Whatever structural questions Mets second baseman Kaz Matsui had about his strained right knee were answered in the positive tonight when he hit an inside-the-park homer in his first at-bat that ended with a hard slide into San Diego Padres’ catcher Mike Piazza.
It is the third straight year Matsui has homered in his first at-bat of a season.
However, his problem has been what he’s done in all the subsequent games.
Actually, the Mets didn’t want to activate Matsui now _ on Tuesday general manager Omar Minaya said he thought he was a week away _ but Anderson Hernandez’s bulging disc in his lower back changed that thinking.
