Michael Conforto
The New York Mets have been making a push for fans to elect their players as All-Stars. At first, it started with Pete Alonso and only recently it was grown to include Jeff McNeil and Michael Conforto. These are three Mets who are putting together strong cases to be All Stars, and they are three of five Mets who could be legitimately named All Stars this year:
Pete Alonso
Traditional Stats: .258/.339/.598, 13 2B, 2 3B, 22 HR, 49 RBI
Advanced Stats: 2.4 bWAR, 2.2 fWAR, 150 OPS+, 145 wRC+
Any other year and Alonso would be a no-doubt All-Star. Currently, he’s tied for second in the league in homers, and he is seventh in RBI, sixth in slugging, and tenth in OPS in conjunction with being in the mix on advanced metrics leaderboards. The problem for Alonso is first base in the National League is extremely deep this year with Max Muncy, Freddie Freeman, and Josh Bell having a higher WAR and Bell, Freeman, and Anthony Rizzo having a higher wRC+.
It is a difficult race, but Alonso has a legitimate shot to be an All Star, especially when you take injuries into account. No matter what the case, at a minimum, Alonso should be taking part in the All Star festivities as part of the Home Run Derby.
Michael Conforto
Traditional Stats: .258/.383/.507, 13 2B, 13 HR, 32 RBI, 4 SB
Advanced Stats: 1.9 bWAR, 2.0 fWAR, 142 OPS+, 138 wRC+
While he’s mostly overlooked, Conforto probably represents the Mets best shot as an All Star because he’s one of the best at his position. Currently, Conforto ranks sixth among National League outfielders in WAR and seventh in wRC+. Also, by DRS, Conforto rates as the fourth best defensive right fielder.
While he’s deserving, Conforto has real impediments to his induction. There’s players with name recognition like Charlie Blackmon or Bryce Harper or players who could be a team’s lone All Star like Brian Anderson of the Marlins. Even if they are impediments, they are not more deserving.
Jacob deGrom
Traditional Stats: 3-6, 3.38 ERA, 1.125 WHIP, 2.2 BB/9, 11.1 K/9
Advanced Stats: 2.3 bWAR, 2.3 fWAR, 118 ERA+, 3.09 FIP
Let’s get the obvious out of the way and point out deGrom hasn’t been the deGrom of last year, but that alone does not mean he’s not a worthy All-Star. While he’s had a “down year,” deGrom is still third in the National League in strikeouts and K/9, and he’s seventh in K/BB (5.1) and FIP. Another note, deGrom is also fifth in the league in fWAR.
When you break it all down, deGrom’s tough stretch fueled by illness and injuries have his stats a little off from what we anticipated. That said, breaking down the numbers more deGrom should absolutely be an All-Star this year as he is still one of the best pitchers in the league.
Seth Lugo
Traditional Stats: 3-0, 2.43 ERA, 0.930 WHIP, 1.9 BB/9, 11.6 K/9
Advanced Stats: 0.6 bWAR, 0.8 fWAR, 166 ERA+, 2.64 FIP
As baseball heads towards these multi-innings relievers, pitchers like Lugo have become more valuable, and in recent years, we have begun seeing more set-up men be included on the All-Star teams over closers who simply accumulate saves. Ultimately, the question with Lugo is just how far is the modern game willing to go to acknowledge pitchers like him.
When comparing Lugo to other National League relievers, you see he is near at in the top 10 in many categories including important ones like innings, K/9, K/BB, FIP, WHIP, and fWAR. In fact, he ranks eighth among all National League relievers in strikeouts. Now that he’s healthy, we should see him advance higher on each of these lists and continue to strengthen his case.
