It felt like one of those many midsummer days in Queens when Mets catcher Mike Piazza would launch home runs over the old Shea Stadium fence.

Piazza returned to Queens on Sunday, but not to hit home runs. This time the former Mets great arrived at a packed CitiField on the last day of the baseball season to get inducted into the Mets Hall of Fame.

"If you look at the big picture of life, you realize that sometimes there's just a destiny in things," Piazza said in his speech. "And I truly feel it was my plan to be here, in one way, shape or form. It may not have been the most beautiful journey at the time, but it was meant to be."

In 2004 Piazza broke the record for the most home runs by a catcher in the history of Major League Baseball. His last game in the big leagues was in 2007 with the Oakland Athletics.

Although Piazza was inducted into the Mets Hall of Fame, the former catcher is now at the point in his retirement when he will be considered for the actual Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York. Although each player requires 75 percent of the vote to be inducted into the Hall of Fame, Piazza did come close in his first year on the ballot. He received 57 percent of the vote.

"When you retire, you get retrospective," Piazza said. "You think of things in the bigger picture. And so if I'm so blessed and honored to get to that point someday, I will enjoy it and be proud and wear the honor that is so important. Up until that point, I can only do like an artist -- here's my work, my canvas -- and it's out of my hands."