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"&lt;p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;NEW YORK \u2014 The Mets had just completed their first World Series win in 15 years, a 9\u20133 victory over the Royals in Game 3. Still, as the home clubhouse buzzed, Curtis Granderson was unhurried.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Granderson\u2019s postgame routine is always the same. He sits in a cold tub for exactly eight minutes, no more and no less. Then he showers, slowly.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CI feel like I shower fast,\u201D he said, \u201Cbut for some reason I\u2019ll get in there and guys will be in and out before I\u2019ve finished up.\u201D\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Then he lays out a towel on the floor in front of his locker and gets dressed. After Game 3, he wore crisply ironed jeans, an unwrinkled long sleeve t-shirt and spotless high tops.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CCurtis is never in a hurry,\u201D said Kevin Long, the Mets\u2019 first-year hitting coach who also worked with the 34-year-old Granderson for four seasons when he held the same position with the Yankees. \u201CHe\u2019s always doing things methodically, taking his time. He doesn\u2019t rush to do anything. And he\u2019s certainly not rushing to get his at-bats over with, I can tell you that.\u201D\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Granderson\u2019s metronomical consistency often leads to his being overshadowed, despite leading the Mets in WAR in 2015 at 5.1. He was the player who was always there for the Mets this season, as their lineup suffered through injury and then was reimagined at the trade deadline, but his contributions didn\u2019t receive the attention that, say, the club\u2019s young aces did all year, and that Yoenis Cespedes\u2019s did during the regular season and that Daniel Murphy\u2019s did during the first two rounds of the playoffs. As they drew the focus, Granderson just kept working pitch counts from the leadoff spot, playing solid defense in rightfield, getting big hits.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Game 3 presented a new hero for the Mets, the one fans in Queens had been waiting all October\u2014and much longer than that\u2014to cheer: David Wright. In his 12 years with the Mets, Wright hit his first World Series home run in the bottom of the first, a two-run shot off Royals starter Yordano Ventura to give the Mets a 2\u20131 lead. Then he hit a two-run single in the bottom of the sixth to make the score 8\u20133, which proved to be an insurmountable tally, even for these relentless Royals.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CThis is what you dream about as a kid,\u201D said the Mets\u2019 captain, who played in just 38 regular-season games due to a spinal condition. \u201CYou\u2019re thinking about playing in a World Series game, and on top of that being able to contribute with a few RBIs and a home run. Running around the bases, it\u2019s just like floating. You can\u2019t describe the excitement of hitting the home run, crossing home plate and seeing people going absolutely nuts. It\u2019s one of those memories, at least for me, that will stick with me the rest of my life.\u201D\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Wright will capture most headlines and lead most highlights, but Granderson\u2019s contributions on Friday night were just as significant, as they so often are. It was Granderson who, leading off the game against Ventura, reached first on a hard-hit infield single, where he stood until Wright\u2019s homer drove him in. It was Granderson who hit a two-run home run of his own, on a line drive down the rightfield line in the bottom of the third, that put the Mets ahead 4\u20133 and gave them a lead they would never relinquish.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;And it was Granderson who, with the Mets up 5\u20133 in the top of the fifth, sprinted to the warning track to turn a potential triple by Ben Zobrist into Mets starter Noah Syndergaard\u2019s 10th out in a row.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CI looked at Cespedes, and he wasn\u2019t going to get there,\u201D Granderson explained, \u201Cso I just kept going.\u201D\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Said manager Terry Collins: \u201CThat was a great catch in right centerfield.... But he\u2019s just had a phenomenal year for us. He picks us up when we need to be picked up.\u201D\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Granderson\u2019s impact on the Mets runs deep, beyond the type of numbers that show that he and Wright combined to go 4 for 10 with two homers, four runs scored and six RBIs in Game 3. He is as fastidious in the batter\u2019s box as he is off the field, hunting through an opposing pitcher\u2019s offerings until he finds the one he likes\u2014and thereby tiring the pitcher and allowing his teammates to get a good look at everything he has to offer.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Heading into Game 3, he had drawn an average of 4.6 pitches per postseason plate appearance, slightly trailing only Lucas Duda and Alex Gordon and trailing them only because Long had suggested that he uncharacteristically swing at Clayton Kershaw\u2019s first pitch in Game 1 of the NLDS.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CThat one, that\u2019s on me,\u201D said Long. \u201CThat was our gameplan, to be ultra aggressive on Kershaw.\u201D\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;In Game 3 of the World Series, his first-inning single came against the fourth pitch he saw from Ventura in that at-bat, as did his homer. In all, he drew 22 pitches from the Royals on Friday night by himself. Just as he scored the first run of the game for the Mets, he also scored the last one.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CHe\u2019s kinda taken on this superhuman role of this leadoff hitter that just does it every single at-bat,\u201D said Long. \u201CI couldn\u2019t think of a better guy to start our offense off.\u201D\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Granderson is the type of player whose accomplishments are accumulative. Suddenly you realize that he\u2019s hit safely in nine of the Mets\u2019 12 playoff games. And that despite Murphy\u2019s legendary hot streak in the first two rounds, and despite the fact that he hits leadoff, his 10 RBIs mean that he trails the second baseman for the team\u2019s postseason lead by just one. And that he\u2019s second to Murphy in batting average, too, at .283. And that he\u2019s struck out only five times in 12 games, a third of the total of Cespedes and Wright.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Suddenly you realize that Curtis Granderson might be the Mets\u2019 single most important player, on a nightly basis. Asked about the gravity of Saturday night\u2019s Game 4, in which the Mets will seek to level the series at two games apiece, Granderson said, \u201CTomorrow is going to be the same situation as tonight was for us.\u201D\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;One thing on which the Mets can count is that their leadoff hitter\u2019s approach to each game, and to life in general, won\u2019t change.\r\n&lt;/p&gt;"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.si.com/mlb/2015/10/31/world-series-game-3-mets-royals-curtis-granderson-consistency>