Jeff McNeil
Traditional Stats: .337/.408/.467, 15 2B, 3B, 3 HR, 20 RBI, 4 CS
Advanced Stats: 2.2 bWAR, 1.5 fWAR, 140 OPS+, 139 wRC+
The problem with evaluatin McNeil is you don’t know where to put him. Is he an outfielder? Second Baseman? Third Baseman? Looking at the positive DRS he has at each of those positions, the answer is clearly yes to each. When looking at it that way, you realize what McNeil really is is a baseball player, a very good baseball player.
He’s third in the league in batting average, fourth in OBP, 10th in OPS+, eighth in HBP (8), and 14th in wRC+. When you look at these and other numbers, you realize it doesn’t matter where he plays. What matters is he does play, and in fact, his ability to play three positions well makes him extremely valuable. IF we look at him as a baseball player, he is definitely one of the best players in the National League, and you are going to need a really good argument to keep him off the All-Star team.
Overall, the Mets should have at least two All-Stars, and realistically speaking the maximum they would have is three. It would seem likely deGrom and one of McNeil or Conforto makes the team with Alonso joining them as part of the Home Run Derby. At least that’s what the analysis says. As we know, who is and who is not an All-Star sometimes makes zero sense, so we just have to sit and wait and hope one of the deserving Mets will not be a snub.
Aside from the stretch where he was dealing with illness and some slight injury issues, Jacob deGrom hasn’t been too far off from his Cy Young season. When he’s going this good, the Mets just need to get him a lead to get the win. Tonight, the Mets needed to do it twice.
The Mets and deGrom fell behind in the third as Matt Carpenter beat the shift for a two out RBI single. We saw deGrom frustrated in the dugout, and we are all reminded how the Mets are among the worst in shifting their infield.
The Cardinals lead was very short lived as Michael Conforto hit a two run homer off Cardinals starter Jack Flaherty. Not only did that homer give the Mets the lead, but it’s a reminder Conforto should be an All Star.
Make that 17 consecutive home games with a home run! #LGM
Vote Conforto ? https://t.co/iAfhjEVKG2 pic.twitter.com/biBo79vdaF
— New York Mets (@Mets) June 14, 2019
Surprisingly, that lead didn’t hold up because Paul DeJong hit a game tying homer in the sixth past a leaping Carlos Gomez. Between DeJong and Yadier Molina, the Cardinals have too many Mets killers. That should come as no surprise as that’s the way it’s always been between these two teams.
Once again, the Mets answered the Bell with a two run rally right after a Cardinals run.
Pete Alonso got the rally started with a ground rule double, and he’d score off a Dominic Smith RBI single. That hit gave the Mets the lead, and the team would continue to rally.
The Mets immediately loaded the bases causing the Cardinals to pull Flaherty and bring in Giovanny Gallegos. Amed Rosario got a hold off of one and drove it to deep center only to be absolutely robbed of an extra base got by Harrison Bader.
The ball was hit more than deep enough to score Smith from third. On the play, Bader made a horrific throw, and there was no one covering third. Todd Frazier, who was halfway and slow to get back took off for third. Carpenter was able to get the errant ball to Kolten Wong who barely beat Frazier to third for the third out.
You understand Frazier going there, but you have to be safe there because it killed what could have been a bigger rally. It would haunt the Mets.
deGrom came out for the seventh and put up another zero. He finished the game with seven innings allowing just two earned on six hits and no walks with eight strikeouts. In sum, it was a deGrom start.
Before the ninth started, the umpires called for the tarps. Mickey Callaway with some animated players behind him, like Alonso with his glove under his jersey coaxed the umpires to reverse course. The tarps came off the field, and instead, the grounds crew went back to work.
It was deemed a rain delay as a warmed o Diaz was left wandering around the dugout while the grounds crew tried to clean and dry up a pretty soggy infield. Whatever the case, it was a nine minute rain delay.
Diaz walked the Marcell Ozuna to leadoff the inning, and he just couldn’t get that last out. With two outs, Wong knocked in Ozuna. Presumably due to the field conditions, Wong couldn’t get to second even with the ball in the corner. Bader then ripped a ball to the left field corner.
