Red Sox in the 1986 World Series, he and some friends listened to the radio broadcast from the roof of a factory near his family’s College Point apartment.

The stream of photos of her and the boys would become iconic symbols of the night. "We just didn't know if we should be there," he says. "To be a professional athlete, you do have to muster up a certain sense of emotion to play with intensity. And at that point, all of our emotion was drained." Throw in that the Mets had closed to within 4½ games of the Braves and there were real pennant stakes to the game, and Piazza was afraid he wouldn't even be able to function that night. Part of our recovery is to suppress certain feelings and emotions.

I count myself among them as both a proud New Yorker and lifelong fan of the Mets. Gies was offered tickets to go to the Yankees-Mets game on Sept. 11 this year, but she thinks she's going to stay in Merrick, where she still lives in the same house that Ronnie built for the family. All three of her boys are Merrick firefighters at the same firehouse that Ronnie started out in. The only big thing that's changed is the neighborhood street sign, which now reads Ronnie Gies Avenue.

The cops and firefighters walked back out the center field gate. In the background, still planted on the first blades of outfield grass, the bagpipers began to play "Amazing Grace." Carol Gies and her boys arrived a half-hour or so before the game, and settled into seats right behind home plate, between the Braves' dugout and the media section. She wore one of Ronnie's blue work shirts and sat in a section designated for people whose loved ones were presumed lost on 9/11.

People ask if the country can ever get back to the unity we had post-9/11. For that one period of time, we saw more of what we have in common instead of our differences. I don’t think anyone really cared about politics. Baseball Hall of Famer Mike Piazza, 53, tells The Post’s Dean Balsamini about his emotions on the evening of Sept. 21, 2001, at Shea Stadium. The Mets were losing to the rival Atlanta Braves 2-1 when Piazza’s dramatic, two-run, eighth-inning homer propelled the team to victory — and lifted the spirits of heartbroken New Yorkers. “That moment, I think, gave the fans in the stadium and the City of New York a small amount of time to take their mind away from the outside world,” Karsay said.

Piazza has recalled just wanting to survive the night, without an emotional breakdown — the playing of bagpipes before the game had him teary-eyed. Walking from the parking lot to the entry gate, we were puzzled by the slowly moving queue of fans that seemed to stretch a quarter-mile. It was the first clue that 9/11 had forever changed the way Americans would attend live sporting events. Guards checked every bag, frisked every fan and wanded people with handheld metal detectors. They were physically and emotionally spent, and ready to lose themselves in a baseball game.

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"I felt myself starting to break down. I didn't really know if I could finish the game. Fortunately, as everything unfolded, I did receive emotional strength from everyone, and the old feelings of competitiveness kicked in." The New York Yankees played their first home game following the 9/11 attacks on Sept. 25 of the 2001 season and lost to Tampa Bay, 4-0. The World Series-bound Yankees clinched their fourth straight division title, though, when Boston lost to Baltimore earlier that day. "It'll be a hard day for us on Sept. 11 of this year, for sure," Gies says, before reflecting on the game that helped her family heal. "But I'll also spend some time just feeling grateful for that night, and for that Mike Piazza home run. Everything changed for us when he hit that ball. We could smile again."

In the bottom of the inning, with one out and a man on base, Piazza stepped to the plate. He had seemed more affected by 9/11 than most of the players. Maybe it was because he lived in an apartment not far from Ground Zero. In the fifth inning, I climbed the stairs to buy more beer. But when I got to the concession, I was told they had run out.

As the game rolled on, there was an eerie sense throughout Shea Stadium, with fans unsure of how to react to what they were watching. But during the seventh inning stretch, Liza Minnelli performed "New York, New York," with fans standing and singing arm-in-arm and embracing each other as they sang about their hometown. The tragic events of Sept. 11 forever changed the world that we live in, as countless Americans lost friends and family members in the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, as well as on Flight 93. YEARS AFTER THE game, right before the start of the 2016 season, New York tabloids lit up with news that Piazza's jersey was up for sale in an auction. The Mets had inexplicably sold Piazza's 9/21 jersey among a group of others to a private collector for $20,000, and now the iconic uniform was up for grabs to the highest bidder. He doesn't remember anything after the swing.