NY Mets: Five best player walk-up songs of all-time in Mets history

The “walk-up song” is a player’s way to show off a little bit of his personality. Relatively new to the baseball world, these are the top five in New York Mets history.

For the New York Mets, and pretty much every other major league baseball team, individual player walk-up songs are a fairly recent development. Teams have long had their own organists to provide a clever, upbeat soundtrack to the on-field action. In 1970, Nancy Faust for the Chicago White Sox was the first team organist to start playing different songs for each home player as they stepped up to the plate.

The tradition evolved throughout the 1990s when the Seattle Mariners were among the first baseball teams to experiment with recorded walk-up music for each player. When this tradition first began, the teams chose the walk-up music, not the players. But as time went on, players began seeing their walk-up song as a valuable way to focus and center themselves before every at-bat.

Now, practically every single major leaguer steps up to the plate with their personal anthem blaring through the stadium PA system. Mets players have had many memorable walk-up songs over the years, all with different meanings to the individual players. It’s impossible to objectively rank which walk-up music is the “best.” With that said, these five players all chose particularly iconic walk-up songs during their time in Flushing.

5) Lucas Duda – “All Along The Watchtower” by Jimi Hendrix

For the 7.5 years that he played in Flushing, Lucas Duda was never among the more publicly outgoing Mets players. His reserved personality hilariously manifested itself in the “We Follow Lucas Duda” Instagram account, which was created by teammates Curtis Granderson, John Mayberry Jr, and Danny Muno in July 2015 and gained over 100,000 loyal followers.

Despite his subdued nature, I always appreciated his awesome walk-up song, an iconic track by an all-time electric guitar god. In a 2018 interview while a member of the Kansas City Royals, Duda revealed that his walk-up song was a tribute to his dad. He explained that his dad always drove him to and from baseball practice as a kid and that songs like “All Along The Watchtower” would play frequently in the car on their rides together.

Though Duda is no longer in a Mets uniform, hearing this song always reminds me of him. “All Along The Watchtower” is the perfect walk-up music for a player like Duda, outwardly unassuming but always a power threat at the plate.

4) Noah Syndergaard – “Game of Thrones theme music” by Ramin Djawadi

Noah Syndergaard has shuffled between a few walk-up songs in his Mets career, but this one seems to match his personality and demeanor the best. Along with his association with a certain Marvel superhero, Syndergaard is also well-known for being a huge fan of Game of Thrones (he even made a brief cameo in an episode from 2017). Thus, it’s not surprising that this epic theme music from GoT is one of Syndergaard’s recent walk-up songs of choice.

When Syndergaard is at his best on the mound, his on-field presence is larger than life, and his pitches are sharp enough to send opposing batters walking helplessly back to their dugouts. His walk-up song reflects this desire to intimidate his opponents and establish himself as a force to be reckoned with on the field.

Though Syndergaard’s last two seasons have been somewhat uneven, he is fully capable of dominance whenever he’s healthy. Once he returns from Tommy John surgery sometime next season, Mets fans can look forward to hearing Game of Thrones music blaring from Citi Field during his starts once again.

3) Daniel Murphy – “I’m Shipping Up To Boston” by the Dropkick Murphys

Whenever Daniel Murphy came up to bat for the Mets, it always felt like St. Patrick’s Day was right around the corner. One of his preferred walk-up songs in Queens, which he still uses, was this thumping anthem from the Dropkick Murphys. The obvious connection between the band’s name and Murphy’s own surname may have made this a clear choice for walk-up music.

However, I always liked Murphy’s walk-up song purely for its musical qualities. The opening of the song is the perfect hype music to get a ballplayer pumped up for any at-bat, whether it’s a scoreless game in the 2nd inning or a potential game-winning at-bat in the 9th.

Despite his defensive miscues, from 2008-2015, Murphy was consistently one of the best hitters on the Mets. Hearing his walk-up song also reminds of when he went on an absolute tear in the 2015 postseason, hitting a home run in a record six consecutive postseason games. Though he went on to have two of his best seasons immediately after that postseason when he joined the Washington Nationals, I will always associate his walk-up song with fond memories of a truly great hitter.

2) Wilmer Flores – “I’ll Be There For You” by the Rembrandts

On September 5, 2016, Wilmer Flores made headlines in New York by debuting a new walk-up song, the famous theme song from Friends. At first glance, this might seem like a curious choice for MLB walk-up music. Most players across the league select songs in the hip-hop, rap, or rock genres as their music of choice.

But for Flores, his walk-up music held much more personal significance than just a song he liked. When Flores was signed by the Mets at age 17, he was a high school student in Venezuela who spoke very little English. As he began playing Class-A ball in Savannah, Flores decided that he did not want to rely on a translator to communicate with the outside world. He began watching Friends as often as he could, to improve his English skills.

“You have to learn,” he said in a 2016 interview. “If you’re smart enough and you really want to, you will . . . I really wanted to understand what they were saying when the coaches were talking.”

As with everything else Flores did, this walk-up song immediately endeared him to Mets fans, who had already connected with him after his famous on-field tears from the year before.

Though Flores may not have a spot on the current Mets roster, I (and I suspect many Mets fans) would absolutely welcome Wilmer back with open arms. No matter where he goes in his major league career, he, along with the characters on Friends, will always belong in New York.