Carlos Gomez made a poor relay throw to Rosario. With the wet weather, Rosario couldn’t pick it allowing Wong to score. It was frustrating because if Gomez makes even a decent throw Wong would’ve been out ending the game.
Instead, after Bader slipped and fell and was thrown out trying to get back to second, the Cardinals tied the score 4-4, and this time, the umpires called a real delay with the tarps out before the bottom of the ninth.
Between the field conditions and weather reports, the game is suspended until tomorrow. That means the Mets will have to wait another 24 hours (perhaps longer) until the Mets can get back to .500.
Game Notes: Before his at-bat in the fourth, Wilson Ramos‘ wife held a sign in the stands to inform him she’s pregnant with their third child. He struck out looking. deGrom became the eighth Mets pitcher to strike out 1,100 batters. Mets have now homered in 17 straight home games.
The Mets are really pushing Pete Alonso for the All Star Game. You can understand why. He was a sensation in April, he’s threatening Darryl Strawberry‘s Mets and Mark McGwire‘s MLB record for homers by a rookie. On top of that, he’s a fun player who has quickly become a fan favorite.
The problem with pushing Alonso is he shouldn’t be an All Star first baseman. Trailing Max Muncy, Freddie Freeman, and Josh Bell in WAR, and he’s tied with Anthony Rizzo. What may come as a shock is Alonso trails all but Muncy in wRC+.
Now, it’s not a travesty if Alonso makes it. In fact, he’s had a good enough season where his being named an All Star is more than merited. It would be good for him and baseball. Then again, there are more deserving candidates.
There are also more deserving Mets. Front and center is Michael Conforto.
Conforto is currently in the top six in WAR among outfielders meaning he should solidly be an All-Star. He’s also sixth in wRC+. Defensively, he’s just 16th in DRS, but that does qualify as fourth best among right fielders.
Overall, Conforto has been terrific this year, and looking at the numbers, he absolutely should be an All-Star. Considering his production and what he’s been for this team, there should be a push among fans and the team to elect him an All Star starter.
All-Star wallpapers for All-Star players. ?
Vote for @JeffMcNeil805 ?️: https://t.co/PisCzB9yDp
Vote for @Pete_Alonso20 ❄️?: https://t.co/Xp6LPndaYV pic.twitter.com/eWrHLV5rdu— New York Mets (@Mets) June 13, 2019
It’s not happening. Instead, the team is pushing Alonso and Jeff McNeil. As an aside, McNeil is very deserving as well. That said, neither McNeil nor Conforto are among the top nine. They should be. Perhaps, if the Mets and their fans cared to notice how good they’ve been they would be.
The Mets and Yankees had their first doubleheader since 2008, which was also their first doubleheader in one ballpark since the inception of the Subway Series. The Mets walked out of Yankee Stadium with a split, and they are still one game under .500. How that happened was quite eventful:
1. The Subway Series needs to stop. The Mets get four games against the Yankees while the teams they are fighting against for the division or Wild Card don’t have the same four tough games locked into their schedule all year. I don’t care how much fun it is, it is putting the Mets at a competitive disadvantage.
2. We can and should talk about payroll disparity and ownership commitment when it comes to why the Mets are the Mets and the Yankees are the Yankees. However, it’s more than that. The Yankees got Luke Voit and IFA money for essentially nothing while the Mets traded three prospects for J.D. Davis.
3. Speaking of Davis, it’s inexcusable hes’ one of three players who started both ends of the doubleheader in the field. Really, the team needs to stop trying to make this ill-advise trade work and instead focus on making decisions to help this team win games.
4. The Mets defense was terrible in the first game. Amed Rosario missed first. Todd Frazier threw one away. J.D. Davis couldn’t get to anything because he was sitting in the front row of the bleachers to make up for his lack of range. Overall, this is a terrible defensive club with a National League worst -51 DRS.
