Will Smith has been enjoying a very successful 2024 season for the Los Angeles Dodgers, hitting .297/.362/.519 with 14 doubles, nine home runs and 36 RBI thus far.
Two of those home runs came on Wednesday as Smith led the Dodgers to a blowout win to earn the sweep of the New York Mets. The first of the two was Smith’s 100th career home run.
He became just the fourth Dodgers catcher to ever reach the century mark, joining Mike Piazza, Roy Campanella and Steve Yeager in the exclusive club.
Smith discussed what the milestone means for him after the game, via Juan Toribio of MLB.com:
“Yeah. That’s really cool. [Two of them] are Hall of Famers,” Smith said. “I’m sure they hit a few more than 100. It’s a cool accomplishment, cool milestone for me. But right now, I’m just focused on winning.”
Since making his MLB debut in 2019, Smith has developed into one of the best all-around catchers. He was rewarded earlier this season with a 10-year, $140 million contract extension from the Dodgers.
Smith cooled a bit over the last 15 games, which led to a drop in batting average. While his average may be down, Smith’s power has significantly increased of late.
Four of his last seven hits have gone over the fence and a third of nine home runs came in this past series against the Mets:
“Felt decent,” Smith said. “Not great the past couple weeks, but not bad either. Just continue to work in the cage with the hitting coaches and stick to my approach, and go out and execute it. But yeah, a couple balls went over the fence today.”
Smith was a catalyst for much of the Dodgers’ success during their sweep of the Mets. After the offense struggled to get anything going early in the first game of Tuesday’s doubleheader, Smith got the team on the board in the first inning with his first of three home runs in the series.
That run was all the scoring the team needed, even though they ended up scoring two more, as Gavin Stone and Alex Vesia combined to shut out the Mets.
Smith’s biggest contributions came in the series finale, where he once again gave the Dodgers an early lead with a solo home run. His second homer of the game helped the Dodgers retake the lead and ended up sparking a six-run eighth inning to put the game out of reach.
Rainout was blessing in disguise for Dodgers
The Dodgers entered the Mets series on their biggest losing streak in five years. The team had lost five consecutive games, which included being swept by the Cincinnati Reds.
That righting of the ship had to wait another day after Monday’s game was cancelled due to rain, but it gave the Dodgers an unexpected rest day and the team took full advantage of it.
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