Reese Kaplan -- All Star Level Production From a Position Regarded as a Weakness

Going into the 2018 season there are a great many holes to fill.  The defense is porous.  The starting rotation is still limping along.  The bullpen is unsettled.  There’s no speed other than Amed Rosario guaranteed a role on the team.  David Wright is still hampering the Mets from moving forward by threatening to play again. 

One surprising area for the Mets going into the new season is one that resulted in a .243 batting average (not great, for sure), but delivered an impressive 27 HRs and 93 RBIs to go along with 30 doubles and a pair of triples.

What?  You didn’t notice anyone posting that kind of production?

Well, apparently you were too busy bashing the Mets catchers to notice how much they contributed to the offense.  Those numbers cited above are the aggregate of Travis d’Arnaud, Rene Rivera and Kevin Plawecki. 

Now ask yourself a question…would an upgrade at this position be significantly better and be a good expenditure of frustratingly limited salary dollars?  I sure don’t think so.  Granted, neither Travis d’Arnaud nor Kevin Plawecki are going to make anyone forget the defense of Charlie O’Brien, but in this case (like Mike Piazza before them) perhaps the offense is enough to compensate for lackluster defense. 

Another Mets blog recently included in an assessment of the Mets catching situation that it was time to declare the Travis d’Arnaud experiment as over.  They cited his fragility and lack of production as the justification for this conclusion. 

Did I miss something?  It seems to me that d’Arnaud was a veritable ironman this past season (by d’Arnaud standards anyway).  He missed three weeks in May when he developed a bone bruise having hit the bat with his arm on a throw to second.  After trying to play through it, he eventually went on the DL and likely spent some time adjusting to the pain upon his return.  Despite this injury, he still hit 16 HRs and drove in 57 in 336 ABs.  Extrapolated over a full season on his own that would be All-Star level of production for a catcher.  A year ago he hit only 4 HRs and drove in 15 over 252 ABs.  How about some kudos for a major step forward?  Baseballreference.com suggests over a 162 game season d’Arnaud would deliver .245/19/66.  Wouldn’t you sign up for that right now?

Now that Rene Rivera is no longer a part of the equation, we are left with Kevin Plawecki who, after a few years of sinus problems finally showed the kind of offense in AAA that had been expected of him.  He finished the year in Las Vegas with a .328 AVG over 247 ABs with 9 HRs and 45 RBIs.  Extrapolated over a full season that’s a 20 HR/100 RBI type of season.  When he came up to the Mets at the end of the season he looked like a totally different hitter.  For sure, the numbers dipped adjusting both to the environment outside of Las Vegas and the MLB caliber pitching, but he hit .260 and didn’t seem overmatched at all.

Going into 2018 I am fully confident that the Mets have a catching tandem that would rank offensively among the game’s best.  As points of comparison Salvador Perez of the Royals delivered 27/80, Gary Sanchez of the Yankees provided 33/90, Buster Posey was 12/67 and old man Yadier Molina contributed 18/82.  Again, the Mets got 27/93.  I think they’ll be just fine.