5. With respect to the poor defense, Juan Lagares is a -2 DRS in center, which seems unfathomable. However, if you look at the new stat called jump, Lagares is not getting the same read on the ball as he did over the previous two years. Who knows why that is, but until he figures it out, he’s borderline unplayable at this point.
6. Zack Wheeler needs to be better than this. Yes, the defense behind him was atrocious, but he wasn’t much better. It was not the defense who served up the homers to Gio Urshela or Luke Voit. Overall, his peripherals show he’s better than this, and he has shown himself to be a second half pitcher. You just wish he would get to being the second half Wheeler sooner rather than later.
7. Yankee Stadium is a real joke where pop flies to the infield in other parks go out. That said, Pete Alonso‘s homer in the second game of the doubleheader would have left Yosemite.
8. Alonso is becoming way too much of an all or nothing guy. Since May 1, he’s hitting .224/.300/.560 with 13 of his 30 hits being homers. He has also struck out 26 percent of the time while walking six percent of the time. As the season progresses, he looks more and more like this type of a hitter than he does the guy who set the world ablaze in April.
9. Alonso’s being in the top five in All Star voting is fun. We should celebrate that. However, it’s bizarre Mets fans are only rushing to help him when Michael Conforto and Jeff McNeil have been so good all year.
10. As noted previously, McNeil is hitting like Ichiro Suzuki. This shouldn’t be sustainable, but yet, it has been. Hat tip to Jerry Beach, a man whose taste in television shows is as excellent as his taste in managers is poor, for saying McNeil is like Wade Boggs after Gare tried to say McNeil wasn’t Boggs.
11. As much as I adore Gary, Keith, and Ron, they need to stop talking about the advanced stats, especially since they clearly don’t fully understand it, and they are mostly doing it to disparage them. Case in point was Gare saying how the shift only affects ground balls.
12. Jeurys Familia has been looking much more like Familia. He now has three consecutive completely dominating innings/appearances. We are getting closer and closer to trusting him in pressure situations again. And the Mets should if everything is ironed out as this looks more like a mechanical issue than a mental one.
13. The Mets bullpen has too many bottom feeders in it. At most, you can have one of Wilmer Font, Drew Gagnon, Tim Peterson, or Hector Santiago. You cannot have four of them. That’s how you start burning out productive arms in the pen and putting games way out of reach.
14. Yesterday, Brandon Nimmo, Robinson Cano, and Justin Wilson played in a rehab game in Syracuse. The team needs all three of them back as soon as possible to help this team go on a run, but the team cannot bring them back until each one of these players is fully healthy and ready to contribute.
15. Somehow, someway, Jason Vargas escaped the third allowing just three runs, and he got out of the fourth unscathed. When all was said and done, he had a quality start and a win. That’s a big credit to him.
16. Right now, Vargas is on one of the better stretches in his career. He pitched well against two good offensive teams, and he flat out dominated a terrible Giants team. The .286 BABIP and 83.3 LOB% would indicate this is not at all sustainable. That said, Vargas is getting results, so you might as well ride this out as far as this takes you.
17. Wilson Ramos seems to be doing with the extra days off here and there. Starting in May, he played less frequently, and he started to become much more productive. When Tomas Nido hits like he did in the first game of the doubleheader, the plan to get the over 30 and injury prone Ramos more rest becomes a more viable solution.
18. Speaking of back-up catchers, good for Travis d’Arnaud for turning things around with the Rays. In addition to catching, he’s also working out at other spots in the diamond. This is what the Mets should have done with him. Instead, they rushed him up way too soon, and they then DFA’d him in a complete overreaction.
19. There was a real fear this team was going to repeat it’s horrendous June of last year. So far, the Mets are 4-4 this month meaning they are just one short of the total win total from June 2018. While things could be better, things could also be a lot worse.
20. Mickey Callaway said about the team how he believes once this team gets back to .500 they are going to take off. With Nimmo, Cano, and Wilson in Syracuse and as Syndergaard puts it, the Mets are a second half team, it’s hard not to believe him.
