The cycle is probably the sports accomplishment with the highest ratio of how excited I get about it to how much it actually matters. It’s a fluke thing, and not really indicative of anything about a player who hits for it (some power and some speed, I guess, but Bengie Molina did it, and you should really go watch that video again), and when you think about, that the four-to-six at-bats in which it is generally completed have to come in the same game is a pretty arbitrary limitation. But who cares. Wil Myers hit for the cycle last night!
Myers completed his cycle against the Rockies in the most exciting way—with a triple—and, as much as players like to pretend they aren’t aware of these things, every Padre knew what he needed.
“I was screaming ‘three,’” Padres manager Andy Green said. “I usually don’t get into it that much.”
“I was screaming ‘three’ to myself,” Myers said. “Inside. I wasn’t screaming out loud. … I wasn’t even thinking about a triple (when Myers went up to bat). I was just trying to put a good swing on it.
“As soon as I hit it, I was going three the whole way.”
Myers was so excited that he stumbled between second and third, which is right where the broadcasters’ voices both cracked in the two calls in the video above. (Please be sure to listen to the second one, starting at 0:37.)
Myers is the second Padre to hit for the cycle, following Matt Kemp in 2015. Maybe one of these days they’ll get that no-hitter.
The Padres are 4-4 after last night’s 5-3 win, which has to qualify as the biggest surprise in the MLB season’s early going.