Who needs the designated hitter when you have pitchers who can rake? At least for one swing, former Mets pitcher Robert Gsellman looked like a position player using the lumber in Japan.
After spending his first six years in the big leagues with New York, Gsellman appeared with the Chicago Cubs briefly in 2022. He accumulated just 15.1 innings across eight appearances, leading to a 4.70 ERA and 1.30 WHIP.
The soon-to-be 30-year-old then took his talents overseas to play for the Yokohama Bay Stars of the Japan Central League in July 2022. After that season finished, the hurler signed a one-year extension for 2023 this past November. He’s allowed four runs on six hits through three innings so far this season while on the mound. However, Gsellman made up for one of them by lining this pitch into the right-center field gap for an RBI double:
Just Robert Gsellman electrifying the crowd with an RBI double.
— Michael Mayer (@mikemayer22) April 8, 2023
Fans at the park absolutely loved it. I also love how Gsellman played it cool like it’s something he’s done consistently throughout his professional career. While he hasn’t gotten a ton of big-league plate appearances since 2017, the results were never great.
Across 72 MLB plate appearances, Gsellman owns a career triple slash of .105/.224/.105 with four RBI. All four of those RBI came in 2017, and yes, you read that slugging percentage correctly. He didn’t collect a single extra-base hit. In fact, the last time he collected a hit at all also came in 2017.
So, this was a momentous at-bat for the hurler and yet another excellent moment for a former Mets pitcher playing baseball overseas. Earlier this year, we saw a 53-year-old Dae-Song Koo still striking out hitters, and now we’ve got this. Keep it coming, fellas.
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You can reach Matt Musico at matt.musico@xlmedia.com. You can follow him on Twitter: @mmusico8.