Things really changed for the Mets when they showed ZERO interest in bringing back Daniel Murphy. He was a clutch player who was a good teammate, and he loved being a Met. His going to the Nationals swung the future fortunes of both franchises.
Murphy left the Nationals, and now they’re terrible. Maybe it’s coincidence, and maybe it’s not. Still, tonight, we saw his impact on a team.
Against his old friend Jacob deGrom, he was 1-for-3. When deGrom was removed from the game, he hit a long homer off Drew Gagnon. It was the second homer of the inning against Gagnon as he melted down and ensured deGrom would be saddled with the loss.
So anyways…
Daniel Murphy goes deep to add some more insurance! pic.twitter.com/0CtFlx59Z4
— Colorado Rockies (@Rockies) June 8, 2019
Gagnon followed the homer by plunking Ian Desmond. Seeing this Murphy was the first guy over the railing. Again, good teammate who helps his team win.
Maybe it never mattered he left. Maybe the Mets were just destined to do what they always do because the Wilpons are terrible and not committed to winning.
Thing is the Mets are missing something whether or not it’s Murphy.
They had their ace deGrom gut his way through six innings allowing just two earned. The offense couldn’t get out of their own way against Antonio Senzatela, a pitcher with a 5.33 ERA.
He didn’t have one strikeout all night, and he had just one 1-2-3 inning over his six innings pitched. Part of that is the Mets hitting into two double plays, going 0-for-3 with RISP, and failing to take advantage of opportunities.
The biggest example was the fourth. Dominic Smith had a one out walk, and for a moment, it looked like Wilson Ramos was going to hit into an inning ending double play. Instead Brendan Rodgers whiffed Trevor Story‘s flip setting up first and third with one out. Mets didn’t deliver a hit or even a sacrifice fly.
If not for a Michael Conforto sixth inning homer, the Mets don’t score a run. Overall, it was basically Conforto and Smith who showed up tonight accumulating four of the Mets six hits.
Well, maybe Brodie Van Wagenen will finally look to do something about it instead of ducking the media and leaving his manager twisting in the wind.
Game Recap: This was the first time Ramos caught deGrom instead of Tomas Nido since May 17th.
The Mets have won just rubber game all year, and it does seem like these mid-week day game typically ends terribly for the Mets. Even with the Mets starting the game with back-to-back homers from Amed Rosario and Dominic Smith off Giants starter Shaun Anderson, you could understand any unease from the fans. Then it seemed to be happening all over again.
After going through the lineup without allowing a hit, Mike Yastrzemski opened the fourth with a leadoff single, and he would come home on a Brandon Belt two run homer tying the game. The Mets would then fall behind when Wheeler allowed a Pablo Sandoval homer in the sixth. To put the bad luck into perspective, Wheeler allowed just three hits to the Giants all afternoon, and all three of those runs scored on two homers. Worse yet, the team was down 3-2 heading into the bottom of the seventh.
The Mets got something brewing that inning with a Juan Lagares lead-off walk. The Giants then went to their bullpen, which has been pretty good all year, and brought in Reyes Moronta. He allowed a single to Tomas Nido. Then Mickey Callaway would make some curious decisions which stymied the rally.
Instead of allowing Wheeler to stay in and lay down the sacrifice bunt, he pinch hit Carlos Gomez to do that. That decision is all the more curious when you consider Robinson Cano was sitting with a leg injury, and the team did not start Jeff McNeil a day after a night game in order to not overtax him after returning from two injuries. But, he would effectively waste Gomez to do what Wheeler could have done just as well.
Callaway would pinch hit McNeil for Rosario, and he would drop a bloop single just beyond the reach of Brandon Crawford to tie the score and get Wheeler off the hook. Bruce Bochy then went to Tony Watson to pitch to Smith. Now, Smith has been decent against left-handed pitching this year, and he was 2-for-3 with a homer on the day. However, this was the Mets shot, and Callaway went to J.D. Davis. Unfortunately, he hit into the inning ending double play.
