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 "It's very different. I've never seen anything like it before," said Santana, the left-handed ace who was acquired from Minnesota last month. "It helps you focus on keeping the ball down."
The Mets cite statistical research that shows big league batters hit .220 against pitches at the bottom of the strike zone, so they want all their hurlers constantly working to keep the ball down.
Fastballs, curves, changeups, doesn't matter. Aim low, win big.
That starts in spring training with the rubber bands, fastened around poles or stakes that are planted in each batter's box in the bullpens at Tradition Field. The rubber bands are set at knee-level for an imaginary hitter and are thin enough that the ball's flight isn't altered before it hits the catcher's mitt.
In this elaborate era of computer scouting and video evaluation, the Mets still use a tried-and-tested teaching tool that you can buy at any corner drug store.
"High-tech -- rubber bands," bullpen coach Guy Conti said with a smile.
The Mets certainly didn't invent this method of tutoring pitchers. The 65-year-old Conti, who has been coaching in pro ball for 25 years, said he first saw the Los Angeles Dodgers setting up strings at the plate to school their pitchers about 1963.
Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale -- not bad.
The Mets began using the rubber bands when pitching coach Rick Peterson arrived from the Oakland Athletics before the 2004 season.
Peterson, who also mentioned that the Dodgers have done this for years, employed the rubber bands to help train Tim Hudson, Barry Zito and Mark Mulder when they were at their best as Oakland's Big Three. The A's led the AL in ERA twice under Peterson, in 2002 and 2003.
Still, the tactic seems to be fairly uncommon.
Mets right-hander Nelson Figueroa, who has pitched in six major league organizations plus Taiwan, Mexico, the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, said the only other place he saw it was with the Arizona Diamondbacks nearly a decade ago.
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"I remember the catchers used to flinch all the time," he said. "I like it. You start playing a game with it. You start seeing how many times you can hit it. If your breaking ball drops below the string, you know that's an out pitch."
The next day, Figueroa said he snapped a rubber band on a near-perfect pitch during his bullpen session.
"With a changeup," he said, joking. "Ask Peterson."
Conti said 303-game winner Tom Glavine got so accustomed to the rubber bands he used them during every side session the past couple of years, and John Maine likes them so much he even uses them while warming up in the bullpen before a game.
"I don't know how many teams do it, but our guys believe in it," Conti said.
That means the Mets have to stock up before every season, because the Florida heat takes its toll on rubber bands. Tommy Bowes, the head groundskeeper at Tradition Field, buys them in bulk
-- 40 boxes each year from The Home Depot.
"They look at us like we're crazy," Bowes said. "If you had to buy
'em in one color, I'd just become a bartender."
Notes: The Mets-Nationals game scheduled for Thursday night in Viera was rained out. RHP Pedro Martinez was to pitch in his first spring game. Instead, he'll pitch a simulated game Friday morning at the Mets' complex. ... 1B Carlos Delgado (right hip) took batting practice indoors.
[Associated Press; By MIKE FITZPATRICK]
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This
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