His Mask Can’t Hide Happiness

Life without Mikey was a drag for the Dodgers.

When a team is willing to walk you to get to .347-hitting Eric Karros, that’s a hitter. When you miss 22 games because of a crummy thumb, then homer on your first day back, that’s a hitter.

Off the disabled list at last, Mike Piazza paced the dugout like a panther before Sunday’s game, dodging the toes of Tom Lasorda and the Mets’ broadcaster, Ralph Kiner.

“Have a nice vacation?” Lasorda asked.

“Vacation?” Kiner asked.

“Yeah,” the Dodger manager said, giving Kiner a nudge. “This guy’s had himself a nice little vacation at our expense.”

A catcher’s mask couldn’t have hidden Piazza’s grin. He said, “Just lucky.”

The night before, with the Dodgers down in the ninth, 5-3, and in dire need of a two-run homer, Piazza sat in the dugout, squeezing a green glob of clay. He looked like a big kindergartner, making a Play-Doh ashtray.

It was a made-for-Mike situation. If only Piazza could have emerged from that dugout, swinging a bat with one hand like Kirk Gibson, the poor Mets might have freaked.

But mighty Mike was still on the DL.

So, Lasorda instead sent up Billy Ashley, who did what Billy Ashley does: He swung for the fences and struck out.

Ashley is Piazza without the contact. He is a wonderful kid with wondrous power, but he is also Dave Kingman and Rob Deer. He doesn’t get wood on the ball.

Whereas Piazza, who hadn’t played in nearly a month, stepped up Sunday and stung the thing. He lined hard to Brett Butler in center first time up. He fungoed a mile-high pop fly next time up. Then he sent scurrying to the wall in right-center his old buddy Butler, who watched Piazza’s two-run homer buzz overhead like a traffic helicopter.

“Even the pop-up felt pretty good,” said Piazza.

Piazza, who is hitting .523.

Piazza, who feels better than ever because his tight right hamstring was able to mend at the same time as his left thumb’s torn ligament did.

Piazza, who simply by being there makes Raul Mondesi feel like a new man. “Raul’s a little superstitious, you know,” Piazza said. “He’s pretty happy to see me.”

Mondesi is happy to see Piazza the way Robin is happy to see Batman. His whole identity changes. Nobody gangs up on him. For 22 games, the fattest pitch Mondesi saw was a foot outside. His batting average plunged maybe 70 points.

Meantime, about all Piazza could do was sit around listening to his AC/DC CDs. He could do heavy metal but no heavy wood.

“I found this green putty in the training room. You can squeeze it like a rubber ball or cut it up into little strips and pull at it like this,” Piazza said, demonstrating his technique like a baker.

He sat in the dressing room before the game, beneath Hallmark get-well cards taped to his cubicle, feeling useful and whole. In this, the year of Cal Ripken Jr.’s testament to durability, the boys of summer are dropping like flies. Ken Griffey. Jose Canseco. Matt Williams. David Justice. Dean Palmer. Deion Sanders. Disabled all.

“People are saying it’s due to the shortened spring training, but I doubt that,” Piazza said. “Crashing into fences, getting twisted up on a slide . . . those aren’t conditioning things.”

Some of those guys are out for the season. Thank goodness, Piazza’s not. He says: “This sounds corny, but it feels like opening day all over again.”

All is well in the Piazza hut. Without him, the Dodgers sink like a CBS sitcom. With him, they seem like a different team.

Look at the Mets’ plight in the Dodger eighth. Mondesi stretched a single into two bases with a burst that made him look like a jet-fuel dragster. That brought up Piazza. Do you pitch to him or pass him to get at Karros, a guy coming off a 17-game hitting streak? The Mets passed Piazza and paid the price.

“It’s a thrill to be back,” said Piazza, who caught knuckleballs and fastballs and felt only a slight twinge. “It was a very frustrating time for me. I’m a positive person who always looks at the positive side of things, so I was just happy that I didn’t need surgery. I didn’t need to do rehab in the minors.

“The only little discomfort I felt was when I took too hard a swing. Funny, but that twinge was a reminder not to swing too hard.”

Funny, except to the Mets.

Dodger opponents don’t send Piazza get-well cards.