Sure, the Giants are terrible, but considering how the Mets bullpen has been of late, the last thing this team wants was a battle of the bullpens in a game which could be going extra innings.
Fortunately, the Mets had their full bullpen available, which meant Seth Lugo and a scoreless eighth. The Mets would then make him the pitcher of record.
Pete Alonso led off the inning with a single against Mark Melancon. Fortunately, Belt could not handle Michael Conforto‘s ensuing liner. This meant instead of a double play, Conforto, the much better runner, was on first. He wasn’t there long as he would steal his fourth base of the year. This put a runner in scoring position for Todd Frazier, who would knock in Conforto and himself:
CLUTCH! A no-doubter from @FlavaFraz21. ? pic.twitter.com/BW6uYyOWOr
— New York Mets (@Mets) June 6, 2019
The ball was carrying all day. The Giants certainly took advantage, and it was good to see Frazier do it as well. It was even better to see the homer not killing the rally.
After the homer, Adeiny Hechavarria singled, and Lagares doubled. After a Nido ground out, Wilson Ramos would pinch hit and walk to load the bases. This set the stage for McNeil who would deliver with another RBI single. This time two runs scored making it 7-3 Mets. This single allowed the Mets to sit down Edwin Diaz to save him for another day and put in Jeurys Familia. For seemingly the first time since the 2015 NLCS, Familia had a quick 1-2-3 inning to lock down the game.
After Monday’s loss, the Mets were facing some adversity with Callaway once again the media looking to give him the pink slip. Once again, the team responded and won games for both them and their manager. While you would have wanted more, the Mets took the series against the Giants, and they have righted the ship. The key here is what they do next.
Game Notes: Conforto is a perfect 4-for-4 in stolen base attempts. The four stolen bases are already a career high. McNeil has 40 multi-hit games in his 112 games played.
One thing Jason Vargas has done well this year is pitch well against bad offensive teams. When he’s faced those teams, he’s actually lasted five innings. The Giants are a bottom three offensive team.
Whereas last night, there was handwringing over Noah Syndergaard, there were no such issues with Vargas tonight as the Mets offense annihilated Tyler Beede and the Giants pitching staff.
The Mets got all the runs they needed when Robinson Cano, fresh off the IL and back in the lineup without a rehab assignment, hit an RBI ground out scoring Jeff McNeil, who had led off the game with a double.
The Mets had a chance to expand the lead in the third, but Canó hit into an inning ending double play. On the play, he pulled up lame likely sending him back to the IL tomorrow. Back in his stead was Adeiny Hechavarria, who would homer in the seventh. With that homer, Hechavarria surpassed Cabo’s home run total with far fewer at-bats.
The Mets also got homers from Michael Conforto
.@mconforto8 with a swing of beauty. ? pic.twitter.com/dXO7r5aosJ
— New York Mets (@Mets) June 6, 2019
and Amed Rosario
When you know, you know. ?♂️ @Amed_Rosario pic.twitter.com/NafawHO7sl
— New York Mets (@Mets) June 6, 2019
It was an offensive onslaught with the Mets scoring seven runs on eight hits. McNeil had three hits. Conforto had two RBI, and Rosario has three.
More than anything, Vargas pitched a complete game shut out with a season high eight strikeouts, and Hechavarria homered. If you told someone these things would happen in the same game, they would’ve assumed you meant Syracuse, and even then, they’d seem skeptical.
But it did happen. Vargas, Hechavarria, and the Mets dominated a bad team like they should. They deserve credit for doing it. If we see more of this, the Mets will be fine. Speaking of things being fine, it was readily apparent this team has not quit on Mickey Callaway.
Game Notes: Vargas pitched seven innings in consecutive starts for the first time since June 2017.
In the rematch of the 2016 NLDS between Noah Syndergaard and Madison Bumgarner, the key difference tonight seemed to be the Mets weren’t starting James Loney and Rene Rivera.
It seemed that way in the sixth inning when Pete Alonso homered to lead off the inning, and three batters later Wilson Ramos would hit a go-ahead two run homer to give the Mets a 3-2 lead.
With the lead in hand, Syndergaard went to pitch the seventh. There were two outs with a runner at first and Evan Longoria heading to the plate.
Some things to consider here. Longoria entered the game 3-for-10 off Syndergaard. Syndergaard was over 100 pitches. In his career, batters are hitting .320/.358/.400 off of him. Really, when you break it down, even if you wanted to see Syndergaard finish that inning, Mickey Callaway pulling Syndergaard for Seth Lugo.
After all, Lugo is the team’s best reliever, and although the bullpen had been taxed, Mets starters had a streak of six straight games with 6.0+ innings pitched, and the Mets were off yesterday. You may not agree, but Callaway made a defensible and arguably the right decision.
Being the Mets, it didn’t work out. Longoria singled, and Brandon Belt doubled to tie the game. The Giants didn’t take the lead there because Michael Conforto and Jeff McNeil executed a perfect relay to cut down Longoria at the plate.
After Lugo pitched a scoreless eighth, and Edwin Diaz pitched a scoreless ninth, Callaway would make an indefensible decision. He brought in Robert Gsellman for the tenth.
Even with the off day and the starters giving length, Gsellman is completely gassed. He’s allowed at least one earned run in five of his last six appearances and has a 9.95 ERA over the stretch. Believe it or not, things got worse.
Stephen Vogt hit a two RBI double off Gsellman to give the Giants a 5-3 lead. As if that wasn’t enough, after a Kevin Pillar groundout and an intentional walk to Brandon Crawford, Steven Duggar hit what should’ve been an inning ending double play. Instead, it deflected off Gsellman’s back and became an RBI double giving the Giants a 6-3 lead.
Well, if you’re a fan who questions why exactly Callaway has gone to the whip so often with his top three guys, Hector Santiago would provide the answer.
He’d allow an RBI double to Pablo Sandoval and an RBI single to Mike Yastrzemski making it a 9-3 game. The inning would mercifully end when Santiago retired Tyler Austin, who became the zombie batter (PH making a second plate appearance in the inning).
The Mets lost this game 9-3. They lost it to the second worst team in the NL. With the Mets now four games under .500, they’re looking more and more like one of the worst teams in the game.
Game Notes: Despite saying Robinson Cano was much closer to return than McNeil, McNeil was activated while Cano wasn’t. Tyler Bashlor was sent down to make room for McNeil on the roster.
During Sandy Alderson’s tenure as the Mets General Manager, he did quite well in the first round. Those first round picks included Brandon Nimmo, Michael Fulmer, Gavin Cecchini, Kevin Plawecki, Dominic Smith, Michael Conforto, Justin Dunn, Anthony Kay, David Peterson, and Jarred Kelenic.
All of the players drafted prior to 2015 have played at the Major League level. They are only one of eight franchises who can say all of their first round picks in that time span reached the Major League level. Of those six players drafted prior to 2015, five of them have established themselves as bona fide Major League players with the jury still being out on Cecchini, who is still just 25 years old.
Nimmo was the second best hitter in the National League last year. Conforto and Plawecki were a part of a pennant winner with Conforto hitting two homers in a World Series game. Conforto and Fulmer have already been named All Stars. So far, this group has a Rookie of the Year and two All-Star appearances.
Fulmer, Dunn, and Kelenic were moved for pieces which were traded to help improve the Major League club. While people have disagreements with the respective trades, the deals brought back Yoenis Cespedes, Robinson Cano, and Edwin Diaz, each of whom are established All-Star caliber players.
Looking at the 10 first round draft picks, all but one of them have made some form of a top 100 prospect list since being drafted by the team. It may come as some surprise that includes Cecchini, who was named a KATOH Top 100 pick by Fangraphs, and Peterson, who was named a top 100 prospect by ESPN‘s Keith Law. In fact, the one who hasn’t is Kay, who right now appears on the cusp of getting named to a list on a midseason update or sometime next year.
Overall, the Mets have drafted talented players they have used to both build a strong core to the current Mets roster and to acquire players in the hopes of winning a World Series. With Kay and Peterson in Double-A, they can soon be part of the current core’s push to win the Mets first World Series since 1986.
That’s the legacy in front of Van Wagenen and Baty. For Van Wagenen, he has to show he has the ability to add talent to the organization the way Alderson did during his tenure as the General Manager. For Baty, he has to prove he can be every bit as talented as the players who came before him.
With the way Zack Wheeler was pitching, you figured the Mets had this game in the bag, and it was time to start looking ahead to see if the team could put together a winning streak.
Entering bottom of the sixth, the Mets had a 3-1 lead on the strength of a second inning rally. In that inning, Michael Conforto had a leadoff single, and he would move to second on a Wilson Ramos single. Conforto scored on a Todd Frazier RBI single, and everyone scored on an Adeiny Hechavarria double which landed just below the yellow line in center.
Wheeler had allowed one earned, but he had allowed just four singles. He had also struck out six. With his having thrown just 73 pitchers, his going deep or completing the game wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. It was after the sixth.
Ketel Marte led off the inning with a homer. After an Adam Jones one out single, Christian Walker hit a go-ahead homer making it 4-3.
Walker was the guy who really did Wheeler in. He was 3-for-3 off Wheeler with two runs, the homer, and two RBI. The other Diamondbacks combined to go 4-for-24 off Wheeler.
For a while, this looked like it was going to be another brutal Mets loss. After the Hechavarria double, the Mets offense had an 0-for-10 stretch with RISP.
This meant the team blew a fifth inning leadoff double by Wheeler, who is now hitting .321 this year.
In the seventh, Juan Lagares snapped an 0-for-13 streak with a leadoff single. Wheeler bunted him over and later that inning Dominic Smith drew a walk after an eight pitch at-bat. Neither Lagares nor Smith would score as Pete Alonso grounded out to end the jam.
Fortunately, the Mets not only got Wheeler off the hook, but they also got him a lead with a big two out rally started by a Frazier bloop hit off Matt Andriese. Hechavarria singled to put that dreaded runner in scoring position for J.D. Davis, who was pinch hitting for Lagares.
Davis hit a soft tapper deflected by Andriese which could not be fielded cleanly by Nick Ahmed. This allowed Frazier to score.
Carlos Gomez pinch hit for Wheeler, and he hit a ball down the line. With it picked up by the ball boy (or man), it was ruled a ground ball double allowing Hechavarria to score giving the Mets a 5-4 lead.
Fresh off the IL, Seth Lugo relieved Wheeler in the bottom of the eighth. He would allow a one out “triple” to Eduardo Escobar. In reality, Gomez completely misplayed that routine fly into a triple.
We then saw just how much the Mets bullpen missed Lugo. Lugo responded by getting Jones to pop out. After an intentional walk to Walker, he got Tim Locastro to pop out to end the jam.
With this being Lugo’s first game back since coming off the IL and Edwin Diaz still unavailable, Mickey Callaway went with Robert Gsellman for the save opportunity. Gsellman pitched a clean ninth to record his 14th career save (first this year).
Now, you feel a lot better about this Mets team. They pulled back to within a game of .500 after a hard fought win. We will see if this is the start of something or just a blip.
Game Notes: Home Plate Umpire Randy Wolf was forced to leave the game after getting hit in the mask by a foul tip. Details are emerging with respect to Nelson Figueroa‘s firing from SNY. Daniel Zamora was sent down to make room for Lugo on the roster.